RESOURCES FOR CANADIAN AUTHORS

OKAY…. Let’s make a little page for Important Things We Rely On as a small duo that makes mostly books…. the big DISCLAIMER here is that these are CANADIAN-based because we’re from CANADA but we encourage folks from all over both in publishing & self-publishing to take these into account when doing your searches in your own neighbourhoods.

OK lets get started.

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ISBNS

ISBN is that funky little 10-13 digit number on a barcode for books! (It’s a serialised something or other, look, plenty of other places explain the nitty gritty, I’m just here to tell you that you SHOULD get one). Getting an ISBN on your book is honestly, really easy and extremely worth it.

• ISBNS make it easier for consignment to register you in the system
• ISBNS make it easier to register your books in libraries
• ISBNS make it cheaper to print your books (??? yeah, in some provinces where theres provincial sales tax, these taxes don’t apply to books to encourage reading, so here QST doesn’t get charged when we SELL our books, NOR when we BUY our printed copies… sometimes that can save you a solid grand or two on a print run–just make sure to tell your printer before the payment’s made)!

That’s cool, but where do I GET one?

Heheh, well you make an ACCOUNT right here:

LIBRARY AND ARCHIVES CANADA

It’s FREE! The only requirement to obtain an ISBN for your book is that you fill out the required information on the website once you have an account, and if you print more than 50 copies you have to mail them one copy of your book, if you print more than 100 you have to send them 2 copies (one to safeguard in their personal records, one for people to actually reference). Make sure to fill out the forms and send them to the required mailing addresses (everything is on the website).

When making an ISBN the general rule of thumb is that each version of your book is a different code. IE: if you have the same story as a paperback & hardcover those each get their own ISBN, so would an audiobook & a ebook… etc.

You also don’t have to just register books, you can register ZINES, and I think even CDS & MAGAZINES. If your work is a bit more multimedia I would definitely check out the Archives website find out more.

BARCODES

These are not generally provided by the government giving you an ISBN (tbh I’m not sure why, I feel like the website just needs a generator) but I digress. There are a lot of free barcode generators online so all you really need to do is plug your ISBN into one of those and slap it on your books. You don’t really NEED one of these but it does make things easier for consignment if you already have one. You can also technically add these retroactively if you don’t mind putting a sticker on your book with the barcode on it!

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LIBRARIES

Awhhhh yes baby. Let’s talk libraries~

The thing with approaching libraries is they only have a certain budget and a lot of that gets put into things that people personally request. If you approach libraries personally, often they will ask you to donate your titles. We’re all on the economics struggle bus. It’s definitely up to you if you want to make that donation. This isn’t to say ALL libraries function this way, but don’t be shocked (or insulted) if they do ask for donations.

We’re currently working on building a page right now that has all the pertinent publishing info for all of our self-published books, I’ll link it here for folks to check out so you can make sure your books come with all that pertinent information that libraries can use to reference and archive your work! Otherwise, for the time being, most libraries have those requirements listen on their websites if you want to do a bit of digging.

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PRINTING

Yayyy printing. There’s a LOT to talk about with printing but resource-wise… I’ll just cover a few things you need to know.

• Make sure you tell your CANADIAN printer about your ISBN if you’re CANADIAN. You don’t have to pay provincial sales taxes on your orders.
• Make sure you’re also not CHARGING provincial sales taxes when you sell your books at conventions (or otherwise). GST is the only thing getting slapped on these babies.
• Make sure you have some sort of barcode on your final draft of your book if you don’t want to put stickers for consignment.
• Make sure you have an information page in your books, outlining: Author, publisher, date of publication, ISBN number, any credits to cover design & editing, contact information for libraries and bookshops (email at least)
• As a general rule, and this is just good practice, make sure there’s a page in your final draft that covers where readers can find you later! (Bonus: let people know what other works you’re known for, it keeps people up to date with your work).

For those wondering what printers WE use….

MARQUIS BOOK PRINTING
LE CAÏUS DU LIVRE
VIDEPRESS

(Pro-tip: we usually list which one of these guys is responsible for a project ON our project pages so you know whose quality you’re holding.)

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CONSIGNMENT

Small Bookshops are your best friend as a small creative with self-published works. When you’re published (for the most part) you worry a bit less about consignment because your publisher generally acts as your distributor.

But how do you get in on the action solo? You gotta do the big schmoogle search and make a list, ooooor you walk around town and go hunting… OR you keep showing up at conventions and the owners of said little bookshops come up to you and hand you their cards and you MAKE SURE TO CONTACT THEM WITHIN THE WEEK. (but if you remember only months later you should still contact them anyway).

There’s no hard fast rule here… but I’ve learned a valuable rule in PRICING along the way.

BOOKSHOPS have to turn a profit and will want to consign with a 45-50% split with you. Anything less on their end is GENEROUS.… cherish it.

It seems steep but bookshops have to turn a profit to keep the lights on, any small shop is really running a risk putting their trust in your book to sell over something else they know might guarantee them the sale. Don’t take this as a reason NOT to consign with them, just as an understanding why shops price themselves this way.

So I take this into account when pricing my books. This isn’t a hard or fast rule but I generally triple my base printing price… and round up. That way I’m always making back my printing price and a little off the top, even with consignment.

WHOLESALE

Not every bookshop is the same, most of the ones we’ve worked with, generally worked on a consignment model that pays you out only when you make the sale. But sometimes bookshops will buy your books outright and ask you what your base price is to purchase the item.

THIS IS NOT THE PRICE YOU PAID TO PRINT THE BOOK!!!

If you go by my earlier, you multiply a book’s printing price by 3 and the half that number. Let’s say base price is 5$ to print, so you sell it at $15 at your table and half that for Wholesale: $7.50 (usually I round up to $8 unless they want to haggle me… don’t be afraid to put your foot down).

In my experience… CONSIGNMENT is a bit of a weird beast that is cool in theory… but in practice is a lot of work for little yield. I leave most of this effort on the bookshops to tell me when a book is out of stock bc I technically make more selling them myself. My biggest word of advice is build up a good repoire regardless. Bookshops can be such a lifeline when it comes to launching your story and pushing your work to people they KNOW will like what you’re making. Its a slow-burn relationship, you know?

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GRANTS

We don’t have the MOST experience with these because W&W is incorporated (easiest to split our work from our personal lives in case anything happens) which means it’s a bit more difficult for us to reason picking up grants and not falling into //whispers fraud.

ANYWAY. Here in CANADA there are PLENTY of amazing grants an opportunities for artists, you’ll want to look things up on 2 levels:

If there was anything I learned from the 1 workshop we went to about GRANTS (and my University teachers’ adamant insistence on grants) it’s that the organisers are more than happy to help walk you through the application process… and to never hold back on HOW MUCH YOU CARE ABOUT YOUR PROJECT. They couldn’t stress enough that the more questions, the bigger your application package, the more invested you seem in your project, the greater the impression you leave behind and the more they’d be willing to give your project a chance.

You also… can still get a grant… to help you along with research and supplement your work on a book intended to be PUBLISHED by a PUBLISHER.

That’s what I’m hearing anyway.

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I think that’s about everything for now. I’ll probably pick and poke at this page as I go, if you have any other questions for these topics you want me to tackle/think should be up here feel free to email or bug me (Winter or the W&W accounts) on socials.