Top 100 Quotes About Book Publishing
#1. I wanted to highlight that whole dreadful process in book publishing that 'nothing succeeds like success.'
Doris Lessing
#2. 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
#3. People in the newspaper industry saw the web as a newspaper. People in TV saw the web as TV, and people in book publishing saw it as a weird kind of potential book. But the web is not just some kind of magic all-absorbing meta-medium. It's its own thing.
Paul Ford
#4. Book-publishing is all about politics. Agents, editors, which books will be puffed, which ignored, etc.
Alexander Theroux
#5. One of the greatest threats facing book publishing, and the entire country for that matter, is censorship.
Bennett Cerf
#6. The Thieves of Manhattan is a sly and cutting riff on the book-publishing world that is quite funny unless you happen to be an author, in which case the novel will make you consider a more sensible profession-like being a rodeo clown, for example, or a crab-fisherman in the Bering Sea.
Carl Hiaasen
#7. 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
#8. I think that the economics of book publishing favor hits with long book runs. You make all your money on the last bunch of books, not the first.
Seth Godin
#9. OUTLANDER A Delta Book PUBLISHING HISTORY Delacorte Press hardcover edition published 1991 Delta trade paperback edition/July 2001 Published by Bantam Dell A Division of Random House, Inc.
Diana Gabaldon
#10. There's a cardinal rule in book publishing that applies equally to brain surgery and auto mechanics: "If it ain't broke, don't fix it." Since people are still buying the original Where Is God When It Hurts?
Philip Yancey
#11. It's interesting that the book publishing industry, on the iPad, has much more flexibility than the music industry had.
Edgar Bronfman Jr.
#12. A very great deal is written about the future of book publishing - much more than on its present or past - and the only takeaway from all these oracles seems to be that a great empire will be destroyed.
Dave Morris
#13. Book publishing would be so much easier without the authors.
Dan Brown
#14. But jackets are the redheaded stepchildren of book publishing. We blame them for everything.
Gabrielle Zevin
#15. Technology has changed the way book publishing works, as it has changed everything else in the world of media.
Bruce Jackson
#16. 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
#17. 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
#18. I think I'm gonna attach myself to the sinking ship that is book publishing.
Daniel Clowes
#19. Australian SF book publishing has undergone a boom recently, and sometimes it's easier for new writers to sell a book to a local publisher first, which then makes a US edition more likely.
Greg Egan
#20. When I left college I thought - based on a staggeringly inadequate understanding of how the world worked - that I might like to go into book publishing.
Lev Grossman
#21. Book publishing was never a heaven "run by editors", and it is by no means today a hell "run by accountants." If our "sole interest" was "instant profit," not only would we never do any number of the things we actually do every day, we probably wouldn't be in book publishing at all.
Patrick Nielsen Hayden
#22. I wrote a book. It sucked. I wrote nine more books. They sucked, too. Meanwhile, I read every single thing I could find on publishing and writing, went to conferences, joined professional organizations, hooked up with fellow writers in critique groups, and didn't give up. Then I wrote one more book.
Beth Revis
#23. 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
#24. Publishing a book of poetry is like dropping a rose petal down the Grand Canyon and waiting for the echo.
Don Marquis
#25. I learned that you have to respect how much time and work a writer has put into their book. I always give the writer I'm publishing a good deal of control in shaping the book and figuring out how it looks, but I'll make suggestions on how to make it stronger.
Kevin Sampsell
#26. The publishing of a book is a worldwide event. The attempt to suppress a book is a worldwide event.
Salman Rushdie
#27. You know, in the old days, you might be able to slowly sort of build an audience for your work by publishing two, three novels before you hit it big. You know, now, there's much more of an emphasis in the publishing houses on making sure that every book makes money.
Chad Harbach
#28. Everything is different - except for publishing itself: getting hold of an amazing author, working to make his or her book the best and best-looking it can be, telling the world.
Jonathan Galassi
#29. I maintain an ongoing survey of Internet Publishing and self publishing, so that it is now possible for any writer with a book to get it published at nominal cost or free, and to have it on sale at booksellers like Amazon.
Piers Anthony
#30. 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
#31. The dirty little secret of publishing is that, all along, each book sold has had an average of 5 readers. That's an 80% "piracy" rate if you insist on looking at it in those terms.
Charles Stross
#32. No book or magazine article is for "everyone" so know your audience, then target them with your writing.
W. Terry Whalin
#33. One of the best book marketing tips I can give you is simply building relationships - well that and publishing more books.
