One of my clients has asked me to edit and put together the manu_script_ of her step-father's book (he has passed away). We want to publish it ourselves so her mother can have a book. What self-publishing services do you recommend? Thank you. Heather

One of my clients has asked me to edit and put together the manu_script_ of her step-father's book (he has passed away). We want to publish it ourselves so her mother can have a book. First question is, how many copies? There are services that will print and assemble one to ten copies of a book by a hand process. If it's hundreds of copies your need, you go to a short-run book manufacturer. Bill Penrose

One of my clients has asked me to edit and put together the manu_script_ of her step-father's book (he has passed away). We want to publish it ourselves so her mother can have a book. First question is, how many copies? There are services that will print and assemble one to ten copies of a book by a hand process. If it's hundreds of copies your need, you go to a short-run book manufacturer. Bill Penrose What about one of those print on demand places? They give you a certain amount of copies for a fee of course, but then people can order more. The cost is a few hundred I think. I know someone who has done that and has been pleased. He designed the cover and it looks pretty fancy. Bryna

One of my clients has asked me to edit and put together the manu_script_ of her step-father's book (he has passed away). We want to publish it ourselves so her mother can have a book. What self-publishing services do you recommend? I don't.  I assume your client is sufficiently in touch with reality to understand that she will never see a financial return on money spent on this project.  It is perfectly reasonable, if she has the means, to make this sentimental gesture, but she must understand that it is that, and by no means can it be considered an investment. How many copies does she want?  If she only wants a handful she should look into print-on-demand services.  If she wants more than a few she should take bids directly from printers and binders (and typesetters, if she wants the highest quality - although much desktop publishing software can produce camera-ready pages that will look fine to most people).  If time is not critical, so that printers can do the work when their equipment would otherwise be idle, she can get some reasonable bids - and she should take many bids because this is a very price-competitive business.  She may want a few presentation copies specially bound.  She should look at the *self* in self-publishing.  There is plenty of material available on the web and it isn't rocket surgery. She should avoid the vanity presses, which include in their services many things that are worthless (e.g. - sending out review copies, since reviewers generally get more books than they could ever review and have a special circular file for books from vanity houses). Finally, you didn't say what kind of book this is.  It is possible that certain kinds of books could be published on a subsidy basis with university presses, historical societies, etc.  This isn't much of a possibility for most fiction, but there some chance for many kinds of histories.

so her mother can have a book. What self-publishing services do you recommend? Thank you. Heather If the book is a work of fiction, and the step father is not a famous person, as Lars points out below, no matter how you do this it is going to be nothing more than an act of love with no financial return

One of my clients has asked me to edit and put together the manu_script_ of her step-father's book (he has passed away). We want to publish it ourselves so her mother can have a book. What self-publishing services do you recommend? Heather, there's a group of people called, I think, personal historians. Their business is to help people put together their memoirs and such. I'm sure they have a professional organization, and I'm betting there are even software packages for pulling together the stuff you'll need to take to the printer (not a vanity press per se). Do a little searching for this bunch and see what suggestions they have. Another thing to consider is putting this together as a one-of-a kind, sort of high level scrapbook. Use beautiful paper, decorative elements