Severed Press

PeteDutcher said:

I self publish my books thru POD and give retailers a large discount code if they order stock for their shelves. That way they make a good profit at the same time.

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What does this have to do with Severed Press?

They are POD. Read the previous comments.

PeteDutcher said:

I self publish my books thru POD and give retailers a large discount code if they order stock for their shelves. That way they make a good profit at the same time.

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jennontheisland said:

What does this have to do with Severed Press?

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PeteDutcher said:

They are POD. Read the previous comments.

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If you published your books through Severed Press that might be a valid comment. As you don't, I don't see the point either, Mr Dutcher. Feel free to explain your reasoning.

So, late to the party as usual. I originally read through this thread last year when Severed Press offered me a contract. Back then I read the whole thing, and on the advice of a friend of mine who is reasonably well-known in the horror genre and has some of his books published by Severed Press, I took the risk and signed (despite my novel being Military SF, which seemed to be less well-represented than Horror).

I am very happy with what has happened since. I've had books published by several small presses and none has done as much to push the book as Severed.

The first pleasant surprise was the cover. Again, I've had some bad experiences with small presses, but the cover Severed Press put together for me was both professional and something I felt worked very well to give a reader a sense of what the book was about. (my book is called Siege, if anyone is wants to have a look on Amazon - I'm chiming in on Severed Press, not trying to sell copies!).

Siege was published in December 2016, and since then has been selling steadily, mostly in Kindle format.

As Severed has not disclosed the royalty percentages above, I won't do that, but they are industry standard as far as I can tell (have never worked with the big five on a novel, only short fiction, but have had books published by four other small presses).

For one quarter's worth of sales Jan-Mar 2017, I have been paid three-figure royalties (someone upstream asked about the levels of payment) - again, much better than what I have seen in the past from other small presses. I'm pretty sure that some of their better-known authors are doing much better than that. Most of all, I like the fact that the book didn't just fall off a cliff after that one quarter, but still seems to be selling at a similar rate (according to its Author Rank numbers, anyway).

The print version of the book looks good as well. It has a matte-finish cover and overall design that makes it look like something from a big house. Will it fall apart sooner than a book from a major publisher? I have no idea, but so far, I love the thing. The audiobook version, released recently, is also selling some copies (again, as far as I can tell from the Author Rank graph).

I like working with them quite a bit, and have since sold them another book. So far, so good on that one as well.

Anyhow, that was my experience - hope this helps others who might be doing their research.

Ditto on everything Gustavo said above. Severed Press has published 3 of my books at this point and the entire experience has been exceptional--much better than the other small/indie presses I've worked with. These guys are straight shooters and no-nonsense and yes, they make fantastic covers (I absolutely adore all three of mine). Very happy to be published by Severed. Very grateful for the opportunity to be published by them.

I have a book published by Severed Press. Never had a problem. Royalties come in like clockwork. Gary Lucas is very short and to-the-point, but they've done a good job for me. The bulk of their sales, BTW, are digital which is fine by me as historically, the vast majority of my book sales are e-book.

Quick question as an unpublished author: is it acceptable to include your self-determined pen name in the title page of your manuscript when submitting to agents, or would they find it a little pretentious to use that over your real name?

bin_b0x said:

Quick question as an unpublished author: is it acceptable to include your self-determined pen name in the title page of your manuscript when submitting to agents, or would they find it a little pretentious to use that over your real name?

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This is a publisher thread so...

However, if you want to use a pen name it goes on the title page. Any accompanying query/cover letter should be signed "RealName writing as PenName".