Publishing Books Quotes & Sayings

We sell books, other people sell shoes. What's the difference? Publishing isn't the highest art. — Michael Korda

She is the founder and owner of Luft Books, an independent publishing company, and the author of Bias Cut, Lonely — Morgan Richter

When I was publishing my first books, the previous generation of authors was fading away, so I was welcomed because I was a new author. — Orhan Pamuk

I really started self-publishing on a serious level in 2002. Those smaller books did well, ended up moving from doing a series to compiling everything into a trade paperback in about 2005. — Tim Fish

Books are like horcruxes
without all the evil
because a piece of the author goes into each one. — Ella J. Fraser

I had a hard time publishing my books in the beginning of my career, because editors were afraid what people would think of THEM, personally, if their name was associated with me. — Susie Bright

Books have a publishing standard, and every Indie Author is responsible to their readers in making sure those standards are met or exceeded. — Eeva Lancaster

To the people who insist they really do have a great idea but they just can't write, I'd say that given some of the books I've read, or at least started to read, it would appear that not being able to write is absolutely no obstacle whatsoever to writing a book and securing a publishing contract. Though becoming famous in some other field first may help. — Iain Banks

I know dozens of authors who have had a lot of books published by New York, and they won't ever take another Big 6 contract since they've gotten a taste of the freedom, control, and money self-publishing offers. — J.A. Konrath

It began to falter not when the book publishers who loved books gave way to those who preferred profits to reading. It happened when publishers and editors cut back on their drinking. If there is one national flower in book publishing, it is the martini. — Al Silverman

Writing is not a numbers game. You should focus more on reaching the hearts of readers and building fans more than publishing a plethora of books that no one may care about. — Selena Haskins

For seven years I wrote and published my texts on the Internet and no Arab festival invited me and no Arab publishing house wanted to publish my books, and I wasn't known in the Western world because of my political positions. — Hassan Blasim

If the novel is dead, I'm a necrophiliac. — Tiffany Madison

Elevation Book Publishing drives each book to their highest peak and afford authors the opportunity to rise to their full potential. We create thriving partnerships. — Rhonda Wilson

Some books and authors are best sellers, but most aren't. It may be easier to self-publish than it is to traditionally publish, but in all honesty, it's harder to be a best seller self-publishing than it is with a house. — Amanda Hocking

I call Algonquin Books 'the gods and goddesses of publishing.' Not only did they give me a career, they care deeply about every writer in their flock. — Caroline Leavitt

People can't read a book if they don't know it exists. All authors need to do marketing, regardless of how they published. — Jo Linsdell

The committees scour the bookstores, printing and publishing houses, paying particular attention to secondhand bookstores. There, they requisition countless copies of 'Incautious Maidens' or 'Flames at the Metropole.' So that those who prefer the false view of the world presented in cheap novels will never find refuge again. — Mariusz Szczygiel

I think that the practice of writing every day was what made me remember that writing doesn't have anything to do with publishing books. It can be totally separate and private - a comforting thought. — Nell Freudenberger

[ ... ]he also had a device which looked rather like a largish electronic calculator. This had about a hundred tiny flat press buttons and a screen about four inches square on which any one of a million "pages" could be summoned at a moment's notice. It looked
insanely complicated, and this was one of the reasons why the snug plastic cover it fitted into had the words
Don't Panic printed on it in large friendly letters. The other reason was that this device was in fact that most
remarkable of all books ever to come out of the great publishing corporations of Ursa Minor - The Hitch Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy. The reason why it was published in the form of a micro sub meson electronic component is that if it were printed in normal book form, an interstellar hitch hiker would require several inconveniently large buildings to carry it around in. — Douglas Adams

Americans ... publish more books than any other country, but the per capita figure is surprisingly low. Of the English-speaking nations, the United States comes in fifth, behind the United Kingdom, Canada, New Zealand, and Australia. The United Kingdom publishes 2,336 books per person, the United States 545. — Lewis Buzbee

Sometimes, I'm brave.
Sometimes, I'm just stubbron. — Nigia Stephens

One of the best book marketing tips I can give you is simply building relationships - well that and publishing more books. — Heather Hart

