BookPeople opened in Austin in 1970, and was named Best Bookstore in the United States in 2005 by Publishers Weekly. Many famous authors include BookPeople in their book-signing tours. Laura Bush was there recently and Jimmy Carter will be signing his latest book at BookPeople on October 29, 2010. They’re selling tickets to the Carter event for crowd control.
Even with their national fame, BookPeople has a special place on its shelves for local authors. Just inside the front door, on the way to the coffee shop, there is a shelf on the left with a sign that says Texas Authors. There are some famous names there, including one of my favorites, Susan Wittig Albert
. Five of my books are in the same shelf. Well, hopefully, there are fewer now. My friend Rollo Newsom has written a community comment card for this shelf.You’ll find five more copies of Where Love Once Lived on the second floor in the inspiration section right along with Jan Karon’s books. I picked that shelf because of Karon, and added a community comment card with quotes from Sandy Althaus’ review.
So what, you’re thinking. Bookstores sell books. They stock books. That’s what they do.
Well, most don’t stock print-on-demand (POD) books like mine. The big chain bookstores won’t stock Where Love Once Lived. They’ll sell it to you and get one for you, but only if you pay in advance and wait a week.
BookPeople in Austin and Hill Country Bookstore in Georgetown both stock my book because on their consignment programs. I furnish the books and they sell them. I end up making a little less than books sold on Amazon.com, but not by much. Also, I’m responsible for costs due to theft or damage.
Is this a reason to avoid publishing POD books? I don’t know yet. With a new book almost ready to pitch, I wish I knew. I’ll be looking at the pros and cons of self publishing and traditional publishing and reporting my findings to you in a future post. If you have knowledge about it, please comment here.
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