ANNOUNCE: ZX Spectrum Game Coffee Table Book
hello peeps.
I'm about half-way through writing a full-colour 250 page 8.5x5.5 inch
coffee-table type book about Spectrum games from 1982 through 1990+
I've put the table of contents and some sample pages (click on the
thumbnails) on the following website:
http://zxgoldenyears.com
(note, I haven't hijacked this - I obtained it to mirror the old
zxgoldenyears.co.uk, but Tayles hasn't sent me the site yet... So no
flames please!)
If enough interest is expressed, then I'll go ahead and get the book
professionally printed, assuming that I'm fairly sure my printing costs
will be covered by pre-orders. Nice people who pre-order will get a
healthy discount, of course. Assuming there were enough of these, then
the book would likely be off the printing presses in October/November.
Incidentally, this will be my third book written, but my first
self-published. The other two were published by a conventional
publishing house. I looked at the possibility of getting this one
published by a conventional publisher, but it would barely be worth my
time to do so given the standard royalty rates and the likely sales
amounts for a niche book of this type...
Of course, I'd be happy to be proven wrong :)
Thanks for listening :)
Andrew
I'm about half-way through writing a full-colour 250 page 8.5x5.5 inch
coffee-table type book about Spectrum games from 1982 through 1990+
I've put the table of contents and some sample pages (click on the
thumbnails) on the following website:
http://zxgoldenyears.com
(note, I haven't hijacked this - I obtained it to mirror the old
zxgoldenyears.co.uk, but Tayles hasn't sent me the site yet... So no
flames please!)
If enough interest is expressed, then I'll go ahead and get the book
professionally printed, assuming that I'm fairly sure my printing costs
will be covered by pre-orders. Nice people who pre-order will get a
healthy discount, of course. Assuming there were enough of these, then
the book would likely be off the printing presses in October/November.
Incidentally, this will be my third book written, but my first
self-published. The other two were published by a conventional
publishing house. I looked at the possibility of getting this one
published by a conventional publisher, but it would barely be worth my
time to do so given the standard royalty rates and the likely sales
amounts for a niche book of this type...
Of course, I'd be happy to be proven wrong :)
Thanks for listening :)
Andrew
Post edited by andrew_rollings on
Comments
I'll 100% be buying one from you !!!
I've been waiting for a book about Speccy games for ages, great stuff. If this does well then i'm sure you'll want to do a sequel to it featuring a lot of other different games.
[ This Message was edited by: psj3809 on 2005-08-12 09:19 ]
[ This Message was edited by: psj3809 on 2005-08-12 09:20 ]
Given this is almost exactly the thing that fair use rights are intended for, I don't see how.
Bytes:Chuntey - Spectrum tech blog.
I've mentioned this on raww.org too.
No Doomdark's Revenge, Avalon, Dun Darach, Dragontorc... I'm sure everyone has favourites missing... Maybe the games covered could be extended, possibly using the YS top 100 lists or even games given 80% or more in Crash reviews as a pointer??
Steve
It's only a taster, it's obvious that not all of the games are shown there.
I hope he manages to get a good deal to publish it though, also hope it sells very well then he'll do more for sure. Great stuff
He is doing it all himself...
(taken from his earlier post)
"Incidentally, this will be my third book written, but my first
self-published. The other two were published by a conventional
publishing house. I looked at the possibility of getting this one
published by a conventional publisher, but it would barely be worth my
time to do so given the standard royalty rates and the likely sales
amounts for a niche book of this type..."
I doubt anyone here can beat me up as much as I beat myself up over the choice. Problem is I only have 250 pages... Any more than that and the cost gets silly.
You drive a hard bargain, sir. Hmm... maybe I should start charging for inclusions. Let me see what the space is like. I saved a couple of pages for things like this. (Of course you're gonna need a microscope to see the index font at this rate.)
[strike]In the words of Bender: They can bite my shiny metal ass.[/strike] No there shouldn't be. It's fair use.
Yup... As long as you pay postage.
Nice idea. Would depend on sales. In order to substitute fun book writing for real work, it has to be indistinguishable from real work as far as the wife is concerned. That means it has to pay :p
[ This Message was edited by: andrew_rollings on 2005-08-12 15:36 ]
Thanks :) Of course, the title won't be "The ZX Spectrum Coffee Table Game Book" or whatever... That's just a description of what it is.
On another note - are you gonna be at CGE-UK tomorrow? If so, you could perhaps rush off a bunch of sample page prints and leave them lying around the venue. May help to increase interest, as I'm sure people who don't read the WOS forums will be there too.
If you're not - well I'd offer to print off some pages myself but my printer is a little bit shafted.
[ This Message was edited by: icabod on 2005-08-12 14:36 ]
i might push myself to pur - chase one :)
I've got a specific vision inside my head of how I want this book to look and feel, and I don't want to deviate from that picture. I'm also determined to keep the cost of the book at 20quid or under, in line with other full-colour books of this type.
I don't mind not making a profit - this is more of a 'love-than-money' venture anyway, but I do want to make sure that my costs are covered and that I don't lose money. If I do get a bit extra to take the wife out to a nice restaurant, then that's just an added bonus :)
Anyway - I figured that I'd be going ahead and setting up a pre-order system over the next few days in order to gauge the level of interest. The idea being that pre-orderers get a discount (maybe the cost of shipping), then to put the money in escrow, and that once I reach a certain threshold (about 80-90% of printing costs), I'll go ahead and get it printed. And if this threshold isn't reached in a certain period of time (i.e. two or three months), refund the escrowed money, and send all the nice patient pre-orderers a PDF file of the book for their trouble. Or something like that. I hadn't decided for sure yet, but it seemed like a reasonable compromise.
In any case, I figured that I'd need about 300 pre-orders to go ahead with the printing without any risk of losing money at all. It doesn't sound too infeasible, but I really have no idea on the size of the market for this book, or on how many of the potential market I'm reaching by posting on forums and newgroups such as this... I'm hoping word-of-mouth plays a part.
Andrew
[ This Message was edited by: andrew_rollings on 2005-08-14 04:00 ]
Just let us know when we can pre-order :)
Beautiful presentation, but of equal importance is the unique and interesting commentary about each game showing it has substance as well as style.
Count me in for a copy!
I've got a basic pre-order system up and running at www.zxgoldenyears.com.
Be sure to read the blurb. I'm a bit pressed for time right now, but I'll make a full forum announcement later.
Oh, and the title has been decided upon:
The ZX Spectrum Book - 1982 to 199x
Thanks
Andrew