David Moody, Barry Eisler, two of the most successful authors have published their own work, tell their stories

David Moody deal of self-publishing success to a traditional book,

"If I 'd finished my first novel in 1995, I immediately went the usual route of trying to find a publisher. I've been published with a very low pressures. The book and it has absolutely nothing. I 'd naively thought that once I' d of the contract, I could sit back and wait for the money rolling in signed, but of course, that didn 't (in fact, I still have the remains of the first edition of microscopic happen sitting in boxes in my attic) a couple of things in the way of work -., -. and a family so it was not 't until 2000 that I finished my second book, now fall slightly more experienced, I realized I had two choices - I return to the template / rejection merry-go-round again, or do I try something with the book itself I my priorities - which was more important to earn money or the book out to \ person? An author's a bit of a loose end without the reader, so I decided the book for free from my website to try and build a readership. The effect of that move, although more slowly at first, was dramatic. Within a few months ago I was still 2,000-plus downloads a month (not that impressive, but we 're talking 10 years ago). I' d always had in mind sequels Write to Autumn. If the second book in the series was finished, I published it as a paid ebook and to my surprise, the people were to soon buy it in decent numbers.

"When it comes to the release of subsequent novels and actually charge people came for her, I have a combination of existing sites and ebook direct download services (eg www.tradebit.com) to facilitate sales, with customers Payment via Paypal. That was when I really started the power of what I tapped \ see 'd. When I published the third book in the fall of 2004, blew the sales me away. Several hundred copies in the first week or so purchased, and I 'd have my hands on several hundred pounds incredibly easy.

"I 'd at first thought, the self-publishing as an experiment - to bridge me anything until I found a" right' publisher at that time self-publishing was frowned upon (it is still to an extent). But I hoped that by actually getting my books into the hands of the audience so I 'd develop a readership, build sales and hopefully the attention that the right people in the publishing industry. With more books on the virtual shelves and a steady stream of cash coming in, but I began to see it as a viable alternative to traditional publishing.

"I was fired in spring 2005 and that gave me a great opportunity in the business look I 'd and developed to try and take it to the next level. I started with a print-on- . Demand publishing work physical copies of my novels it produced was surprisingly easy: I just need the print quality of text and covers manufacture, and they turned it into a book, for all intents and purposes, not many of the books on the shelves was bookstores. I bought a stack of ISBN numbers, and that it allows me to use the services of the printer 's parent company (Ingram), so that my books are available pretty much worldwide from Amazon, Barnes & Noble, etc. In order to avoid self-published 'stigma', I have my own publishing house and hid behind the name 'Infected Books'. Incredibly, it cost less than ? 250 in order to bring everything up and running. [And] within 12 months starting Infected Books, I had published seven titles and sold several hundred pounds per month.

! "A part of me I want self-publishing was now, because I had to make '\ a fortune d then the ebook market a fraction of what it is today - not a Kindle, no iBooks, only very few special e reader ... I sold ebooks very cheap, especially because they were almost 100% profit and I thought, a potential reader would be glad to spend a few pounds to take a chance, especially if they 'd make it to the end of autumn, and were sufficiently interested to read more.

"Paperbacks were a different matter. My margin was considerably lower. Produce the tremendous costs per unit of books via print-on-demand, I have also agreed to get maximum discounts to give retailers in an effort to always have the books in so many online stores as possible. I aimed for a clear profit of at least $ 1 per book (most of the company that I did was in the U.S. or at least on Amazon.com). In terms of sales, as I mentioned , I aimed to increase on a month to month to get, and generally that has been achieved. Infected Books is really only at their full potential between 2005 and early 2008, and I was between 600-700 pounds per month in total sales (and pocket books -. ebooks combined on a 2-1 split), I wanted a monthly income after deducting the cost of around ? 1,000.

"I have always hoped to attract the attention of mainstream publishers, although I was quite happy to continue as I was with an extra ? 1,000 per month in my pocket it, however, an unexpected downside: the company itself took more and more amount of to manage time. That with the fact that I am both a full-time job and a very full-time family, had meant that, unfortunately, my writing suffered. My issue came to nothing.

