Harlequin Horizons & Thomas Nelson West Bow Press: Good For These Publishers and Author Solutions, Inc., Bad For Indie Authors

Just as Thomas Nelson did about a month ago, Harlequin has announced it is partnering with Author Solutions, Inc. (ASI) to form a self-published books imprint. This new imprint is called Harlequin Horizons (HH), and according to a Harlequin press release:

“Through this strategic alliance; all sales, marketing, publishing, distribution, and book-selling services will be fulfilled by ASI; but Harlequin Horizons will exist as a division of Harlequin Enterprises Limited. Harlequin will monitor sales of books published through the self publisher for possible pick up by its traditional imprints.”

So in other words, they’re basically just lending the Harlequin name to ASI for use in providing the same services it already provides via such vanity and subsidy outfits as AuthorHouse, AuthorHouse UK, Inkubook, iUniverse, Trafford, Wordclay and Xlibris. Some of these outfits have raised both hackles and eyebrows over at Writer Beware!

Right in its press release announcement, Harlequin makes it clear that their involvement here is strictly limited to lending their name and monitoring sales, every other aspect of the publishing process for HH, from editing to marketing, will be handled by ASI. But wait, that’s not entirely true. There is one other area where Harlequin will be involved in the HH process: “acquisitions”.

First, Harlequin will refer authors whose manuscripts they reject to HH. Second, Harlequin will monitor sales of HH titles with an eye to re-publishing any big sellers under the Harlequin imprint.

This new HH imprint clearly has the potential to earn Harlequin a lot of money, given that they will be taking a cut of ASI’s proceeds on every HH publishing package and service bought by self-publishing authors. Given that HH standard publishing packages range in price from US$599 to $1599, and HH “VIP” publishing packages run from US$2299 to $3499, there’s most definitely gold in them thar hills.

Compare these rates (and services) to those on offer from Xlibris, iUniverse, Author House or any of the other subsidy/vanity outfits working with ASI, and you can easily see there’s nothing special or unique about HH. The services and pricing offered are on par with what you’d get going through any of ASI’s other outlets for self-publishing, and since ASI is actually handling the pre-publishing work, publishing, distribution and even marketing (assuming the author elects to pay for these services), you’re getting the same product as well. The only difference with HH is its affiliation with Harlequin and the implied promise that self-publishing through HH gives your book higher visibility among Harlequin editors—which carries the implied promise that your self-published HH book is more likely to be picked up by Harlequin for regular acquisition. While I’ve always warned indie authors away from subsidy and vanity publishing, I have an even greater concern with this new wrinkle.

For those of you who are wondering why I advise against working with a subsidy or vanity press, the reasons are numerous but primarily boil down to an economic argument. Such outfits are notorious for their high-priced “publishing packages” which bundle together all manner of services plus one to two dozen “free” author copies of the finished book, depending on the package selected. Very often, the author must sign away some or all of her publication rights to the vanity/subsidy outfit for a set period of time as well.

The bundled packages are bad news because you’re limited to working with their staff editors and designers (as opposed to hiring your own individually, to ensure their skills and working styles mesh well with your project), they typically include (and charge for) services you don’t want or need, and also typically overcharge for products and services you can obtain on your own at a fraction of the cost, or even for no cost at all. For example, as of this writing it costs $35 to register a U.S. copyright online; HH/ASI charges $204 for this same service. That’s a 583% markup, and all HH/ASI is doing is taking information you provide them for filling out the form, then filling out the form for you. Why not just provide your information to the U.S. Copyright Office directly and save yourself a fast $169?

You can bet you’re overpaying for virtually every service offered by HH/ASI, because there are two layers of middlemen with their hands out: ASI and HH. Even if you’re the type of author who would rather pay someone else to get your book ready for print, published, distributed and marketed, does it really make sense to pay both the actual service provider and a “services packager” like HH, iUniverse, Xlibris, etc.?

Here’s where my second major objection to the Harlequin deal comes about: self-publishing authors are being led to believe that they’re actually getting something of value in exchange for paying the HH layer of middlemen, and they believe that “something” is greater visibility, a greater chance of having their self-published book plucked out of the great unwashed masses of self-pubbed books for the full Harlequin treatment. But here again, they’re paying for something they can already get for free.

