Roger Packer - Self-Publishing News

£20,000 Kindle Storyteller UK Award 2020 picks five books for the shortlist

The five-book shortlist for the 2020 Kindle Storyteller UK Award see a vampire thriller, a detective novel, a feelgood novel, an LGBTQ romance, and a non-fiction travel book contending for the £20,000 prize. READ MORE >>

Kindle Unlimited KENP rate for August 2020 holds steady as KDP fund shows 26% annual increase

The Kindle Unlimited KENP rate for August 2020 stayed steady at $0.0043, the same rate as for July 2020, while the KDP Select Global Fund for August 2020 rose by $200,000 to $32.6 million from $32.4 million in July 2020. READ MORE >>

KDP authors can now advertise their books through Amazon Advertising in Canada and Australia

The Amazon Advertising scheme for KDP authors has expanded to cover Canada and Australia. READ MORE >>

StreetLib adds audiobook distribution deals plus comics channel

Worldwide digital book distributor StreetLib has signed a double deal with Scribd and Bibliotheca to widen its reach for audiobooks. READ MORE >>

Kindle Unlimited big year-on-year fund rises continue as July 2020 KENP rate edges lower

The Kindle Unlimited KENP rate for July 2020 fell back to $0.0043 from $0.0045 in June 2020 as the KDP Select Global Fund for July 2020 rose by $100,000 to $32.4 million from $32.3 million in June 2020.

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Storytel streaming on with more than 1.2 million subscribers

European audiobook and ebook subscription service Storytel has seen total subscribers leap by 42% to 1,257,000 from 897,500 at the same time in 2019.

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Print-on-demand pioneer Blurb taken over by digital printing specialist Reischling Press

Blurb, one of the pioneers of self-publishing for print books, has been taken over by its long-term digital printing partner Reischling Press.

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Amazon streamlines promotional access for authors with new KDP marketing resources page

Amazon has added a new Marketing page to the Kindle Direct Publishing website to make it easier to find available resources to promote your books.

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Wattpad Books pick up London lockdown love-life stories

Data-driven publisher Wattpad Books is to publish a contemporary romance story collection, Lockdown on London Lane by Beth Reekles. The book follows the love-lives of a group of Londoners in lockdown during the Covid-19 pandemic.

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Self-publishing star Mark Dawson ousted from Sunday Times bestsellers Top 10 after print book bulk buy

Thriller author Mark Dawson bought 400 copies of his own print book to boost the title into the Sunday Times bestsellers Top 10 in the UK but Nielsen BookScan, which supplies the figures for the list, has now rejected the bulk buy and is recalculating the list.

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Amazon Advertising adds Kindle Unlimited KENP pages read metric to performance dashboard for authors

Amazon Advertising has added Kindle Edition Normalised Pages (KENP) Read to the performance dashboard so authors can get a better measure of the return on their ads. READ MORE >>

Amazon says thousands of indie authors still earning more than $50,000 a year from KDP

Over 1,000 indie authors earned more than $100,000 through Amazon’s Kindle Direct Publishing during the year to the end of May 2020 and ‘thousands more independent authors earned more than $50,000’.

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Kobo Plus ebook subscription service expands to Canada

The Kobo Plus ebook subscription service is opening up in Canada after launching in Europe in 2017 in Belgium and then adding the Netherlands.
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Kindle Unlimited KDP Select Fund total leaps by nearly a quarter for the first half of 2020

The Kindle Unlimited KENP rate for June 2020 rose to $0.0045 from $0.0042 in May while the KDP Select Global Fund for June 2020 edged up by $100,000 to $32.3 million from $32.2 million in May 2020.

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UK turns to crime and lifestyle books as reading time nearly doubles and tastes change

Nearly half of UK adults say they read more books during lockdown and almost doubled their total time spent reading per week from 3.5 hours to 6 hours.

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Lightning Source builds up print capacity around the world after publishers turn to POD distribution

Print-on-demand specialist Lightning Source is adding print capacity with investments in the US, UK and Australia.

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How to win the Wattys 2020 — Wattpad sets out what the judges will be looking for as contest opens for entries

The Wattys 2020 is opening up for entries from July 13, 2020 with the aim of helping writers to complete their novels and Wattpad has handed out some advice on how to impress the judges.

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The Fussy Librarian adds transparency with promotion data showing click numbers and CPC details

The Fussy Librarian ebook promotion website has started to publish some valuable data detailing numbers of clicks and cost-per-click on recent free ebook promotions.

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Kindle Unlimited paying out $1 million a day as KDP Select Fund for May 2020 hits new high of $32.2 million

The Kindle Unlimited KDP Select Fund for May 2020 leapt to another record high of $32.2 million, up from $30.3 million in April 2020.

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Severn up for Joffe Books deal with crime backlist leading the way

UK indie ebook publisher Joffe Books is linking up with library specialist Severn House in a new partnership to republish titles from Severn’s extensive backlist.

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