Writing To Be Read

Embracing ProgressThe newest literary device in cyber-technology is, of course, the e-book.  Everywhere I look the term keeps popping up.  As a writer, I have to wonder how legitimate the e-book really is.  Many business type persons on social business networks, Twitter, etc… offer free e-books as an incentive to get you to buy their product, and some authors have used it as a gimmick to get you hooked, in hopes that you will want to read more and purchase other works by them.  Many of the books offered by Amazon are advertized as “available on Kindle”, and apparently there are several other e-book readers available.Can something that is being offered for free in so many places, which requires a special reader to access it, really be a profitable option for writers to publish their work?  Is publishing via e-book jumping on the bandwagon or abandoning ship?  Can cyber-literature really compete with the traditional turning of the page?   What benefits are there for authors in cyber-publication?  Does going with an e-book publishing house, (yes, there really is such a thing), cheapen or enhance the author’s reputation?  These are the questions that I have been asking myself, so I set out to discover the advantages and disadvantages of e-book publishing.  In my research, I discovered the answers to some of my questions, as well as some unexpected information that I wasn’t looking for, but improved my understanding of the e-book industry.First, I learned that although digital publishing is a relatively new industry, it has the potential to explode onto the market, in a similar fashion to what happened with social networks, blogs and even with the Internet itself, which seemed to appear on the scene almost overnight.  I found that contrary to what I had believed, you do not have to have an expensive digital reading device, such as Kindle, to read the e-books produced from digital publishing.  E-books can be read, even on cell phones, which expand the potential market and makes e-books available to virtually everyone.  This makes digital publishing look quite a bit more appealing to writers, who naturally want to reach as many readers as possible, as well as generate income from their work.   According to Editor Unleashed, there are other advantages to going with a digital publishing house, including more opportunity for new writers because it is such a new industry, and the potential to earn a higher income from your work.  Although digital publishers tend to offer lower advances, they offer higher royalties, which editor Maria Schneider claims can actually generate a higher income in the long run.  Schneider also points out that many digital platforms include an option for ordering a physical book, so it is possible that you may actually see your book in print eventually, and there are many new opportunities for new authors to get in the door, because the digital publishing industry is so new.I also learned that e-books are already out there in abundance.  What I viewed as an industry just being introduced onto the scene, is actually a publishing garden that is already coming into full bloom.  While cyber-publishers are just beginning to test the waters, such as Quartet Press, are limiting themselves to a single genre (romance), to get their feet wet, I was pleased to find that e-bookstores, such as Books on Board, have donned fins and dove right in, advertising titles by best selling authors that are familiar names, such as James Patterson, Greg Isles, Daniel Silva, James Rollins and Patricia Cornwell.  If these best selling authors are already embarking on the digital publishing journey, perhaps I should not be so quick to scoff.  I think this also says that the publishing industry is beginning to consider this a viable branch of literature.  While I don’t think that e-books will ever take the place of traditional paper and ink books, I do think that e-books are already making their own place in the publishing world.

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