Publish America - The best thing to EVER happen to unknown authors

Just wanted to throw my .02 in here. I'm a former PA author. I think during the course of my 2 1/2 years with them, I spent about $150 (I'm cheap he he he) and only earned $24 in royalties. And, that was because my mother's friends bought my book. Honestly. Of course, most PA authors I know would consider $24 a large amount of money, and ask me what I did to promote the books in order to sell so much.

I've just acquired my publishing rights back to both of my books...and I'm in the process of re-editing my novel. I remember when I first signed with them. I was so happy because I knew absolutely nothing about the business and I was determined to get this novel published. It was only after I'd signed that I found out about all the shit other writers had been through with them. But, I honestly thought: "It won't happen to me. They will be great with me because I've been nothing but nice to them. I don't argue with them or anything like those other people have."

What a crock of shit. *laugh*

I honestly thought that as long as my books were being accepted then everything was ok. It gave me a sense of pride and self worth when people read my books and praised them. Even strangers I'd never met before. And, that was something I didn't want to relinquish.

Then I found this place and I realized that my publisher saw absolutely no quality in my work. They didn't believe in me as I did them. They only wanted money. My first book was priced at $25 on Amazon.com. Out of that $25...I got about $.80 PA got the rest. That was all it was ever about. And, that upset me.

I went to others' websites and I read Jenna's account on how real publishing works...and I thought "holy fuck! I have been so screwed!" Then, I became angry. Granted, I should have done my homework before I signed the contract, but I was so excited to think that someone believed in my work enough to actually publish it.

Hopefully, one day, I will find a real publisher who will actually believe. There was a point when I wanted to just give up and just keep my writing to myself. I've been writing since I was a child. Then, I realized that--as much as my PA experience scarred me--to give up is to let them win. I'm an extremely sore loser. So, I dusted myself off.

I can understand this person's need to defend PA and her work--because, when you hop on the bus you really don't think 'oh, shit, did I get on the right one?' You're happy the bus came. I just hope that, in time, she will come to realize that you all were just trying to help her.

Sorry...hope I didn't ramble too much.

Peace,
KJ

Slave2Six said:

The drama in this thread, gripping though it may be, is somewhat superfluous don't you think? Why try to talk someone out of a decision that they have made and acted upon rather than allowing him/her to go with it? The contract is signed and the train is in motion. Let's admire its speed or watch the spectacular explosion. Either way, it's certain to be exciting.

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Because we're a compassionate bunch. None of us wants to see people get screwed over and have their hopes and dreams stomped on.

Christine N. said:

Don't forget stupid and liars. We're just a bunch of stupid liars who are jealous.

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Not stupid. Stipid. (It's part of the PA Word-Book. Right up with Zobmi and Darf.)

"Stipidly, I darfed up a zobmie right in front of the wedding party."

James D. Macdonald said:

Not stupid. Stipid. (It's part of the PA Word-Book. Right up with Zobmie and Darf.)

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I must see this word-book.

Oh, that's right, how could I forget!

Attack of the Stipid Zobmi Darfs...a book that fits their specialty Like A Glove, certain to Resonate With Readers.

And the classic, spline.

Meanwhile, Verses of the Stipd Darf

Today's PA authors are mere shadows of the PA authors of ages past. Those were writers of resonance! They wore fitted gloves. They knew words like aurora and echelon! Where will we see their like today? They have pranced from the fields we know, beyond the shining sea, and we mourn their prancing.

James D. Macdonald said:

Today's PA authors are mere shadows of the PA authors of ages past. Those were writers of resonance! They wore fitted gloves. They knew words like aurora and echelon! Where will we see their like today?

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Ah, those were the days, Unk. PA was a vast, fetid, uncharted swamp, drawing in the unwary and...wait a minute. It's still like that. Anyway, I think since PA now boasts of over 20,000 duped--er, happy--authors in their stable, the quality must, of necessity, be less.

aadams73 said:

Because we're a compassionate bunch. None of us wants to see people get screwed over and have their hopes and dreams stomped on.

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Not to mention the benefit of lurkers who might be reading.

Actually, I am glad you're here, Alien Enigma. You're proof to anyone doing their research that AW accepts even people who defend PA. While I hope to one day see you bite the bullet and admit you were wrong, until that day comes, you provide a small counterpoint to the so-called "bashing" for anyone looking for the facts.

DeadlyAccurate said:

Actually, I am glad you're here, Alien Enigma. You're proof to anyone doing their research that AW accepts even people who defend PA. While I hope to one day see you bite the bullet and admit you were wrong, until that day comes, you provide a small counterpoint to the so-called "bashing" for anyone looking for the facts.

