The Best Article I've Seen On Self-Publishing

Nancy Miller

According to 10 Top Ten Reviews, the top ten self publishing companies are:


  1. Lulu
  2. Createspace
  3. Authorhouse
  4. Outskirts Press
  5. iUniverse
  6. Llumina Press
  7. Xlibris
  8. Virtual Book Worm Publishing
  9. Infinity Publishing
  10. Wheatmark

The original idea was that I would compare the top five companies and report back to you. But I can’t possibly do better than they did in the aforementioned article. They have hit on everything you might want to know, and they have my respect for a job well done.

What I can do is give you an overview of what they found. The prices for a basic package ranged from $1299.00 (Wheatmark) to $430.00 (Virtual Book Worm). Whereas the Gold Medal winner, Lulu, is right at $999.00. These prices are for setting up a paperback book and ebook by the way I read it.

The article breaks down the overall rating, publishing package, additional paid services, bookselling reach, and help/support. I can’t believe how thorough it is. Make sure you hit ‘review’ under each company’s name. It will take you to a breakdown of that particular company, price for basic package, pros/cons and verdict. It also includes titles in print, minimum and maximum publishing time, and number of free author’s copies. Just below those stats is the narrative giving even more information. I am totally impressed. It went up on my Favorites bar immediately.

Now, if you just want a Kindle ebook, they are relatively easy to format and cost virtually nothing. But if you want to be listed on Baker & Taylor, Ingram, Barnes and Noble, etc. then you have to reformat/resubmit for each. Part of the cost in many of these companies is that they format for those other distributors, and they list the books on search engines. That is a huge relief for the writer.

You can hire people to format your manuscript for e-readers or go with a publisher who will do the job and get the paperback published. How much it will cost basically depends on how much work you want to do.

So that’s it. I started to write a fabulous article on self-publishing and found one that did the work for me. I’m good with that.