Record Detail Back
A Guide to Book Publishing for the Social Science Writer
- Share to:
Book publishing has become an increasingly fraught professional activity for the academic these days. Quite gone are those halcyon days when you could easily get your PhD published as a ‘scholarly work’. Publishing costs have escalated so much that even the most idealistic commercial publisher can ill afford to publish ‘studies’ which will interest just a few hundred readers.
The common attitude of Australian publishers in particular suggests that unless your book will sell above 1500 copies there will be little commercial interest in your work. Can your argument, your theory, or even your idea for a textbook sell at least 1500 copies? Think. Think hard and honestly because you can be sure that either the anonymous reviewers, the commissioning editor, and, or, the publisher’s editorial committee will be asking the same question - and answering it dispassionately, mercilessly.
If you are Anthony Giddens or some other iconic person, your book - whatever it’s on - will probably sell that number just because disciples, fans, or the simply curious will buy that many copies anyway. For the rest of us plebeians, more organised strategies and thinking are required. It all starts with The Book Proposal. Here is the first evidence for the publisher that you can even write at all. So that document should look professionally put together and should always appear well thought through.
Allan Kellehear, PhD. - Personal Name
2nd Edition
07259 09897
NONE
Social Science
English
2002
1-19
LOADING LIST...
LOADING LIST...