This week’s guest poster is author Lynne Farley who talks about her experience with a small publishing company and discusses things to consider when deciding on a self-publisher. Enjoy!

Choose Your Self-Publisher Carefully!

by Lynne Farley

The thrill of writing your own book and finally having it published should be the greatest satisfaction that you, as a writer, should be proud of.

However, your gratitude can be quickly ripped away if you choose the wrong Self-Publisher.

Do Your homework!

Before you make the decision to sign up with ANYBODY, do your homework. The internet is a wonderful tool for checking reviews of other experiences.

Also check places like the Better Business Bureau! You can question your Self-Publisher about the reviews you’ve read but they will just lie.

The most common answer for bad reviews is; “They’re only rebellious because their book didn’t sell! I’ve read your book and I will be honored to be the publisher when it becomes a number one seller!”

I would guarantee that 99% of the time they haven’t even read your book and neither has any of their associates.

Ask Many Questions and Get Everything in Writing!

When you are making your choice to pick a Self-Publisher, make sure they are not just telling you everything you want to hear.

They will butter you up by telling you about all their Company’s great accomplishments and then they will make you believe that you are getting the most for your money in comparison to other Self-Publishing companies.

Read Your Contract, Carefully!

Once you have chosen a Self-Publisher, read your contract carefully. If there is ANYTHING you don’t understand, bring it to a Lawyer.

Don’t accept the word of the Self-Publisher that it is standard in any contract. BUYER BEWARE: it’s your obligation to be smart!

I’m just going to quickly tell you about my horrendous Self-Publishing experience with a very bad company. I feel like an idiot now when I think of how easily I was manipulated into believing I was working with the BEST!

In the beginning, I respected this company for giving me time to make my decision. I would get reminder notices, but nothing pushy like the other Self-Publishing Co.’s.

Once I made my decision we carefully picked out the package that was most suited for my needs.

I trusted them even more because their choice for me wasn’t the most expensive so I signed up for $5,600 because I was going to receive 50% of the royalties. After I sent my manuscript to this Self-Publishing, my nightmare began!

My first draft had many mistakes, which I pointed out! I was offered another package to fix the mistakes. My book came back even worse than the first time. I might mention that every time I called I had to deal with a different department and a new person.

No one seemed to be familiar with my name or book so they had to check into my concerns and get back to me…I was just a number!

I paid $8,000 for Editors and another $3,800 for Proofreaders and I was promised a book ready for Publishing. Once I reviewed my final draft I was still concerned about the number of pages but I was told, bigger book, more revenue. I’d had enough and signed the release.

After waiting months for my promised copy, it certainly wasn’t the book I signed the release for. It had so many mistakes that I was embarrassed to call it my own! There were some sales, $869. to be exact!

However, when I received my first royalty check it was for $39. That was it, I cancelled my contract! They tried talking me out of it by offering me a deal on a Marketing package, which was only going to cost $19,999. What a joke!

That wasn’t the end though; I am now with a new Self-Publishing company and quite pleased. I now have a smaller professionally edited book at a more reasonable price.

BUT, even though I cancelled my contract with the other Self-Publishing Company, they still have my book advertised through some of the selling agents I’m working with.

Just please be very careful! I certainly didn’t write my book to get rich and I’ll never re-coop the costs I incurred through a bad Self-Publisher but that wasn’t my intentions.

I wrote my book to try to bring awareness to Domestic Abuse and if I can save one woman, then it was worth my time and money to write it.

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About Lynne

About Torn Between Two Worlds

Lynne Farley was a young, naïve woman when she entered into an abusive relationship. To this day, she still wonders how different her life would have turned out if she had been strong enough to walk away before bad turned to worse.

Abuse is something rarely understood by society and frequently ignored even when it is clearly evident! People either don’t want to get involved or they simply can’t comprehend the power and control an abuser has over their victim! Many will criticize the abused because of their choice to live with it, while others may not even be aware.

The physical abuse is concealed through lies and makeup, while the physiological abuse is gradually scarred deep into the victim’s soul. Once the victim has been demoralized to the point of feeling worthless, they don’t know how to save themselves. So, to protect
themselves and their children, they remain silent, leaving them even more vulnerable and isolated!

In this memoir, Lynne shares her personal story of abuse, and its effect on her, her children, and her family. She wants people to understand how she was caught between the normal world she grew up in and the abusive world she innocently enters into. By writing Torn Between Two Worlds, Farley hopes to help other victims of abuse by making family and friends recognize the many warning signs, which might save them from their brutal situation before it’s too late.

Facebook Page

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Big thanks to Lynne for giving up her time to contribute to my blog. There are many sharks out there, so be aware when looking into small publishing companies or vanity presses.

I’ll be back on Friday with a post of my own. I’m hoping to have some new guest blogs up next year, but this one may be the last one for 2016.

Happy reading

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Source: Images from Canva. Book cover belongs to Lynne

© Ari Meghlen. All Rights to the works and publications on this blog are owned and copyrighted by Ari Meghlen or their respective owners in the case of guest posters, podcast hosts etc. The Owner of this site reserves all permissions for access and use of all documents on this site. NO AI TRAINING: Without in any way limiting the author’s [and publisher’s] exclusive rights under copyright, any use of this publication to “train” generative artificial intelligence (AI) technologies to generate text is expressly prohibited. The author reserves all rights to license uses of this work for generative AI training and the development of machine learning language models.

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