Amazon Pages and Amazon Upgrade leverage Amazon's existing 'Search Inside the Book' technology to give customers unusual flexibility in how they buy and read books, .. In collaboration with our publishing partners, we're working hard to make the world's books instantly accessible anytime and anywhere. — Jeff Bezos

One of the most terrifying aspects of publishing stories and books is the realization that they are going to be read, and read by strangers. I had never fully realized this before, although I had of course in my imagination dwelt lovingly upon the thought of the millions and millions of people who were going to be uplifted and enriched and delighted by the stories I wrote. — Shirley Jackson

When Superman was originally created, by Siegel and Shuster, they were two Jewish immigrants that were desperately trying to assimilate into America. They were having a hard time because they were Jewish. They wanted to get in to mainstream publishing but they couldn't. That's why they, and a lot of Jewish guys, went into comic books. — David S.Goyer

McSweeney's as a publishing company is built on a business model that only works when we sell physical books. So we try to put a lot of effort into the design and production of the book-as-object. — Dave Eggers

After much research I've found the secret to publishing: Write excellent books. Write lots of them. — Liana Brooks

The publishing industry has always wanted to make books as cheaply and as ephemerally as they could; it's nothing new. — Ben Katchor

Suddenly I could control every aspect of publishing, and it was incredibly empowering! I didn't have to sit by the phone any longer waiting for things to happen because I was the one making them happen. That's why I decided to start Amber House Books. — Teresa Medeiros

Writing is a solitary endeavor, being an author is not. — Karen A. Chase

What is true for book publishing is true for civilization: the books that survive the test of time are humanity's backlist, our collective memory. — Jason Epstein

I was in the second year of my PhD when I first had the idea - I'd recently started working as a translator, which meant firstly that I was hearing about amazing-sounding books from other translators, and also that I was getting enough of an insider's view of the publishing industry to be aware of all the implicit biases that made it so difficult for these books to ever get published, especially if they weren't from European languages (harder to discover, editors can't read the original, lack of funding programmes, authors who don't speak English). — Deborah Smith

When you decide to write and publish a book, you go into business - no matter how you publish that book. You enter the publishing business, which is the business of selling books. Consider your book the foundation of your business. — Nina Amir

It really gets me when the critics say I haven't done enough for the economy. I mean, look what I've done for the book publishing industry. You've heard some of the titles. 'Big Lies,' 'The Lies of George W. Bush,' 'The Lies and the Lying Liars Who Tell Them.' I'd like to tell you I've read each of these books, but that'd be a lie. — George W. Bush

Someone ought to publish a book about the doomsayers who keep publishing books about the end of publishing. — Evgeny Morozov

I used to read music books when I was 13. My mom was working at a library. She's a librarian. I would get my mom to check out any kind of books that had anything to do with the music industry. I read a lot about royalities, publishing, marketing, stuff like that. — Juicy J

At heart, Pearson is in the intellectual property business, be it through publishing books or the 'Financial Times'. — Marjorie Scardino

Readers have a loyalty that cannot be matched anywhere else in the creative arts, which explains why so many writers who have run out of gas can keep coasting anyway, propelled on to the bestseller lists by the magic words AUTHOR OF on the covers of their books. — Stephen King

Book-publishing is all about politics. Agents, editors, which books will be puffed, which ignored, etc. — Alexander Theroux

I began illustrating children's books because of a growing disillusionment with the sort of work I was doing in the advertising industry. Book publishing offered me the chance to be far more creative. — Graeme Base

In essence, Zizek's procedure here is no different in principle from that of Husserl, who wrote and rewrote voluminous drafts and was continually "introducing" the project of transcendental phenomenology. The one thing that has changed is that Zizek is publishing his drafts as he goes. — Adam Kotsko

What's funny about that is when I was writing Twilight just for myself and not thinking of it as a book, I was not thinking about publishing, and yet at the same time I was casting it in my head. Because when I read books, I see them very visually. — Stephenie Meyer

Early in my publishing career, someone told me I'd need to have five books in print before I could quit my job as a journalist. Turns out it was closer to 10 books. It also turns out that while it's great to see my titles on bookstore shelves, my best customers are schools and libraries. — Kate Klise

