Vanity of Vanities, All is Vanity

That’s a quote from the Bible—Ecclesiastes, if I am not mistaken—reminding us that life is empty, futile, and short-lived. But that’s not what I’m going to talk about; I’m here to talk about Publishing.

It has been over a decade since I published my novel, with a reputable publisher, who paid me for it. Since then (and as you well know), I have been writing a fantasy/adventure series for my grandsons and, since finishing the final book in 2020, revising them to make them better. No eye on publication, just smartening them up so I’d be pleased to have them sitting, self-published, in my Amazon author page, alongside my published (though now self-published, as the contracts ran out long ago) books.

But then I asked my Book Club to read The Magic Cloak, and after they roundly praised it, I decided to send it out for publication, just to see what happened.

And, oh my, hasn’t publishing changed since I’ve last looked into it.

Traditionally, if you wrote a book and wanted to do something with it, you had two options: a publisher, or a vanity press. A publisher would look at your manuscript and, most likely, reject it. However, if they accepted it, they would work with you to get your book in the best possible shape, then published it, and give you a cut of the money it earned.

Vanity presses were where you would go to pay to have your book published. They were around when I last ventured into publishing territory, but they were like brothels: they resided on the seedy side of town, and you didn’t want your friends to see you go there. These days, however, they have infiltrated the mainstream.

Having decided to try publication, I spent a weekend combing through lists of publishers, eventually refining a list of likely candidates who I sent the manuscript to. And the offers starting rolling in.

The publishers were full of praise: “A wonderful book,” “Sure to make money,” “We’d love to publish it.” And they had a “Hybrid” contract they could offer that detailed how much I would need to pay them for the service.

I was shocked. These were companies that advertised themselves as real publishers but who were, in reality, call girls. It was akin to meeting a woman, getting on great with her, then, when things got serious, hearing her say, “Okay, before we go any further, let’s talk money. Kisses and hugs, that’s entry level, so £1,500. Anything more than that, say, first to third base, is £5,000, and a home run will set you back ten grand.”

You were looking for a girlfriend, and what you ended up with was a prostitute.

(I realize that, due to my gender, race, pronouns, upbringing, and predilections, I am confining my metaphor to female sex-workers; other forms and flavours of sex-for-hire are available. The end result is the same, however: you are expecting a satisfying, mutually beneficial relationship, and your partner unexpectedly demands money. That is Vanity Publishing.)

After the initial shock, I assumed any reply that started out praising my book was a vanity press. And I was not wrong. The few real publishers I managed to find all said, “Thanks, but no thanks.”

As noted earlier, Vanity Presses were always around, but this new breed is more insidious. They not only disguise themselves as “Traditional” publishers, but they call what they do “Hybrid” publishing, which is akin to having your sex-for-hire significant other trying to convince you that they are seeking a traditional, mutually satisfying coupling, by calling your payments to them a “Hybrid Relationship.”

And one Vanity Press really did try this on me:

But, they want me to pay for the privilege.

Either a book is worth publishing or it is not. If it is not, you have to pay someone to publish it. That someone is a Vanity Press. You can call it Hybrid, New Wave, Non-Traditional, or Hocus-Pocus Publishing, but if money goes from the writer to the publisher, it is a Vanity Press.

The good news is, there is now a new alternative: self-publishing. I am not going to go into that here, so I will simply leave you with this:

I was quoted anywhere from £1,500 to over £8,000 for “publishing” my book. And one Vanity Press tried to entice me by promising the following:

• An ISBN number (which is free when you self-publish with Amazon)
• Professional typesetting of your book (any competent person can do this themselves)
• Professional cover creation (you got me there, but if you can’t do it yourself, you can hire someone to do it for you for less than £8,000)
• Full control over the production of your book (ditto for Amazon)
• Five complimentary printed copies of your new book (Five free books, for £8,000? You can get at-cost copies from Amazon, and that’s a lot cheaper.)
• Online distribution to all major international retailers (ditto for Amazon)
• Wholesale distribution via Gardners and Nielsen Book Data (I am not sure about this; I think Amazon does, but either way if won’t matter because you’re not going to sell any books.)
• Placed on legal deposit with UK National Libraries (you cannot do this with an Amazon self-published book, and I doubt the Vanity Presses can do it either)

In closing: if you have written a book, and a publisher won’t accept it, but you want to publish it anyway, go to Amazon. It’s free, you’ll sell just as many books (if not more), and it’s likely to look better.

And, as a bonus, you won’t be patronizing the literary equivalent of a prostitute; instead, you’ll be wanking.