I was giving a workshop at our library this morning, so I took a few minutes after it was over to scour the shelves for books related to self-publishing. I by-passed some of the really old out-dated ones, but picked up a handful that I hope to skim through in the next several weeks. Here’s what I found:

Chicago Manual of Style – I’ve had a couple of questions recently about certain stylistic elements and thought this would be a handy reference. For example, I wasn’t sure whether to capitalize the word spring when referring to it as a season. Rule 8.94 in the 15th edition states, in part, “The four seasons are lowercased (except when used to denote and issue of a journal).” Question answered.

The Prepublishing Handbook: What you should know before you publish your first book by Patricia J. Bell – Although the copyright date on this one is 1992, a seal on the cover identifies it as a recipient of the Benjamin Franklin Award from the Publishers Marketing Association. Not that I know what that means, but surely that makes it a book worth reading. Right? Plus, the Table of Contents looks very interesting and relevant.

How to Publish and Promote Online by M.J. Rose and Angela Adair-Hoy – With a range of topics addressing both traditional print publishing and e-publishing, this book of 58 short chapters looks to be full of practical ideas and resources.

How to Make Money Publishing from Home by Lisa Shaw – Covering the broad spectrum from books to newsletters to web sites to greeting cards and even software, this book seems to deal mostly with the business side of things. It looks like it covers a lot of the nitty-gritty details of the daily operations required of the self-publishing business.

Guerrilla Marketing for Writers: 100 Weapons for Selling Your Work by Jay Conrad Levinson, Rick Frishman & Michael Larsen – I’ve heard people in the business world rave about the Guerrilla Marketing books, so I was excited to see one specifically written for writers. Plus, I keep hearing that marketing is the key to a successful self-publishing venture. I hope to pick up lots of great ideas from this book!

I’ll be sure to report back with more thoughts as I read through each of these books in the coming weeks.