"As it happened, it wasn't a publisher I caught the eye of; rather it was two different groups of film-makers. I was approached by a small Canadian production company for the film rights to the first Autumn book (they produced a very low budget movie in 2009 starring Dexter Fletcher and the late David Carradine). The same week I was approached by a production company in Los Angeles for the film rights to Hater – a novel I'd published just a couple of months earlier. Initially I thought it was a scam – one of my mates winding me up! – but after a few weeks of negotiations I sold the film rights to Mark Johnson (producer of Rain Man and the Chronicles of Narnia movies among others). Johnson subsequently brought Guillermo del Toro (Hellboy I and II, Pan's Labyrinth) on board, and the movie is currently in development. As a result of this deal, I sold the rights to Hater and its two sequels (Dog Blood was released last year, Them or Us is out at the end of 2011), to Thomas Dunne Books in the US. They went on to sell the rights to the books to a number of different territories, including Gollancz in the UK.

"I 'd at first intended to keep the autumn books and publish them on through Infected Books, but if the publishers make deals began for her, it was a breeze. The downside was that it made the print for - almost two years, but this was very impressed by the positive outweigh - massively increased exposure, a presence in major American and British book chain, foreign rights deals, and (perhaps most importantly) time selling the rights to the books allowed me to work on new material again. "

Barry Eisler: from traditional book far too self-publishing

"Financially, I think it is useful to consider the long term, and I 'm sure I financially do better in the long run on my own, as I earlier with a partner. If I don' t have to advance today, why take it if I think it 'll cost me money tomorrow? "

"But it 's not just the goal that important to me \ it'. Is also important that I enjoy the journey and call assignment creative control of packaging, not the control over important decisions such as pricing and timing, . has never been easy for me It might be OK if I thought that my publisher made all the right decisions, but if your publisher does something which you think is stupid and that 's costing you money - something like , we say, saddling your book with a close-up of an olive-green garage, or writing a bio that your date and place of birth as an important selling point, or a misunderstanding of the concepts of automatic response and acquired response, or else blows the book 's packaging treated -. it can get pretty crazy (at least it can for me) I' ll be happy that these decisions themselves.

"Ask yourself this. If someone offered you a half-million dollars today as a one-time payment, or $50,000 a year for the rest of your life, which would you take? Assuming you weren't in the middle of a financial emergency and expected to live longer than a decade, you'd be better off with the annuity. And that's the difference between legacy publishing and indie.

And on why he decided to sign up with Amazon:

"Here 's what I wanted to self publish: .. 1) a much fairer digital royalty split 2) the full creative control (packaging, pricing, timing) 3) Instant digital version, followed by paper off when the paper is finished (no more toil release the digital version on paper).

"As it happens, all these terms are available, a self-published authors are, I have decided to publish it. What is missing some people in this simple statement, however, is that it 's the concepts that are important are to me, not the means to achieve with those I see it. If these terms are a target, is undoubtedly an excellent tool for self-publishing journey. But it isn 't the only vehicle. And if any other vehicle together that offers these words come, plus a substantial advance, plus a retail business wing, can reach millions of customers in my demographic ... then, as a non-ideological man of business, I 'm going to change drives.

\ Charge "for a single title that doesn 't my ability to self-publish or otherwise publish what I want, provided Amazon, all three things I list above (except for pricing, but no matter what the contract says, we agree that digital books should be priced much lower than legacy prices), as well as a massive, unique note Amazon's marketing push to retail business and otherwise, plus a comparable advance what SMP had offered me ( They, however, that the Amazon deal for a book that SMP advance was predicated on two books, if I say "comparable," I mean, on a per-book basis) in return I 've to certain digital channels given because the Amazon deal is exclusive to the Kindle platform .. devices. And Amazon, the paper versions will sell through its retail stores and through wholesale channels to other retailers.

"One thing I think is important to understand. We 're not living in an either / or I-universe now has four low-cost, self-published digital works, and if Amazon's marketing blows to the settlement, the other works (and those who come, that I plan on self-publishing) will benefit enormously. As I ve 'many times said that publication of a company for me is not an ideology. And Self-publishing is a means, not . The end is the end of the financial -.. luck and happiness for both the type, a mixture of self-publishing and the Amazon model seems perfect to me now "