(due in 2013)

The 100 Worst Self-Publishing Misteaks: how amateurs can publish books like professionals -- or even better [paperback]



Sheila M. Clark

Michael N. Marcus



(from the publisher) Self-publishing is part of a general cultural trend—aided by advances in technology and falling costs—to remove middlemen between creative people and their audiences.

     There’s also a trend to “micro-ization” in many areas of commerce, including movie theaters, microbreweries and Internet radio. Products and services can make money when aimed at a small, specific audience.
     Creative people can take advantage of equalized distribution. Even one-person companies can have the image and impact of giant corporations. Many barriers to communication have been eliminated. Now it can be easy and inexpensive for any creative person to put work before the public. There is no longer a need to get approval from the gatekeepers of traditional media.

     Unfortunately, the ease of self-publishing has led to the publishing of many substandard books. The bad books sell poorly, get negative reviews and disappoint their authors. Even worse, each bad book makes it more difficult for other self-published books to achieve artistic respect and economic success.

This book can help to raise the standard by helping writers to learn from the mistakes of others—even from less-than-perfect big-name publishing companies.
     This book is informative, useful, easy to understand and often funny. It covers writing, formatting, choice of title, cover design, interior design, photography, marketing, publicity, pricing, grammar, spelling, printing and more.

The book does not merely offer general rules. It is illustrated with many images of actual book covers and pages that show what not to do.

     "Misteaks" includes a Publishing Hall of Shame which highlights books that are so pathetically bad that they deserve special notice. There is also an authoritative appendix with grammatical pitfalls and useful info for all authors.
     (Although the title says "100 Worst," the book actually includes about 130 mistakes. A title had to be chosen before the writing was finished, and 100 is an impressive number.)
     Authors Sheila M. Clark and Michael N. Marcus have many years' experience in writing, editing and publishing. They have known each other since grade school and this is the third book they've worked on together.