Heather Hart
#34. Anybody can write a book. But writing it well and making it sell - that's the hard part.
Jay Taylor
#35. Electronic distribution is more of a fall-back strategy for putting out a book that isn't deemed profitable enough to print. You hardly make any money publishing an electronic book.
Rudy Rucker
#36. Fame, money and the size of the market are not very important to me. What is, is writing a book that is worth doing and then publishing it. I don't write books for entertainment, for people to pass the time then throw away.
Aidan Chambers
#37. My belief that the publishing industry is run by prigs and cowards dates back to many years before I even had the idea for the book.
Jessa Crispin
#38. The process of writing a book is so removed in my mind from the process of publishing it that I often forget for great stretches that I eventually hope to do the latter.
Karen Joy Fowler
#40. Publication is a marathon, not a sprint. Writing the book is only the start.
Jo Linsdell
#41. 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
#42. It may take a village to raise a baby, but hell! it takes an army to produce a book.
Sara Sheridan
#43. An author's strong belief and enthusiasm will affect the writing of the book and often the publisher's commitment to it.
Sterling Lord
#44. Writing a book and not publishing it, is like building a boat and never sailing it - UNTHINKABLE!
Tony Jones
#45. Publishing a new book is like adding anything new to your life--marriage, a child, a new job, a new house. It takes time to adjust to a different status.
Annette Wood
#46. 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
#47. I write slowly by hand. Publishing is effectively bankrupt for you unless you are Danielle Steele. It takes a year to write book and advances are going down or disappearing.
Erica Jong
#48. 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
#49. No matter how good it is, your book will not sell itself.
Elinor Florence
#50. I sighed. "What's a couple of bullets to the chest when compared to a grenade? Bulletproof vests are great things. Every girl should have one."
Blain, RJ (2014-05-11). Inquisitor (Witch & Wolf Book 1) (Kindle Locations 1452-1453). Pen & Page Publishing. Kindle Edition.
R.J. Blain
#51. Ooh-kaay. Moving on from odd reaction to completely innocent question.
Zart, Lindy (2014-09-04). Ordinary (Anything But Series Book 1) (p. 14). Crushing Hearts and Black Butterfly Publishing. Kindle Edition.
Lindy Zart
#52. So, while I gave up the notions of publishing at that time, I never stopped editing and refining that book. A few years later, in 1987, I thought I had it ready to go out again.
R.A. Salvatore
#54. What with the reviews of critics, the sarcasms of one's friends, the reproaches of one's own taste, there's precious little peace after publishing a book ...
Winifred Holtby
#55. Given the current state of publishing, I think it helps to have a brand name on the cover of your book. Comedians are proven commodities with built-in audiences. They may not have the writing chops of a Dave Eggers, but they're salacious and funny and self-reflective.
Michael Showalter
#56. 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
#57. Maybe self-publishing is going to be an extra step added to publishing. Maybe what's going to happen is you self-publish a book, someone notices it - an agent? - and it goes from there into the traditional sphere.
Victoria Strauss
#58. 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
#59. I had the easiest publishing experience in the entire world. I sent out fifteen courier letters to agents, got five no replies, nine rejections and one I want to see it. A month later I had an agent. Another month later I had a three book deal with Little Brown.
Stephenie Meyer
#60. My grief is that the publishing world, the book writing world is an extraordinary shoddy, dirty, dingy world.
V.S. Naipaul
#61. I worked in publishing before I became an author, so I knew how a book gets made.
Lauren Oliver
#62. Publishing a book is great. Dropping a lame pitch on a potential customer and STILL racking up a book sale? Priceless. Or 8 bucks--whichever works best.
Tevin Hansen
#63. I think that writing texts, publishing texts, selling texts in a physical book store is one of the important tools for breeding this new generation.
Alexander Mamut
#64. God forbid that I should ever suffer the shame of publishing a book for money, or of having one of my family so demean themselves. How can one tell who might read it? No worthy book has ever been written for gain, I think;
Iain Pears
#65. What sells a book sells a book, same in traditional or self-publishing. You gotta shake your tail feathers.
Joni Rodgers
#66. Diabetic Diet. The premise of this book is to enable the reader to choose healthy foods by following a healthier more nutritious diet plan.
Speedy Publishing
#67. As a book author, it's your responsibility to cast a vision for your book about the length and appearance before you pitch the idea to a publisher.
W. Terry Whalin
#68. Anyone who says it's easy to self-publish a book is either lying or doing a shitty job.
