I am feeling a bit downhearted and discouraged because of the extremely lackluster sales of Transitioning Home and Hands of the Morri.
My publisher is even worried that they might need to let me go if my sales don't improve. Apparently, there is not much of a market for Transgender books. This is makes me want to bang my head into the ground. I had a lot better sales with 300 Rains, because it was from Doppler Press and came with everyone here on the site as a potential purchaser. I had hoped that the audience that I had gained here over years would have followed, but that does not seem to be the case.
Please don't just buy from Doppler. There are other companies out there that buy and sell books with Transgender characters. We need to support the authors who are out there trying to get good content out there. There are Bold Strokes Books, JMS Books, and many more, with all sorts of different stories out there. If book publishers only think that we are super niche and they are unlikely to make book sales, Transgender Literature will never go anywhere.
I beg all of you, please spread out your purchases. You don't even have to buy my books. I would like you to buy, but I am more concerned with a larger issue. Please buy Trans books from various publishers. You never know what neat stories you might find, or authors you might support. And remember Doppler, they helped get 300 Rains published and I am grateful. So, you know, get their books as well. We all need to support each other.
Comments
Got my hands on Hands of the Morri
Two weeks ago I got my hands on "Hands of the Morri" here in Germany. :-)
(It came from Amazon.de)
Best wishes
Martina
Thank you and I hope you
Thank you and I hope you enjoy the read.
Heather
We are the change that will save the world.
Bold Strokes Books messed up my pre-order
Wenn you first annouced that "The Hands of the Morri" would be published by BSB, I pre-ordered it there. Then you reminded us, that it was published – but I never got that pre-ordered copy. So I went to their webshop again and bought it, this time for real. ;-)
But I have to wonder, how many possible sales (via pre-orders that were not properly processed) you (and your publisher) lost out on?
It is not your fault for not attracting enough interest in your books if they mess up pre-ordering and thus losing sales. :-(
That is an excellent point
That is an excellent point and one that I will mention to the company.
Heather
We are the change that will save the world.
I just bought "Transitioning Home" on Amazon.com
I bought it on the strength of the reviews but it was a tad pricey for my social security budget. For a few pennies more I could have gotten 800 pages of the latest "Outlander" kindle.
Do yourself a favor and talk to Doppler Press. Neither of your books showed up on my regular transgender kindle feed. All of their books do.
Ron
I have talked to Doppler
I have talked to Doppler before. I moved on to a larger publisher and doing that has taken me out of my usual recognition. It's frustrating to be leveling as an author and then vanishing from readers. And I get that it's expensive but that it the pricing set by the publisher and I am not involved. But thank you very much for purchasing it. I do hope you enjoyed the read.
Heather
We are the change that will save the world.
I’m scratching my head.
I’m new here, and I may have this all wrong. But it’s my understanding that Doppler and BC are effectively sister entities — two lines of business owned and operated by Janglewood, LLC. They support each other. When you publish through Doppler, Erin regularly puts your cover on the front page here at BC. It’s free advertising for the author, but obviously from BC’s perspective that’s real estate it is giving away. So people on BC get lots of exposure to Doppler books, which hopefully increases their sales, which in turn supports both Doppler and (for books that aren’t donated) the author. Sounds like that was your experience when you published through Doppler, so the system worked. Hopefully, sales of Doppler Books on Amazon generate interest that draws traffic back to BC and helps keep it afloat, too.
You decided to try out a publisher that isn’t also affiliated with BC, and are disappointed that the BC-related traffic didn’t follow. I get that. But to get the same crossover, logically, you would need to have the other publisher put up your title covers on the main page here, similar to what is done for Doppler Books, since that has a demonstrated impact on sales. Naturally, since that’s valuable, that publisher would need to pay BC for the virtual real estate. I don’t know how Erin would feel about that, but it would be a source of income for BC, and as Erin’s frequent appeals for funds demonstrate, additional revenue streams would help a lot.
I apologize. I see the frequent appeals for funds here and it makes me worry about whether this site will be able to stay up, supporting this wonderful community we all love. That’s the primary lens through which I read your blog post, and I know you had other concerns on your mind.
— Emma
To get advertising on the
To get advertising on the site I would have to have the money to do so, not my publisher. A lot of the larger publishers are not aware that places like this exist and want their authors to bear the burden of paying for the advertising. As I am a disabled veteran on a fixed income, paying for extra things like that is literally out of my budget. And I am not begrudging Doppler or BC for this fact. I made the choice to go somewhere else and missing these people is part of that. I still occasionally do stuff on here, such as rough drafts of stories and the like, to share that I am still writing. And I think BC is starting to face similar issues, with it becoming harder to find the site for younger trans people who might not be searching for sites like this and being content with the trans content on Archive of Our Own, wattpad, and other sites.
I posted this here to drag some of the readers from here to other sources of purchasable stories, while lauding BC for what it is. I would be a hypocrite if I did not acknowledge this site for all the help it has given me in the early years of my career. I still have people who like my books here and keep my comments to the blog side of things where it belongs. The main page is really or those stories, not comments like mine.
