Still open

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There have been some recent personal events that have caused a protracted silence here. However, Leg Iron Books is still open and the eleventh anthology is still accepting submissions until midnight on March 31st.

Apologies are due to those authors waiting to hear about books they’ve submitted. We will get back to normal, gradually. Please be patient.

In view of the current plague infecting the world, payments to authors will be by PayPal or bank transfer. No cheques. Those who wish to be paid in copies of the book (generally applies to anthology authors), we can arrange for Amazon to send them directly to you if you are in the UK. Outside the UK, it’s better if we send money by Paypal and you order them locally.

The omnibus edition of last year’s anthologies has also been delayed but will be back on track shortly.

Thank you for your patience.

A winning strategy

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Well, royalty payments have been calculated. Authors who have not been contacted can safely assume they didn’t sell any in the last three months. Most didn’t, it has been a very poor quarter.

One thing is notable. One author is streets ahead on sales. Nothing you could retire on, this is not a publisher that will ever rival Penguin Random House and never will be. It’s a small press starting point for new authors and it’s staying that way.

This does mean that Leg Iron Books is not way up in the marketing stakes. We cannot buy full page ads in Writer’s Digest nor can we afford to bribe Waterstone’s to put us in the window. We do what we can but with 75 to 100% of royalties going to authors (if it’s a small royalty we don’t take a cut) we have virtually no marketing budget. Authors who want to get ahead have to promote themselves too.

This author’s success lies in social media, notably Twitter. There are rules for authors on Twitter and social media in general. Most don’t follow them.

Politics, Brexit, climatology, anything that is viciously divisive, stay out of it. When you pick a side, half of your potential audience will block you. Have a second account if you want to rant but do not link the two. Even big names like Stephen King and JK Rowling have suffered with their political stances although they are currently at the stage where they need not care about lost sales. Starting-out authors are not. You need all the sales you can get.

This particular author follows a lot of other writers and posts about holidays and general amusing chat. Then, when someone asks about what they’ve published, they post a link to the book.

It works. Don’t bother with the book-ad services on Twitter, we have tried them and we have found that just like us, everyone simply scrolls past them. Not one sale was generated by that investment, not one.

Chat with people, get to know them, stay uncontroversial, don’t spam your books and only give a link when asked.

It seems to work. And it costs nothing but time.

Anthology Eleven

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There has been a ‘thing’, which has caused some delay in the normal running of Leg Iron Books. Three short story collections are in the works as is the omnibus edition of the 2019 anthologies and all are delayed – but this is not going to stop progress on Underdog Anthology Eleven. It might delay publication, but unlike the Halloween and Christmas anthologies, this one is not tied to a particular event.

The Spring Anthologies are a free-for-all. Any genre, anything goes as long as it’s legal. Stories around the 2000 word mark are best but this is, as always, extraordinarily flexible. Payment is £12 per story, very short stories (under 1000 words) and we’ll negotiate a price.

February is the quarterly payment month for novel authors so this anthology will officially open on March 1st and close on the 31st. Publication should be mid to late April. Early stories can be accepted but editing won’t start until March.

Here we go again…

The Silence of the Elves

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The Christmas book is finished. Leaving one week between close of submission and publication date was pretty tight, but here it is. Links will go in when the book goes fully ‘live’, although the Kindle version is already available.

Next year the close of submissions date will need to be a little earlier. None of us are getting any younger!

The Silence of the Elves

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Underdog Anthology Ten has sixteen stories from ten authors, and now has a title and a cover image. More on that later.

This volume introduces three writers new to the Underdog Anthologies. Someone new in every release is becoming something of a tradition – there is already a new author for UA11 and submissions haven’t officially opened yet!

This one is at the stage of circulating a PDF of the interior among the authors for final checks. All author contracts are signed and all those who elected to be paid in cash are paid. The cover is under construction and we are looking at publication later this week. It will be available in time for Christmas.

