Hello, and welcome!
We are an independent UK book publisher specialising in publishing nonfiction history books about Liverpool.
Are We the Right Book Publisher for You?
We may not be the right fit for everyone, so before you contact us, please read through the relevant sections below to find out about who we are as a company, what we do and the value we bring to you if you decide to partner with us.
NB: Self-publishing authors of other genres, please go to our self-publishing section for your book publishing needs.
On this page, you’ll find information on:
Our history (how we came to be)
Our book publishing services and processes
Manuscript submission guidelines
Frequently asked questions
Book project costs
How to contact us for a quote
Continuing a Legacy
Our heritage stems from Countyvise Ltd (started by the late John Emmerson) who were one of the largest publishers of Liverpool and Wirral history books with over 30 years of publishing experience. Sadly Countyvise came to an end, but when one door closes another one opens.
Suzanne, one of the graphic designers at Countyvise, had a great love for books, an intrigue for history and a passion for graphic design and book publishing (it’s her dream job!). She decided to set up her own graphic design and book publishing business and continue on where she left off at Countyvise.
World of Creative Dreams® is a company in its own right with its own new features, services and processes but with a few of the important elements of Countyvise still present at the heart of the business, such as creating and publishing high quality books that people will enjoy reading and working in close partnership with authors.
Visit the testimonials page to see all the things Suzanne’s authors have said.
The Start of a New Chapter
We are a cross between a traditional publisher and self-publisher. You could say we are a ‘partnership publisher’ (or a ‘hybrid’ publisher as we use the hybrid publishing model).
The traditional aspect is that not all books are accepted for publication. We are very selective in our acceptance process. We are not a vanity publisher accepting everything that gets sent to us. Quality is a top priority for us, so we only accept certain books that match our niche and are of a high standard and value to the marketplace.
Books that are accepted, are designed, proofread and produced to the highest of standards and saleable quality. Books are supplied with our World of Creative Dreams imprint, and ISBN code. Authors receive royalties (rather than an advance).
The self-publishing aspect is that authors are charged a fee for our creative services (average costs are outlined further down in FAQs). You do not need to spend time struggling to find different people to do different things in order to bring your book to life; we take care of that for you.
Our publishing service are all-inclusive of the following:
- Professional book set-up (origination) consists of:
Full book cover design for print (includes a complimentary digital front cover version)
Book formatting and design (interior text and image layouts)
Manually going through each photo and setting them to the correct resolution quality and print specifications
Proofreading
Corrections
Supplying our imprint ISBN code
We create print ready files for the printer.
- Printing We only partner with printers that match our level of quality. This means using quality materials and producing high quality print.
- Premium marketing services See the FAQ further down for more in-depth information.
- Distribution We take care of book distribution to bricks-and-mortar bookstores, online bookshops as well as processing and sending out individual online orders.
We strive to work with you to produce high quality books your audience will enjoy reading.
While we will try to accommodate your suggestions where we can, as the publisher, we will have final say when it comes to the final production as any books that bear our name would need to be of the highest quality and meets our design approval. (For authors who require control over book production and final say, we would not be the right publisher for you).
After the production of your book, we also help as much as we can when it comes to marketing your books; from channels of distribution to marketing materials and beyond.
Manuscript Submission Guidelines:
The only genre we accept is nonfiction local history about Liverpool.
Contact us first and tell us in detail (the more details the better) about your book project.
We prefer to publish books that are under 200 pages when finalised to A5. (We can do A4, but it depends on the book).
Be mainly in black and white with minimal coloured pictures (we accept up to 20% in colour or the whole book gets classed as a colour print job which would be expensive to produce).
The book covers we create can be in colour. We mainly use pictures from the interior of the book with the occasional mixture of stock photos to create book covers.
If we are interested in your book and want to see your manuscript draft, please make sure you set your manuscript up in Microsoft Word (text and images). It doesn’t have to be super neat as we wouldn’t be using your layout. We just need to see what your book is about at a glance and helps us to consider if it's something we would accept for our publishing house.
Should your manuscript be accepted, we can use the Word file to import the text into our own design software for layout editing. Images would need to be sent separately, but this is something we will discuss with you.
