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当今自助出版越来越呈现两极分化的趋势

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Self-publishing these days is increasingly a tale of two cities.


当今自助出版越来越呈现两极分化的趋势。



There are established authors, like Nyree Belleville, who says she's earned half a million dollars in the past 18 months from selling direct rather than through a publisher.


有像奈瑞•贝尔维尔(Nyree Belleville)这样的知名作家，她说，过去18个月里她不经出版社直接卖书赚得50万美元。



Then there are new authors, like Eve Yohalem. More than a month after self-publishing, she has grossed about $100 in sales -- after incurring costs of $3,400. She said she's in no rush, though.


也有像伊夫•约翰勒姆(Eve Yohalem)这样的新手。在自助出版一个多月以后，她的销售额总计约100美元，而前期成本则为3,400美元。不过她说她不着急。



Vanity presses have been available for decades. But thanks to digital technology and particularly the emergence of e-books, the number of self-published titles exploded 160% to 133,036 in 2010 from 51,237 in 2006, estimates R. R. Bowker, which tracks the publishing business.


自助出版行业已经有几十年历史了。但出版业追踪机构R. R. Bowker估计，得益于数字技术，尤其是电子书的出现，美国2010年自助出版的书籍由2006年的51,237部激增160%，达到133,036部。



Amazon.com Inc. fueled the growth by offering self-published writers as much as 70% of revenue on digital books, depending on the retail price. By comparison, traditional publishers typically pay their authors 25% of net digital sales and even less on print books.


亚马逊公司(Amazon.com Inc.)推动了自助出版的蓬勃发展。根据书籍零售价高低，亚马逊为自助出书的作者提供占数字图书销售收入至多70%的分成。而传统出版社一般只向作者提供占数字图书净销售额25%的分成，纸质书的分成比例则更低。



For some established authors, these terms can make self-publishing a financial home run. Ms. Belleville, for instance, a veteranromance author who wrote for seven years under the pseudonym Bella Andre and a year as Lucy Kevin, self-published her first e-book in April 2010. She has since cumulatively sold 265,000 units of 10 self-published titles, most priced between $2.99 and $5.99. Her total take from those 10 titles since last April: in excess of $500,000 after expenses, she says. Previously, the most she ever made from a book was $33,000.


这些条款能让一些知名作家通过自助出书获得丰厚利润。贝尔维尔是个有多年经验的浪漫小说作家，她以贝拉•安德烈(Bella Andre)为笔名写了七年书，以露西•凯文(Lucy Kevin)为笔名写了一年书。贝尔维尔于2010年4月自助出版了第一本电子书。从那以后，她自助出版了10部小说，总共卖出265,000本，定价大多在2.99美元至5.99美元之间。她说，从去年4月份到现在，她这10部书刨去支出净赚50万美元以上。而之前她写一本书所得最多为33,000美元。



Self-published women's fictionwriter Darcie Chan has seen her new work, 'The Mill River Recluse,' hit No. 5 on The Wall Street Journal's list of digital fiction bestsellers for the week ended Oct. 23. Ms. Chan priced her novel about a secretive widow living in Vermont at 99 cents, and says she has sold 'hundreds of thousands' of copies since it went on sale on Amazon in May. The book, also carried by Barnes & Noble Inc. and other e-retailers, was previously rejected by major publishing houses.


陈达西(Darcie Chan)是一位自助出书的女性小说作家，她的新作《磨坊河的隐士》(The Mill River Recluse)在截至10月23日当周名列《华尔街日报》(The Wall Street Journal)数字小说畅销排行榜第五位。这部数字小说的主角是佛蒙特的一名隐居寡妇，陈达西将其价格定为99美分，并称该书5月份在亚马逊销售以来已经卖出了"数十万本"。这本书在巴诺书店(Barnes & Noble Inc.)和其他电子书零售商处也有售，而之前曾被大型出版社拒之门外。



'My original intention was to gradually get my name out there as a writer, because when it was rejected one of the things I heard was that nobody knew me,' says Ms. Chan. 'I never expected this.'


陈达西说，"我最初是想逐步提高自己作为作家的知名度，因为出版社退稿的理由之一是没有人知道我。这是我从来没有料到的。"



Ms. Chan says the book was featured on several Kindle-related sites that recommend e-books to readers. In August it broke into the top 10 on the Kindle store, where it ranked No. 6 Friday. She paid a site to review her book, which she thinks may have given her book a boost. And she also did some 'inexpensive Web-based advertising' which also got the word moving among readers. Ms. Chan, a lawyer by training, said the novel is now being resubmitted to major publishers.


陈达西说，有几个与Kindle相关的电子书推荐网站介绍了这本书。该书8月份跻身Kindle书店销售排行榜前十位，而最近则排到了第六位。陈达西委托一个网站为她写付费书评，她认为这可能带动了书的销售。她还做了一些"便宜的网络广告"，也起到了向读者推介此书的效果。身为专业律师的陈达西说，现在正在把这部小说重新投给大型出版社。



Then there are writers like Erik Kjerland. He has self-published four novels and one book about self-publishing in the past year under the pseudonym Derek J. Canyon. His profit of about $5,000 on sales of roughly $10,000 is better than he'd hoped but not enough for him to quit his day job as a technical writer.


还有像埃里克•谢尔兰(Erik Kjerland)这样的作家。过去一年他已经以德雷克•J.卡尼恩(Derek J. Canyon)为笔名自助出了四部小说以及一本有关自助出版的书。他的销售额约为10,000美元，获利5,000美元左右，好于他的预期，但仍不足以让他辞去技术文档工程师的工作。



The question that most intrigues would-be self-published authors isn't whether they'll be viewed as literary outcasts, but how to do it and what it costs. Simply getting attention is an enormous challenge, although e-books have a longer shelf life.


