Welcome to Writers Talkback. If you are a new user, your account will have to be approved manually to prevent spam. Please bear with us in the meantime
If you've bought your own ISBN then you should. They will accept e-versions. If you've used a free ISBN from CS, then they are the publisher and, in theory, it's their responsibility. However, technically the book is published outside of the UK.
Some indie authors that have used their own ISBN don't bother. Some wait until they're contacted. Very few are contacted. I suspect it's impossible to police.
I would like to get my books into local libraries. No idea how to do that without donating (and spending a fortune). I did donate my short story collections, but as they are borrowed 'on trust', there is no policing in force. Two are now missing.
I didn't donate mine. I heard that most public libraries won't put donated books on the shelves and just dispose of them – but I expect different areas have different rules.
Funnily enough, Nell, I went in to my central library in Bristol today to ask about that. I was told that they no longer have control over which books they choose - there are two central ordering facilities, which have pictures of all the books they stock, and the libraries choose from there. So you have to check with these facilities to ask if they will stock your book. It's faceless. But she did take the name of both books I was asking about so she can order them if they do appear. Reaching the stars was there in the poetry section, I went to have a look. But they only had 15 children's poetry books!
I'll get the name of the two places ad post it here, later. She said they did use one which was very good but had to change (she didn't sound pleased about this but did not specify why).
Would be useful to know. And might be worth all self-published writers contacting their library service and finding out what their system is, then go from there.
When I gave a library talk last year, one librarian bought a copy of the book with her own money & donated it to the library after she'd read it. It did appear on the shelves.
Comments
Some indie authors that have used their own ISBN don't bother. Some wait until they're contacted. Very few are contacted. I suspect it's impossible to police.
I would like to get my books into local libraries. No idea how to do that without donating (and spending a fortune). I did donate my short story collections, but as they are borrowed 'on trust', there is no policing in force. Two are now missing.
I'll get the name of the two places ad post it here, later. She said they did use one which was very good but had to change (she didn't sound pleased about this but did not specify why).
askewsandholts.com
peters.co.uk