It may take between 4 to 8 weeks to hear back from us (after initial email confirmation from us) depending on the amount of submissions we receive to read through.
Please note: like a traditional publisher, not all submissions will be accepted for publishing.
FAQs:
How will my book be sold?
Books will be sold to major book wholesalers such as Gardners, various bricks-and-mortar independent bookshops such as News From Nowhere in Liverpool, Pritchards in Crosby, Museum of Liverpool (gift shop), and big UK chain bookstores such as Waterstones; as well as online on places like our Creative Dreams bookstore, and other online outlets who decide to stock our books.
We also send out copies to the British Library and library legal deposits as required by UK law.
Do you help with marketing?
Yes, it is a partnership with you after all.
Our **1 year premium marketing service comes with every book project we publish under our own imprint. Here’s an example of what we do:
We build a relationship and liaise with bookstores on a regular basis making sure they have enough stock of your book.
We create digital and printed materials and digital info packs about your book for our book suppliers and customers.
We create and display website and social media artwork and post on our social media pages informing people about your book as well as implementing paid advertising campaigns (this is done at various times throughout the year). Visit our ‘Portfolio’ and ‘Video’ section to see a sample of our creations.
We also work with partner media companies such as newspapers and radio stations. (See ‘In the Press’ section or follow our FB page).
(**The reason for only 1 year, is that marketing can get very expensive over time, especially when we have many books to advertise for authors; it is not economical for us to continuously market older books as standard that’s already been out in the market for a while unless they are selling extremely well. Any marketing we decide to do beyond the first year would be at our own expense and discretion).
Can I purchase copies of my own book?
Yes, of course! Just let us know how many you require before we go to print.
Will my book be a guaranteed success? (*Looks hopeful*)
No publisher, big or small can ‘guarantee’ a book’s success; to say they can would be doing you a disservice as it can lead to false expectations.
The tricky thing about book publishing is that you never know if a book will be successful or not. Some books don't do well and sell little, while others will do very well and sell a lot over time. It is the market interest that determines the success of a book.
We do the best we can producing your book into a professional one, and we take steps to market and promote it, but at the end of the day, it’s up to your audience to decide whether to purchase your book. This is not something we can control unfortunately.
Do you publish both ebooks and hard copy books?
Currently, only hard copy books are published. Our ebooks are mainly just the first chapter sample of a book we publish as an online free read.
How much will it cost?
Ah, yes, a very important question!
Costs will vary as it depends on what your project is like. Your book won’t have the exact same specifications as another author’s book. Because each book project we take on is unique, we prefer to price them accordingly (as custom quotes) as this is the fairest way for everyone. No one should have to pay more than they have to.
Things we have to take into consideration are:
Origination costs - The size and complexity of your project affects the amount of time we need to spend working on it.
Printing costs - This depends on the specifications of your book and printing quantity required.
Marketing costs - There’s the initial marketing for the book release, and we also continue to do 1 year of marketing for you.
Like a traditional publisher, we take care of the nitty gritty and do most of the hard work so you don’t have to.
To give you an idea of how much money you would need to budget for if you wanted to publish with us, costs are typically between £6,000 - £8,000+ depending on what is required overall and the specifications of the project.
We do dedicate a lot of time and care to publishing books which is reflected in the costs. (We have payment plans available. See below).
Where possible, we will always try to keep costs as low as possible for authors.
Do you have a payment scheme?
Yes, you can pay in thirds. We understand not everyone can pay a big chunk of money in one go, so we try to be fair when it comes to payments.
We accept a deposit as first payment before work starts, the 2nd payment at the proofing stage and the final 3rd payment before we go to print.
Fantastic! I shall get in touch right now and leave it to your capable hands.
Thank you. We look forward to working with you and welcoming you into our Creative Dreams family!
Use the form below to contact us about your history book project.
UPDATE:
We are now FULLY BOOKED and NOT ACCEPTING NEW MANUSCRIPTS.
(Submission form below is disabled and no messages will be received)
(Authors wanting to self-publish, visit HERE for info and active submission form)