Artificial intelligence (AI) has been present in our lives for the past few years now. You can find it on social media, writing tools, and even in search engines. Its ever-looming presence begs the question: are we going to lose our jobs to AI?
One of the most important parts of the acquisitions process for a publisher is determining if a manuscript they are considering is likely to sell enough copies to make financial sense to publish. One of the ways publishers can determine audience interest is finding comparative titles, or comp titles. While a winning set of comp titles isn’t the secret to getting a book deal, understanding their function in publishing and having a few solid options will help any author seeking publication position their book effectively.
Tabling at an event comes with all sorts of factors to consider, many that you need to get a head start on. Working with a new venue, however, is a whole different ball game. In starting fresh somewhere new, there’s only so much you can figure out in advance.
It’s Saturday night in Portland. I’m sitting at a small table decorated with garlands of marigolds and small tea cups. Sweet incense mixes with the last breath of a candle. A wash of red light covers the room. Around a rectangular table, eight other people I have never met sit listening as once-local author Nick Jaina alternates between reading from his book Spektrum and winding melodies through the room with his guitar and voice.
A majority of my position is digital collaboration: reviewing Marketing or Publicity documents for project teams, corresponding with Project Managers, or reaching outside Ooligan for various extracurricular publishing activities. Marketing and Publicity are actually two distinct departments at Ooligan Press. The role of Marketing and Publicity Manager is unique because it is one of the few positions that is currently combined; while the responsibilities vary, the skillset is similar.
One of the most carefully considered decisions in the early stages of the publishing process is how to classify and categorize a book. These decisions are often the cornerstone of how a book finds its way home to readers who will most appreciate it. It’s a delicate balance between enticing readers to pick up just the book they’ve been waiting for, and gently signaling what readerships might not enjoy the book so that readers don’t end up feeling tricked into purchasing something that isn’t what they wanted.
Over the past several years, manga has been experiencing huge growth. One of the many reasons for its appeal is likely due to anime. While book to screen adaptations or screen to book projects aren’t uncommon in other genres, it’s far more common with manga and anime.
Want to join the infamous BookTok or increase the bookish context that lands on your For You page? Maybe you just want to diversify your TBR? Start here!
Thorn City is Ooligan Press’ forthcoming suspense/thriller title. Now that the developmental edit and title generation have been completed, the book is moving on to the next steps. During the Winter 2023 term, the heavy copyedit was sent to the author for review and the Thorn City team has been working on the persona exercise, marketing plan, and cover design brief.
Some blurbs that we receive will end up on the front or back cover of our book. However, this will depend on many factors, including but not limited to the length of the blurb, the length of the other front or back cover copy, how much space the book cover design allocates for a blurb, how many blurbs we receive, and the print deadline.