Have a great book written, but no publishing house has come forward to publish your book? Say hello to self publishing.
A cost effective format, this form of publishing has helped many closet writers turn into successful authors. One such author is Amish Tripathi, who after facing a series of rejections, decided to self-publish the first edition of his now famous Shiva Trilogy. Amanda Hocking, author of the My Blood Approves series and John Locke, author of the Donovan Creed thriller series and Emmett Love Western series, emerged from obscurity and rose to the best-selling status in a matter of months. Closer home, Rasana Atreya quit her nine-to-five job and published her first novel, Tell a Thousand Lies, which was downloaded by over 17,000 people in its first week. Following suit were authors like Sri Vishwanath, Rangarajan Iyengar, Narita and Viji Varadarajan — all self-published writers who have emerged successful, thanks to self publishing. Once considered the last resort, self-publishing — also called vanity-publishing, has now become a viable choice, as it is an easier and quicker way of getting the book to the readers.
Writers speak
Viji Vardharajan, a Chennai-based cook-book author, who recently self published Classic Tamil Brahmin Cuisine, says, "Self-publishing gives us total control over content." Sri Vishwanath, a Mumbai-based author who published his book, The Power Of Visualization online, agrees. "From the pace of writing to creating their own covers, the authors own it and market it. Like others, I took the traditional book publishing route. But simultaneously, I also explored the self-publishing route," reveals Vishwanath. Eight years and 13 transformational titles later, he got all his books published with Amazon Kindle Direct Publishing (KDP). In less than two years, he had over a quarter of a million downloads and is currently ranked among the Top 100 popular non-fiction authors.
Jon P Fine, the director of author and publishing relations, Amazon.com, says "India is a very nascent, but growing market. So far, we have received a good response from Indian authors. There's a lot of growth opportunities for aspirants interested in various forms of writing, including poetry and prose," he says, and adds, "The self-service nature of this platform is an important factor as it allows writers to boldly experiment and accomplish things that would otherwise be impossible."
What publishing houses say
Many self-publishing houses like Pothi.com, Power Publishers and India's first self-publishing house, Cinnamon Teal, dot the Indian literary landscape today and thus, there is no dearth of publishers for young talents in India. These publishing houses are also constantly engaged. When Jaya Jha co-founded Pothi.com with Abhay Aggarwal, back in 2008, they were publishing one or two books every month. "Today, we publish 60 ebooks and 60 physical copies a month," says Jaya. Since they started, the number of books they publish has been increasing. "We do not reject any manuscript. Unless someone asks, we don't even look at the script," she reveals. The self-publishing house started making profit within two years of its inception, which is a telling sign that the phenomenon is picking up quickly.
Why it works?
Self publishing is less time consuming, informs Leonard Fernandez, the co-founder of Goa-based Cinnamon Teal. "Typically, in traditional publishing, there's an 18 to 24 month gestation period for the book to come out. In self-publishing, it takes three-four months for the book to hit the market, be it online or in stores." Kolkata-based Sanchaita Biswas, manager, sales, distribution, promotion and events, Power Publishers concurs, "We take 14 days to publish the book and make it available all over India." Adding to these benefits, Jaya says, "The authors have the liberty to experiment with the content as well as with the pricing." Other reasons include timely publishing, cost effective prices and a greater variety in terms of genre.
BDST: 1502 HRS, JULY-16, 2014
