Submission Form for Self-Published Books SECTION 1: About the Book

* Full title of book

Title of Series

* Author’s name (or pen name) as it appears on the book

* Author’s legal name (for contractual/payment purposes)

Author’s year of birth

* Author’s city of residence

* Author email

Co-authors

(please list any additional authors)

* Year of publication

ISBN (print book)

ISBN (ebook)

* List price

Language

* Brief synopsis of book

(50-250 words)

* Fiction/Non-Fiction fiction non-fiction

*Audience adult teen children

*Setting Vancouver British Columbia World Greater Vancouver Canada

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AUTHOR GUARANTEES The author guarantees that the book and everything contained in the book, including text, images, sound, video, and metadata, complies with the following terms and conditions:

Author represents and warrants that the book is the Author’s original work and property. The Author represents and warrants that he, she, or they are the author of the book and that the Author has not entered into any agreement that would conflict with the inclusion of the book in the VPL collection.

Author represents and warrants that the book does not infringe on any copyrighted work. The Author represents and warrants that the book does not include any elements that violate the proprietary rights of others, including cover image, poetry, song lyrics, etc. If any third-party elements are included in the book, the Author represents and warrants that he, she, or they have secured the necessary licences and permissions to include those third-party elements in the book prior to signing this agreement.

Author represents and warrants that the book does not defame others or violate their privacy. The Author represents and warrants that the book does not contain material that is libelous, slanderous, an invasion of privacy, an unlawful appropriation of name or likeness, or a defamation of character, including publishing a person's private email address, phone number, or other personal information without their permission.

Author represents and warrants that the book does not contain commercial advertising. While it is acceptable to include promotional material about other books by the Author, the Author represents and warrants that the book does not contain any other form of commercial advertising.

Author represents and warrants that the book does not contain content prohibited by law. The Author represents and warrants that the book does not violate the laws of Canada or British Columbia, including laws governing:  hate speech  obscenity  advocating or condoning violence against another person or group  deceptive business practices, including multi-level marketing and pyramid schemes  dissemination of instructions, recipes, computer code, etc. which are intended to be injurious to readers or others.

SECTION 2: Submitting a Print Book [If you are not submitting a print book, please skip ahead to Section 3.]

FORMAT REQUIREMENTS We require books to be bound in a treatment such as hardcover, library binding, trade paperback, or perfect binding. We will not accept punch-and-bind treatment, such as coil, spiral, or comb bindings; stapled pages, or 3-ring-binding. Please check the box to indicate that your book meets these criteria:

The book is appropriately bound for library use and circulation.

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PURCHASING PRINT INDIE TITLES Vancouver Public Library buys material from a variety of suppliers, such as Library Services Centre, Amazon.ca, Library Bound Inc, United Library Services, etc. We prefer to purchase from these suppliers and, if you haven’t already, we recommend you list your book with the Library Services Centre which has a Small Press and Author Program in support of indie authors.

Is your book available from a supplier? If so, please specify which ones, (e.g. Library Services Centre, Amazon). If you are not working with a supplier, we will have one contact you.

To help us purchase your book, please follow these steps:

1. Complete and submit this form. 2. If your book meets the selection criteria, we will forward your information to our vendor. 3. You can then expect to be contacted by our vendor, usually by the email address you have provided in this form. The vendor will send you a purchase order number, and you will send them your book and invoice. The vendor may have specific invoice requirements. You should include the following on your invoice: a. Purchase order number b. Your name c. The name the cheque should be payable to d. Your address e. Your phone number f. Your email address g. Date of invoice h. Price of book i. Shipping cost (up to $8) if you will mail the book to the vendor; OR if you want to deliver the book to the vendor in person, contact the vendor j. GST number OR if you don’t have a GST number write ‘GST exempt’ 4. When the vendor receives the book(s) and the invoice, they will issue a cheque and mail it to you, generally within 4-8 weeks. 5. The vendor will then send your book to us at VPL with their invoice. 6. We will not pay for any material left at a VPL location or any invoice from an author that we receive without a purchase order number issued by VPL. Please do not deliver materials to VPL yourself if you would like us to purchase them. Follow the steps above.

DONATE If you prefer to donate your book and bypass the purchase order requirement, VPL will gladly accept one gift copy. Please provide information about where we may purchase additional copies if we need them. Note: All gifts become the property of the Vancouver Public Library and material sent to or left at the library will not be returned. The Library reserves the right to decide the disposition of all gifts we receive. We will review all donated material according to the same selection criteria we apply to purchased materials. We may sell print material that is not needed for our collection for the benefit of

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By mail: Collections & Technical Services - Acquisitions Attn: Vancouver Indie Authors Collection Vancouver Public Library 350 West Georgia Street Vancouver, B.C. V6B 6B1

In person: Drop off at the Central Library Information Desk at 350 West Georgia Street, clearly labelled “ATTENTION: Vancouver Indie Authors Collection”

SECTION 3: Submitting an eBook [If you are only submitting a print book, please skip to Section 4.]