If your self-published book is selling in great enough numbers to garner the attention of a mainstream publisher, it doesn’t matter how, or through whom, you self-published. The mainstream will want to acquire the rights to your book. Having published via HH doesn’t make this outcome any more likely than if you’d self-published through Lulu, Createspace, Lightning Source or elsewhere.

You may be protesting that per the quoted press release, “Harlequin will monitor sales of books published through the self publisher for possible pick up by its traditional imprints,” but this is a paper tiger at best. Among the likely thousands of titles to be released under the HH imprint, perhaps the top 10% in terms of sales would merit further attention from Harlequin staff, and even then, only if the top 10% are selling more than a couple hundred copies a year.

You could publish via any author or publishing services provider, save yourself a LOT of money by being a smart shopper and not paying for services you don’t need or for which you’d be overcharged by HH/ASI, then invest some of your savings in the distribution, marketing and promotion options that make sense for you and your book, and sell as many (or more!) copies as you could sell of the same book published under the HH imprint. Self-published books that sell well attract publisher attention regardless of who published the book, or how.

If it’s really worth an extra 500% to get an HH logo on the spine of your book, knock yourself out. But I’d argue that if that’s your position, you’re not a very savvy self-publisher.

UPDATE: THIS JUST IN (to me, anyway) – yet another reason not to go with HH is this: in addition to all the upfront fees you must pay for HH to publish your book, they also intend to keep 50% of your net royalty on every copy sold (scroll down to comment #18, in which Harlequin Digital Director Malle Vallik says so)!! 50% of gross would be exorbitant since the standard bookseller cut is 40% of the retail price, but 50% of net is simply beyond the pale. And if you're handing over 50% of your net royalty AFTER paying HH hundreds or thousands of dollars for its services, that's just financial rape. Without even buying you dinner first.

Just in case that comment #18 from Harlequin Digital Director Malle Vallik on Dear Author should become unavailable at some point in the future, I'm copying and pasting it here:

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1. Will rejected submissions to Harlequin indeed be “informed” that they can “opt-in” to Horizons? How do you assuage the stated concerns that this is a predatory process?

Malle: A writer receiving a standard reject letter will find a line included about self publishing. The writer, if she wants, can then contact HH. The writer will never be cold-called or contacted unless she has opted in.

2. Will Harlequin Horizons hold the ISBNs and pay out royalties from the sales, if any? How does this differ from the “vanity press” model? How does it compare to the “self-publishing” model, in which the author holds the ISBNs and keeps all money from any sales?

Malle: The content is completely owned by the author. Royalties are 50% net from both eBooks and print.

3. If an author chooses to go to Horizons for a “keepsake” or a “gift”, what does Horizons offer (except for the Harlequin name) to distinguish it from much much cheaper services such as Lulu?

Malle: It is any writer’s choice as to what self-publishing option she choses to purchase or if she wants to self-publish at all.

4. If an author chooses to go to Horizons, do they lose “first publication” rights? How will that affect any effort to gain an agent or traditional publisher with their “bound copy”?

Malle: I’m not sure I completely understand this question. The author owns her content. How would she lost first publication rights? She has published it herself. Whether she is giving it away as gifts or marketing it, is up to her. Yup, clearly I don’t get your question.

Enough With The Editorializing, Tell Me How To Publish & Sell My Book Already!

Bottom Line It For Me, Baby Version (200 Words Or Less):

I've been fielding a lot of email questions about the nuts-and-bolts aspects of self-publishing lately. I have written a whole book on the subject, The IndieAuthor Guide, but it would be pretty obnoxious of me to answer each query by saying, "Buy my book and flip to page such-and-such," so I do my best to provide answers when I have them. Still, rather than answering the same questions over and over again in private messages which don't benefit the self-publishing community at large, I've decided to blog a series based on content from my book. I can't just copy and paste everything from the manuscript, because the thing is 300pp long and heavily illustrated besides. But I will present topics from the book to the extent of detail possible in a blog post. Note that I'm not covering editing, designing your own book cover, creating your brand or publishing to the Kindle here, since those topics are already presented on my website in the form of free pdf guides. First up in the series: Publishing Options.



