Hey, it was only an innocent suggestion, and yes, I've published and wrote many of my own books (9HB, 8SB
Not impossible? What would you do throw away any books in print, throw away the ISBN and any agreements, invest at least $20,000 or more in printing and shipping 1,000 new books, and pray you could sell them in the next decade? There's even more to it than you realize but mostly the problem is finding someone sitting on a load of money interested in investing in a loss. I wouldn't mind investing in a loss but maybe that's why I don't have an extra twenty thousand laying around. Would you be willing to invest the money and store and sell the books to prove it isn't truly impossible?
Feel free to post a link to one of your books. I'm not sure it would feasible for any books of this type without a large unwaranted initial investment. This is something I do for love of the hobby, if I were doing it for money I would have quit before I started but I'm also certainly not going to try to borrow tens of thousands of dollars I can't pay back. If you have resources for investment and marketing of this genre I'm all ears.
You don't think pretending to know everything about a genre you admit you don't know and circumstances you can't know is maybe a tiny bit presumptive?There's not more to it than i realise, it's what i do for a living Orin. Its what i live, breathe and sleep.
I'd rather you gave out (than gave in
Thanks Ryan I appreciate any help you can provide. I think the book is successful because it exists, it's a labor of love and I'm very happy with it. I didn't think I'd ever see something in full color and large format and not stapled together. I was only saying the sales will likely contintue to be very dismal, so far only two copies sold and both to my friends. It would be great to sell a thousand of them and be able to print them in a more cost effective manner but it's just not possible without a large investment and is realistically impossible after the fact (you couldn't unmake and unsell to redo). I guess it would be like working a decade to get to the olympics and being excited to even qualify but your family just says you shouldn't even go if you're not going to get the gold medal. I think we should be able to be proud of our accomplishments even if we aren't the superstar. I think the beetle guides have greatly helped the hobby over the years as before there wasn't anyone keeping beetles. Lastly, hardcovers normally preceed softcovers, I don't know if it ever has worked the other way.
It's up on book depository and nile.au but on amazon.uk it just made it on the list but is not yet available.
Johnboy, you may have been right though not in a mass production China option. The publisher mentioned there's a brand new printing process that makes color printing much cheaper, so much so that the price could be dropped, and hard cover added if it looks good (the final product may not be of decent quality and the paper has to be thinner for the machinery). The price would be even lower in paperback but I'd prefer to see it redone in hardcover. Of course the edition would need a new ISBN, reworked base file and license but it would be really nice if it works out.
This book is good because it includes sections on rhinoceros and stag beetles as well as greatly expanded and updated information on flower beetles and jewel scarabs as well as chapters on rearing darkling and dung beetles and other groups. It is a much more comprehensive book written also for people who don't have access to mat, mushroom log, and other store bought supplies.
