How to Get Book Published and Join the Other 291,920 Published Authors

29 Full Grown Elephants? That’s a Lot of Books.

Every year writers try to answer the question "How to get a book published? The year 2006 saw 291,920 writers successfully answer the question of how to get a book published. That's the number of new titles released in the United States, according to Bowker, the world’s leading provider of bibliographic information. The number of new books published increased slightly from the 2005 level of 282,500, but didn't reach the level of 2004, an all time high of 295,523. If these numbers sound a little different than last year, they are. Bowker, in their news release of May 31, 2007, says "Due to a change in methodology this year to more accurately track and report on these figures, the statistics cited in this news release differ from the statistics cited in previous years." 291,920 titles is still quite a few books.

I'm the author of The Making of a Bestseller, and the soon to be released The Publishing Primer: A Blueprint for an Author's Success,, I'll try to put this number into perspective.

If the books were shelved side by side one would need four and ½ miles of shelving. If the books were stacked one atop the other, they would reach almost 15 times higher than the world’s tallest building, the Taipei 101, which measures 1,677 feet. To transport one copy of each title, the vehicle would have to be capable of hauling 118 tons or 29 full grown elephants. Laying the books down in a straight line would require a little over 23 miles of railroad tracks.

If an average person read a copy of each title, it would take them 249 years to get through the entire pile. If one cup of coffee was drunk while reading each book, nearly 18,245 gallons would be consumed by the time the last book had been read.

If a copy of each title was purchased at retail, the total expenditure would be enough to send 33 students to Harvard for four years.

If each author received a $5000 advance for getting their book published, the total would nearly approach $1.5 billion. And most interestingly of all, if one author wrote all these books, consecutively, he or she, would have had to start writing during the time of Neanderthal Man, nearly 145,000 years ago.

If 291,920 other authors figured out how to get a book published, you can too.

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About The Authors
Brian Hill and Dee Power have written several nonfiction books including The Publishing Primer: A Blueprint for an Author's Success and The Making of a Bestseller: Success Stories From Authors and the Editors, Agents, and Booksellers Behind Them.