Self-Publishing: The Perils and Opportunities to Bring Quality Books to Life
August 6, 2025, 1:30 pm-3:00 pm ET
ASJA, Book Publishing, Tips, Design, Writing SkillsThe self-publishing industry in America today is exploding and over-saturated, fraught with editorial, advertising and public relations services purporting to help authors grow their sales.
According to Bowker data (Publishers Weekly, February 20, 2023), 2.3 million books were self-published in the US in 2021, the third year in a row registering 2 million self-published titles. The average book now sells less than 300 copies over its lifetime in US retail channels. Because of competition for shelf space, a book has less than 1 percent chance of being stocked in a particular bookstore. *
So why would anyone want to self-publish? The answers are complex, but there are always a few books that leapfrog the competition and enjoy vast commercial and/or literary success. How do you get there?
This webinar will feature three experts who will guide you through the decision making process—why are you self-publishing? How do you craft the best and most error-free book possible? How do you obtain quality design? Reviews? Prizes? Influencers? Distribution?
Our three panelists—Gina Kammer, a science fiction and fantasy book coach with an immersive background in reader psychology, Carl Pritzkat, the Chief Operating Officer of PWxyz, the company that owns Publishers Weekly and BookLife, and Katherine LE White, an award-winning poet, essayist, and international best-selling fiction writer—will discuss the perils, strategies and opportunities to make your self-published book a success. So join us and learn!
*https://ideas.bkconnection.com/10-awful-truths-about-publishing
Register here.
Members
Free
Public
$20
Panelists
| Gina Kammer is a book coach and editor who guides science‑fiction and fantasy writers through every stage of the novel-writing process to create stories that enchant readers. She translates reader psychology into concrete craft strategies that make manuscripts both immersive and marketable. With a background as a former in‑house editor and instructor of college writing and literature, Gina pairs step‑by‑step instruction with practical industry insight. Her mentorship at inkybookwyrm.com gives authors more clarity and the confidence they need on their journeys to publication. |
| Carl Pritzkat oversees all aspects of operating PWxyz and serves as president of BookLife, PWxyz’s site dedicated to indie authors. Prior to PWxyz, Pritzkat co-founded interactive media company Mediapolis, inc., where he oversaw projects for The New York Times, Viacom, NPR, Sony, Johnson & Johnson, Volvo and others. Prior to that he ran ECM Records for Bertelsmann. He has a degree in music from UCLA. |
| Katherine LE White is an award-winning poet, essayist, and international best-selling fiction writer who has grown up all over the world. With green eyes and crazy titian curls, she goes about having grand (mis)adventures with her family and many friends, and then tries hard not to write about them. Using anthropomorphized characters, she explores the deeper questions of life and culture and what it really means to be a person, while pretending to be an urban farmer. If others were to rely on her skills to eat, they would most assuredly starve. She lives in Southern Appalachia with her husband, two children, and several animals, all of whom, thankfully, are better urban farmers than she is. |
| Arielle Emmett, Ph.D., is a writer, visual journalist and traveling scholar specializing in East Asia, science writing, and human interest. She is a recipient of a 2015 Fulbright grant to teach visual media and online journalism curriculum for the Universitas Padjadjaran, West Java, Indonesia. She received the U.S. Fulbright Scholar award in 2018-2019 to teach legal research and thesis writing at Strathmore University Law School, Nairobi, Kenya. Emmett also conducted a 10 month intensive study of Chines eBelt & Road initiatives in Kenya and their impact on labor, human rights, and the economy. Arielle is also the author of The Logoharp (Leaping Tiger Press, July 2024), awarded a Silver in Science Fiction from the Nautilus Book Awards 2025. She is at work on an audio book and a sequel. |