PublishAmerica: A Vanity Printer in Disguise

When it comes to bad publishers, the worst is PublishAmerica. One could write a book about how bad PA is and they'd probably agree to publish it. You see, they don't read the books they accept. If their daily quota hasn't been filled, they'll accept every manuscript that comes in. Their editing appears to be an automated spellcheck that includes so many misspellings as to make it almost comical. They are print on demand, or POD, and often their books will fall apart in your hands. This is especially egregious since their prices are far above market value -- paperbacks for $30 are common among PA books. They pay their authors $1.00 advance -- why that isn't a huge clue for writers I'll never know. The advance is the only guaranteed money you'll make on your book -- and royalties. Of course, they cheat the royalties, never paying for the true number of books sold.

And who gets those sales? The author. PA's business model isn't about selling books to the public. It's about selling books to its authors. In short, it's a vanity press that claims to be a "traditional publisher". I guess that dollar makes them think they're in that club. Authors are expected to do all of the marketing for their books. The titles are available on online stores like Amazon and Barnes & Noble, but you'll rarely find them on the shelves in bookstores. If you do find one, you can bet that the author personally made that happen, usually at their own expense. PA encourages authors to buy copies of their own books. That's how PA makes its money. They have over 20,000 authors and the average sales per book is about 75. When you realize that 5,000 books sold is barely a success for a small publisher, then you can understand how impossible it is to have any success with a PA book.

When authors wake up and realize what PA is, they'll often try to get their rights back. PA's contract specifies that they own the rights to your book for 7 years. That's a long time to have your baby mistreated. When authors do get their rights back through arbitration or other means, PA keeps selling their books. With absolutely no legal rights to the material, and without paying even the paltry royalties they usually send, PA continues to illegally sell the books they don't own.

There is a lot of information about PA on the web. Predators and Editors has a good write-up with lots of links and Absolute Write has an entire forum for it in the Bewares and Background Checks area. If you've got a book out with PA and you're waking up to who your "publisher" really is, check out the forum asap.

It breaks my heart to read the stories of what's happened to people who fall for these various scams. Every one of them had the dream to be a published author and that's what these sharks feed on. They know that people will do almost anything to realize that dream.

If you want to break in and are looking for an agent or publisher and something comes along that seems fast and easy, that's a huge red flag. It's not a fast and easy dream. It's not about getting a lot for very little effort. To be a successful writer you have to work hard, pay your dues, learn every day, and maybe, just maybe, the real thing will come along. It's a myth that new writers can't get published. Every writer was new at some point. 20% of books that came out this year were from new writers. It's also a myth that new writers can't get an agent. Of course they can if they have a marketable book. That's the true key to success, you see. You have to write a really good book. And if that one doesn't sell, write a better one. Keep trying, keeep getting better and eventually you'll have a genuine agent and will get published by a real publisher. It's not fast and it's not easy, but it is achievable.

Aren't your dreams worth the effort?