Noble Romance Publishing

Kensington said:

Their contract locks you in for 7 years. That's way too long, as far as I'm concerned. They wanted to change my novel too much, in order to fit in with their guidelines, more sex, etc. so I backed out. Jill is reasonable to deal with though.

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7 Years for novels in that series, or for first peek at all novels you write afterwards?

Kensington said:

Their contract locks you in for 7 years. That's way too long, as far as I'm concerned. They wanted to change my novel too much, in order to fit in with their guidelines, more sex, etc. so I backed out. Jill is reasonable to deal with though.

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Do you mean they hold on to the first rights for 7 years? What's acceptable?

The contract should last as long as they can sell the book. Sales drop, they lose it.

James D. Macdonald said:

The contract should last as long as they can sell the book. Sales drop, they lose it.

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Oh agreed, absolutely. Writers should ask for a clause like this to be added, if there isn't already one in the contract. "Publisher will return rights to author if title doesn't sell at least 25 copies in the first six months." That sort of thing. This protects the author from being tied into an author mill that is not selling his book, and then being strong armed for kill fees when they try to get out.

Clementine B said:

Oh agreed, absolutely. Writers should ask for a clause like this to be added, if there isn't already one in the contract. "Publisher will return rights to author if title doesn't sell at least 25 copies in the first six months." That sort of thing. This protects the author from being tied into an author mill that is not selling his book, and then being strong armed for kill fees when they try to get out.

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What would you suggest doing if a publisher refuses to have this clause?

Walk away.

A book publishable by one is publishable by many.

(quoting someone here on the board)

Noble Romance Publishing (merged into B&BC thread)

Has anyone had any experience with these guys (Noble), are they ok? Do you know what kind of royalties they offer?

I think what you're looking for is this thread in Bewares and Background Checks: <snip>

I don't know, hun. They're an ebook publisher and I was hoping to get the opinions of ebook authors on this one...

If it's moved -- sorry, and don't shout at me, please...

First off, nobody's shouting.

Second, Bewares & Background Checks is for all sorts of questions, regardless if it's hard copy or e-pub. It's a better fit there.

Third, the link supplied addresses Noble.

Fourth, check the condescension at the door.

Thanks for moving it, this makes interesting reading.

the above few entires are a little confusing because I thought this was the bewares and backgrounds thread for Noble.

But, regardless, I am working with them and have had nothing but a wonderful experience.

I signed a contract on my novel recently and it will be pub'd in May. Jill Noble has been wonderful to work with and the community of Noble authors is fabulous.

If you would like more specific questions answers, feel free to PM me

Those posts were magically transported into this thread from elsewhere

I see that Noble Romance is now offering advances up to $1000. Hmmm.

I have a short out with Noble. It was originally accepted for an anthology that didn't quite work as planned, so it wound up being released as a standalone. I did receive an advance for it (not $1000, though... not a long enough story for that amount). Royalties are in the same ballpark as most e-pubs that I'm aware of... 35-40%. My own sales aren't great, but then again neither are my promotion skills, so I think the onus of that falls more on me than on Noble.

As far as my dealings with the company in general and Jill in particular, I find her very receptive to authors' concerns and questions, and willing to think up or consider additional ways to boost sales. If you have a story that fits what they're looking for, they're worth a try.

Newb here. Don't mind me.

I know these questions have likely been beaten to death already, so forgive me for being repetitive.

Any word on what the sales are like for Noble?

Has anyone had any recent dealings with Noble? I notice the threads stop in 2010.

I will say this in favour of Noble, there is (or was) no termination fee. I signed up with them, and when I objected to an extensive edit, they let me out, pleasantly.

After years of lurking on Absolute Write, I felt the need to come out of the proverbial closet in order to comment on my experiences with Noble Romance.

I signed with them in December of 2010 after doing extensive research and even querying my 'big three' before moving on to query other publishers. Right from the query stage there were communication problems - emails missed, redirected or not responded to at all - I brushed it off at the time as a problem with my ISP which was very peculiar with the spam blacklist and changed email addresses when I signed the contract with them. However, the problems in contacting the staff and editors continued and even now continue.

Additionally, my first royalty statement contained very basic math errors. It took several emails for me to get an explanation, yet the explanation was less than satisfactory.

My book sales are very, very low. Both for the novel and the short story I released with them. My novel was scheduled for print, constantly pushed back date wise - to the point where I have told people asking me about a print copy that I do not expect it to ever be printed - and again the reasons for the change were less than satisfactory to me.

At this stage, I'm very disappointed in the publisher but have given up on emailing them in attempts to work out the problems as the bulk of my emails never receive responses. I just thought someone out there might be interested in the situation.

Stretch

Thanks for the information Stretch.

I submitted to Noble this year. I didn't go with them in the end, but I did not have any issues in communicating with them. They always answered my emails in a timely manner.

You were lucky, brainstorm. I'm still having problems contacting the staff of Noble Romance.

Stretch

Not so Noble

I have multiple books at Noble and have recently severed the ties. I write thrillers, paranormal and contemporary romances. This is not the focus or readership of Noble Romance. If you're a new writer, that writes m/m, that would be ideal.

Once an author learns how little a small publisher does for their career, most will self-publish with Smashwords, Barnes & Noble and Createspace/Amazon. The author does ALL the promotions for their books. A small publisher supplies the editing...period.

So, if you want to allow Noble to take 60+ percent of your hard work for the next 7 years, go for it. I woke up and have more control over my own career. I have published a nonfiction book called, Spellcaster: Book of Magick that is doing VERY well in every major country. I have 2 novels ready to be self-published and I'm very excited to get 70% of the ebook and 60% of the printed book overall.

Noble is no different from any other small ebook publisher who is pumping out 3-5 books a week, then moving on to the next group of ebooks. Author mills are ugly and demeaning to the authors who get no support from these tiny editing/publishing companies. Most of the small publishers use Createspace to publish your novel in ebook and print. YOU can do this yourself.

Lastly, Noble set the print price so high on novels, novellas and short stories that NO ONE would ever buy them. My novel can be purchased directly from Createspace/Amazon for $4.00 in any quantity. Noble set the price at $24.00. Bad business move.

I would note that small presses offer packaging, distribution and a brand (varying in value)--which can greatly increase sales over what a typical self-publisher will achieve. This is why some epublishers sell in dozens per title, and others in thousands. They are not all the same.

IrishGypsy said:

A small publisher supplies the editing...period.

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No cover art or interior layout? I got those.