Self-Published Success for ‘God Without Religion’
By Lynn Garrett -- Publishers Weekly, 6/22/2007 9:10:00 AM
Every now and then a self-published book beats the odds and grabs the attention of enough readers to draw an offer from a traditional publisher. That’s what has happened for God Without Religion by Sankara Saranam, who published the book in June 2005 and has just sold domestic paperback rights to BenBella Books, an independent press based in Dallas.
"The book has been working quiet magic," said Ellen Kleiner, principle in Blessingway Author Services, who edited and produced the book for Saranam. The hardcover edition—distributed by Midpoint—has garnered an IPPY for Best Religion Book, won the Best Spirituality Book award from USABookNews.com and won ForeWord magazine’s Religion Book of the Year, all in 2005. Melissa Etheridge cited it as her "favorite book" in Organic Style magazine that year. Foreign rights have been sold to India, Russia, Turkey, Spain and Indonesia. Saranam is continuing to sell foreign rights and will continue to market the hardcover.
A savvy and active author is always key for a self-published book, and Saranam fits the description. Based in Albuquerque, he is the founder of the Pranayama Institute and is described on its Web site (www.pranayama.org) as "a writer, philosopher, lecturer, and tireless proponent of pranayama," a term he uses to describe a number of breathing and concentration techniques most closely associated with yoga. Aside from promoting and selling the book on his sites (there is also www.godwithoutreligion.com) and writing articles that got picked up by what he describes as "left-leaning" print and Internet publications, Saranam did some local radio, speaking engagements and retreats. But buying blog ads and Google keyword ads, though expensive, has probably been the most effective promotion, he said. "The bloggers got interested, and now they’re promoting it for free. Blogs are read."
BenBella publisher Glenn Yeffeth said, "It’s a great book, brilliantly written—it deals with the same issues as the atheism books that are out there right now, but without abandoning the search for spirituality." The fact that this self-published book has some 20,000 copies in print with about 12,000 copies sold was another factor. BenBella will release the paperback edition in May 2008, with big plans for promotion, including hiring an outside publicist and doing more blogging and other Internet campaigns. Asked what he paid for the rights, Yeffeth laughed and allowed it was "five figures—that’s all I’m going to say."