Heather
We are the change that will save the world.
As a BC author
As a BC author, you're allowed to post blogs that promote your work elsewhere. No charge for blogs that will stay up probably four days to a week and can include links to sites where your stuff sells. At least two authors do this already.
More permanent ads are available for a price.
Hugs,
Erin
= Give everyone the benefit of the doubt because certainty is a fragile thing that can be shattered by one overlooked fact.
Curious
It sounds like you had a good experience with Doppler. As they have published over twenty books for me and all has gone well I would expect no less.
I'm curious why you went with a different publisher?
Jill
Angela Rasch (Jill M I)
For the first little bit,
For the first little bit, Doppler was fine. The book sold well and I got paid in a timely manner. But there were some communication issues developing. I would start not hearing from them, I would have to get in touch with someone to get my royalties. Now at this point, I have heard nothing about my book in years except that it is still selling and that it is popular in Brazil. It's great that my book is doing well, but the business side of things mostly fell through. I have been trying to get 300 Rains back from them, but getting contact with them has been rough. I feel burned by them because of feeling like I have fallen out of their care. Sure some of that is natural, but if you are still selling a book and not passing on the royalties...yeah. I am also aware that this is my experience and certainly not yours.
The other thing is that I was wanting to step up with my storytelling and get picked up by a higher tier publisher. Bold Strokes Books is a major mid-tier publisher of books, with good distribution and sales numbers. They bought Transitioning Home and Hands of the Morri, and I thought all was good. I was riding high on that for a while, but apparently trans readers don't know to look for stories outside of places like BC. It's ironic that I got with a publisher who has helped with editing but is not helping my book connect with readers.
In the end, I just want people to look for books all over the place, because there are a lot of good stories out there. I want the readers to have the best choices, which sure as hell includes BC and the books published on Doppler. I am unlikely to sign with them again, for reasons, but I wish them well. I also am really happy that people can get their writing seen and out from this page. I just wish that my books could find the readers that would enjoy them.
Heather
We are the change that will save the world.
Your Concerns
I can understand your concerns.
I operated a business that required me to be the paymaster for several hundred individuals and businesses who worked through me. They deserved accurate, timely payment. The companies didn't always pay me on time or provide accurate statements. I believed the buck stopped with me and did what I had to to get those who counted on me their due. I often paid out of my own pocket.
Your book was published three weeks before my first book was published by Doppler in Narch of 2015. I've had over twenty published by Doppler since than. I've never experienced the communication frustration you describe. However, I donate my books so I can't comment on payments as I don't get any payments and don't expect them.
On the other hand, since I work for Doppler is as a volunteer you can bet I would have long ago given it up if it was a pain.
I work directly with Erin. Either Mel or Erin does my covers. Mel worked for me years ago writing content for my website. She wrote dozens of very satisfactory articles for me and was a terrific independent contractor.
I'm surprised that you've had problems.
You're a courageous person. Getting published takes perseverance. You are to be admired if only for your service to our country.
But. . .I have done fairly well in business. During the last month I've purchased five hard cover books costing me from $20 to $30 each. All bestsellers. I've read them all. I also bought about the same number of ebooks. Those were all transgender fiction. The most I paid was $3.99.
For years I bought Sandy Thomas' books when they were the only game in town and paid $9.99. I thought she was ripping me off but bought dozens of them. She still is selling her books for $9.99 decades later as ebooks. But she is an anomaly.
I think the market is telling you that there are tons of TG books available for much less than you are charging. Doppler is a side hustle and is content to work for much less within that context. They allow you to price your book at market rates.
As a good friend if mine once said you really shouldn't compare the Shop Around the Corner to Target.
I have an economics degree. I was taught that in most situations there is an economic loser for every economic winner. Doppler and BC are interlocking. BC struggles to maintain and counts on book sales for revenue.
While I appreciate your opinion that people should go to varied sources for books and pay premium prices for what they buy, is this really the right venue for that discussion?
The bookselling pie doesn't enjoy total elasticity. Only so many books will be purchased by the BC users. Erin is a very nice person. For example there are a number of authors who hawk their books on BC even though they're not published by Doppler. I don't think I would be that generous if I depended on this site to keep a roof over my head. If I were in Erin's shoes I would want to wet my beak on every book mentioned for sale here.
But that's just me. I hope your new books find buyers.
Jill
Angela Rasch (Jill M I)
Oh yeah, I get that. And I am
Oh yeah, I get that. And I am not overly fond of the pricing plan the publisher has, because 18.95 for a paperback book, no matter how good is a lot of money. The 14.95 Doppler charged for 300 Rains paperback is still a chunk but a more fair one. And 9.99 for an ebook. That's also a lot and I get that. Honestly, I just want to write and write the best stories I can and get paid for them a fair ammount. I figured my issues with Doppler are anomalous, which is a bit more of an irritation, but so it goes. I honestly did not mean to bring up those details until you asked. And I wish you every success with your writing and BC and Doppler success as well.
Heather
We are the change that will save the world.