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That, and he's delicious with sugar.

bstevens said:

Publish America - The best thing to EVER happen to unknown authors

Traditional publishers are upset with PA. A company like PA has a major effect on the volume of manuscripts they receive. They like to have everyone's good work sent to them to glance at and discard and send out a rejection letter. I am sure PA has beat them out of more than a few good manuscripts.

If I could I would kiss the hands of everyone at PA for rescuing poor unknown authors from the hellish rejection cycles of traditional publishers and the vanity publishers who ask you for thousands of dollars UP FRONT!!!

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Traditional publishers are not upset with PA, because they barely know it exists. PA certainly doesn't impact their business in any way. If the bigshots send out rejection letters, it is because most don't accept unsolicited manuscripts any more. They are NOT looking for any more over the transom manuscripts than they are already deluged with. Do some reading and research.

Literary agents and writers' guilds and unions DO know PA exists. They all know PA is not a legit writing credit because PA prints everything they can within their daily quota. They do not consider you to be published and I agree with this decision 100%.

If you believe PA is selective because they "reject" 80% of what they receive, an acceptance of 20% alone would be unprecedented. Most publishers accept about one tenth of one percent. Does that make them elitist snobs? On the rare occassion yes, but most are anxious to find a new fabulous voice with amazing writing talent. Does that describe most PA authors? Not from what I've seen and read.

If you think I'm a snob by believing this, allow me to tell you about a short story I had published in a prestigious Canadian lit journal last April. I worked, worked and re-worked that story for a year and a half. That's right, 4400 words that I revised for 18 months. I wanted to make sure the product I put was as outstanding as I was capable of creating. Did other journals reject it? Sure. But eventually one of those "elitist" magazines, who didn't know me from Adam, published my story, because they believed in the quality. It sure wasn't easy, but it was worth it.

No legit publisher should ever ask you for money up front. But if you're happy with PA (and it seems that you did have a good understanding of their business practices before you signed) that's good. Those that believed PA was a genuine commercial publisher are the ones who are not happy, and rightly so.

DeadlyAccurate said:

While I hope to one day see you bite the bullet and admit you were wrong,

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Or at least, actually engage in meaningful conversation instead of chest-thumping. Certain questions are still open from his first apperance.

1. Jeff claimed that he turned down representation from a real publisher in order to sign with PA. He hasn't identified said publisher. It could be because he knows that somebody at AW has almost certained signed with anyone he can name and can verify that the offer didn't exist.
2. Jeff claims that PA is better than other publishers without quantifying how it's better. While "better" is certainly subjective, I can't imagine many people would think that selling 50 copies is better than selling 3,000 or 25,000 or 100,000 copies.
3. Jeff claims that PA is NOT a vanity publisher, yet he won't disclose how much money he has sent them.
4. Jeff boasts freqently about how successful his "promotions" are but fails to mention actual sales.

I personally have no interest in reading unsupported propaganda.

I'm new to Absolute Write, and this thread has been incredibly informative and very entertaining. A friend referred me to AW, and linked me to this thread, and to this post:

I am trying hard to identify my niche market. I think it is women. Did you look at my website www.barbarastevensbooks.com?

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Oh, I looked at it, and I laughed my ass off.

Brenda experiences her own private 911

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Her own private emergency hotline?

She thinks that we are married eventhough I have never married anyone.

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Ooh, a new word! "eventhough"! How inventive!

"Will you marry me please. Please.....Please.....Please.....It is the only way. I'm a dead man otherwise.Please............................................?"

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Don't you know that ellipses only have 3 dots?

But it was this post that had me mystified:

I don't need all that editing. I am a professional person with a college degree. In fact I asked PA NOT TO EDIT mine at all. I didn't want my story line changed. That's another thing I have heard that the traditional ones do IF YOU are one in a million who gets published at all, they REWRITE and pick apart your story and put it how THEY want it. I want to sink or swim based on my own merits. Glad I didn't send my manuscript to your company.

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Wow! I would love to have an editor! I would love to have my writing examined and critiqued. I would love to have a professional editor advise me on how to edit my work to make it marketable, or just readable. I can't imagine not wanting critical advice, or not wanting to be informed of errors in spelling, punctuation, and grammar.

I'm not new to writing, but I'm new to the writing community. I hadn't heard of PA prior to reading this thread, but I've heard of other vanity publishers, and I wouldn't even bother. If my work isn't good enough to get snapped up by a real publisher, why would I bother publishing it on my own? And why wouldn't I take advice from other writers on how to improve my work?

