Articles by Max Rivlin-Nadler

by Max Rivlin-Nadler
May 10, 2012
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In Memory of Maurice Sendak

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This week, American literature mourns the loss of its hero Maurice Sendak. Sendak is best known for writing children’s books, yet his work resonated with readers of all ages.

A less-known fact about Sendak was his distaste for eBooks. If you’re trying to find “Where The Wild Things Are” on your NOOK, you would run into a problem: none of his work is available in electronic form. Sendak was pronouncedly opposed to eBooks — going as far to tell Stephen Colbert last year, “I hate those eBooks. They cannot be the future. They may well be. I will be dead.”

Even though he staunchly opposed the form, other authors working on children’s books have readily embraced it. Right now on Lulu, you can find great electronic children’s books like OwlCat: The Cat Hoo Thought He was an Owl, Gunna’s Adventures – Gunna Daydream, and Gino The Giant Slayer.

Children’s authors have used eBooks to not only spread their work farther than print, but to also enhance it. Many have chosen to create special features that help

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by Max Rivlin-Nadler
May 4, 2012
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How to Get Your Local Bookseller to Carry Your Book

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Selling your self-published book through Lulu and other online outlets feels good. Your book is now available to anyone, anywhere in the world just by downloading or ordering it through the Internet. But there might be something missing. What about being able to eagerly browse the shelf at your local independent bookstore and coming across your book there?

Independent bookstores have considerable trouble stocking self-published titles. First, they’re not often able to sell the book back to the self-publisher if the product doesn’t sell. As such, bookstores need to be pretty sure the book is going to be purchased before they buy it.

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by Max Rivlin-Nadler
May 3, 2012
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It’s Never Too Soon To Become An Author

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Is it ever too early to start publishing your own books? We think not. We see talented, young authors use open-publishing platforms to publish every day.

Instead of waiting for a publishing house to take a chance on a 14-year-old’s novel, teens are publishing on their own (with their parents help). A recent New York Times article described the attitude of some of the youngest self-publishers, “The young authors themselves, raised in an era of blogging and equal-opportunity Twitter feeds, take the notion of self-publishing in stride.”

Parents fund their children’s work, and, sometimes, actually make their money back. Either way, parents view it as part of the learning and maturing process. A Pennsylvania superintendent, whose teenage daughter self-published a novel, said: “What do you do with something you’re proud of? You want people to see it.”

Some established authors are more skeptical of these young authors.

“What’s next?” asked the novelist Tom Robbins. “Kiddie architects, juvenile dentists, 11-year-old rocket scientists? Any parent who thinks that the crafting of engrossing, meaningful, publishable fiction requires less talent and experience than designing a house, extracting a wisdom tooth, or supervising a lunar probe is, frankly, delusional.”

While I won’t argue against the difficulty of writing fiction (I can testify to it), I would challenge Robbins assumptions about young writers. Several famous writers got their start while still in their teens.

Arguably the most prominent young author is S.E. Hinton, who wrote The Outsiders when she was only 15 years old. Another young author was Christopher Paolini, whose Inheritance Cycle has sold more than 33.5 million copies worldwide. Paolini wrote the first book of his series, Eragon, when he was also 15. Mary Shelley wrote Frankenstein when she was only 18. Anne Frank wrote her tragic diary when she was only 13.

When did you first know you wanted to write? What was your inspiration? Which young authors do you most admire?

 

by Max Rivlin-Nadler
April 30, 2012
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Linotype Machines & the History of Printing

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Image courtesy of Adam Foster. Please click image to see his photostream.

In this digital age, the actual act of printing becomes an afterthought. We type and then hit print, assured that the lasers housed in our sophisticated printers will deliver us our perfectly-written piece. It seems ages ago that the very idea of printing words was a complicated ordeal, involving sophisticated (and incredibly cool-looking) machines.

Linotype machines were the industry-standard for the better part of the 20th century. They were mammoth machines which used “hot metal” to create complete sentences for manual printing. The printer would type the words into the machine, and the machine would create a unique piece of metal to transfer the ink to the page. The actual mechanics of the machine are fascinating, and if you’re into the sort of thing, you can check out this page for a complete breakdown of the function of each part. Here is a great Flickr photo album by Adam Foster with images of an existing machine.

A new documentary, Linotype: The Film, explores the origins and importance of a machine that changed the world, but has fallen into disuse. Thomas Edison called the Linotype machine the “Eighth Wonder of the World.” The documentary ”tells the charming and emotional story of the people connected to the Linotype and how it impacted the world.” It will be released on DVD later this year.