FORMAT REQUIREMENTS There are three minimum requirements for any eBook submitted for consideration. Please check the appropriate boxes to confirm that your book meets all three requirements.

The eBook must be in Open EPUB format. The ‘open’ in Open EPUB means that the file doesn’t have any encryption or digital rights management applied. (Not sure if your file is open? If you haven’t gone out of your way to add encryption to your file, you can safely assume it is open.)

The EPUB file must include a high quality cover image in JPEG format. For eBook covers, high quality means resolution of 1600x2400 or greater, portrait orientation with a roughly 6:9 ratio, and a file size of no more than 2 megabytes.

The eBook must include a full title page. At minimum, the title page should include the author’s name (or pen name), the full title of the book, and the year of publication. This is necessary for the book to be catalogued.

FORMAT PREFERENCES In addition to the requirements above, there are a number of highly recommended formatting practices that make for a better experience for readers. VPL is far more likely to include books that follow these practices. Please check the appropriate boxes to indicate which practices your eBook follows.

The EPUB file should be run through a validator and be found error free. We are more likely to purchase books that have been run through a file validator and been shown to have no hidden errors in the file.

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The eBook should use minimal text formatting. Validation errors can be confusing and difficult to solve. One of the simplest ways to avoid validation errors in the first place is to keep the formatting of your text as simple as possible. This includes limiting the use of bulleted lists, auto-numbering, footnotes, block quotes, etc.

The eBook should use standard fonts. We prefer standard fonts which are readable and universally compatible across various devices. If you are going to embed additional fonts, please use True Type Fonts (TTF) or Open Type Fonts (OTF).

The eBook should include a hyperlinked table of contents. Even if your chapters are not titled, a hyperlinked table of contents will help readers navigate the book, especially readers who might be using screen readers or other accessibility devices.

Images in the eBook should include alternate text. To ensure your eBook is accessible to all readers, please include an short description (125 characters or less) of any images using the ‘alt’ attribute in the image’s tag. This ensures that patrons using screen readers will be able to hear a description of any images that cannot be accessed visually.

Images within the eBook should be high quality, but not too large. If you are including images above and beyond the front cover image, it is important to strike a balance between high quality images and small file size. The resolution needs to be high enough to look good on a powerful tablet, but not so high that it overwhelms a low-power eReader. We prefer JPEG images, roughly 300-600 pixels wide, with a pixels-per-inch of roughly 72-150 ppi.

The overall file size should be no more than 10 megabytes. Larger file sizes can create problems for some eReaders. COMPLETE YOUR SUBMISSION

EMAIL THE EPUB FILE Once you’ve completed and submitted this form, please email your EPUB file to us at [email protected]. Please include the full title and author name in the body of your email so we can easily match the EPUB file with your submission form.

SIGN AND MAIL THE LICENCE AGREEMENT In addition to emailing your EPUB, please print, sign and mail (or scan and email) the licence agreement. We cannot begin assessing your submission until we have received your signed licence agreement. You can email the signed licence agreement to [email protected] or mail it to: Digital Services Attn: Vancouver Indie Authors Collection Vancouver Public Library 350 West Georgia Street Vancouver, B.C. V6B 6B1

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PURCHASING EBOOK INDIE TITLES For eBooks, our vendor can purchase eBooks through Smashwords. Smashwords is the largest distributor of Indie eBooks in the world and does not require exclusive publishing contracts. Authors can also remove their work at any time. For more information on Smashwords and how to upload your title check here: https://www.smashwords.com/about/how_to_publish_on_smashwords.

The Vancouver Public Library can also purchase eBooks directly from authors. To help us to do so, please follow these steps:

1. Complete and submit this form, email the epub file, and sign and mail the licence agreement. 2. If your book meets the selection criteria, we will then contact you to establish you as a vendor for the Vancouver Public Library. We may require additional personal information such as a Social Insurance Number to comply with Federal Income Tax requirements. 3. Once you receive the purchase order, you can email us an invoice. The invoice must include: a. VPL’s purchase order number b. Your name c. The name the cheque should be payable to d. Your address e. Your phone number f. Your email address g. Date of invoice h. Price of book i. GST number OR if you don’t have a GST number write ‘GST exempt’ 4. When we receive the invoice, we will issue a cheque and mail it to you, generally within 4-8 weeks. We will not pay for any material sent or any invoice that arrives without a purchase order number. DONATE If you prefer to donate your ebook and bypass the purchase order requirement, VPL will gladly accept one gift copy. Note: All gifts become the property of the Vancouver Public Library and material sent to the library will not be returned. The Library reserves the right to decide the disposition of all gifts we receive. We will review all donated material according to the same selection criteria we apply to purchased materials. To find out if the Library has included your donated ebook(s) in our collection, please check the library catalogue.

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SECTION 4: Additional comments

Please provide us with any additional information we might need to assess and catalogue your book.

No more than 1,000 characters, please.

We welcome any feedback you might have about the collection or the submission process.

No more than 1,000 characters, please.

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