     Kaye | Thursday, May 02, 2002 - 04:31 pm 
After consideration by the Editorial Review Committee of your
manuscript, we have decided to offer you publication. Congratulations! You will be joining a catalogue of high quality
authors.
There is some information we require before a contract can be drawn
up.
1) What is the exact spelling of your name as you wish it to appear on the
manuscript and contract
2) What is the exact spelling of the title as you wish it to appear on the
manuscript and contract
3) What payment method will you be selecting
1- one time payment of $2000 no later than one month after signing
2- three monthly installment
I look forward to hearing from you soon, and continuing the publication process.
The company never mentions anything about payment on their website.
I was pissed for lack of a better term. I gathered all of the information that they requested, and to find out they were yet another "scam type" company.
I sent them this e-mail.
No reputable company charges an author to publish their book. Bottom-line?
My intentions are serious. Your intention is to exploit dedicated authors
who mistake your "scam" for something legitimate. Although I have total
faith in the quality and merit of my work, I find it hard to believe your
"editorial committee" would turn down any manuscript. Charging an author
$2000.00 is absurd! You are essentially asking me to pay you $2000.00 to
relinquish my rights to the book and pay for your production costs, I may as
well self publish. I should have known your company has no integrity when I
first viewed your website, it's completely unprofessional, but persistent
authors leave no stone unturned, so I gave you the benefit of the doubt. If
your presence online is representative of the "quality and service" you
speak of, any author who signs with you is destined for failure. Your "FFAF"
is a joke masquerading as some "official" document used by "people in the
business" everywhere. I guess I don't have to tell you I will not be
accepting your contract, but if you would like to respond, it will at the
very least be entertaining.
This was their response.
We are no scam company, as you insinuate wrongly. We are a legitimate publishing company, with an excellent reputation in the academic field and beyond. We provide a top quality service and this service has a price. If you are a professor, I assume students pay to attend your class too.
I understand your reluctance to pay contractual and production fees, but it makes the difference between being published and not. In any case it does not give you the right to insult us, when you have been treated very professionally.
We do turn down a lot of manuscripts, and we have a very good reputation on that too.
I wish you good luck in your editorial endeavors.
This has been a learning process for me. I'm just getting really tired of these companies trying to take advantage of authors! How do you guys deal with this type of stuff? If you'd like the name of the company e-mail me @ lavender4ever84@yahoo.com |
| Nancy Marie | Thursday, May 02, 2002 - 07:23 pm
I am so sorry Kaye, how awful for you, and my heart hurts for you.
I know it does no good to tell you to keep on "keeping on," but that's exactly what you've got to do. Use all that righteous anger to propel yourself into sending it out again and again, until you do land a "good" contract, just so you can show these bozos what a mistake they made.
smiles and blessings, Kitty |
