Authors of Erotic Romance

Show Me the Money!
by Delia Carnell

You spent years reading books, falling in love with characters, standing in awe of certain authors, losing yourself in compelling stories. Now you’ve finally written something that someone else wants to publish. Hooray!! All you have to do now is sit back and wait for the money truck to back up in your driveway, right?

Wrong!

There are a few scenarios that might play out for you. None of them involve a money truck.

If you have sold a manuscript to a print publisher, you will most likely receive an advance. An advance is just what it sounds like – they are advancing you money against what they hope to earn on your book. It could be a hundred dollars; it could be a thousand dollars. It probably won’t be a million dollars unless you’ve become a household name. The amount varies from publisher to publisher. A good agent may be able to get you more than they offer you first time around, but probably not a lot as long as you’re an unknown.

After you receive (and spend) your advance, you won’t be getting any more money until your book appears on the shelves of bookstores. Your publisher will pay you royalties as a percentage of the cover price for every copy sold. Six percent is fairly standard, but that may vary from publisher to publisher as well. However, you don’t get any money until your books have sold more than enough copies so that your percentage exceeds the amount of the advance they gave you in the first place.

In the print world, you also have to deal with remainders. Remainders are books that did not sell during their allotted time on the bookstore shelf, and so are returned to the publisher. Part of your royalties will be held back by your publisher as a reserve against the remainders that come back to them.

Since many print publishers pay royalties twice a year, it could be as much as two years before you receive all the money owed you for one title. This is something to consider when you (or your agent) are negotiating the size of your advance.

The electronic world operates differently. There are very few advances to be had for an ebook. The good news is, you don’t have to wait as long for publication. Nor do you have to deal with remainders. Since ebooks are sold one download at a time, there is nothing to come back.

An epublisher will also pay your royalties equal to a percentage of the selling price of your book. The electronic world has no expenses for printing, so they pay as much as thirty-five to forty percent of your selling price.

ePublishers vary between monthly and quarterly. The entire process is much more straightforward for them since everything happens electronically. At the end of the accounting period, the publisher knows exactly how many copies were downloaded of your book. They pay you based on actual sales for that period. There is no need to hold back anything in reserve.

Neither type of publisher is likely to make any major changes to their accounting practice for you. But armed with information, you will know what to expect and can plan your finances accordingly. And maybe some day, you’ll have that household name, and your very own money truck!