The Book Designer Blog Has Been Sold

12.01.2021 Nate Hoffelder 2 Comments

The Book Designer is a blog which most authors should know. Founded by Joel Friedlander, this blog has been around for over ten years now, and in that time it has dispensed sage advice from dozens of experts (including myself).

For the past couple years I have been an occasional contributor to The Book Designer, which is how I found out that The Book Designer was sold just before Christmas. This has not yet been publicly announced (and I don’t know why not) but I just learned that Chandler Bolt bought it.

I can’t really say I know Chandler, but I have interacted with his staff at Self-Publishing School. A few times now, we have talked about a guest post, but so far nothing has jelled. I am not terribly familiar with that site (it’s way out of my price range) but I did find a couple reviews.

Update: Victoria Strauss of Writer Beware tweeted this when I told her the news. She also directed me to BBB complaints about Bolt’s school.

Whoa, really? I may have to reconsider recommending that blog. I periodically get questions about Chandler Bolt and his "school" (mostly as a result of spam-style solicitations) and I've gotten one pretty serious complaint (person also complained to BBB https://t.co/9NbuGaUwKR )

— Victoria Strauss (@victoriastrauss) January 12, 2021

If you’ve worked with Chandler Bolt, or used his Self-Publishing School, I would love to hear about your experiences.

No plans have been announced for  the future of The Book Designer, but I do know that publication of new blog posts has been suspended for the time being (I had a guest post scheduled for 4 January).

Edit: I have been asked to clarify the sale:

FYI – just to clarify, Book Design Templates https://www.bookdesigntemplates.com/ and Author Toolkits https://authortoolkits.com/ were not a part of the sale to Chandler Bolt of the Self-Publishing School and both remain under the ownership and control of Joel Friedlander and Tracy Atkins.