Feel Free to Make a Submission

[Jan]

Deep Read Press offered me a contract. When I said I was sending it to a couple of lawyer friends they immediately withdrew the offer. Beware.

[Gwyn]

thanks for the heads up

[Cindy]

Uh-oh. I was just about to send them something. Thank you!!

[Mellie]

I hope writers do their research before submitting to such places. Their site is literally a red flag! It's not an traditional press, its an author (CL Gammon) calling themselves a press and trying to grab the work and rights of naive writers. The covers are awful and look like the free kindle create covers. The ranks are well into the millions. There are either no reviews, or ones that indicate problems with the work. The place has nothing to recommend it.

You would simply be handing your work, rights, and royalties (if they could actually sell books) to an unsuccessful author.

[Jenna Marie ~Scheming Scribbler~]

Another thing I noticed on their site when I clicked out of curiosity; there were no submission guidelines, descriptions of what they're looking for, details to their process ect. that you'll find on legit sites.. instand red flag for me

[Connie]

I accepted a contract from Deep Read and I have no regrets, they are a small company and maybe a young company. I showed my contract to a traditionally published best selling author who said the contract is fairlly standard but he did question a couple of things. I queried those things with Deep Read and they were answered to my satisfaction. I have found them to be both courteous and efficient. I have control over my manuscript and as Deep Read are footing the publishing bill I cant see why they would do that and not try to sell the finished book. Am I naive, only time will tell but I am happy with my experience.

[Kimberly]

I recently self-published my first book on Amazon. For anyone who has published both with a traditional publisher as well as through self-publishing, I'd love to hear information--pros and cons--regarding your experiences. My self-publishing experience has been good so far, but I'm still figuring out the best way to promote my book. Thanks.

[Mellie]

Connie wrote: "Am I naive..."

Yes

[Cindy]

I had four books traditionally published quite some time ago with a NY publishing house. In the interim life got in my way and I wasn't able to get back to my writing for a decade. During that decade my editor retired. I finally finished another novel, found an agent fairly easily, and she submitted my mss to the editor who replaced my old one at the NY house. They were not interested. For almost five years this agent tried to sell the book and all she kept getting were glowing rejections. It was too long. It wasn't female forward enough. They didn't know how it would fit in their line. Yada yada. I'm sure we have all heard this stuff. I decided at the beginning of this year to self-publish. I wanted to see this book published before I die (I'm not THAT old) but at the rate it was going, it looked like that might never happen. I'm super happy with how the book turned out; it looks great. I got to be involved with the cover art which I never was able to do at all with the NY house. In fact, they changed the titles I had given to three of the four books. The biggest drawback for me with self-publishing has been how shunned you are by editorial reviewers, newspapers, bookstores, etc. I thought since I had a reputation with my first four novels I would be able to pick up where I left off with this indie one. How naive I was. With my first four books, I averaged about 25-30 reviews in national publications. With this indie book I have had exactly four and had to pay for a couple of them. The NY house sent me on multi-city book promo tours, and got me dozens of signings and speaking engagements. I have had no luck with any of that with this indie book. The industry is definitely skewed in favor of the traditionally published writer. Still, I am happy to at last see the book in print, which is something I wanted. And I like having more control. But none of that matters much if you can't generate sales.

[Kimberly]

Thanks for sharing your experience with self/indie publishing as well as with traditional publishing. I didn't realize that traditional publishers are able to control so much--even the name of the title. I'm glad that you were able to have more control during your self-publishing experience, but I see that you didn't get as much exposure as you did when you went the traditional route. Knowing what you now know, would you go back to traditional publishing for your next book or take your changes on indie publishing again?

[Cindy]

If a traditional publisher wanted to publish my work I would probably go that route, simply because of the money involved in going the indie route. I have the rights back to my first novel and am in the process right now of re-issuing it myself. I'm working with a designer and am enthused about the project. I think it's really hard for a mid-list writer like me to interest traditional publishers nowadays. They don't want to take risks, and my stuff has always been too literary to be called commercial, but not literary enough to be categorized there either. If I never find another traditional publisher, though, I will be happy to continue going the indie route and working hard to increase my readership.

[J.]

I have been published by small and large traditional presses, self published twice (once print, once Kindle) and have a book upcoming that will be traditionally published by a small press. Even with direct submissions, a publisher should not have a problem with the author consulting an agent or attorney on the contract.
Two sites that are helpful:
The Writer Beware blog - very useful in keeping up on scams and cautions.
Agent Query - Helpful in finding the right agent for your submission.