想自助出书的作者们最关心的问题并不是他们是否会被视为文学的弃儿，而是该怎样自助出书以及成本是多少。虽然电子书的在架时间较长，但仅如何吸引读者关注这一点就是个巨大的挑战。



'One of the big differences between e-books and print is the sales cycle,' says Ms. Yohalem. 'It's almost inverted. A chain store buyer makes a decision as much as six months before the book is published, and then it has no more than six months on the shelf. At that point your sales cycle is over. But with e-books, it's completely the opposite. It's often six to nine months before your book takes off, and you never take it down.'


约翰勒姆说，"电子书和纸质书的一大区别在于销售周期，两者销售周期几乎是相反的。连锁书店在纸质书出版之前的六个月之内决定要不要进货，书籍出版之后其在架时间不会超过六个月。至此图书的销售周期就结束了。但电子书的情况是完全相反的，书籍上架之前通常需要六到九个月，上架之后就再也不会下架。"



She says she began to think seriously about self-publishing after her second book -- a collection of short stories aimed at readers 6-10 -- was rejected and she realized there wouldn't be enough of a market to lure a big publisher. She also wanted to experiment with self-publishing. Her first middle-grade novel, 'Escape Under the Forever Sky,' had been issued by Chronicle Books in 2009 to good reviews but only modest sales. Chronicle told her that story collections targeted to that audience don't sell. A separate young-adult novel didn't find a buyer either.


约翰勒姆称，她是在自己的第二本书──一部面向6-10岁读者的短篇故事集──被出版社退稿之后开始认真考虑自助出书的，她认识到该书市场偏小，不足以吸引大型出版商。她也想尝试一下自助出书。约翰勒姆的第一本小说《在永恒的天空下逃离》(Escape Under the Forever Sky)面向8-12岁读者，2009年由Chronicle Books 出版，该书获得了好评，但销量平平。Chronicle告诉她，面向这个年龄段的故事合集卖不动。另外一本面向14到21岁青少年读者的书也没有出版社愿意出。



To learn about self-publishing, Ms. Yohalem visited blogs such as Joe Konrath's 'A Newbie's Guide to Publishing.' She also spent time on KindleBoards.com, an independent community focused on topics related to Amazon's Kindle e-reader, including self-publishing. Within a few months she decided to self-publish the short-story collection. She priced 'Grandpa Hates the Bird: Six Short Stories of Exciting, Hilarious and Possibly Deadly Adventure' at $2.99 and priced individual stories at 99 cents each.


为了解自助出版，约翰勒姆访问了一些博客，比如乔•康拉特(Joe Konrath)的"新手出书指南"(A Newbie's Guide to Publishing)。她还花时间上KindleBoards.com，这是一个独立的网络社区，主要讨论与亚马逊Kindle阅读器相关的问题，其中包括自助出书。在几个月之内，她做出了自助出版这部短篇故事集的决定。她把这部名为《爷爷讨厌这只鸟：六个小故事讲述精彩、滑稽、致命的探险经历》(Grandpa Hates the Bird: Six Short Stories of Exciting, Hilarious and Possibly Deadly Adventure)的书价格定为2.99美元，把单个故事的价格定为每篇99美分。



It helped that her sister and two friends, all experienced editors, lent their services free of charge. This saved her $1,000 to $2,000, she says. She commissioned a cover illustration for $400.


她的姐姐和两个朋友都是有经验的编辑，为她免费提供帮助。她说，这让她节省了1,000到2,000美元。她花了400美元请人设计了一个封面。



She then hired Telemachus Press LLC in Longboat Key, Fla., to act as her digital publisher, including formatting the manuscript, for about $3,000.


接下来，她聘请佛罗里达州朗博特岛(Longboat Key)的Telemachus Press LLC出版公司作她的数字出版商，包括手稿排版在内，她一共花了大约3,000美元。



One of the things that Ms. Yohalem did for promotion was tap Facebook. A friend searched for bird/parrot related pages, posting a message on nine sites praising the 'Grandpa Hates the Bird' titles. Ms. Yohalem then 'liked' the pages and the postings on each site. Ms. Yohalem did her own searches on Facebook and when she found sites she considered appropriate, she posted a note about her books.


约翰勒姆推销这本书的方式之一是借助Facebook。她的一位朋友搜索与鸟/鹦鹉相关的网页，在九个网站上留言称赞《爷爷讨厌这只鸟》，然后约翰勒姆"赞"了这些网页以及每个网站上发布的内容。约翰勒姆自己也在Facebook上进行搜索，当她发现合适的网站时，会留言介绍她的书。



Ms. Yohalem says that her titles went live on Barnes&Noble.com the week of Sept. 26, and on Apple Inc.'s iBookstore the week of Oct. 3. So far, she says she's made 44 sales on Amazon, including 34 sales at $2.99, and four sales of the entire collection at Smashwords Inc., an e-book distributor. 'I'm just getting started. It's way too soon to begin counting dollars.' She hopes to soon sell a new middle-grade novel to a traditional house.


约翰勒姆说，她的书9月26日当周开始在巴诺书店的Barnes&Noble.com销售，10月3日当周开始在苹果公司(Apple Inc.)的iBookstore销售。她说，到目前为止她的书在亚马逊上共卖出44次，其中34次是以2.99美元的价格卖出的，她还通过电子书分销商Smashwords Inc.卖出了四整套故事集。她说，"我刚刚起步，现在开始考虑钱的问题还太早。"她希望不久之后能把一本面向8-12岁读者的新书卖给传统出版社。



Jeffrey A. Trachtenberg


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