Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Ask The Gunwriters Handloading book will be here in a couple of weeks

I just successfully ordered from your site after logging in (no "guest" checkout), and all went fine. The site does seem to be running a little slow - must be lots of traffic right now!

I ordered from the website with no problems. Looking forward to the book!

I ordered from the web site yesterday

It's starting to look like the occasional problem may be related to the amount of traffic we've been getting on the website, which is probably heavier than we've ever had before. Here's what happened with somebody who was having problems:

"When it asks you to 'confirm order' it returned an error message that PayPal would not process the order. These were three banners on top of each other on the same order review page. I said 'what the heck' and clicked the confirm button again to see what would happen and it went through."

Didn't want to reply to the group PM, but I ordered yesterday and all indications are a go.

Thanks for the PM

I do not handle websites well - too old and technologically challenged. I called Eileen and not only got my order done easily, but got to converse with a nice lady.

MD - if you would - please post a list of your currently available books.
I need to start ordering!

Sure--

LIFE OF THE HUNT and BORN TO HUNT are both collections of big game hunting stories in various places, with a little other stuff thrown in.

MODERN HUNTING OPTICS is a look at optics today, including how they work, both optically and mechanically, and some info on how to use them.

RIFLE TROUBLE-SHOOTING AND HANDLOADING is an overall look at getting rifles to function correctly and shoot well.

OBSESSIONS OF A RIFLE LOONY is a mixture of opinion and a look at various types of rifles, plus some favorite hunting cartridges.

SHOTGUNS FOR WINGSHOOTING is a guide to shotguns and ammo for various kinds of upland birds and waterfowl, with over 100 color photos of guns and hunting.

HUNTING THE GREAT PLAINS is a guide to hunting the birds and big game of the plains, with plenty of hunting stories mixed in.

More details are available on riflesandrecipes.com, along with some other stuff, including Eileen's cookbooks.

My wife interjected and is getting it for me for Christmas...will you tell me if that didn't happen, LOL!

Who am I to complain...now my play money will got elsewhere!

Good deal!

I forgot to mention one other book, RIFLE LOONY NEWS: THE FIRST FIVE YEARS, co-authored with my wife Eileen Clarke.

"RIFLE LOONEY NEWS: THE FIRST FIVE YEARS" is going to be my next purchase,after deer season is over......you know priorities.

While we're patiently waiting....

I'm not a shotgunner but read, enjoyed and learned a bunch with SHOTGUNS FOR WINGSHOOTING. It was especially enlightening on load and choke selection that corrected some misperceptions from my rifle-centric upbringing. Well done. Recommend to all.

Glad you like SHOTGUNS FOR WINGSHOOTING!

Must confess, however, that was one of the books Eileen and I wrote for various publishing companies that pushed us into self-publishing. When the publisher originally approached me, their proposal was for a very "affordable" book, under $20 cover price, which meant that with the standard royalty agreement I'd get maybe $1.50 for each book sold, and most gun books don't sell more than a few thousand copies these days. It just wasn't worth my time to write it, and I told them so.

So they came back with a proposal to do a hardcover with color photos. The cover price would be enough higher than the first book to up the royalty considerably. So I said OK, and my contract was to deliver the manuscript and photos a year later.

They contacted me a month later and said if I could get it done in three months, a major bookstore chain would buy a bunch of copies and display them prominently. So I said OK, and got it done.

Well, they liked my photos so much they then decided to turn it into a coffee-table style book, printed on high-grade shiny paper with over 100 photos. Trouble was, this meant the cover price was $49.95. Now, even general book buyers go into sticker shock on books priced much over $30, and not many hunters are willing to pay 50 bucks for a book just because of pretty pictures. I told them this was a mistake, but they considered themselves publishing geniuses and said that's what they were gonna do.

In the meantime, the accelerated publishing schedule made them "forget" to send me page proofs before publication, to correct any set-up errors. This procedure is in every publishing contract. There were some errors, including a few from the guy who edited the manuscript.

Turned out I was right and the book didn't sell well. I never saw any royalties because my advance was never amortized--and the advance was as much as I make writing 2-3 magazine articles.

Other than the advance, the only money I made on the book was selling it on our website. But even the reduced price we could buy it for (about what bookstores pay) meant we had to sell it for $35 to make any money, but within a year we were seeing it for sale in various places for $25. We asked the publishing company about this, and they said they'd "remaindered" the book, basically selling it for the printing cost to book retailers. Also in my contract was a clause to be informed of a decision to remainder, giving me first option on buying books, but again they somehow "forgot" to tell me. Did manage to buy a few hundred at that point, which are what we're selling on our website for $26, which includes shipping.

A few months later the same publisher approached me about doing a hunting rifle book along the same lines. This meant THEY made money on my shotgun book, probably from the big bookstore deal. I told them I'd need a lot more money up front, but their best offer was way below what I needed.

That, however, was far from the worst of our experiences with traditional publishers. Had to take another one to court because he was cooking the account books to totally screw me out of royalties for a book that sold very well.

All of which is why we now have total control of our book publishing, including the account books!

Good on you for going it on your own.

That sucks John! I can completely see why you went to self publishing. I always figured it was simply due to getting a more fair cut of the profits, but if publishing houses were outright screwing you...

Glad it has worked out in the long run though.

Actually did OK on 3-4 books we did with traditional, but with most we would have been better off publishing ourselves. The Internet and digital printing made that far more practical than ever before, the reason so many writers are self-publishing these days.

There've always been problems in any business that supposedly pays royalties to authors, musicians, artists and even inventors. A lot of people are greedy, and also think they're smarter about making money than writers, musicians, artists and inventors. In some ways they're right, but the combination of greed and a superior attitude sometimes leads to outright theft!

JB,
It is disturbing to hear how you were treated by that publisher. It makes me mad. If only everyone would just treat others the way they would like to be treated the world would be a much better place.

I am not much of a shotgunner, but I just went to the websight and ordered the book as a show of support for you and Eileen. It gave me an excuse to order the Loony Hat that I forgot to add on to my order for the Gun Gack book.

I have most of your books and have enjoyed every one of them. I am looking forward to some great reading this winter.

John,are the books going to be in next week?

Yes,I'm impatient.

They are supposed to show up today or tomorrow.

John:

Put me down as first in line.

Confirmed order, one book post haste.

I pass these on to my Grandson regularly.

Return details and I will shoot to you the payment.

You should already have my previous mailing address on record

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