Review of Publish America

Daniel J. Neumann

Period 9 (Journalism)

Mrs. Obrien

7 May 2007

Review of PublishAmerica

PublishAmerica: little known company to readers, huge controversy to authors. How can one begin to review the infamous (or unheard of) PA? First: Who do they claim to be?

On their website, PA writes in their Frequently Ask Questions section, “Founded in 1999, PublishAmerica is a traditional advance and royalty paying book publisher. The Maryland based publishing company is fundamentally opposed to charging any author fees. Now in its eighth year of steady growth, PublishAmerica serves almost 25,000 authors. It specializes in books about, or by, people who face and overcome hardships and obstacles in life (both fictional and nonfictional), and who turn stumbling blocks into stepping stones.

“PublishAmerica is the world's largest traditional publisher in terms of new titles in print. We pride ourselves in maintaining lower acceptance hurdles than what has historically been the norm in traditional publishing, thereby giving a voice to authors who would otherwise have remained unpublished or felt forced to spend hundreds of dollars on paying to be published. By not charging its authors any fees at any time, PublishAmerica has saved them, all combined to date, an estimated $35 million that might have otherwise gone into the coffers of vanity publishers.”

PA is sure to explain – repeatedly – that they are a “traditional” press, paying out an advance with royalties. Yet, according to the publisher of Llumina Press, Deborah Greenspan, “PublishAmerica is not a traditional press. They are a POD press.” PublishAmerica stated five times on their site “we are not a POD publisher,” although admitting later that they use Print On Demand technology. Greenspan said, “They try to make themselves look like a traditional publisher, but their advance is only $1.” Deborah confirmed, with a chuckle, that the advance payment from PA is enough to buy an item on McDonald’s Dollar Menu©.

PublishAmerica boasts serving 25,000 authors, making them the “largest” publisher in the world. They also brag about paying out a landmark royalty rate in 2006, “$1 million in royalties.” Using simple division, one can conclude – under the best circumstances – an author published with PA can expect $40.00 a year. Combined with the advance, the total sum the author would receive, after a year of exposure, is $41.00. That would be enough to buy, perhaps, two of the author’s own books.

The discount for PA’s authors is 20%. The average paperback book from PublishAmerica is around $20.00. To buy that book, the author would have to dish out $16.00. If they sold that book, they would receive a four dollar profit. To make matters worse, there is fine print in the contract, “Royalties are calculated from the sold price of the book, or the price that PublishAmerica is paid. For example, if a customer buys your book from our website for $16.95, you will receive your percentage of that amount. If Amazon purchases that same book from us at a 40% discount off of the retail price ($11.97) and sells that book for $19.95, you will receive royalties from $11.97.”

PA wrote, “PublishAmerica is a traditional, royalty paying publisher. We are strongly opposed to charging fees, ever. There's no catch, no hidden surprises. We even pay small advances to indicate our principle. The author is never, ever, under any obligation to pull their wallet to make any purchase whatsoever. We don't want their money. We want their book. All expenses involved with acquiring, producing, manufacturing, and publishing a book, and marketing it to the industry's wholesale and distribution channels for full availability through all bookstores at home and abroad are underwritten by PublishAmerica solely. This is one of our main claims to fame, and one that we are very proud of. All authors are treated equally here.”

Greenspan responds, “PublishAmerica had the idea to do POD publishing and not charge them. It’s a gimmick. They earn their money by getting the authors to buy their own books. You are tied down for eight years. And the retail price is insane.”

PublishAmerica created, for themselves, a reputation of being a true traditional publisher by writing, “We review not only the quality but also the genre of their work… like all serious book publishing companies we have to be picky as we can only accept the works that meet our requirements in both areas.”

Greenspan said, “PublishAmerica has no editorial standards… you’d be surprised what people write. Some writers can’t put sentences together.”

Looking at PA’s practices, one may see the company as a scam. After all, they do pay little, promote less, and sell your book for ridiculous amounts (and for eight years). But Greenspan makes it a note to state, “I don’t think PublishAmerica is a scam. It’s all in the contract, but some people don’t read it. Don’t get me wrong; it’s sneaky… But I read my contracts. That’s why I started Llumina Press, because I didn’t want anyone of those other companies touching my book… PublishAmerica appeals to some writers because they don’t have to put down any money. PA takes advantage of naive or lazy people… PublishAmerica doesn’t sell books; they sell their authors.”

On December 7^th, 2004, a group of author deliberately wrote the worst book ever, to debunk PublishAmerica’s advertised editorial standards. The distinctive flaws of Atlanta Nights include chapters written by two different authors from the same segment of outline (13 and 15), a missing chapter (21), two chapters that are word-for-word identical to each other (4 and 17), two different chapters with the same chapter number (12), and a chapter written by a computer program that generated random text based on patterns found in the previous chapters (34). Characters change gender and race; they die and reappear without explanation. Spelling and grammar are nonstandard. The initials of characters that were named in the book spelled out the phrase “PublishAmerica is a vanity press.”