Wednesday, April 9, 2014

Entrancie No More

Last year there was a lot of debate about small presses, and I posted about it myself here. At the time, I was Senior Editor for an upstanding small press with a great reputation and promising sales figures. But even good presses come to an end.

It has since closed its doors, and not in the prettiest way. Slammed them, is more like it. Then nailed them shut. And boarded them over. And ran away with tail tucked, a fake name, and a lit fuse ready to blow the remnants. Nobody got paid. Not the writers, not the editors, not the marketing staff. Some authors still haven't gotten their rights back.

So. Yeah. I'm still not anti-small press. Small presses give voices to talented writers who might not get heard at the big houses. But please, do your homework. Don't let yourself get burned. Get an agent, if you plan to publish traditionally--the authors that made out the best were the ones whose agents negotiated contracts to protect them against these types of situations.

For now, I'm back to fulltime freelancing. Will I work for a small press again? I'd love to. You live and learn. And I definitely learned what to do differently.

TJ

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