There was another post elsewhere in the thread that made the same point:

imagoodgurl4 said:

My point that I was trying to make before is that bstevens will be very unlikely to succeed in the publishing/writing world if she cannot come to terms with the fact that editing and critiquing is not a personal attack on her as a writer, but a useful tool to help improve her writing so that her books will be even better. I apologize if that point was not made clear before.

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I look forward to having you all tell me what to change, and where I can improve. I visited the AW chat last night, and was told that I ought to read things in the genre I'm trying to write for. (I actually knew this, but I needed the reminder.) I'm here for the help. I'm going to write anyway, I may as well do a good job of it.

Thanks to AW for being here and for warning newbies like me about PA.

Belittling them will not help the message to get through, Janice.

If you've written a book that total strangers want to read, you can get it legitimately published and total strangers will read your book. If you haven't ... there isn't a vanity publishing scheme in the world that will make total strangers want to read your book.

Hooray for Editors!

bstevens said:

I don't need all that editing. I am a professional person with a college degree. In fact I asked PA NOT TO EDIT mine at all. I didn't want my story line changed. That's another thing I have heard that the traditional ones do IF YOU are one in a million who gets published at all, they REWRITE and pick apart your story and put it how THEY want it. I want to sink or swim based on my own merits. Glad I didn't send my manuscript to your company.

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Yes, I think a lot of us on this board are professionals and have university/college degrees. That doesn't mean an editor isn't essential.

It certainly hasn't been my experience that my published work has been "picked apart and put how 'they' want it." Ever seen galley proofs? They did not "rewrite" anything, only make minor spelling/grammar/clarity changes which believe me, I thanked them for.

J. Weiland said:

Belittling them will not help the message to get through, Janice.

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I suppose that was rude of me, but it appears that no message would get through, no matter how it's worded. If I thought that the writer was serious about wanting feedback, I wouldn't have used a mocking tone.

I'm sorry for being less-than-polite about it, but with the assertions being made (that the work did not require editing), I wanted to share my first impressions of what I read.

I'm still getting used to this forum, and I'll try to use more tact in the future.

Fair enough, Janice. And welcome.

Traditional publishers are upset with PA. A company like PA has a major effect on the volume of manuscripts they receive.

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No, PA has had virtually no effect on the volume of manuscripts other publishers receive. If your contention were true, you'd be able to graph the volume of manuscripts coming over the transom and see a huge drop when PA started up its operations. But you'd be hard pressed to find a publisher out there whose submission volume has been doing anything but steadily increasing throughout the years they've been in business.

Basically, if you were being bathed by a dozen firehoses with more being added all the time plus a kid with a toy squirt gun, would you be less wet when the kid stopped shooting?

Wow

bstevens said:

I can write a great book in one month that usually consists of about 300 pages.

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That is incredible. I have never heard of that kind of speed before. Even assuming that you may not have a day job, that is astoundingly fast.

I could probably write a first draft in that amount of time, if I really, REALLY wanted to.

Would it be absolute crap? Sure would. It would take another 9 months to a year to make it publishable.

Tina said:

That is incredible. I have never heard of that kind of speed before. Even assuming that you may not have a day job, that is astoundingly fast.

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I did Goblin Quest in a bit under two months, from start to submission. But I was unemployed at the time, and had just moved, so I had no social life either.

Assuming 300 pages of double-spaced Courier, that's about 75,000 words. I know a few authors who could probably do it and produce something good, but they're rare. And none of them are publishing with PA.

Sorry to quote myself, but...

Tina said:

That is incredible. I have never heard of that kind of speed before. Even assuming that you may not have a day job, that is astoundingly fast.

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I just read Barb's excerpt from her website and now I understand...

Barb, your writing reads exactly like it HAS been rushed. You've got too many cliche phrases, i.e., descriptions that have been used far too many times by thousands of writers before you.

Slow down and have humility. There's no writer out there that doesn't need to improve on something. That includes me and it also includes you.

Christine N. said:

I could probably write a first draft in that amount of time, if I really, REALLY wanted to.

Would it be absolute crap? Sure would. It would take another 9 months to a year to make it publishable.

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Exactly. I could do it too, but it would take a major portion of my free time and beyond to accomplish. As Christine said, that would just be for a rough draft.

Originally Posted by bstevens
I can write a great book in one month that usually consists of about 300 pages.

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Not to sound like a hater, but come on.