I am hoping to work with writers publishing books for first time, since I of course remember what that experience is like. It's all a bit of a mystery for new authors who don't know what to expect. — Rebecca Stead

There are two ways to look at my publishing career. One is that I'm a novelist churning out books, who is eight into a series; the other way is that I'm a cartoonist, just starting out. Most cartoonists have long careers: Charles Schulz drew Peanuts for 50 years. — Jeff Kinney

Programs has a temporary results leading to nothingness, and the Gospel the brings the result of Eternal life. — Tommie Scott

Every time you publish a book, be prepared to eat a fresh slice of humble pie. — Shana James

A book's a strange thing. It's ideas, feelings. It's fragile and complicated. You can't make them like refrigerators or cars. — Etienne Davodeau

London thou art a jewel of jewels, & jasper of jocunditie -- music, talk, friendship, city views, books, publishing, something central & inexplicable. — Virginia Woolf

No matter how good it is, your book will not sell itself. — Elinor Florence

If I send all the books that I faithfully wrote overseas, would that, for any chance, be considered work-shipping?? — Ana Claudia Antunes

After publishing a book, start writing the next. And repeat. Don't get hung up on overmarketing the books, focus more on getting more books out there — Crissi Langwell

One of the saddest things about publishing is how quickly it ages what it touches. The frenzy involved in getting books on shelves, and in putting the word out that they're there, moves at a speed that is not the speed of writing, let alone of reading. — Walter Kirn

I'm very privy to the way bookstores work, and I think a lot about the ecosystem that my books have been published in. I think it's great to be aware of how publishing works. — Gabrielle Zevin

New York publishing is about, 'What's the next Harry Potter? What's the next Twilight?' When I've approached people, I've asked, 'What is the book you've been dying to do, but New York won't do?' I want the books that they think won't sell - because I think they will. — Marissa Moss

THE MANY FACES OF SURVIVAL
Sunday, August 10th at 2:00 PST
Dachau Liberator, medical whistle-blower, award winning writer, college professor and world renowned garlic farmer, Chester Aaron, talks about the hard choices he's had to make, why he made them, and how it's changed his life.
Mr. Aaron was recognized by the National Endowment for the Arts, and received the Huntington Hartford Foundation fellowship which was chaired by Aldous Huxley and Tomas Mann. He also inspired Ralph Nader to expose the over-radiation of blacks in American hospitals.
Now Mr. Aaron is a world-renowned garlic farmer who spends his days writing about the liberation of Dachau. He is 86 years old and he has a thousand stories to tell. Although he has published over 17 books, he is still writing more and looks forward to publishing again soon. — Judy Gregerson

Publishing the lyric books, poetry or comics of other musicians I know. That's the thing I really want to break into! — Frank Iero

When I wanted to quit smoking cannabis a few years ago and found that I couldn't do it under my own steam I went in search of a self-help book to show me the way. Annoyingly all I could find were books on how to cultivate the damn stuff. So to exact my revenge on the world of publishing I decided to one day write that book myself. — Chris Sullivan

I'm seeing more and more books by celebrity authors, and I'm not happy to see them. I'd rather see publishing budgets devoted to genuine talents. — Jabari Asim

Nobody sells books like J.K. Rowling. We have a rule in publishing: Never compare anything to 'Harry Potter' because it's like lightning in a bottle. — Cassandra Clare

The current publishing scene is extremely good for the big, popular books. They sell them brilliantly, market them and all that. It is not good for the little books. And really valuable books have been allowed to go out of print. In the old days, the publishers knew that these difficult books, the books that appeal only to a minority, were very productive in the long run. Because they're probably the books that will be read in the next generation. — Doris Lessing

Books are such quiet things - created in silence, read in silence - yet publishing a book has become a very noisy business. I've been noisy, too. I felt like I had to be in order to connect with my readers. — Ellen Potter

Estimates are that in 2012, more than 32 million books were available - the explosion, thanks to the ease of self-publishing; 2013 could see even more titles grace our virtual bookstores! That means we are going to be awash in covers and titles, plot descriptions and characters. — M.J. Rose

Vanity's contribution to Fiction in general was an abundance of cheap labour and the occasional blockbuster, which was accepted into Fiction with an apologetic 'gosh, don't know how that happened'. — Jasper Fforde

