My Experience Self-Publishing

My Project

My book included translations of hymns, with footnotes and a bibliography.  I needed to obtain permissions to include the translations in the book.  (To learn more about my book, go here:  Lady of Praise, Lady of Power.)

I decided to self-publish my book using Lulu.com in both paperback and PDF formats with 2 free ISBNs from Lulu.  I also chose to distribute it on Amazon.  (Links are here:  My Lulu Store or My Amazon Page.)

The Good

I lucked out and found great people.  So many Egyptologists and publishers were kind enough to grant me permission to include their translations  or allowed me to translate from their material and include it in my book.

I found a great cover designer.  He really did a great job.  His website:  Meit’s Garret Gallery

I found a wonderful person who granted me permission to use her papyrus image as the main image on my front cover.

I found a wonderful, patient and efficient book designer.  She was so patient with me and so professional.  And her turn-around for edits was within a few days to a week.  Here is the website:  Penoaks Publishing

The Permissions

I had to get permission to translate the hymns from French or German or to include other

people’s translations in the book.  I emailed publishers and Egyptologists explaining my project and asked permission to include their material in my work.

I lucked out again.  Many said yes with the only caveat that I send them a copy of the book in both E-Book and Paperback format.  Some (only 3) did ask for a permissions fee in order to grant me permission to reproduce their work.  In total I spent approximately $350.00 USD for those.

Requesting permissions for everything took about 2 years.  But that’s because I kept adding things to the book.  And I also had to wait for the responses to my initial request.  So if someone else does anything similar, it may take less or more time.  It depends.

The Money Side of Things

So adding up my expenses for this book, I paid:

Permissions:  approx. $350 USD

Book Design:  $119 USD +  $10 USD (for an extra tweaking)

Book Cover:  $85 USD  (He had to do it twice because I got the sizing wrong the first time)

All of this totaling $564 USD.

Plus the cost of printing and shipping the paperback copies to the publishers and Egyptologists who asked for them.

What I Learned

I learned that I needed to organize the book at the start the project.  I needed to get the size specifications for the cover once I input the final page count into the Lulu publishing wizard.

And I saw that there were kind and wonderful people willing to support my project.

So to all who made this possible, I would like to say:  Thank you.