Why Learn The Book Publishing Process?

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The book publishing process has many steps and is multifaceted.  Many people are involved in the full publishing process.   The purpose of the book publishing process is to make the material available for the public to read.  There are cases where the authors publish their own books.  This is called self publishing.  Publishing includes each stage of book development, acquiring property rights over the book, marketing the book, producing the physical book, and distributing the book. 

The process normally starts off by buying intellectual property rights from an author.  The publishing company spends much of its time looking for material that it believes will sell.  The author then has to negotiate some kind of agreement to allow the publisher to utilize his/her material.  This process takes years sometimes, due to lengthy negotiations and the lengthy process of planning a book.   The author must go through a proposal process where he/she normally hires an agent to represent them in front of the publisher.  The author also submits a formal proposal that contains all of the information on the book.

Once the work is accepted and negotiated, the editorial stage is entered.  In this stage the book is read by a number of editors.  Depending on the size of the company the book may be read by as many as five levels of editors.  These editors often change the material, request additional material, change grammar and spelling mistakes, and work with the author to create more of a sellable book for the public's consumption.  The executive editor will make the final choices as to what content is allowed in the book and what is left out.  This process can take years, as the book is normally worked on after the intellectual property rights have been negotiated.  The editing process can still occur after the book has been published with new editions being released.

Finally the book is published and distributed.  Materials such as paper, ink, and a custom cover are gathered and brought to an onsite facility or an offsite facility to print massive quantities of the book.  The book is normally wrapped in plastic and loaded onto trucks where it is taken across the nation to the various bookstores that have negotiated with that particular company to display their books for sale.  This process requires a large amount of money in the creation of the product as well as the distribution.  Often times book stores will pay upfront for the books, or request a portion of the books sales per each sale.