Since it’s full of Christmas stories, that’s as it should be.

Up Next – Marsha Webb

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If you have read the last four Underdog Anthologies (6 to 9) you will be familiar with Marsha’s style. She has also written a novel and it’s due to go to print/eBook this weekend.

It’s the story of Phil, a man who only ever wanted a quiet life, a steady routine, a happy family… but you know it’s not going to stay that way.

More details will appear on publication but in the meantime, here’s a taster of the wraparound cover –

The cover will of course include spine text and information on the back. It’ll be done by the weekend. One for the Christmas stockings, maybe?

Underdog Anthology 10 open for submissions

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We already have one story submitted, and there’s time for many more. Close on the heels of the Halloween anthology comes the Christmas one. This has to be fast so it will close for submissions at midnight on November 30th.

Stories should be set at Christmas time and can be anything from the gentle, happy ending to the destruction of the entire universe. As long as Christmas is the central theme. Rules are available under Contact > Submissions > Underdog Anthologies from the drop down menu, and rules are somewhat negotiable. Payment is twelve fine British pounds per story, or the equivalent in your local currency (PayPal is easiest if you have it). UK authors can elect to be paid in copies of the book. For very short stories (less than 1000 words), we can negotiate payment.

If you have a Christmas tale and like the idea of being published and paid for it, let us know. We’re always on the lookout for new talent.

Title block

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Everyone gets writer’s block once in a while but this time the book is finished, it just needs a title.

The cover art is ready, completed by Gary V. Foss, but this book needs a name. Suggestions are welcome, along the lines of Halloween and underground water, wells, springs, and so on.

Here is the cover –

All suggestions welcome. This has to be completed within a week.

UPDATE: The double meaning in Mark Ellott’s suggestion for the title works very well. Here’s the first (but probably not the final) draft cover –

The border is there to allow for trim in printing. So that the main artwork is not lost. There will of course be a huge blot on the landscape due to the barcode but that can’t be helped. The Leg Iron Books logo will likely be smaller than usual for this one.

Amazon review anomaly

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If someone writes a review on Amazon.com, the US site, this is referenced on all the other sites. However, it appears the reciprocal arrangement is not in place.

Es-tu la, Allah, by Dirk Vleugels, has a review on the Canadian Amazon site which is not referenced on the other sites. It’s only visible there. It’s in French, as is the book.

So if a book is reviewed on a non-US Amazon site, ie. anything other than Amazon.com, there is no guarantee that review will be visible from any other Amazon site.

If one of the Leg Iron Books authors, or anyone else, spots a review on a non-US Amazon variant, please do let us know. We can link to it from the book’s page here.

Think of it as a game of Bookemon. Gotta catch ’em all!

Underdog Anthology 9 now open for submissions.

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The 2019 Halloween anthology is open for submissions. The closing date will be midnight (GMT) October 1st. No set title yet, but the cover will feature a haunted well so any stories linked to that theme will be most welcome. Of course, all Halloween stories of any kind are welcome, it’s just that this year’s overall theme will be the haunted well.

Stories should be Halloween themed and around 1500-2000 words.

The story length is not set in stone. They can be longer, the price is the same (£12 per story). If they are much shorter than 1000 words we’ll have to discuss payment, since someone who sends in 3000 words or more is going to be a bit annoyed if they find someone else got the same pay for 500 words.

The end of August also sees the quarterly payments to novel/story collection authors. These are paid on recorded sales up to midnight on August 31st, whether or not the money actually arrives at Leg Iron Books. Sometimes it takes a little while to arrive but we don’t indulge in fancy or complex accounting here. If the book sold in the last quarter, the author gets paid. Then we at Leg Iron Books wait for the seller to pay up. They always do, it can just take a while.

There are still two books in the works, a novel that’s just awaiting a cover image and a short story collection. These should be completed through September and we should be all clear for new things at the start of October.

Onwards!