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Community Publishing for the community

Vanity Publishing Contracts

16/1/2018

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One my pet hates is VANITY PUBLISHERS. These people prey on would-be authors, pretending to be conventional publishers but taking money from the authors instead of giving it to them. Have a look at this contract below, from a British vanity publisher (Austin Macauley) with an American office.
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Hardly any part of this is fair. The author has to pay hand over fist for the book to be published, yet has no guarantee anything will be done. There's not actually any incentive for AM to do anything at all. Sign this and your manuscript and book are dead. Done for. You've paid out over $3000/£2000, have no recourse and can't even complain – Clause 18 is a gagging clause.

To be clear, SELF-PUBLISHING is very different from vanity publishing. Authors who self-publishes retain all the rights to their books, and they can terminate the contract and sell to a higher bidder (such as another publisher) any time they like. They even own the books. So Comely Bank Publishing authors can and do run their own signing events, selling their books and pocketing all the money.

Comely Bank Publishing is a self-publishing not-for-profit collective with a growing reputation and a network of marketing outlets. But there are reputable commercial firms that will help you self-publish, too. Two that get a decent name are Matador and New Generation.

They make it clear that you're self-publishing, unlike the clear-as-mud nonsense in that contract above. I'm sure there decent people who work in these offices, but I'd have so much more sympathy if they'd only be honest.

In the meantime, please – whatever you do, don't sign anything like that.
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The Sad Tale of Some Useless Books

10/1/2018

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Image: Judit Klein
I need to share a very sad story with you.

The authors at Comely Bank Publishing generally do all right; in fact some of us have done very nicely and almost all of our titles have gone to reprint. But our motto is damna ad reductum – keep losses to a minimum.

In the circumstances, then, you'll understand that the very notion of throwing out books, even destroying them, is anethema to our association. Yet that's exactly what I'm about to do. What makes it worse is the books in question are actually my own.

My 2013 novel Four Old Geezers And A Valkyrie has gone to reprint a few times now (they're not big print runs, 100-200 at most). By 2015 sales were beginning to slow down, but I didn't want it to be out of print so I asked the printer I was using at the time, Berforts, to run off 40 copies for me.

When the books arrived a few weeks later, I didn't know what to make of them. The ink seemed very faint, the copies seemed rather thick and the paper had a rough texture. Back then I was still learning about printing (I still am, in truth) so I couldn't work out what the problem was. Fortunately I had some copies left from the previous print run so I wasn't panicking.

And then, just as I was about to complain, Berforts went bust. It had gone into administration. As John Cleese might have said, it had ceased to be. It was a dead printer. I had nobody to complain to.

I had to find a new printer fast, and fortunately managed (our current printers are 4edge) with the help of a former Berforts employee. But I also needed to find out what was wrong with the old books so I sent a copy to the new printer and one of their staff helpfully explained over the phone that... absolutely everything was wrong with it. The wrong paper had been used, they'd even cut it in the wrong direction. Presumably this was because the firm was struggling to meet orders and it was my misfortune to get caught up in all of it. Berforts should have been ashamed of it. Thankfully it wasn't a big print run.

I have enough decent copies of Four Old Geezers And A Valkyrie. You can still buy it in the shops and it's available online, too. But what can I do with those unsaleable copies? Nobody seems to want them, even free, and they're taking up valuable space. We have new titles coming, including one of my own called The Blogger Who Came in from the Cold, and I keep tripping over these two unopened boxes of substandard books in the middle of the floor.
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They have to go, and reluctantly I've come to the conclusion that means "recycling". I can't even burn them to stay warm this winter as it's a fossil fuel. Perhaps they'll compost nicely.

Gordon Lawrie


(I should in fairness point out that Berforts has returned to life but not really as a printer. Instead, I understand they're now 'print agents' who source printers for their clients.)
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Happy New Year!

8/1/2018

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...To all of our readers.

This year promises at least one new author, Lucy Lloyd, as well as the 2018 publication of Gordon Lawrie's new novel The Blogger Who Came in from the Cold.

More news shortly.

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Punctuation, the semi-colon and the comma

6/1/2018

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by Gordon Lawrie
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I've had a couple of interesting discussions recently with fellow writers and editors over the value of style manuals such as the Chicago Style Manual, Fowler, Grammar Girl and so on.

Personally, I don't care for them much. Particularly when writing fiction, language style is definitely what seems natural: there isn't a 'right' and 'wrong'. I concede that style manuals are fun to look at sometimes, and there are a few things – italicisation of newspapers or song titles and so on – that my generation wasn't taught at school.

Here are a couple of examples. Some people just hate semi-colons (a word that can be spelled without the hyphen, of course). A semi-colon should separate two linked sentences; the two sentences should be independently viable but feel better connected.

Another bad boy is the "comma splice", sometimes known as the "comma fault". Occasionally it feels right to separate two sections with a comma, the words just read better that way. But you can't lay down rules for any of this. (That comma could even be a semi-colon, for instance. Or just two sentences. Or a dash.)

To quote Lynne Truss (not the Tory cheese woman), "done knowingly by an established writer, the comma splice is effective, poetic, dashing." I'd suggest the rest of us should consider dashing.

Finally, it so happens I completely disagree with Grammar Girl on the use of commas – I just happen to think she's coming from completely the wrong angles. The use of a comma is generally easy for me: it's where you stop to breathe. Just about everyone of my generation would agree with me.

That doesn't mean she's wrong, though, it just means that her style and mine are different...

​This article first appeared on
Gordon's own blog.
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Friday Flash Fiction Christmas Competition Winner Announced

2/1/2018

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Each year, Friday Flash Fiction – Comely Bank Publishing's sister site – runs a flash fiction contest that attracts entries from around the world. The event is sponsored by Comely Bank Publishing and this year attracted a record entry.

The organisers tried something a little different this year: the two judges selected a short list of eight, then all the Friday Flash Fiction writers were invited to vote for the best one (just like the Oscars).

In the end, the winner was a relatively new Edinburgh writer, Lyn Miller, who won $50 and the pleasure of being a judge next year. Here's her winning entry.
CAIRNGORM REINDEER
Lyn Miller
Ruth fled north, escaping her first widowed Christmas. Traditions were the last thing that she wanted. She’d chosen a luxury Lodge offering a gourmet menu and organised activities.

Ice cracked under boots as they climbed and exhaled breath formed a cloud. The group leader yodelled. Nothing, the hills seemed bare. Another yodel and then shapes began to appear; silver-grey, approaching down the hillside. Closer, and antlers became apparent. Ruth’s offering of pellet food on up-turned palms was nuzzled up gently. The reindeer gazed at her as she stroked its warm, luxuriant fur and Ruth’s petrified heart thawed just a little.
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