Go On An Run Yo Mouth, I Ain't Got Nuthin' But Time Version (Can't Promise It Won't Go On Forever):

Vanity, Subsidy, POD, Oh My!
The terms “self-publishing”, “subsidy publishing”, “vanity publishing” and “print-on-demand” are often used interchangeably when people speak of self-publishing, but these terms aren’t synonymous. Rather, they describe different self-publishing options or processes.

Self-Publishing
In common usage, “self-publishing” has become a catch-all term. People using it may be talking about subsidy publishing, vanity publishing or print-on-demand (POD), but ironically, they’re rarely talking about true self-publishing. In the strictest sense, self-publishing is exactly what it sounds like: doing your own publishing. This is also known as “desktop publishing,” since it’s generally done with an ordinary computer, or ‘desktop’ computer. Typical self-publishing projects include club or family newsletters, brochures, booklets and research papers, any of which can be created using a standard word processor. There are also dedicated desktop publishing computer programs that enable the user to create more sophisticated and lengthier publications.

Either way, desktop publishing isn’t a workable solution for book manuscripts because binding options are severely limited. Office supply stores and print shops offer several types of binding, and can generally bind up to 300 pages. However, all their binding options are more fitting for reports or business documents than books. The pages may be hole-punched and placed between two report covers, or drilled for comb- or spiral-binding. The finished product will have a binding, but even if you customize the report covers with artwork and a book title, it won’t look like a book. You won’t be able to duplicate the look of a “real” book, which has pages glued or sewn into a wrap-around cover at the spine. Furthermore, having manuscripts bound individually is very expensive.

Vanity Publishing
Vanity publishing is the process whereby an author pays a publishing service to format and publish a minimum number of copies of his book. The publisher usually offers related services on a fee basis, from editing to cover art design and even promotion. The author is essentially paying to have his book printed, and so long as he’s willing to pay the required fee, the publisher will not turn him away. It is because of this fact that as a group, books from vanity publishers are presumed to be of poor quality.

This bias is the primary downside to vanity publishing, but expense comes in at a close second. An author who chooses to go with a vanity publisher must pay all production costs for a minimum ‘print run’ of his book, generally at least 200 copies. Cost per book goes down as quantity goes up, but in most cases the author can expect to pay anywhere from US$5 - $10 per copy for a trade paperback edition and between US$8 - $16 for a hardcover. Multiply those figures by 200, then add hundreds more dollars in flat fees for project setup, optional ISBN assignment, proof corrections, project management and delivery. Add another thousand or two if the author pays for related services.

The third downside to vanity publishing is distribution, or lack thereof. When the print run is finished, all the books are delivered to the author and it’s up to him to store them, sell them, give them away, or otherwise dispose of them. With few exceptions, brick-and-mortar bookstores won’t stock any type of self-published book. They’re particularly leery of books from vanity publishers, all of whose names are widely known in the publishing and bookselling industries.

More recently, vanity publishers have begun addressing the distribution problem by setting up online bookstores to stock their clients’ work, but the sites don’t get much traffic because they only stock the vanity publisher’s books, and again, most people assume those books aren’t very good. Enterprising authors can turn a profit selling their books themselves, on their own website, at community fairs, through direct mail and so on. Occasionally one will even do well enough to attract the attention of a mainstream publisher, but this is very rare.

Lastly, even though vanity publishers are only providing services for a fee, they act like conventional publishers when it comes to contracts and rights. As part of the publishing arrangement, the author will be required to sign a contract granting certain, exclusive rights to the publisher. The contract may stipulate that the author cannot publish the same work in the same format, or any other format, for a set period of years. In this way, the publisher ensures the author must go back to the same publisher to order additional print runs if the book is successful enough to sell out its first print run. The contract will also specify whether or not the author can buy his way out of the contract before the term is up, and if so, what it will cost. This stipulation lines the vanity publisher’s pockets in the event a mainstream publisher wants to publish the book.

