Guest Post: A Critically Acclaimed Midlist Indie Author Proves Why We Need Indie Picks Magazine

I am so happy about the impending existence of Indie Picks- a magazine of book reviews by non-big 5 published books aimed at library workers [click here if you missed the detailed announcement]. This is the review journal we have been waiting for. All of you who have wanted to add great books but you couldn’t because there was no “official” review [a requirement of many library’s collection development policies], now you can add these titles.

Earlier this year I was the  Librarian Special Guest at the Horror Writers Association’s StokerCon 2017. All of the authors wanted to know how to get their books into libraries. I spent most of my time at the conference explaining this unfortunate circumstance to small and self published authors. I agreed with many of them that their books were just perfect for a library audience but without a publisher who could get them an official review in one of the major review publications, the vast majority of libraries could do nothing about adding their titles. Many of them didn’t even know that libraries had complex acquisition policies. Why would they? We know that libraries are giant bureaucracies, but most authors and patrons have no idea.

One of those authors I met was Patricia V. Davis. She serves as the perfect example of what is wrong with our current Big 5 publisher dominated system. She chose to publish her novel Cooking for Ghosts with a smaller publisher, but that doesn’t make it any less good. In fact, this was proven by the fact that it was nominated for a National Book Critics Circle award!

I was so compelled by Patricia’s story and her series [which is a spooky, food mystery that library patrons would LOVE] that I asked her to write about this issue from the author perspective. Meeting her and many other authors heightened my frustration which I have expressed on the blog many times before [here is just one example]. I work as hard as I can to get books in the various publications I work for, but I am only 1 person. 

While I was at the conference I began working on my own plan to help alleviate this problem. I even started putting the pieces into place, but what I had planned was not nearly on as big a scale as Indie Picks, so I abandoned my first plan and jumped on the Indie Picks ship. Actually I didn’t totally abandon the plan, I diverted it to Indie Picks. 

Now, Indie Picks still cannot review every single great book out there, but it will give the smaller publishers a fighting chance. They will have a voice and an advocate in the publishing world. I have started letting all of my horror author and small publisher contacts about the magazine and have encouraged them to advertise and send in ARCs. I am contacting the library reps for all of the writers associations and told them to get the word out to their publishers. I have even begun talking to Indie Picks about including author profiles and feature articles so that even more great reads can be given a chance to shine on their limited pages.

It’s a start.

I really want all of your libraries to subscribe. I don’t want you to give up your Library Journal, PW, and Booklist subscriptions [especially Booklist since I am still writing reviews for them]. And honestly, these publications are not upset with Indie Picks. They know they cannot do every book. More attention on good reads helps everyone, publishers, book sellers, authors, and libraries. More attention means more readers. More readers translates to more dollars. The people in charge listen to dollars.

I know it is another expense, but there will be plenty of content. The first issue doesn’t come out until November but I just turned in a pre-publication review column of three great titles that will serve as a preview of this resource before it comes out.

But enough from me. Here is Patricia V. Davis to explain why we need Indie Picks from the author side of the coin.

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On the (Vital) Importance of Libraries for Midlist Authors 

When authors who write good books you’ve never heard of talk among themselves, the mantra most often repeated is the wish to get on The New York Times bestseller list. Those who see this as the golden ticket to success are surprised when a number of us say that our wish is different. Our wish to the publishing gods is for our novels to be in every library in the United States. 

“Libraries?” some of those authors say. “You won’t get any repeat sales in a library. And besides, how many people still go to libraries?” 

Since this is a site for librarians, I can only imagine the collective eye roll at that last question. You don’t need me to tell you who “still” goes to libraries. But as a former teacher and an author with a wide and varied social media following, I know the answer is, “everyone who can manage it.” Recently one of my favorite Twitter accounts, Librarian Problems @librarianprblms retweeted an article that talked about libraries as a “dying industry.” Needless to say, they begged to differ. Libraries are not at all a dying industry. What they are is a changing industry, and millennials are frequenting them more than ever.  

But for those who don’t recognize the rich resource the library system is, I tell them about the first time I took my son into a library. He was three. When, after two hours, I told him it was time to go, he started to cry. I tell them about my underprivileged teenage pupils who viewed their library as a haven of promise and possibility ─ a colossal-sized room filled with ideas, imagination, hopes, and inventiveness they might never have been exposed to in the world of financial hardship that restricted their families. I tell them about the homeless woman who wrote to me weekly on my blog by using the computer available to her at her library. I tell them how librarians are different than booksellers in that they are not motivated by sales, but by a literary quest is to discover a great, new story, whether or not it ever becomes a bestseller, and that their patrons are looking for just that ─ the wondrous, the unique, the undiscovered.  But, on the purely practical side, I point out that there are currently over one hundred thousand libraries in the United States. Getting just one copy of any novel in all of those libraries is far better than a fleeting mention on a list that is not really a “bestseller” list, in the actual meaning of the word.  

