Signing a Book Contract: Dos, Don’ts and Dirty Little Secrets

Are you prepared to negotiate a book contract? Columnists and bloggers are expanding their platforms into authorship. There are important aspects for contracts with hybrid and traditional publishers: rights, royalties, risks, sub-rights, marketing expectations, pricing, and more.  This useful workshop will feature sample publishing contracts, templates, royalty calculators, and tips from two members who have signed with publishers. Learn how to protect yourself and your work!

Lori B. Duff is the managing partner of Jones & Duff, LLC and the Municipal Court Judge for the City of Loganville, Georgia.  She writes a bi-weekly column called “Legalese” which is geared towards translating complicated legal topics into plain English.  Her humor column, also bi-weekly, has been twice mentioned honorably in the NSNC annual column contest.  She is Vice President of the Council of Municipal Court Judges’ Association (or is that President of all Vice?) and serves as the current Vice President of the NSNC.  Her fourth book, “If You Did What I Asked in the First Place” is now available, and is hopefully a bestseller by the time you read this.  She can be found at www.loriduffwrites.com

Lisa Smith Molinari is a multiple, award-winning columnist behind “The Meat and Potatoes of Life, a military spouse column that appears weekly in the Stars and Stripes and military community newspapers worldwide. She is the author ofThe Meat and Potatoes of Life: My True Lit Com. She is a NSNC past president and her work has been featured in anthologies, including Chicken Soup for the Soul editions.

She is a lawyer, co-founder and Vice President of Operations for The Orion Military Scholarship Fund, Inc., a public charity.