My earliest books focus almost entirely on psychological tools to help readers employ effective commonsense approaches to problems. There are no references to God or a higher self in the first 15 or so years of my publishing history. — Wayne Dyer

Hey, ants!" she shouted. "Please help. Anteater is very hungry, but cannot find any food. — Emlyn Chand

Indeed, being a beginner is very difficult right now. Book publishers are in a crisis, sales are dwindling, and publishing houses are losing money, doing their best to survive. It's a sign of the times, the emergence of new kinds of entertainment
there's nothing we can do about it. I don't think books will perish for good. They could become less widespread, though, falling even further behind movies and computer games. But we shouldn't be afraid of this, because books will always remain the entertainment of choice for intelligent people, of whom there are still many in this world. — Sergei Lukyanenko

Write from the heart. A book without a pulse is like a person without a spirit. Linda Radke, President of Five Star Publications — Linda F. Radke

We have more choice than ever before about where and how we buy and read books. — Sara Sheridan

'Harry Potter' opened so many doors for young adult literature. It really did convince the publishing industry that writing for children was a viable enterprise. And it also convinced a lot of people that kids will read if we give them books that they care about and love. — Rick Riordan

Wrong' training can be a very innocent thing. Consider a father who allows his child to read good books. That child may soon cease to watch television or go to the movies, nor will he eventually read Book-of-the-Month Club selections, because they are ludicrous and dull. As a young man, then, he will effectually be excluded from all of Madison Avenue and Hollywood and most of publishing, because what moves him or what he creates is quite irrelevant to what is going on: it is too fine. His father has brought him up as a dodo. — Paul Goodman

You have made some notes, read some writing books, and done some research. Mostly what you've done is talk about writing a book. An idea for a book is not a book; it is a waste of time. There is no singular thing that makes someone a writer, but there is one thing that makes someone a joke
talking about writing a book without doing any work. — Pat Walsh

While writing my first 90 books, I was magazine editor, publisher, book publisher, executive, etc., so I was established in publishing. three of my seven or so books were biographies of sports stars and really opened doors for me in that area. — Jerry B. Jenkins

A good book is not the same as a successful one. — Johnny Rich

You were right the first time, Cathy. It was a stupid, silly story.
Ridiculous! Only insane people would die for the sake of love. I'll
bet you a hundred to one a woman wrote that junky romantic trash!"
Just a minute ago I'd despised that author for bringing about such a
miserable ending, then there I went, rushing to the defense. "T. M.
Ellis could very well have been a man! Though I doubt any woman writer
in the nineteenth century had much chance of being published, unless
she used her initials, or a man's name. And why is it all men think
everything a woman writes is trivial or trashy-or just plain silly
drivel? Don't men have romantic notions? Don't men dream of finding
the perfect love? And it seems to me, that Raymond was far more
mushy-minded than Lily! — V.C. Andrews

Until I became a nurse, no one had ever asked me to sign a book contract. I had been writing for decades, read thousands of books, and even worked in publishing for 10 years. Who knew that nursing would be my break? — Steven Amsterdam

Publishing is no longer simply a matter of picking worthy manuscripts and putting them on offer. It is now as important to market books properly, to work with the bookstore chains to getterms, co-op advertising, and the like. The difficulty is that publishers who can market are most often not the publishers with worthy lists. — Olivia Goldsmith

This is what happens when the discourse of publishing, defined and driven by spoken and written language, is talked about in exactly the same vocabulary and syntax as any widgetmaking industry. Books are reformulated as 'product' - like screwdrivers or flea-bombs or soap - and the majority of writers are perceived as typists with bad attitudes. — Suzette Haden Elgin

One of the reasons I wanted to write this column, I think, is because I assumed that the cultural highlight of my month would arrive in book form, and that's true, for probably eleven months of the year. Books are, let's face it, better than everything else ... . Even if you love movies and music as much as you do books, it's still, in any given four week period, way, way more likely you'll find a great book that you haven't read than a great movie you haven't seen, or a great album you haven't heard: the assiduous consumer will eventually exhaust movies and music ... the feeling everyone has with literature: that we can't get through the good novels published in the last six months, let alone those published since publishing began. — Nick Hornby

