ZLS’s had it’s 1st of the year Poetry Event on Saturday, January 23, 2010 at the Downbeat Jazz Cafe, located downtown Albany, NY. Our many thanks to the poets, observers as well as a few of the following businesses for making this event a great event:

Kaybond Enterprises

Downbeat Jazz Cafe

Hollywood Hustle TV

Citizens Bank

Hudson Valley Community College

AJEMM Brothers Greeting Card Company

College of Saint Rose

Urban Guerilla Theatre

DJ Dillon DJ Services

Cash Central

just to name a few of the companies there who helped us out by donating their time, money and services….

We could go on and on naming all the companies that donated and participated in making this event a great success but instead we’ll say-Thank You.

We look forward to the next event, February 20, 2010-7pm-9pm at Larks Tavern.

We look forward to seeing you all there and thanks again!

ZLS Publishing

New poem on the poetry page!-Replaceable Dick!

Hi all:
Let me warn you now-What I’m about to say is not for the faint of heart. It is an observation that I and a few others that I know have made. Here goes….

As a publisher, it is my duty to study the industry. What does that mean? Well, it means a lot of things but for the sake of this post, it means learning the trends in publishing and studying what makes a best seller list and what doesn’t. There are a lot of facts on what makes a bestseller: Cover, title, storyline, etc. Today, I will be discussing Book Covers.
I was in my local Barnes and Nobles this weekend when something caught my eye: There were some African-American author books on the outskirts of the book aisles. What caught me was that usually unless it’s an Eric Jerome Dickey or a Sister Souljah book, the African-American books are hidden in the aisles. I got excited for all of two seconds and then started paying attention to what I was looking at:
1) The book covers were so bad that had it not been for the fact that I was meant to write this article I wouldn’t have seen it.
I’d been in the bookstore for about five hours at that point and was walking to the children’s section with my daughter when I came across them. I’m in the same Barnes and Nobles every Saturday by the way! I asked one of the workers when had they started placing such books there and she told me a little over a month. Now, I’m at that same Barnes and Nobles every week for the past month as I meet with my company editor there every week, and have walked past the section, Lord knows how many times and never spotted those books until today.
I decided to stand back for a minute and watch how many people stopped at this section and picked up at least one book to browse.
I timed it for five minutes.
Guess how many? 0
I also happened to be with our editor and asked him to step out of editor mode and into reader mode for a second to help me out. I picked up two books-A Wendy Williams Book-Ritz Goes To Hollywood and Fiona Zedde-A Taste of Sin. I asked my editor would he buy either book. His response: NO!
I then asked him why not? Nothing about either book attracts me.
I wanted to see if it was just him or were there others who felt the same way. I stopped a few people and asked them the same question and got the same answer, except one lady who said she would buy Wendy Williams book because she knew her name.
That got me to wondering how familiar people were with either author. I asked a few more people if they knew who either author was. Not one caucasian person knew either author, but the Hispanic and African-Americans knew Wendy Williams but no one knew Fioda.
I then asked each individual that said No what the reason was and here they are:
1) The ladies on both books look cheap
2) The background looks nothing like Hollywood but instead a florist shop (Wendy Williams book)
3) The lady on Fioda’s book is ugly and has a terrible body (sagging breast)
4) No one knew who in the world Ritz was supposed to be-(Ritz Goes To Hollywood)
5) What does the mattress spring have to do with anything? (Fioda’s book)
6) No desire to read a book about sex with no story line, it would bore me (Fioda’s book)
7) The cover colors are too dark (Fioda’s book)
I already know what the book is about don’t want to read another one like it (Fioda)
9) The women on the cover is ugly and is dressed badly (Wendy Williams book)
10) Looks boring (Wendy Williams book)
11) Author name starting in lower case letters, looks like bad grammar. I question the editing inside. (Fioda)
Ouch! Ouch! Ouch!
People are harsh!
I could go on and on with the complaints but you get my drift. I wish that I could say that it was just these two books but it wasn’t. I decided to grab all 10 books from the same section and saw the same thing that people were complaining about:
1) Bad pictures on covers
2) Unclear of what the book is about
3) Ugly people
4) Bad background
I then decided to check out the book covers of non African-American people and noticed a significant difference:
1) Most (not all)-of the non African-American books with pictures on it had pictures that made it very clear as to what the book was about. I.E-Dan Brown (Lost Symbol), Jennifer Weiner (Best Friends Forever), The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo (Steig Larsson), etc. (All Best Sellers by the way!)
2) There weren’t four or five different fonts on the book cover!
3) The colors were for the most part bright although some book covers were dark
4) Titles or subtitles were clear
5) Better paper quality
6) Not one author had their name in lower case letters
All of the comments reminded me how important book cover design is. Now, not all non-African-American authors are doing book cover design correctly because some of them aren’t. The distinction though is that there are so many that are doing it correctly, that you can’t tell the difference unless you have an eye for it. As I said earlier, unless it is an Eric Jerome Dickey, a Sister Souljah, a Zane, or an a E. Lynn Harris book, I have yet to see an African-American book without these author names displayed out front.
As I said, they were on the sides of the aisles and like I said, so many people walked right past these books.
I’m not at all picking on African-Americans as I am one myself but if there is a distinction, there is a distinction. I asked the workers, what helps sell the books around here and the response was the same-Name recognition, book covers and titles. People don’t want cheesy covers, especially from authors they don’t know. If you look at Eric Jerome Dickey’s books, it’s clear by the cover what the book is about. Same goes for Zane, and E. Lynn Harris.
Writers, regardless of their skin color need to pay attention to the best selling authors who have done it before them. Look at their covers-Do you see 4 or 5 different fonts? Do their book covers look boring? Would any race pick it up? Is your title very clear as to what the book is about? (Who the heck is Ritz?) Does the person look good? (Ask someone else that because you would be blinded to your own cover) Is the grammar on the book cover correct?
Remember, you have all of 7 seconds to impress a potential book buyer. Anytime they can look at your book and make the comments that were made such as the ones above, then that is a problem. Yes, you were lucky enough to get into the bookstore, but will you be lucky enough to stay in the bookstore. Bookstores have a short life span, they buy very few books at a time, and if you’re not selling then you have got to go. Having someone else besides your friends and family buy your books is very important (or maybe not). You may not care about future sales and the audience that may or may not pick up your book. If that’s the case, then by all means ignore what I just said, but for those of you who are looking to be published-Writer Beware!
There are some publishers who don’t care what the cover looks like as they only care about the bottom line. You have to care about what your product looks like because your name is on it. The publisher is going to make money off of you whether you make lots of sales or little sales. The writer is the one who falls short in the end because no sales or little sales means little to no royalties.
You have no one to blame but yourself-You have been warned!

Until the next blog!
Yours in Writing!
ZLS

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