Ok,My Uncle's Uncle wrote a book called the godson
Willie Fopiano, DOB 8-29-44, minor North End hoodlum of Boston who in 1993 wrote a book, "The Godson", about his exploits, claiming to have been a runner for the late Meyer Lansky.I believe he passed in 1995 or 1996 Me and my uncle talked on christmas he told me about the book! And then a Light Bulb started flashing over my head!!!

What if we turned this into a ebook,Could we sell more copies then the publishers did. The book only sold i believe 25,000 Copies!

We will be looking alot into this to put it back on the market, if anyone has any advice how we could turn this into a ebook,Please let me know. the more readers we get. the faster we can turn this into a possible movie.

You have to be careful about the original publisher and his heirs. If you want to do something like this look into public domain books. That way you don't have any legal issues redistributing it and of course pimp it out with affiliate links.

we plan on getting in contact with the publisher,unless they're dead .My family is associated with gangs and Mobz.... so they probably all got shot up at a spaghetti fest haha...

Public domain books... if i do that wont have to get copyrights?

No if it's in the public domain you can add your own copyrights. The book is too new to be in the public domain though and at the very least it was published so I'm sure it's still copyright.

This little program has all the information on what is public domain and what's not
http://rapidshare.com/files/79754867...Researcher.zip

If you're interested in public domain stuff just google public domain books, videos, movies, music, ebooks, pictures whatever you are interested in using. There is tons of public domain stuff. I think I posted something about this before with some links to places on where to find stuff in the public domain.

I use to own a site that sold movies for $1 that were in the public domain. I made a couple of dollars from it and then sold it to someone else.

The book was published in the 90's....

It's 99% most likely not in the public domain (especially since it was a published book). Of course you can always contact the publisher and him (if he's not alive his family) and buy the rights to the story or even suggest a profit share.

what is this nonsense

Yeah it's still too new, copyrights usually last longer than 20 years if I'm not mistaken. If the publisher lets you do it, they'll for sure want a fat cut of the profits, at which point it probably wouldn't be worth it.

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honestly, i think your excitement about your relative is muddling your viewpoint. It would be an awesome thing to sell, because you can and because the story is cool but if want to profit well then there are better ways to do it. Not to be negative, but there is almost no way youll be able to sell 25000 copies of that anytime soon, esp on the internet.

take care and thanks vze for the resources

Copyrights last for the life of the author + 70 years. I don't understand how someone can "own" something, like a Copyright, for 70 years after they're dead... You would think it would pass on to the immediate family or maybe even the publishing company? Not sure. The only way to find out who (if anyone) currently owns the rights to the book is to make some phone calls, starting with the publishing company.

But as the member above me mentioned, if the actual book only sold 25,000 copies, I wouldn't expect the eBook version to sell very well. But, hey, who knows? If you can get your hands on the rights to the book, for free or very cheap, then I say why not.

Yeah,I know im trying to see who published the book I have no info on it.. i want to re do the book. turn it into a series.

If you google alibris then search their site. The book is still for sale from $16.50.
Not an expert, but I think that means that the copyright is still in place. There is a co-author, John Harney, and there are 15 copies available at this site.
The publisher is:
Edition: First edition. Binding: Hard cover Publisher: St. Martin's Press, New York Date Published: 1993 ISBN-13: 9780312097486 ISBN: 0312097484

My suggestion would be to contact the publisher, see if they would be willing to turn it into an ebook, with some added value by you.
Meaning, stories you may have heard from family members etc. that you could add to the original context.????
Just a thought.