Nan McCarthy
#69. 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
#70. 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
#71. Three carefully stringed words are worth more than a book of gibberish. It's not the word count but the impact of those words that counts.
Richelle E. Goodrich
#72. Of publishing a book on religion, my dear sir, I never had an idea. I should as soon think of writing for the reformation of Bedlam, as of the world of religious sects. Of these there must be, at least, ten thousand, every individual of every one of which believes all wrong but his own.
Thomas Jefferson
#73. To read a book, to think it over, and to write out notes is a useful exercise; a book which will not repay some hard thought is not worth publishing.
Maria Mitchell
#74. 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
#75. There's only one thing more frightening than being asked to do a book tour, and that's not being asked to do a book tour.
Gerald Petievich
#76. The trouble with the publishing business is that too many people who have half a mind to write a book do so.
William Targ
#77. REFLECTION. In discussing abortion, its supporters never defend the act of abortion itself, but only the alleged right of someone to have one. They focus on the freedom to choose it, but avoid describing what is chosen.
Catholic Book Publishing Corporation
#78. Apple doesn't need to maximize book sales. It simply needs to keep publishers happy enough to maintain an impressive-sounding inventory of titles while waiting for entirely new forms of publishing to develop.
Virginia Postrel
#79. It is bound to be a failure, every book is a failure, but I do know with some clarity what kind of book I want to write.
George Orwell
#80. Self publishing' is not as easy as it is portrayed! When you think you have finished your book, proof read, proof read again, and again, and again. Don't believe it is ready until you have a hard copy proofed!
Phil Simpkin
#81. 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
#82. I had been self-publishing for a number of years at that stage and selling my books at markets around Melbourne - little pocket books. I'd make them for 10 cents and sell them for a dollar. But I knew there was an audience who loved silly stuff so I just kept plugging away.
Andy Griffiths
#83. In the end, what makes a book valuable is not the paper it's printed on, but the thousands of hours of work by dozens of people who are dedicated to creating the best possible reading experience for you.
John Green
#84. Every time I start off a book or a story I feel like I'm developing a new style or approach for that individual story alone, and it sometimes feels as if readers are looking for the same style/approach from the same writer over and over again, which hasn't helped me in the publishing biz.
Scott Bradfield
#85. If writing and publishing a book is like giving birth to a child, then book marketing is like rearing it.
Heather Hart
#86. Publishing a book is like being pregnant. By the end, you're just ready to get that baby out!
Carmen DeSousa
#87. Starting your book is only the first five miles of a twenty-six-mile marathon that's one-third of a triathlon (authoring, publishing, and entrepreneuring).
Guy Kawasaki
#88. You can't judge a book by it's cover but you can sure sell a bunch of books if you have a good one.
Jayce O'Neal
#89. Publishing is a very mysterious business. It is hard to predict what kind of sale or reception a book will have, and advertising seems to do very little good.
Thomas Wolfe
#90. Writers can write whatever they want, but after THE END, when they self publish their book, they become accountable to readers for the quality of the book they're selling.
Eeva Lancaster
#91. I didn't really start publishing books until I was 40 because I was busy being a McDonald's employee. So there's always a sense of trying to make up for lost time.
Jerry Stahl
#92. If he kissed her once, just once, he'd walk away and never think about it again.
Brooklyn Skye
#93. Publishing a book is like giving birth. You labor over it and then produce what you think is the most beautiful thing in the world. Then some asshat comes along and says 'what an ugly baby'. And you want to throat punch the Fuq into Outer Mongolia. Quote by Jordan Silver 12/22/13
Jordan Silver
#94. [P]ersonally, I know I'd prefer to read an honest review by someone who has no reason to lie, than a book reviewer who has an employer and a publishing house to keep happy.
Catherine Ryan Howard
#95. Book clubs are the best thing that has happened to the world of publishing.
Adriana Trigiani
#96. [Mark] Twain was a publisher. He published General Grant's Memoirs (a big success) and had a hand in the publishing of many of his own books. He would, I think, be very keen about the question of how a book would sell.
Hal Holbrook
#97. You'll learn that the key to a great book is editing - grinding, buffing, and polishing - not writing.
Guy Kawasaki
#98. I got a couple of different contacts from publishing companies saying they'd be interested in a book about my work: not a kiss-and-tell book, which I specifically put in the contract. Just a book about my work and what I did.
Linda Ronstadt
#99. The creation is a very internal process, and publishing the book is a very external process. It is nice to see the book out in the world and people having the same reaction as when I created it. The point of all art is the emotional transference, and when that happens, the book has succeeded.
Elliot Ackerman