There is a lot of talk in publishing these days that we need to become more like the Internet: We need to make books for short attention spans with bells and whistles - books, in short, that are as much like 'Angry Birds' as possible. But I think that's a terrible idea. — John Green

When I was growing up the publishing world seemed so far away. When my mother wrote a book, she would look up the address of publishers on the backs of the books she owned and send off her manuscript. — Kiran Desai

Amazon is such a big player in publishing, but a lot of authors feel this connection to their publishing house and their editors who helped them get their books out there, so their loyalties tend to go that way. — Edan Lepucki

Aside from the movies, examples of positive-Black Swan businesses are: some segments of publishing, scientific research, and venture capital. In these businesses, you lose small to make big. You have little to lose per book and, for completely unexpected reasons, any given book might take off. The downside is small and easily controlled. The problem with publishers, of course, is that they regularly pay up for books, thus making their upside rather limited and their downside monstrous. (If you pay $10 million for a book, your Black Swan is it not being a bestseller.) Likewise, while technology can carry a great payoff, paying for the hyped-up story, as people did with the dot-com bubble, can make any upside limited and any downside huge. It is the venture capitalist who invested in a speculative company and sold his stake to unimaginative investors who is the beneficiary of the Black Swan, not the "me, too" investors. — Nassim Nicholas Taleb

You are not too small. No one is ever too small to offer help. — Emlyn Chand

It's possible there are no two books in publishing history more dissimilar than 'Human Traces' and 'Devil May Care.' And that was really the attraction of it. — Sebastian Faulks

As it stands there is a very strong argument that as the book trade becomes increasingly corporate it's our literary heritage that is at risk - a vital part of our culture. — Sara Sheridan

I've had situations when I've actually encouraged authors to self-publish because their book was poor. Now one would conclude that I'm asking them to self-publish because their book was poor and the self-publishing warehouse is where all the poor books belong. But no, it's because "poor" is only my opinion, and I'm just one in millions of readers. — King Samuel Benson

Frankly, I'd rather make a little bit less money if it means living in a better world for books and publishing in the future. — Tucker Max

There is only two kind of #books .First one is by some #famous person and Second one makes a person #famous . — Tushar Upreti

When people asked me what I did, I'd say, 'I work in publishing', and when they then say, 'What side of it?', I say, 'Supply' - no doubt leaving them to think I drive the books around in a van and deliver them. — Jim Crace

This is the cusp of an age at least as exciting and as brimful of potential as the early days of the printing press. — Sara Sheridan

I loved publishing; I loved working in the book industry, but I've been writing pretty much nonstop since I was 19. I realized very early on that I would need a day job, and I wanted one that was in books. — Garth Nix

In the industry, trying out new genres is not always encouraged but what I've discovered is that as a writer, a jaunt outside my comfort zone generally brings new skills to the main body of my work. — Sara Sheridan

A comic book publisher says he's trying to increase voter turnout in the presidential election by publishing comic books about John McCain and Barack Obama. Yeah, the publisher said that the election comic books are targeted at first-time voters and long-time virgins. — Conan O'Brien

Those of us who know the transporting wonder of a reading life know that it little matters where we are when we talk about books or meet authors or bemoan the state of publishing because when we read, we are always inside, sheltered in that interior room, that clean, well-lighted, timeless place that is the written word. — Alice McDermott

MADELINE SHEEHAN WILL BE PUBLISHING ALL HER BOOKS IN ALL FORMATS FROM NOW UNTIL HER UNTIMELY DEATH BY HEART ATTACK (AT A VERY YOUNG AGE) DUE TO GOODREADS! — Madeline Sheehan

I'm not an overnight success. My early publishing history, through my first five books, was unfortunate in many respects, typified by a couple of short anecdotes. — John Lescroart

Without the book business it would be difficult or impossible for true books to find their true readers and without that solitary (and potentially subversive) alone with a book the whole razzmatazz of prizes, banquets, television spectaculars, bestseller lists, even literature courses, editors and authors, are all worthless. Unless a book finds lovers among those solitary readers, it will not live ... or live for long. — John McGahern

Of course, people say maybe there are some self-published books out there that shouldn't be out there. Well, it's the same with conventional publishing. — Patti Davis