2012 Lesbian Fiction Appreciation Event: Lori L. Lake: Giving New Life to Your Backlist and Unpublished Works

Have you been writing for years and possess a “secret” drawer – or hard drive – full of unpublished manuscripts? Or did you publish some books, they went out of print, and now you have the rights back?

There’s never been a better time to resurrect old manuscripts and out-of-print books and convert them to digital/electronic books. In the last two years, e-books for e-readers have become extremely popular. It’s time for you to get with the new program!

Rights
You have to have the rights – if the book has been previously published – before you can go forward. If you had an agent, ask them to get that information. You can also contact your previous publisher. Your contract may specify the end date as well. Just make sure that nobody else has a license or rights to your book before you proceed.

Editing
If your book was never published, you already possess all the rights to do with it as you wish, so all you have to do is haul out your manuscript and either edit it yourself or engage an editor. Don’t scrimp on this step. Even a previously published book may need to be re-edited. Make sure that the book is in tiptop shape in every way, including plot, characterization, grammar, punctuation, and sentence structure.

Scanning
Older books that exist only in print form will need to be scanned and turned into digital files. You can do it yourself – scanners with optical character recognition (OCR) are cheap. There are also online sources that will do it for you such as:
www.pdfdocument.com
www.bookscanning.com
www.blueleaf-book-scanning.com

You send them the physical book, they take it apart and feed it into the scanner, and that will turn it into a digital format – usually Word.

Formatting
Once you have your book in digital form, it must be formatted. Two of the most widely known formats are ePub and Mobi/PRC. In order to upload your book to sales outlets (such as Bella Books, Rainbow eBooks, Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Kobo, or the iBookstore), the book must be formatted so that people using various e-readers can make sense of it. This is a critical step and, besides editing and cover creation, may be the most expensive.

I know of two lesbian craftswomen who run formatting businesses:

• Catherine Wilson at www.raqoon-design.com
• Liz Gibson at www.lizardoebooks.shuttlepod.org

They will turn out a professionally formatted, beautiful version of your book for a reasonable price.

Covers
Your cover will help sell your book, so you need a very good one. It needs to “pop” and be laid out effectively because it may be as small as one-inch tall on the customer’s screen! The images must be clear, and the title and author name need to be much more prominent than what we usually see on print books.

I find cover images at places like iStockphoto.com, Shutterstock.com, or Dreamstime.com, then share those images with a cover designer who can use Photoshop or other tools to create the design. Like formatting and editing, this is another area that you don’t want to skimp on. I recently found a terrific “pre-made” site at http://bookgraphics.wordpress.com. There are scads of cover artists all over the internet who will create covers for reasonable prices.

Uploading
In order to make your book available at the various e-tailers, you will need to gather data to describe and promote it. That includes title, author, publisher, category, copyright dates, eISBN (if any), description, and any review quotes or blurbs that you have. All of that is part of the “metadata” that e-tailers post on their sale websites. You will also want to think about “keywords” that will market and promote your book. For instance: lesbian romance, uber, coming of age, YA, romantic intrigue, World War II, espionage, lesbian erotica, etc. All of those keywords can help describe your book and allow readers to find it more easily.

Pricing
The last step before going “live” is to price your book. We’re seeing a range in prices from 99 cents to about $14.99, with the vast majority of books between $2.99 and $9.99. The biggest reason for that range is that e-tailers like Amazon.com give the author the biggest split for pricing between $2.99 and $9.99. Amazon pays 70% of the sale price at that range, and Barnes & Noble pays 65%.

Most e-tailers have created uploading pages that are easy to update and change. So feel free to experiment with pricing to find the level that sells most and gives you the best results.

Finally…
You will want to let your friends, fans, and family know about your new book. Get the word out. And then be ready to post your next book. I’ve found that a new book sells the old book, so keep on writing!

© 2012 Lori L. Lake. Not for distribution or copying without the express permission of the author. Lori can be reached at Lori@LoriLLake.com and welcomes questions and comments.

Bio:
Lori L. Lake is the author of eight novels, two books of short stories, and editor of two anthologies. Her short work has been anthologized in “The Silence of the Loons,” “Once Upon A Crime,” and “Women of the Mean Streets.” She is a recipient of the Alice B. Reader Appreciation Award, a Lambda Literary Finalist in the anthology category, and winner of the Ann Bannon Award and a Golden Crown “Goldie” for Snow Moon Rising. Lori lived in Minnesota for 26 years, but re-located to Portland, Oregon, in 2009. When she's not writing, she’s at the local movie house or curled up in a chair reading. She’s currently working on another novel in the “Gun” series. For more information, see her website at www.lorillake.com.