Rights to Author - Now What Do I Do?

[karenranney]

I've been holding onto the rights for my first published book for a couple of years now. It sold over a 100,000 copies and has won awards, etc.

What are the options open to me? I think I know most of them, but I'm soliciting advice.

[Medievalist]

Get an e-book out, from either/or Palm Press, or Fictionwise, or Embiid. These are hands down the most professional. Fictionwise and Embiid are less known for romance, but they both treat authors well. Palm is larger, the process is more polished, but you'll be one of the herd.

[maestrowork]

Sub rights (movie, e-book, audio book, foreign)? Adapt it to a script? Reprint? If it was a hb, try pb, or vice versa?

[James D. Macdonald]

The choices are

a) reprint with the same publisher
b) reprint with another rmajor
c) reprint with a small press
d) electronic version (e.g. fictionwise)
e) self-publish
f) PoD (e.g. iUniverse back-in-print program)

If you're agented, this is a question for the agent. Award-winning, 100,000+ sales, should be marketable.

[karenranney]

Perfect. Just wanted I wanted. Thank you, all.

(I'm not agented on this book. It's an orphan.)

[James D. Macdonald]

Do you have an agent right now, Karen?

[maestrowork]

Fictionwise requires at least 10 reprints from established authors.

[Medievalist]

Fictionwise requires at least 10 reprints from established authors.

That's negotiable, really. It's easier with an agent, and I'd suggest using one, or an attorney who really knows and understands digital rights, because the contract is complex.

But they do negotiate.