Guides
Straight, jargon-free answers to the questions authors ask before they publish, grounded in how UK publishing actually works. No sales pitch, just the facts you need to make your own call.
The honest, genre-agnostic overview: your real route options whatever you write, what each costs, ISBNs and formats, and how a launch works. Start here.
The children's-specific deep-dive: routes, illustration and format choices, age banding, and how a launch works for a children's book.
The fiction deep-dive: routes (traditional wants a finished manuscript), what it costs, the editing a novel needs, why cover and categories sell it, and how a launch works.
The non-fiction deep-dive: routes (including selling on a proposal), what it costs, the extra work (index, permissions, fact-checking), and how a launch works.
An honest UK cost breakdown — traditional, self-publishing, hybrid and the £0-upfront launchpad route — with indicative ranges for illustration, editing, covers and ISBNs, so you can budget your own book.
An honest comparison of the two classic routes — control, cost, royalty, speed and the catch — plus a third route: a launchpad that runs your launch for you at £0 upfront.
Which UK routes actually take a submission without an agent — traditional, hybrid and open-submission — honestly compared, and where FossPress fits if your manuscript is finished.
The honest launch playbook — reviewers, schools and libraries, getting into bookshops (trade supply on sale-or-return), listings and ads — and how FossPress runs the whole launch for you at £0 upfront.
The format that catches first-time authors out — word count, interior illustrations, age 6–9 banding, series planning and which formats to publish — a plain guide, plus how FossPress sets it up for you.
The plain-English answer — no to publish on Amazon, yes to reach bookshops and libraries — plus what a UK ISBN costs, the free-KDP-ISBN catch, and the one-ISBN-per-format rule.
The honest trust answer — yes, you keep your copyright; what a publishing licence really is; whether rev-share is safe after the 2025 Unbound collapse; and how £0-upfront means no cash at risk.
The cheapest and free routes compared honestly — what “free to publish” really costs, the production nobody can skip, and the £0-upfront route that also runs your launch.
Free tool: try our children's book cost & route planner — pick your route and see the real cost, effort and time. No sign-up.
More guides are on the way.
Places worth an author's time for getting a book discovered, beyond the launch we run for you. We are not paid to list these.
Want to see this in practice? Here's a real book we published, and exactly what we did.
