Just a note to new writers. Read everything a publisher says carefully. Traps for the unwary may lie in submission guidelines as well as in contracts.
Here are a few red flags to look for:
1. Contests that ask for rights to all entries, not just the winner. Newspapers are commonly guilty of this. It's a scam; they get all the content provided and only have to pay out one, often relatively small prize. Also, nobody should get your rights without a contract. Even if they promise to give them back.
2. Publishers who talk about how hard it is to be published. Note, this is a different thing from a publisher saying they are selective, or releasing their acceptance statistics. This is 'We know how hard it is to be published. Let us help.' Behind this language lurks, most of the time, a predator. That predator is the vanity publisher in real publisher clothing. Often their victims do not know they are going to be charged to be published until they see the contract. Alternatively, publishers or agents who admit to being failed writers. They often don't intend to rip off their clients, but seldom know what they are doing. (Agents who also write? That's a different matter).
3. Publishers that seem to lack basic knowledge. For example, it is generally considered bad form to register copyright on work before submitting it. Therefore, a publisher that advises you to do so, may not know what they are doing. Many, many authors have fallen into the trap of signing with a promising new publisher that then promptly went out of business...tying their rights up for months, if not years. Sometimes, it can be hard to avoid this one, but think very hard before entrusting your novel to a publisher that has no track record.
4. Never let your friend publish your book. You're likely to end up with no book...and no friend.
Very good advice. A good alternative to sifting through these red flags is self-publishing, as long as the writer is dedicated and organized enough to pull it off. ;)
ReplyDeleteThe thing with self publishing is that the vast majority of people who try it don't do it right. A significant proportion of those have no talent or have not yet developed their craft to the point of being ready to be published.
ReplyDeleteBecause of this, there are vast numbers of unedited or poorly edited manuscripts posted to services such as CreateSpace and Lulu. People download one, read it, and vow never to touch anything self-published again.
In some ways, the unprecedented access to self publishing is a good thing. But it does allow just about anyone to claim to be a writer.
Because of this, the stigma to self publishing remains. Many traditional publishers will not touch an author who has self published unless they did very well.
To do it right requires having a professional edit the book, purchasing or making good cover art and having a solid promotion plan in place.
I did some math once and determined that, as a rough guess, publishing a novel and doing it right, counting editing, artwork, conversion, etc, would cost about $1500 for an ebook. That means that assuming you charged $3 for the product, you need to sell 500 copies to break even.
But if you don't do all of that, then the chances are, you are producing crap. If you are one of those people very good at editing yourself, you might be able to skip the use of a professional editor, but you will have to put in even more time to prepare the manuscript for publication. The same for ebook conversion - you can do this yourself, but it's time consuming and tedious.
Cover art really needs to be done by somebody with some actual talent for graphic design...which is seldom the writer or their friend in college.
This all sounds harsh, but I don't want people to go jump on the self publishing bandwagon, screw it up and end up with no rights, no money and no reputation. I am not against self publishing...just against tossing unedited manuscripts with clip art covers up on CreateSpace.
Well that's where "dedicated" comes in, meaning they have to put forth the effort to contribute something of quality. If the author does all of his/her editing, artwork, and conversion - the prices are not as high. It takes a creative mind and a willingness to put forth the time and effort to learn. I wouldn't knock DIY quite this much, but I understand the issue of there being publications out there not worth the time. That's where the reader comes in. Too many readers do not provide reviews of the work they download. If they invested the time and money to download the ebook, then why not give feedback to fellow consumers? If no one knows it's broke - then it can't be fixed.
ReplyDeleteI'm not knocking DIY. I'm knocking lazy, poorly thought out DIY. And not everyone has the skills to self-edit to a professional level and I know I couldn't do cover art to save my life (although I know somebody who can and would do it reasonably cheap).
ReplyDeleteWhy put something out there under your name that is not as good as it can possibly be?