Most Linotype machines were scrapped after the advent of quicker printing methods, and there are very few machines left out there. The original operators of the machine are dying off, and without a new generation of printers, we might lose the art of manual printing forever.

So what? New technology replaces older technology all the time. But maybe by reflecting on older forms of printing we can learn things from a time when words were not so cheap. In the digital age, we take for granted the ability to transmit our words across the globe in an instant. But for hundreds of years authors chose their words carefully — it cost a good deal to print something.

By learning the history of printing, we can appreciate the exciting era we live in, where we can print and distribute our work with the click of a button.

by Max Rivlin-Nadler
April 26, 2012
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Innovative Ways to Leverage eBook Technology

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Only “print” your book with Lulu? You could be missing out. According to Reuters, one-fifth of American adults read an eBook last year, with the number surely to keep rising over the next few years.

As readers move away from print, the electronic realm can become a lucrative option for self-published authors. The rise in eBooks provides some amazing opportunities, like:

  • Updated editions of non-fiction books
  • Extra chapters
  • The ability to try out releasing a book electronically before committing to print

Lulu.com is #1 in eBooks, but what about our old, beloved friend, print? Well, he’s getting a boost as well. With more readers come more recommendations, and even though e-readers are sweeping the nation, it still doesn’t make up the majority of the market. So more often than not, people who are being recommended books can’t buy the eBook, instead they buy it on good ol’ fashion print.

So where does this leave you, the writer? We live in exciting, changing times for authors. Perhaps you would like to test some new material that your readers aren’t quite familiar with? Then perhaps an eBook is the way to go. Once that takes off, you can print your book so the people who its being recommended to (who don’t have e-readers) can order your print version.

Some might lament — this is surely the death of print, right? Well, not necessarily.

As eBooks continue to gain popularity, writers will find new, creative way to utilize print — trying out new design schemes, or offering some print-only content. The future of publishing is going to be dictated by the self-publishers. A new profit-model will be determined by the adventurous writers who try out new ways to promote and distribute their work. Be it print, digital, or something we haven’t even thought of yet, self-publishers will be the engine of innovation for the industry.

by Max Rivlin-Nadler
April 23, 2012
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Happy Birthday, Shakespeare!

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William Shakespeare turns 448 this week. It’s the dream of every writer that 448 years in the future, when people are reading whatever version of eBooks exist then (mind-books?), that they’ll still be poring over the words you wrote so far in the past. It’s a long-shot, but even the famous “Bard of Avon,” had to start somewhere, sitting down at a desk and opening his mind to the possibilities of a story that just needed to be told.

Of course, some of his works were bigger hits than others. “Romeo and Juliet,” “Hamlet,”and “Othello” are routinely read by every high-schooler, while “The Life of Timon of Athens” is less so. Still, the fortitude that comes with writing so many works of such incredible quality is worthy of high respect from any type of writer. For the novices all the way to the most seasoned of hands, here are a few words of inspiration about the creative, clever, and intellectual spirit (and some of its ensuing difficulties) from possibly the most successful writer of the past 500 years.

Better a witty fool than a foolish wit. - Twelfth Night

Give every man thy ear, but few thy voice – Hamlet

How well he’s read, to reason against reading!  - Love’s Labour’s Lost

Brevity is the soul of wit. - Hamlet

What is past is prologue. – The Tempest

I say there is no darkness but ignorance. – Twelfth Night

Ignorance is the curse of God; knowledge is the wing wherewith we fly to heaven. – Henry VI part II

Is it not strange that desire should so many years outlive performance? - Henry IV

Life’s but a walking shadow, a poor player, that struts and frets his hour upon the stage, and then is heard no more; it is a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing. - Macbeth

O, had I but followed the arts! – Twelfth Night

Sweet are the uses of adversity which, like the toad, ugly and venomous, wears yet a precious jewel in his head. - As You Like It

The very substance of the ambitious is merely the shadow of a dream. -Hamlet

To be a creative individual, while definitely a gift, is something that will always be wrestling inside you, waiting to be expressed through some form of art. Shakespeare did a wonderful job describing this struggle.

From all of us at Lulu, Happy Birthday William Shakespeare!

We’d love to hear from you in the comments below. Do you have a favorite Shakespeare quote or play?

by Max Rivlin-Nadler
April 10, 2012
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Famous Historical Figures Who Self-Published

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In 1640, Stephen Day self-published the Bay Psalm Book, only 20 years after the pilgrims arrived in North America. Consider the self-publisher as the ultimate American underdog. Our history is pretty much filled with individuals who started publishing on their own, in somewhat obscure conditions, to become cultural and political leaders.

