My tether’s made of leather so I’m not about to fall here

[rolanni]

Well, I did a lot of learning yesterday, and I need to order a proof copy of the completed book from lulu.  My, my, aren’t they expensive?  And clever, too!

For those playing along at home, if you’re willing to do your own fulfillment, it really is worth your time to seek out a local printer and order up 200 (or wherever their Big Price Break Point lies).  Depending on the number of pages and extra goodies in terms of color that you want, you ought to be able to easily halve lulu’s price per.

The “distribution to Amazon, BN, and others!” requires the purchase of a “distribution package” — I haven’t tracked down how much that is, but the cost of that is added on top of the manufacturing cost of each book.  The manufacturing cost of Barnburner (130-page digest-sized perfect bound) at the moment stands at $4.48.  That goes directly to lulu.  If I (the, yanno, author/production department) want a piece of the action, I need to add $$ on top of that.  Plus whatever other extra costs are hidden in the small print.  Which starts to add up to an expensive little mystery novel.

So, that!

Regarding the Big List of Words, as requests seem to have petered out, and that’s Some Big list, I’m freezing requests NOW.  Steve and I will be thinking about how to proceed in a sanity-preserving manner.  I expect we’ll break the list down into little lists and post them as can.  Our intent is to at least begin before the end of the year.

This morning, the Cat Eating Machine and I have some bidness to conclude; I’ll order in that proof.  After lunch, it’s all George, all the time.

Hope everybody has a good day!

Originally published at Sharon Lee, Writer. You can comment here or there.