[BNM] Bit of book advice

[Chris Korhonen]

I don't see competition as being a turn-off for a potential publisher - if
anything it reaffirms the fact that there is interest out there in the
topic.

Ask them both for details on the contracts - how much advance do you get?
what do the royalties look like? who owns the rights to the work? (eg. can
the author republish parts of it in other places such as magazines....) -
that should be the deciding factor.

Another question to ask is around the process - what is the schedule for new
chapters and the production process, what support do you get (for a new
author, having a good editor really helps), how does the technical review
process work etc.

I wouldn't necessarily try and play both publishers off against each other -
they have standard contracts for authors and do not normally like to
negotiate, especially on someone's first book, unless you are someone really
famous.

Chris

On Mon, Nov 3, 2008 at 9:52 AM, Remy Sharp <remysharp at googlemail.com> wrote:

> Hi all,
>
> I figure there's a few authors so I'm in need of a bit of quick advice.
>
> I've been approached by two different book publishers over the last couple
> of months about doing a book - pretty much the *same* book.
>
> There's no contracts in place yet.
>
> I'm just writing to the second chap now, should I tell him that I've been
> approached by another publishing company or should I keep it to myself -
> i.e. do you think it might put them off?
>
> Should I be looking to play these companies off of each other to find get
> the best deal?  I'm not a particularly shreud businessman - I tend to show
> all my cards early and stick very much to the truth, hense this request for
> help! :-)
>
> Any suggestions/advice would be welcome.
>
> Cheers!
>
> --
> Remy Sharp
> Left Logic
>
> blog ~ http://remysharp.com
> twitter ~ http://twitter.com/rem
> project ~ http://jqueryfordesigners.com
> work ~ http://leftlogic.com
>
> { note gmail is not my primary account, if you want to contact me, please
> use remy at leftlogic.com }
> --
>
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