Ben Franklin self-published Poor Richard’s Almanac in 1732, well before he became known for his politics and diplomacy. Thomas Paine self-published “Common Sense,” a pamphlet that inspired the American revolution.

It makes sense that self-publishing would be a hotbed of interesting, radical ideas. If your ideas are truly radical and pushing the envelope, there’s a good chance they’ll scare off traditional publishers. We think this means you’re doing something right.

Mark Twain self-published Huckleberry Finn in 1885,  one of the first books to seriously tackle racism in America. Walt Whitman’s Leaves of Grass, a seminal collection of poetry that has inspired countless American writers, was also self-published.

What is it about self-publishing that attracts some of the best and most influential talent America has to offer? Hemingway self-published his first work, Three Stories and Ten Poems, in 1923. Perhaps it has something to do with the vanguard-status of writers who self-publish. Because they are often ahead of their time, traditional publishers may not feel ready to take a gamble on them. Perhaps because they consider what they have to say more important than definite material reward, they self-publish with an urgency and passion that they wouldn’t find at a publisher.

Thoreau, Stein, Crane… the list goes on. To consider self-publishing a new “trend” would be to ignore the very foundation of publishing and writing in America. In the Internet age, we’re given even more of an opportunity to put our writing out there, to publish it ourselves, be it digitally or physically, to connect with our readers and to make a difference in our world without a publisher, without an advance, without a care in the world.

The history of the American writer is really always the story of an underdog. No one is born a best-seller. Everyone starts as an underdog. There’s no bigger underdog than the self-publishing writer. And pretty consistently in America, the underdog makes a big difference.

by Max Rivlin-Nadler
April 5, 2012
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What do writers have in common with indie rock stars?

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DIY (Do-It-Yourself) culture is everywhere these days. What started as a punk rock ethos of spurning the system and making your own clothing, albums and films has become an essential part of our economy (it even has its own cable channel). Self-publishing, one of the oldest forms of DIY (I doubt Gutenberg had a corporate publisher before there was such a thing as mass-produced books), is a brazen statement of independence and resiliency, no different from someone making their own shoes or outdoor shower.

Then why don’t we associate self-publishing with something as radical and cool as someone selling cassettes from the trunk of their beat-up Volkswagen? Possibly, it’s the very nature of writers to be reclusive — not trumpeting their works from behind a microphone and sweating all over the front row of screaming teenagers. And yet almost each week we see a new author who chose to self-publish, to go DIY, become a media force, able to connect with thousands of fans through Facebook, YouTube and public events.

Self-Publishing is as DIY as it gets, it just looks a little different. A writer decides not only to brave perhaps the most solitary experience in the world (the writing of a book), but to also to try to market and help that book find an audience with little help from (or interference by) a publisher. They’re able to rely on friends, other authors and even strangers to help edit their book, to spread the word, to create an underground sensation. That’s why it’s always a shock to everyone whenever a self-published book finds its way to the best-seller list — because it was done through a network of loose acquaintances. It’s just like when an independent band suddenly explodes onto the scene — a slow, underground, DIY product has taken the world by surprise.

So, while we do admit that there are some key distinctions between indie rock stars and writers, we like to point out their similarities: they both now participate in a great tradition of creating your own work, controlling your own work and building community around that work. When you self-publish, you aren’t handing off your book to someone else and saying, “now this is your problem.” Instead, you’re looking at what you’ve created, recognizing you’ve done something outstanding, something that not many do and inviting people to help your project grow. You’re ready to Do It Yourself, with the help of others. And that’s what DIY is really all about.

by Max Rivlin-Nadler
March 30, 2012
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Literacy Month: Know the Facts, Make an Impact

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As writers, the very ability to read is something we take for granted. But the truth of the matter is that 32 million adults in the United States have low literacy skills. That means one in seven Americans would have a difficult time finishing even a page of a book. To us, people who spend our days writing and reading, it seems unfathomable that illiteracy is still a problem in the United States. But it is.

The Facts:

When parents don’t read to their kids, it can lower their average reading score by 74%. (source)

Only 31 percent of college graduates have high level literacy skills. (source)

Only 24% of 17 year olds ever read for fun. (source)


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by Max Rivlin-Nadler
March 23, 2012
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Is self-publishing a bubble?

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The dot-com bubble burst in the early 2000s, sending the economy into a recession. The housing bubble burst in the late 2000s, crippling the U.S. economy. Is self-publishing a bubble? Could it burst? And if so, what effect would it have on the publishing market? These are the questions that have been getting a lot of attention as self-publishing continues to expand in popularity, reaching all-time highs in both books being published and sold.

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