Publish yourself and be damned

[dArKeR]

When Amy Fisher finished writing her memoir about shooting her lover's wife, she told her agent not to send the manuscript to New York publishers. Instead, Fisher, who made headlines in 1992 as the 17-year-old "Long Island Lolita,'' turned to iUniverse in Lincoln, Neb. The company charges authors several hundred dollars to convert a manuscript into a book and make it available for sale online.

Fisher's If I Knew Then, which came out in September, is probably the first sure-fire success to start out under the imprint of a so-called self-publishing company. Other self-published books, notably The Celestine Prophecy and The Christmas Box, became best sellers, but their success was a surprise to the publishing industry.

iUniverse is one of more than 100 "author services'' companies in a fast-growing industry aimed primarily at writers who can't get the attention of traditional publishers. Earlier this month Amazon.com got into the act, announcing that it had acquired BookSurge, a printing company with a self-publishing division based in Charleston, South Carolina, BookSurge uses print-on-demand technology that makes it possible to guarantee a two-day turnaround to print a book, even if only one customer orders a copy.

http://www.taipeitimes.com/News/feat/archives/2005/05/01/2003252771