Subsidy Publishing
Subsidy publishing is virtually identical to vanity publishing, except that subsidy publishers will not publish every manuscript submitted to them. Instead, they accept submissions (sometimes for a fee) and choose the manuscripts they wish to publish. Subsidy publishers sprang up as a legitimate self-publication alternative to vanity publishing. Subsidy publishers aren’t all created equal, however. Some are hardly more discerning than vanity publishers, while others are so selective as to rival mainstream publishers.

The worst subsidy publishers are ripoff artists par excellence, assuring every prospective client her manuscript is a diamond in the rough that is practically guaranteed to become a bestseller if she will only pay for professional editing, artwork, promotion, and other services—all of which just happen to be offered by the publisher or a company referred from the publisher. The best subsidy publishers truly strive to distinguish themselves by putting out quality books and dealing fairly with authors, but even in that case the author must contend with all the same downsides as she would face with a vanity publisher. She must pay for a minimum print run and related services, she must sign over at least some of her publication rights in a contract, and she faces all the same distribution challenges as a vanity-published author.

Print On Demand
While vanity or subsidy publishing is fine for a book with a built-in customer base, such as a textbook published by a college professor for use in his class, Print On Demand (POD) is the best way to go for an author who intends to sell her book to the general public. As with vanity publishing, an author who chooses POD is essentially paying for printing services. There is no selection process on the part of the publisher. Also as with vanity and subsidy publishers, POD companies may offer related services for a fee, and the published books aren’t likely to be carried by brick-and-mortar stores. That’s where the similarities end, however.

There is no minimum print run to order and pay for with POD because the publisher stores POD books in digital format. Individual copies of the book are printed and bound by automated systems “on demand”, meaning each time an order for the book is received. The author doesn’t pay to have on-demand copies produced. Instead, the printer keeps a share of the book’s price to cover its production costs and pays the remainder to the author as a royalty.

POD publishers may offer services related to publishing for a fee, but they are also prepared to accept print-ready files from authors. This is where the author can save thousands of dollars, by doing as many of those related tasks as he can for himself instead of paying for services. Some POD publishers don’t even charge set-up fees. In that case, the only expense that must be shouldered by the author is the cost of proof copies, which must be printed in order for the author to review the book before approving it for publication.

With a POD publisher, the author retains all rights to his work. If there’s any contract at all, its terms are limited to the details of fees, royalty payment, services provided and the responsibilities of each party. If your publisher requires you to order a minimum print run or sign over any of your publication rights, it’s a subsidy or vanity publisher. Most POD publishers have distribution relationships with major, online booksellers such as Amazon and Barnes and Noble, through which the bookseller agrees to sell the POD publisher’s books on its website. Some POD publishers only offer this as an optional service, and only for a fee. Another service some POD publishers offer, always for a fee, is ‘guaranteed returns’, whereby brick-and-mortar stores are allowed to return any unsold copies of POD books to the publisher. This is supposed to encourage brick-and-mortar stores to carry POD books, since many cite ‘un-returnability’ as a reason not to carry them, but in reality the centralized purchasing departments and computerized inventory systems of chain bookstores present obstacles at least equal to concerns about money lost on unsold copies. My previous blog post, Big Chain Bookstore Death Watch, provides rationale enough not to invest too heavily in courting big chain bookstores.

All POD publishers can print paperback books in various, standard sizes, both in black and white and full color, but only some of them can print books in hardcover editions. When the hardcover option is available, the production cost for it is much higher than that charged for paperbacks. Since an author who goes the POD route can still opt to pay for certain related services as desired, vanity and subsidy publishers have no advantages to offer the typical indie author. Why pay stiff fees upfront, warehouse your books, and sign away your publication rights if you don’t have to? POD book production is also 'greener', in that no books are printed until they're bought and paid for by actual customers. There are no crates of returns going back to the publisher, no overstock being marked down or remaindered, no unsold copies headed for the dumpster.

Next Time: Rights, Royalties and Advances