Candlestick Publishing

Your manuscript,properly published

print · ebook · audiobook

You finished the book. Getting it into the world is a different job, with its own rules, file formats and rejections. That part is mine.

Tell me about your book

Candlestick Publishing

I will not tell you your book is going to sell.

Anyone who promises you that is selling you something. What I promise is a book produced to professional standard and distributed everywhere it should be — Amazon, Apple, Kobo, Audible, libraries and the rest. What happens after that depends on your book and on the work you put into telling people it exists. I will tell you honestly what I think your chances are.

What it costs

Flat rates, quoted before we start. You keep your copyright, your ISBNs, your retail accounts and every penny of your royalties. I am not your publisher and I take no share of your sales.

All prices in Canadian dollars
ServicePrice
Ebook Interior formatting, copyright page, table of contents, ISBN registration, and setup on Amazon Kindle and Draft2Digital for Apple Books, Kobo, Barnes & Noble, Scribd and library systems. $700
Paperback Trim sizing, mirrored margins and gutter, print-ready interior, spine width calculation, cover wrap specification, and setup on Amazon KDP and Lulu. $900
Audiobook Full narration production, chapter mastering, square cover art, rights documentation, and submission to distributors reaching Audible, Spotify, Apple, Chirp, Hoopla, OverDrive and fifty more platforms. $1,800
All three, one project The complete job — print, digital and audio — produced together so the metadata, covers and ISBNs agree across every edition. $2,900

Cover design is billed at the designer's cost plus a flat coordination fee. Editing is not included — if your manuscript needs an editor I will say so before taking the job, and point you to one.

How it works

You are never handed a login and left to figure it out. I do the work and show you each piece before it goes live.

  1. You send the manuscript

    Word document is fine. I read it, tell you what shape it is in, and quote you a flat price and a timeline.

  2. ISBNs and imprint

    Every format needs its own ISBN. I register them in your name so you own them, and set up the copyright page correctly.

  3. Production

    Interior formatting, cover coordination, audio if you want it. You approve a proof of each before anything is submitted.

  4. Distribution

    Retail accounts, metadata, pricing and territory settings. This is where most books stall, and where the unglamorous experience matters.

  5. Handover

    Accounts in your name, files in your hands, and a written record of every ISBN and platform. If you never speak to me again, nothing breaks.

Why me

I publish my own books and I have made every mistake on my own titles first. What you are paying for is not a course or a template. It is someone who has already been through the parts that stop people.

Audiobooks are the hard part

Distributors reject files for reasons nobody warns you about — the wrong project type, the wrong file format, missing rights documentation. I have worked through all of it and know what they actually want.

Print files fail on details

Spine widths that do not match the page count. Margins that swallow the text at the gutter. Covers rejected for a mismatched title. Small things, every one of them enough to stop a book.

You keep everything

Your ISBNs, your copyright, your accounts, your royalties. No contract signing away rights, no percentage, no exclusivity. I am a service, not a publisher.

Tell me about your book

No obligation and no payment to start the conversation. Tell me what you have written and what you want to do with it, and I will tell you honestly what it would take.