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There are exactly three ways to publish a book: land a traditional deal, do everything yourself, or hire help. We've walked 1,200+ authors through that choice since 2017, and we'll tell you the truth about each path — including the free one, and including when the answer is "don't hire us."
Every book you've ever held reached print by one of three roads. There's no fourth. Anyone who tells you otherwise is renaming one of these to sell it to you.
Here's the part most guides skip: none of these is "the best." They fit different books and different people. A 34-year-old thriller writer with years to spare and a taste for rejection letters should probably query agents. A 68-year-old with a finished memoir for her grandchildren should not. Let's take each path in turn.
When most people wonder how to get a book published, this is the picture in their head: a publisher reads your manuscript, loves it, and pays you an advance. That still happens. It's worth understanding exactly how, because if your book is a fit, this path costs you nothing but time.
Agents sign roughly 1 to 2 percent of the writers who query them. That's not because 98% of manuscripts are bad. It's because an agent can only sell what big publishers can sell in volume, and big publishers need books with a large, provable commercial audience. A beautiful family memoir, a niche devotional, a children's book about your grandson's first fishing trip — these can be wonderful books and still be commercially invisible to New York. The rejection isn't a verdict on your writing. It's a verdict on the size of the market, and it says nothing about whether your book deserves to exist in print. It does.
We'll say this even though it earns us nothing: query agents first if your book has a big commercial hook (a timely subject, a built-in audience, a high-concept plot), you're comfortable waiting two to four years from query to bookstore, and getting into physical bookstores nationwide matters more to you than control or speed. If an agent bites, take the meeting. You can always come back — plenty of our authors queried for a year or two first, and we've never once thought less of them for it.
Know the trade, though. A traditional deal means the publisher owns the publishing rights, controls the cover and title, and pays royalties of roughly 10–15% on print. You get their muscle; you give up the wheel.
Tell us about it. A real person answers at (229) 518-4453 from 1pm to 11pm ET, seven days a week — and if we think you should query agents instead of hiring us, we'll say so on the call.
Get your free consultationAmazon's Kindle Direct Publishing changed everything in 2007. Today anyone can upload a manuscript and cover, and Amazon will print copies one at a time as readers order them. No warehouse, no upfront printing bill, no gatekeeper. Uploading is free. We say that loudly and often, because companies in our business tend to whisper it.
So what's the catch? There isn't one, exactly. There's just a job description. When a traditional publisher takes a book, about a dozen specialists touch it before launch. Self-publish and every one of those jobs is yours:
Some people love this. Truly. If you're comfortable with software and you like learning systems, DIY is free and there's real satisfaction in it. We wrote a complete, step-by-step guide to Amazon self-publishing that will take you through the whole thing without spending a dollar with us — account setup, formatting rules, cover specs, pricing, all of it.
The honest cost of "free": authors who do it all themselves tell us it took weeks or months of evenings, and the jobs they couldn't do well — usually editing and cover design — are the two readers notice most. Hiring just those two out to freelancers runs $800 to $3,800 on its own, which is how "free" quietly becomes the middle path anyway.
The third path sits between the other two: you keep everything an independent author keeps — your rights, your royalties, your name as the author — and a team does the production work a publisher's staff would do. One payment, known in advance.
A finished manuscript typically takes about 60 days start to shelf; illustrated or translated books run two to three months. We never promise a calendar date, because rush jobs are where quality dies.
This corner of publishing has real scammers in it, and you've probably already met one if you've googled your own book idea. So judge any assisted publisher — including us — against three tests. One transparent payment, printed publicly, before they have your phone number. One hundred percent of rights and royalties staying with the author, in writing. And nothing publishing without the author's written approval of the final files. Those are our three promises, and any company that flinches at putting them in a contract has told you what you need to know. Two more scam tells worth keeping: anyone promising bestseller status or specific sales is lying, and payment should always be by card or bank through a proper invoice — never wire transfer or gift cards.
Our how-it-works page walks the whole process week by week, and our published books are on Amazon right now — go look them up before you believe a word we say.
Talk to a publishing consultant| Path | What you pay | What you keep |
|---|---|---|
| Traditional | $0 — they pay you an advance if they buy the book | Roughly 10–15% print royalties; publisher controls rights, cover, timing |
| DIY self-publishing | $0 to upload; $1,000–$4,000 if you hire out editing, cover & formatting | Everything — rights, royalties, control. And every job. |
| Assisted (us) | $699–$7,999, one payment, priced publicly | Everything — 100% rights and royalties, in writing. We take zero. |
On royalties, the math is the same for the second and third paths: the store (Amazon, Barnes & Noble, wherever) keeps its standard 30–40% retail cut plus printing, and everything left goes straight to your account — typically $7–$12 a copy on a $20 paperback, paid out every 60–90 days. For the full piece-by-piece numbers, our book publishing cost page has the quick answer and our full cost breakdown guide goes line by line through the whole industry's pricing.
Nobody puts honest timelines in their brochures, so here are ours, from watching hundreds of books cross the finish line:
A pattern worth knowing: the calendar's biggest enemy isn't the work, it's the waiting between decisions. Authors who answer proof emails within a couple of days finish weeks ahead of authors who sit on them. Your book moves at the speed of your yes.
Margaret D. · Memoir author · Ohio
After 1,200+ authors, the mistakes repeat so reliably we could set a clock by them. Read this list twice; it's the most valuable part of this page.
Our honest routing, the same one we give on the phone:
And if you're still torn, call us at (229) 518-4453. It's a real person, 1pm to 11pm ET, seven days. We've talked plenty of people into querying agents and plenty into trying KDP alone. The right authors come back, and they come back trusting us — which is worth more than a rushed sale ever was.
“I'm 71 and I don't do computers. They explained every step in plain English, showed me the proof before anything went live, and my royalties go into my own bank account. My daughter checked everything — twice.”
Straight from the phone log at (229) 518-4453.
Pick your path first, then work it. Query literary agents if your book has broad commercial appeal and you can wait two to four years. Upload it yourself to Amazon KDP if you're comfortable doing the editing, cover, and formatting jobs. Or hire an assisted publisher like us to do the production while you keep 100% of rights and royalties. The mistake is drifting between paths for years without choosing.
Between $0 and roughly $5,000, depending on path. Traditional costs nothing (the publisher pays you). DIY uploading is free, but hiring out editing, cover, and formatting runs $1,000–$4,000. Our complete packages run $699 to $7,999, one payment. Full numbers on our cost page.
Only for the traditional path — big publishers rarely read unagented manuscripts. Self-publishing and assisted publishing need no agent, no permission, and no gatekeeper. Your book goes to print because you decided it should.
Yes. We work in drafts — authors send us half-finished manuscripts, handwritten pages, and boxes of notes all the time. If the story needs a writer to carry it home, ghostwriting starts at $1,600.
With us, yes — 100% ownership and 100% of royalties, in writing, with an NDA available if you want one. With a traditional deal, the publisher holds the publishing rights; that's the trade for their investment. With any assisted company, get the rights answer in writing before you pay a cent.
Traditionally, two to four years including querying. With us, about 60 days from a finished manuscript — two to three months if the book is illustrated or translated. We never promise a calendar date; anyone who does is guessing with your book.