But how to attract the attention of librarians when one is a midlist author, published by a small, independent publisher? That is the frustrating challenge for the many of us in that group.  

Take my novel, Cooking for Ghosts. (And, if you’re a librarian, I mean that in the same way Henny Youngman did.)  It’s a magical realism story about four diverse women who meet on a food blogging site and decide to open a restaurant aboard the modern-day, haunted RMS Queen Mary, which is now a floating hotel berthed in Long Beach, California. Cooking for Ghosts was nominated for a National Book Critics Circle Award for Fiction, is an Official Selection of the Pulpwood Queens Book Club, and is the only book about the Queen Mary, fiction or non, chosen by the ship’s staff to be presented aboard at their monthly Salon Series.  That series was such a success, I have been invited back to present Book II, SPELLS and OREGANO, in the trilogy. 

As for the publisher, HD Media Press, I have no complaints about the marketing they’ve done for the book series. Their publicist has worked hard to get me a number of speaking gigs, including at StokerCon 2017, which, by lucky coincidence, was held aboard the Queen Mary, and I know their distribution is as good as, if not better than, other indie publishers. They’ve been reasonable and fair in regards to giveaways, promotions, blog tours and the like, and they offer above standard industry discounts, as well as returns to any retail outlets and wholesalers such as amazon and Baker & Taylor. In addition to the printed version offered through direct sales and distributors, HD Media Press has made a POD version of the novel available for those indie booksellers who wish to go through Ingram as their wholesaler.   

And yet, while Cooking for Ghosts is doing better than I might have hoped, and my agency tells me several foreign publishing houses are eyeing the title, domestic sales so far are mostly online sales and through independent bookshops. Much to my dismay, in libraries across the country the novel is almost invisible. And this I believe mostly has to do with the industry perception of smaller houses.  

Let’s take what happened with the ARCS of Cooking for Ghosts, as an example. While the final version of the novel included intricate interior graphics inspired by the royal salons of the Queen Mary, a unique cover that pays homage to vintage Cunard travel posters with a supernatural bent, an interior Art Deco style QR code that scans to an interactive Readers Guide that includes video, and another Art Deco style QR code on the back cover that scans to the viral book trailer, the ARCS had none of these extra features or beautiful graphics. They were standard, the back cover including the required marketing material and other necessary information for reviewers. The ARCS were submitted everywhere, including Booklist and Library Journal, and they looked no different than ARCS from larger houses. But with the exception of the Huffington Post and Midwest Book Review, HD Media Press was not able to garner any mainstream professional reviews. Additionally, Barnes & Noble turned down the title.  

And then, HD Media Press re-submitted the final version of the book to Barnes & Noble, and suddenly the title was accepted. With that in mind, even those at the publishing house contemplated that not seeing the professional work (and money) they were willing to put into the final version of the book, reviewers assumed the ARC was an example of the end quality that could be expected from such a small publisher.  

While frustrating, this is certainly understandable. But I know of many truly wonderful books that the public who frequents libraries are missing out on as a result of this mindset. Librarians cannot pick new authors and discover new titles if those titles are not visible through the channels they trust. 

Someone reading this might ask, “Um, excuse me ─ but if this novel is so ‘noteworthy,’ why wasn’t it published by a bigger publisher, one that might have more clout in the industry?”  

I’m glad you asked, but I won’t be surprised if you’re skeptical when I tell you that I turned down two ‘really-big-deal’ agencies to go with the more innovative agency I have now.  I know that those RBD agents would have likely sold Cooking for Ghosts to a bigger publisher, and for a very nice advance too. But after talking with those agents, I learned that their plan was to sell it to a publisher who would produce it as a pricey hardback along with an ebook edition at 12.99 USD. And this is where the tough choice comes in for an author: a great advance, accolades from your fellow authors for landing such a deal, but limited retail sales because readers have no idea who you are, or why, even with a good review, they should buy an unknown’s book in hardback or in ebook at a price that rivals the cost of a paperback.  

At the end of the day, I decided that I’m more like a librarian than a book merchant. I wanted to introduce as many readers as possible to my work. I wanted to give them the best story I could possibly offer, whether that story becomes a bestseller or otherwise. And I wanted a publisher that would present it at a price point that would entice as many readers as possible. HD Media Press produces my novel in a paperback version and a reasonably-priced Kindle version. They make a hardback version for libraries. So far, the hardback sales have been rather sad, and that’s because so few libraries even know it exists. 

So, on even-numbered days, I’m happy with my decision to publish with a small publisher, because they have the commitment to get to as many readers as possible. But on odd-numbered days, I wonder whether I should have made a different choice. Particularly when I go to a library. 

Patricia V. Davis is the author of Cooking for Ghosts: Book I in The Secret Spice Café Trilogy, (October 2016, HD Media Press) and Spells and Oregano: Book II of The Secret Spice Café Trilogy (November 2017, HD Media Press).  Visit The Secret Spice Book Series Page