Do you prefer to read a physical book?
Most of my books are available in paperback via print on demand sources. However, what’s available may depend on where you live and what makes sense in terms of shipping.
Sources
I make paperbacks available via two main print on demand sources: Amazon and Draft2Digital. Draft2Digital prints via Ingram. Ingram is one of the main distributors and sources for many other booksellers – both big ones like Barnes and Noble and small indie bookstores.
- For Amazon, check out the page for a given book and see if a paperback option is listed.
- Do you know about Bookshop? They collaborate with a wide network of independent booksellers, so you may be able to order a paperback that benefits your favourite independent bookshop. You can find all of the available titles from here.
- You can also find my books via Barnes and Noble or others tied into the Ingram distribution system.
- If you’d prefer to talk to your own local bookstore, you can ask them to order the book. You’ll probably need the ISBN for this.
Most of your books?
I’m usually a few books behind in getting things into paperback. We can’t finalise the paperback cover until we know exactly how long the book is going to be – even a few pages can make a difference in the width of the spine!
After that, it’s dependent on my executive function to wrangle a few details, and then Augusta having time to do the final edits and get me the cover. (We do set up what the paperback cover looks like in advance, so this is fairly quick once she’s got a moment in her schedule.)
A word about pricing
Print on the demand is the most expensive per-unit way to make a physical book. I price my paperbacks so I make somewhere between $1.30 and $2.50 per book (depending on the printing source). $2.50 is about what I make from an ebook for a novel. Sorry, Australia, this does particularly horrible things to your pricing.
Periodically the printing costs go up, and I also want to make sure I won’t lose money on a print copy if that happens before I update prices.
Got a special project?
I’m able to get author copies much more inexpensively. I’ve occasionally collaborated with people with a special project in mind (like a table at a major SF and Fantasy convention). Getting things to the post office is not one of my best skills, but I’m glad to chat and see if it makes sense for a particular idea.
(To make this work, I need at least two months of lead time to order copies and mail them.)
Coming in 2025
One of the coming plans is an update to the “More options” links to something that makes it easier to spot the paperback (and where I have audio, audio). I’ll update this and let folks know on my newsletter once that’s in place. Coming sometime in the middle of 2025!