Saturday, May 02, 2015

Old books never die. They just find new sellers on Amazon.

In 2006, I reworked for the third time my story and recipe cookbook called Flavored with Love, Mary Lou's Family and Friends Can Cook. The first two editions, done in a homespun fashion with spiral covers, sold as well as hotcakes at a benefit on a cold Saturday morning. Mostly my sister, Ruth Ishee, sold them throughout south Mississippi. She had contributed a large number of recipes and told me some of the stories included.

The third edition, which has a cool-looking cover but still has the same down-home style, has made a modest showing on Amazon. Since my sister's health has not allowed her to continue to sell  books and since all her friends bought earlier editions, it hasn't succeeded the way I'd hoped.

In 2004, Ruth gave me a pickup load of collard greens, which inspired another cookbook co-authored by Dr. Paul Elliott, The Collard Patch, also published in 2006. It has an attractive cover, quite a bit of nutritional information, some stories, and all sorts of recipes for collards and cornbread. Unlike Flavored with Love, it sold well on Amazon.

Since the paper upon which these books are printed has aged, I removed them from the market. Other sellers though continue to offer them on Amazon.

Having been encouraged to write some Kindle cookbooks, I'm working on pulling some of the favorite recipes from these two books and publishing them as Kindle books.




No comments: