Hi Sigrid, and Congratulations! Sandpiper, I also published with Authorhouse. Yes, I was pleased with how the book looked and "felt." They did a great job on the cover which relates to the title: a close up of an dry eye, thus, "Beyond the Tears." In fact, the eye is shaped like mine, so it is uncanny about the resemblence. No one, at least no one told me, that it "looked" like POD self-published material; it looks like any other publication. I've been treated courteously and competently by Authorhouse. The only thing is that I paid for services I could have done myself, like a press release and marketing kit, which are over priced by Authorhouse yet have a professional look. I paid money for an ad in Foreword Magazine, which to my knowledge did not pay off. What has paid off is self-promotion, which is a constant and unrelentless necessity if you want to sell books. Good luck to all of you, Lynn

Thanks for the information Lynn. I'll go back and give it another look-see. I am debating on which publisher will give the highest return as well as a professional product.

Sandpiper

Sand P, you might want to do a search on the forums for the key words "Authorhouse" "POD" "Print on Demand" and "Self Publish" because I know there has been much discussion on the topic on this site. LLL

Sandpiper,

I know that you want to choose the best publisher so I'm going to give you my honest opinion of AH. Like Lynn, I received a professional looking book and was treated with courtesy and respect. They also wrote an excellent press release and I was pleased with the fact that they gave away free review copies of my book to the media.

However, AH made numerous and inexcusable errors doing my galley proofs. They were unbelievably sloppy and for a period of time, I worried that I would never have a book. Moreover, there is a class-action lawsuit pending against them by disgruntled authors.

That does not include me! I'm perfectly happy with my book but I agree with Lynn that I paid for a lot of unnecessary services.

I published my last book with Lulu. If you're comfortable with a company that does not have online phone support but will deliver a stellar product, Lulu is the most cost-efficient way to go. They do have online chat available with staff and all questions are answered on the community forum. I have no complaints whatsoever about Lulu and I published my book with them for a fraction of the cost of AH.

I would recommend iUniverse over AH. Just my two cents :-) Good luck to you. Sigrid

Hey Lynn and Brenda -

Nice talking to you again. Thanks so much for your enthusiasm. I'm becoming much more creative in my marketing although I still prefer writing any day. And, yes, it's an incredible feeling to see those efforts paying off.

However, I can never figure out which one of my tactics caused a rise in sales. That's very annoying. My book wasn't doing well for an entire week and then suddenly a whole bunch of people bought it, but they didn't visit my web site because I track everyone there. Confusing!

Bad enough to be a writer and a marketer -- I can't be an FBI agent, too! Sigrid

Funny, detective! Aren't there "market watches" who can do this for you? Oh yeah, for a price, I'm sure. LLL