The Great Befuddlement

Hello everyone,

Ever feel Befuddled?

Befuddlement: verb (used with object), be·fud·dled, be·fud·dling.

to confuse, as with glib statements or arguments.

My book contract with Covenant Books for my title “Beck the Speck” has expired, so I was debating whether I should renew it. I’ve researched different outlets for publishing kid’s picture books and decided to relaunch Beck the Speck on my own.

The cool thing is now I have complete control over the pricing, marketing, and distributing of my book. I’ll keep you all updated.

Now the reason for this post!

Well, it’s kind of in the name, publishing can be confusing. Really confusing! Especially when you’re trying to figure out what route is best for you.

When I sent my book out I made the big mistake on not doing any research. I kind of just sent my book out to a publishing house my gramma heard about and wished for the best.

Looking back there are so many things I would do differently. For example, I would have conducted more research on the publishing house’s success rate and all the different publishing houses. For example, I didn’t know there was over one type of publishing house.

Some Publishing House Types

Hybrid Publishing Houses – is selective in what they publish. They also charge for publishing your book.

Vanity Press – are not selective about what they publish. They charge to publish your book too.

Traditional Publishing Houses – they are very selective on what they publish and they don’t charge to publish your book.

With all of that being said you might be tired of reading the word published. In a nutshell that’s the many different publishing houses.

Anyhow, I sent my book to Covenant Books and I’m grateful that they published my book but I didn’t have the greatest experience.

Since I didn’t know the difference between traditional, hybrid, and vanity. As a new author I didn’t know what to ask or what to do. They didn’t tell me it was a good idea to start up social media and create a website until a little more than a year after publication. They gave promises and didn’t fulfill those promises. The marketing wasn’t good. When I signed up with them I was under the impression that, they would market my book for me because that’s what they said they would do. The icing on the cake was they sent me the materials for my book since I didn’t renew my contract and they charged me for shipping.

This post isn’t meant to be complaint central, because it taught me to do my research.

Take this and run with it whether you use a publishing house or self publish. Do your research look at books in your genera that are published by the houses you’re considering and look at their success rate. Also have some form of social media.

That’s all, folks.