A Writer's Love

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A friend of mine, Nicole White, has started a Christian Independent publishing firm called Magpie Eclectric Press. Here’s a little bit about it. Enjoy!!

1) Why did you start Magpie Eclectric Press?


I started Magpie Eclectic Press first and foremost because of the strong passion I have for the written word. For years I’ve been considering the idea, but every time I prayed about it, I felt like God was saying, “No, not yet. Just wait a while yet.”

While I was waiting, I was doing research, and everywhere I turn, I come to the same conclusion… there just aren’t enough good Christian publishers for Speculative fiction out there in the world. There are plenty of good writers out there, many who might decide to self publish or else who might never get the chance to have their work see publication. This year, I felt in my heart that this was THE year to open Magpie… and so I started getting everything set up and prepared.


So, in essence, Magpie Eclectic was created out of a passion and love that I have for the written word, and this strong calling and NEED I have in my heart to help other writers improve and shine. In the process I’m sure I will learn many new and wonderful (and perhaps some not so wonderful) things as well.

2) What types of books are you looking for?


We are looking for anything Speculative, but we are especially looking for Christian Speculative. So, Science Fiction, Fantasy, Thrillers, paranormal… and all of their subgenres.

The reason we opened our submissions to some books that might not be strictly Christian is because we recognize the entertainment and sometimes the lessons that can be learned from good clean fiction that might not be what some would call “Christian”. For instance, I think it would be GRAND if Magpie somehow stumbled across the next Cornelia Funke, Christopher Paolin, or Ted Dekker. Books like Inkheart, Eregon, The Sword of Shanara, Bran Hambric, The Personofid Invasion (through MLP), Percy Jackson, House, Imanuel’s Veigns, Frank Perreti’s book, Monster, and the Hunger Games … those are the types of books we are looking for; well told, well written christian Speculative fiction of any subgrene in the age groups of Adult, YA, and middle grade.

We are also open to some poetry collections. I am a big fan of well written poetry myself. Sometimes the most beautiful bits of inspiration come from a descriptive poem.

We are not, however, looking for books for Children, picture books, books that are very dark, or even demonic in nature, or books that stand against a Christian World View in general. While we accept some secular titles, we are still Christians here at this press… books that stand against what we believe in will not be tolerated or accepted.

3) Will your company put the books into the bookstore or is it mostly internet stores?

Our goal is to eventually get the books into physical bookstores, both in our area and the areas of our authors, as well as to offer books through distribution services such as Ingram. However, the majority of our marketing and sales is likely to be online. The internet is a wondrous place where authors and publishers alike can reach interested readers all over the world. ^_^ Here at Magpie, we will be doing all we can to push the author’s book forward in the literary world. We will need the author’s help, of course, but we won’t be slacking on our side either

4) What is the author’s royalty?


After the break even point for production costs, the author starts getting paid 40% of net profit. The net profit is the profit made after printing costs and service provider fees. Service provider fees are 40% of profit made after printing costs… so basically, the net profit is what is left after the printing cost is taken care of and after the service provider takes out their cut. Then the net profit is split so that the author gets their royalties, which is 40%. This is much, MUCH more than what any of the large publishing houses offer, and still much more than what many other small presses are offering their authors as well.

I know that some authors think that this percentage is still not enough of a royalty cut. HOWEVER, an author should remember that as a publisher, we will be working for our cut. We produce the book, yes, and that’s the upfront cost, but for as long as the author’s contract is maintained, we will continue to work to promote and sell and publicize our authors’ books.

Think of it this way. It would be as if an author decided to self publish and then hired a publicist and an agent to help them in marketing. As a publisher, we are multi-tasking. We produce, publish, and publicize… and at the same time we continue to handle the troublesome truths of dishing out the cuts to printers and service-providers, and so on and so forth. We are definitely working for our pay.

5) You said you used a POD style. What are the advantages of the POD style and what does that mean?

POD has the advantage of not having print runs which keeps surplus down and erases the need for warehousing altogether. This is a good thing for small presses on any kind of budget because neither the publisher nor the author has to worry about storage space or how much that might cost. It also means the consumer is getting the best type of product available… fresh off the press, ready to read, not tampered with. Who wouldn’t like a book like that? ^_^ Also, POD is environmentally friendly, since it only prints what the consumer orders, thereby aiding the movement to save our forest resources by eliminating the waste of printing on an excess amount of paper. So in the end, everyone is happy all the way around.

6) Does the author have to buy the books and then sell them himself?


No, the author doesn’t HAVE to, but it is HIGHLY encouraged. As we are a small press, we know that our marketing will only take an author’s book so far. However, with the author’s help, a book could go even FARTHER than it could with only the publisher working to market it.

