Anyone else writing a book?

[Count Zero]

A lot of academic books are unaffordable, unfortunately. I once contemplated buying the (German) standard work on ethnic interpretation in archeology because it was kind of hard to get your hands on it (stolen in our library, constantly checked out in all others) but it costs 219 €.
It's also a problem for libraries because they're constantly short on money and can't buy everything they want anymore. I think it was last year when the main library here ran out of money to buy new books halfway through the year. A shame, considering its long and high tradition. But my home state is always broke.
I think it's an absurd situation. Academia is largely financed by public money (at least the humanities are) but its output is published in high-priced journals and books that then have to be bought by even more public money.
I do understand why things are the way they are but it frustrates me to no end. Mainly because we rarely have every piece of literature you need and you waste incredible amounts of time tracking them down or at least finding out what's in them.

 

[Goliath]

Two hundred and nineteen euros? I honestly don't know why the price of a book like that would be so high.

It's certainly not because the authors are getting rich. I was talking to one of my colleagues today, and her royalties from her publications are enough to pay for dinner at a restaurant once a year. Yet I don't get the impression that the people who run academic publishing houses are making a fortune either--except perhaps on certain undergraduate textbooks. Those are like the big-budget summer blockbusters of the academic book business.

I can understand why, for example, they would charge fifty dollars for my book. It really is beautifully put-together: high-quality paper, high-quality printing, high-quality everything. And they had to pay people to produce all of that quality.

But it's clearly intended for sale to libraries, who need something durable, and to academics, and to people with money to blow on nice books. In time, they'll bring out a cheaper paperback version for students and the general reader, which will cost somewhere between twenty and thirty dollars. And an electronic version that will cost less than that.

Two hundred and nineteen euros? What the hell? Is that book made of gold, or something?

 

[Count Zero]

It's due to low circulation, mostly. I doubt anyone's getting rich in the process. That's why it's so absurd. It's basically all financed by public money to a large degree but the public is more or less excluded from access to them. Not even specialised libraries have all the books and journals that one might want to use.

It's a bit of a vicious circle. You print few books, so they're expensive and only bought in small numbers. Hence you think no one would buy them anyway which is why you opt for low circulation and so on.

It's pretty much the standard more academic books and journals here, not just in my field. Come to think of it, even the physics text books I did buy when I still studied physics were sort of pricey, though of course still affordable.

There are, of course, also books with more mass appeal which are sold in higher numbers and at lower prices.

 

[Flying Spaghetti Monster]

I wrote a novel.. not sure if anyone would like it

Maybe you should get someone to read it.

Easier said than done.

Writing takes a lot of time an energy, so, in writing my novel, I kind of wanted to try something different. I wasn't going to invest the time if this thing played out with plot structure or narrative style, or even it's overall point. I can't sum it up in one line to sell it easily, I can't necessarily make it easily digestible to the masses. So I still have yet to find someone who would read it.

 

[RJDiogenes]

Congratulations. Will it be available in the US as well?

Yes, in October.

That's great. I hope it does well.

Click

Thanks. It didn't come up in my search, probably because I used "&" instead of "and."

 

[Holdfast]

^^ Fashion tips?

lol, no. Not yet anyway. Though the publisher I'm with for the current book would be perfect for that too, and I'd probably ask them to do it, if this one goes well.

Two hundred and nineteen euros? I honestly don't know why the price of a book like that would be so high.

Some library/reference-type academic books go for ridiculously high prices, simply because volumes are tiny and the relevant libraries have to buy them to meet the needs of their niche customers. This is especially so in the sciences. A book my dad wrote is exactly like this, and is well over £100, from memory. No-one gets rich on those kinds of books, though, you're absolutely right on that. It's more about meeting the needs of a niche audience.

 

[cultcross]

The library at my uni when I was reading Chemistry was full of books which cost well into the hundreds of pounds, simply because they're the sort of book only 50 science libraries up and down the country will ever buy, and so that tiny circulation has to turn a profit.

 

[BrotherBenny]

Congratulations, Goliath. I hope you do well from it.

I'm not writing a book, but I am working on writing short stories at the moment and one of them is in the reading pile at Analog Science Fiction & Fact while I work on another.

I've got several ideas for novels though and I am wondering if any of them, or part of them, can be distilled into short story/novellette/novella form. Once I have finished this current short story I'll be looking into that before working on the second draft of said story.

 

[RJDiogenes]

Congratulations. Will it be available in the US as well?

Yes, in October.

Pre-ordered.

I wrote a novel.. not sure if anyone would like it

Maybe you should get someone to read it.

Easier said than done.

Writing takes a lot of time an energy, so, in writing my novel, I kind of wanted to try something different. I wasn't going to invest the time if this thing played out with plot structure or narrative style, or even it's overall point. I can't sum it up in one line to sell it easily, I can't necessarily make it easily digestible to the masses. So I still have yet to find someone who would read it.

You can join a local critique group or a writing forum and get feedback that way.

 

[Goliath]

Congratulations. Will it be available in the US as well?

Yes, in October.

Pre-ordered.

Hope you enjoy it!

*Pockets $2.55*

 

[Flying Spaghetti Monster]

Congratulations. Will it be available in the US as well?

Yes, in October.

Pre-ordered.

Maybe you should get someone to read it.

Easier said than done.

Writing takes a lot of time an energy, so, in writing my novel, I kind of wanted to try something different. I wasn't going to invest the time if this thing played out with plot structure or narrative style, or even it's overall point. I can't sum it up in one line to sell it easily, I can't necessarily make it easily digestible to the masses. So I still have yet to find someone who would read it.

You can join a local critique group or a writing forum and get feedback that way.

I don't think they'll wanna read a 700 page novel that can't easily be summed up

 

[thestrangequark]

^I'm making my little sister read my novel.

 

[iBender]

That's cool, getting published, congratulations.
I wonder what I'll have to do to write a book?
I don't even know how to look for a publisher even if I did write something... Do I look in the phone book? Send my stuff for submission?

 

[HoneyBLilly]

Congratulations, that's awesome.


I've written a few novels but never sent them off to a publisher or anything.

 

[RJDiogenes]

Yes, in October.

Pre-ordered.

Hope you enjoy it!

*Pockets $2.55*

Nice. I get 11 cents each for mine.

I don't think they'll wanna read a 700 page novel that can't easily be summed up

Make tsq's little sister read it.

Well, you don't have to make somebody read the whole thing. You can just do excerpts. Also, if you discuss it with other writers, you may find some ways to summarize it to submit to an agent or publisher.