How long does it usually take before paperbacks are published?

It is typically about a year. This can very though depending on how well (or poorly) a book continues to sell in hardcover as the planned paperback release date.

With books that continue to sell well in hardcover, the paperback release date can be pushed back to two or more years (see The DaVinci Code). And books that do particularly poor in hardback may never get a paperback release.

Yeah, that's what I feared. It's a pretty mean business. Not everyone can afford hardcovers - or have the space to store them. But I guess this thread wont change anything...

Faster if self published if traditional published then about a year.



💎Happy trails to you, till we meet again🚢💎

I think there is no standard time. The paperback is issued whenever the author decides to sell the paperback rights. The guy who wrote the Garden of Good and Evil kept the book in hardcover for 10 years before he sold the pbk rights.

I'm not a criminal Iris, I'm an outlaw.

Surely it's up to publishing house and not the author? Then again, both want the same: Earn some decent dosh on the hardcover and then some sweet slow trickling from the paperbacks?

Once a publisher accepts a manuscript for publication, it goes on a list that will set down the release date. Several issues determine the release date: number of books a publisher releases every month, the timeliness of the book, amount of time will take to prep the book (editing, cover design, sending out ARCs, etc) As a very general rule, a book will be issued between six and eighteen months after acceptance. For print-on-demand services used by self-published authors, the timeline is much shorter, of course.)

If a book is to be published hard/soft, the audio release will usually coincide with the hardcover release, the paperback coming out about a year later, unless the hardcover does not sell the projected number of copies; in that case, a paperback release may be cancelled.