Forum: Author Hangout

I've been creating paper editions of my books, revising as I go along, for myself. Sales are not the point, since the books are free downloads on SOL and the other usual places, albeit without the latest revisions yet, and I've been putting up PDF versions of the paper editions as well on Google Drive.

I've ordered at least a dozen books over the last few months, not a huge investment given the size of the books and Lulu's ongoing promotions and sales, but I am impressed with their simple but effective packaging---the volume has a slightly padded wrapping, and in turn is shrink-wrapped to a piece of cardboard inside a correctly-sized flat cardboard container, which itself has a strap around it.

There is no effing tape!

Cover colors have been generally accurate, even if today my copy of Goddess arrived with a very slightly greenish Hebe on the cover. Perhaps she was carsick from the road trip. Others, including Chloe with very warmish tones on the cover, have arrived spot-on.

Interior layouts are fine. Like Ernest, I give them exact print-ready PDFs to work from, so no automated conversion.

Overall, probably 4 out of 5 stars to Lulu.

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I wasn't generally pleased with lulu's print books, mainly due to the price differential, though, to be honest, I compared services several years back, so things may have changed.

I've been happy with Createspace's books, though with them you run the risk of bookstores refusing to carry any product associated with Amazon, despite their being an independent company with Amazon having/taking no direct actions regarding their behaviors.

I've also been extremely disappointed with lulu's sales and error reporting. While my smashword sales were decent, similar sales on lulu are few and far between. Frankly, my one gay story has sold more on lulu than any of my 'mainstream' books so far, though none near my worst selling book on smashwords.

As for their error reporting, I've never ONCE been able to figure out what they were objecting to, as most of their claims were patently incorrect. Since the sales are SO bad, I've decided against selling any more books thru them. Frankly, I pay out more for the ISBNs I waste on the site than I gain in royalties.

I'm glad you've had success with them, but I haven't been impressed.

By the way, my createspace print sales have been insignificant as well, as I order many more books for myself as gifts than I've ever sold to anyone else.

Other than Amazon and smashwords, I haven't found any other sites which seems capable of selling more than a few books at a time.

On the other hand, smashwords has notorious problems with their book conversion software, which they consistently deny, despite their information pages continually referring to 'the nuclear option' which is their only work-around to the problem.

Amazon's biggest problem is their reporting (they consistently report greater sales than I've ever received payments for), but I've never had a single issue with the books I've submitted to them, the quality of the final product, or the sales they generate (though their sales were always lower than my smashword sales, as well).