Traditional publishing woes

[Josh]

I've been advocating pretty hard for folks to bypass the traditional publishing channels for a bit now, and there's a reason for that. When we got our first batch of rejections, we started looking into our fallbacks, and the more research I did, the less palatable getting a regular publishing contract was. The pay is peanuts, most writers don't earn out on their advance, the contract terms are crooked and punitive, etc. So by the time we got our last rejection for me it was actually a relief, because then there'd be no contract offer to debate the merits of.

For those of y'all who are thinking on getting into writing for moneys, this is one of those must-read articles:

http://laurahoward78.blogspot.com/2012/ ... -ever.html

I kind of get the idea that going with one of the big houses relates to a 'I have arrived' moment, but to me it's a matter of trading a complete loss of independence, lack of respect, and ability to even have any real idea of what your material is doing in terms of sales* for the very limited validation of "an editor and an editorial board liked reading your thing and found a place for it on their calendar."

There's a lot of material out there these days for going into the business eyes-open, and so for anybody who's looking to do it, do your research.

* Language regarding timely and accurate reporting of sales that are standard in contracts in most other industries are routinely stricken in writing contracts. Publishers have gotten away with this forever and a day because if a writer backs out in negotiation it's no sweat to the publisher because there's an endless line of aspiring authors waiting to put work in. Me, I can't really see signing a deal that bases my compensation on units sold without providing a timely and accurate reporting of said sales, but a lot of folks will sign pretty much anything put before them if they think it's roughly what they want in life.