Authors are encouraged to approach friends and relatives, talk to bookstore owners, speak at libraries and local schools, attend book fairs and craft fairs in your area, set up book signings, approach local newspapers, see about getting interviews with local news channels, or perhaps a radio stations. It’s also good if an author works to set up contests on your blog and website, and talk to people about hosting blog tours and mini book tours. We also ask that our authors look into building their online platforms so that they will have a following to support them when the book comes out for purchase. We will be doing much of the same work on our end; we really expect no less from our authors whose life-works are on the line. If an author’s book is important to them, they will work to market it.

With that said, an author is NEVER expected to buy a book at full price. First of all, Magpie Eclectic Press automatically offers ten physical ARC’s of the book against the author’s royalties to be negotiated and sent out to the author’s pick of endorsers who agree to read the book and review/endorse. After the 10 ARC’s, the author can purchase more books at an author discount of 40% after printer costs… and if an author purchases 50 or more books at one time, the discount becomes 40% + 20% after printer costs. An author may also send out as many PDF’s or e-books as they see fit. It’s also good to note that copies of an author’s book bought at an author’s discount actually counts towards the author’s production break-even point. This means that an author can even help to push themselves to break-even, and start getting paid that much sooner.

As mentioned before, authors don’t HAVE to do this, but it is much better all around if authors plan to work on selling and marketing their books both online, and physically.

7) Will you help the author market the books? If so, how?


Yes, yes, YES! Of course we will help market the book! We will be pushing the book into as many outlets as we are able to. We will be pushing for online marketing with FB, goodreads, our website, amazon (both kindle additions, and physical copies), barnesandnoble.com, smashwords, etc… We will also be trying to get the book into bookstores in our area, as well as having the book available through distribution channels. Our goal is to get Magpie books into Ingram, which is currently off-limits to publishers with less than 10 books available, but there are also other options supported by Ingram that support small publishers with less than 10 books to offer. Right now I’m looking into applications for some of those.

We are also planning to work with our authors to create other marketing options… we hope to help our authors set up mini/online book tours, blog tours, author chats, amazon blitz days, etc…

Marketing a book is a jointed effort between the author and the publisher. We will be working hard to make sure this book gets into the public’s eye, you can count on it.

8 ) Will you help in book signings?

That really depends on a few things… budget being a MAJOR one. We can definitely help authors set up book signings, and we might be able to help with costs for signings sometime in the future. However, at this point in time our resources are unfortunately limited, so unless our author’s live relatively close to our location, it is unlikely that we will be able to help very much in the way of book signings.

We CAN, however, offer the author marketing material that will be set against the author’s royalties. Such material includes pamphlets, bookmarks, posters, and business cards. ^_^ I would even like to provide authors with a special “book signing pen”. I think that would be pretty awesome… and as an author, I think I would appreciate it too.

9) How long before the book is available for sale?

This is a hard question to answer. Some projects may generally take longer than other projects as a given. I know that it may take months to get a book produced to perfection, maybe even a year, and my current goal is to have Magpie release a list of 2 to 3 books at a time as their first list and the “official opening” of the company. First finding the books that we want to produce, and then producing those books will definitely take some time. Hopefully within the next year (maybe two, if things don’t go very well at first), we will be able to release our first list. After that I expect that the process will go faster, a we will probably already have submissions waiting for review, and maybe we will even have some other books picked out to produce.

10) Will the Author sign a contract with your company?


Yes, the author will sign a contract with the company. This is a given for all publishing companies.

As a small press, we retain the right to publish your material in the formats agreed upon in the author contract. Terms of the contract will be thoroughly discussed to make sure that both parties are satisfied before anything is signed into agreement. And let me now make it clear that the stories our authors send us remains the authors property without exception; however, as a publisher, we will retain the right to printing and distributing. If it is ever agreed that the contract should be terminated – whether instigated by the author or by the publisher – the contract will be voided within a default 6 months (or agreed upon time span) of both publisher and author having signed a written termination agreement.

The reason contract termination is handled this way is to make sure that we, as the publisher, can try to sell out any of the author’s books that we still have in stock (in stock, here, meaning placed in bookstores, on amazon, etc… we would have to get all of that cleared out and taken down so that the author would be free and clear to present their story to the world at a different time under their own name or a new company name.) 6 months after the termination agreement is signed, all rights automatically revert back to the author… period. And we will renounce all claims to that story’s publishing rights or distribution rights. The story is and always will be the authors. End of story.

It is the author’s choice to publish with us, and our honored privilege. We don’t want to impose on that privilege, and a contract helps both the author and the publisher set boundaries so that both parties end up happy with the result of the product, and the service provided.