Optional services to enhance your publishing program.
Hardcover Edition – $250
Most of your sales are going to come from the softcover edition of your book, but few things are as satisfying as holding a hardcover version of your book, and as impressed as your friends and famliy will be with your new book, they’ll be wowed by the dust-jacketed hardcover edition.
Offer the hardcover for sale online side by side with the softcover edition, or reserve it for your private use. Many authors have us produce the hardcover version to be printed and delivered only to them for use as gifts or for sale at speaking and bookstore appearances.
(This option is free with Select and Premium packages)
Expedited Service – $250
Most books take about two months from submission to final approval. Editing, layout, design, and perhaps multiple rounds of corrections – each takes a certain amount of time, and there may be a several books already in the queue. With our expedited service, your book goes to the head of the line. You can see the first draft of the interior in as little as two weeks, and your revisions and corrections will be handled as soon as they are submitted. Can’t wait to hold that book in your hands? Fast-track it with this option.
(Included with Premium package)
Cataloging in Publication Data – $175
Cataloging data is a specialized language used by libraries to correctly and consistently catalog and shelve new books. (Look at the lower half of the copyright page of almost any book on your bookshelf and you’ll find CIP data). Created by a cataloging librarian, this adds to your book’s professional look and feel.
Note that you can’t make this block up yourself. The Library of Congress has created specific language and formatting requirements for this data.
(Included with Premium package)
Copyright Registration – $125
Note: Your book will be legally copyrighted the moment it’s published, without purchasing this service. Your copyright is secured under international law with the inclusion of your name and the © symbol on the copyright page.
But many authors go a step further and register their copyright with the Library of Congress. LOC registration has been viewed by the courts as prima facie evidence of ownership of intellectual property in the past. You might think of it as a form of insurance in case you ever have to defend your ownership of the material in court.
(Included with Premium package)
Library of Congress Catalog Number – $50
This is what we used to call the ‘card number.’ Librarians all over the world use this unique identification number to catalog books which have been published in the United States, and to find your book in online databases.
(Included with Select and Premium packages)
Printed Proof for Review – $100
Once layout and design of your book is complete, you’ll receive a pdf version of it for review. Some people find it easier to review if they can see it as a printed book rather than viewing it on-screen or printing it themselves. With this option, we’ll print and send you a bound draft softcover copy of your book for your review. Additional copies of the same draft are available for $10 plus shipping.
(One printed proof is included with Premium package)
Amazon Forever – $250
After your first full year of publication you can elect to keep your book in print and available for sale at more than 150 online sales outlets. Many authors opt for that because your book remains in wide distribution through all our retail partners. But the truth is, these days, up to 75% of your sales come from Amazon, either print or Kindle, especially after the first year when your initial marketing efforts are over.
So here’s a feature you won’t find anywhere else. With Amazon Forever, we’ll set your book up for print and distribution at Amazon only, both print and Kindle, and keep it active at no annual cost as long as you want it in print. No further action, or expense, on your part is necessary.
Options for More Complex Manuscripts
Image Acquisition – $50/image
Every author receives a unique cover design as part of the setup fee. If you have an image or photo that you want to use for your cover, we’ll incorporate it into the design at no additional charge.
If you have a particular type of image in mind, we can help you acquire it, either by directing you to stock photo sites where there are millions of images available, or we’ll find 2 images that will make a good cover for your book and let you choose between them. Once you’ve made your selection, we’ll acquire the image for you.
We can also work with outside designers if you choose to have your cover designed elsewhere.
Manuscripts over 100,000 words–––$100
Our standard setup fee applies to a text manuscript of 100,000 words or less. This charge is for manuscripts between 100,000 and 200,000 words in length. If your manuscript is longer than 200,000 words, please talk to your customer service representative.
Additional B&W interior images – $10 each; Tables and Charts – $20 each
We’ll place and size them to fit the page and add your caption.
Index Formatting – $150
We’ll create and format the index of your book based on the index tags you flagged in your Microsoft Word document. If you need an index and are not familiar with this function in Word, talk to your customer service representative about your options.
Footnotes – $100 + $.50/footnote
We’ll format and position your book’s footnote references. Note that all footnotes must be flagged using Word’s footnote function.
Endnotes – $75
Endnotes appear all together at the end of the book. These are normally flagged using Word’s endnote feature, but because they appear all together at the end of the book, they may just be typed text and do not require as much formatting as footnotes.
Editorial Assistance
Line Editing – $.02 per word.
It’s almost impossible to edit your own work successfully. And nothing says ‘amateur’ like misspellings, bad grammar and poor word choice – no matter how well you may know your topic.
If done right, editing is a time-consuming process. A proper line edit does more than find obvious spelling errors. ‘There’, ‘they’re’ and ‘their’ are all spelled correctly, so only a careful reading of your manuscript will note that one is appropriate in a sentence and the others are not. A good line edit will check for spelling, grammar, word usage, punctuation, capitalization, even sentence fragments.
An experienced grammarian will go over your manuscript twice looking for every misplaced comma to help make your book the best it can be. Every book has errors, but minimizing them is key to leaving the reader with a good impression of your writing skills.
Development Editing – $.04 per word
The developmental edit provides an in-depth editorial review of your work with a focus on organization and writing style.
Fiction: We’ll look at voice, characterization, scene development, and language. A historical romance ‘reads’ differently than a mystery or a modern social novel. Does your writing voice fit the genre of your book? Are the characters believable? Do they act the way people act? Even in the most far-reaching fantasy novel, people are people, and sometimes even aliens are people too. Does your book adequately present a sense of place; is it descriptive?
Non-fiction: Does your work hold together as a piece, or is it all over the road? Does your table of contents promise an easy-to-follow journey of learning and discovery, then does the text deliver? Is your writing too casual? Too formal? Does it have the authority that a reader can trust? We’ll help you sound like the subject matter expert you are.
For both fiction and non-fiction, we’ll review grammar, word choice, sentence construction, and logical organization. We’ll help you shed the cliches and generally improve your approach to your material.
After editing, you’ll receive a markup copy of your manuscript with corrections and improvement areas noted, plus, a thirty-minute conversation with our senior editor to discuss ways to improve the overall quality and approach to your book.
Good writing is marketable. Bad writing is not. We’ll help you improve the writing to catch and keep a reader’s attention.
Making Changes to Your Book
Changes Before Publication – $50 per round of 25 changes
When you first sign up, we’ll ask you to verify that you’re submitting the final manuscript that you want to see in print before we begin layout. But sometimes, when you see the book in layout form, you find typos, or even things you wish you’d said differently the first time around. You’ll be able submit changes before approving your book for print. After changes are made, we’ll provide you another pdf proof for review.
(Some free changes are allowed with each of our publishing packages.)
Changes After Publication
Once your book has gone to print or has been published as an ebook, making changes requires that it be taken out of print and reassigned to a designer. Changes are made, then the manuscript or cover is sent back to you for review and approval. Upon approval, the book goes through quality control again and is uploaded and its internet catalog listing refreshed so that the new version appears to online retailers.
This process is expensive and time-consuming and is necessary for each published edition of your book. If you have both hardcover and softcover in print as well as an ebook, it has to be done for all 3 versions. The distributor charges us for this, and those costs are passed on to you. (for this service, Kindle and ebook are considered a single edition.)
Changes to a published book: cost $150 plus $75 per edition. For example:
Softcover only: $225
Softcover and hardcover: $300
Softcover and Kindle/ebook: $300
Softcover, hardcover, and Kindle/ebook $375
If you require a new printed first copy of the revised book, or if your changes require more than 2 hours of additional edit/design time, additional charges will apply.