- Joined
- May 13, 2005
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- bmlgordon.com
Okay, I myself am unpublished. But I have an acquaintance who has three books with Treeside, and I have been watching in dismay recently. I don't have anything like full information, unfortunately.
However, roughly, they're an e-publisher and PoD, and their contract got them a 'not recommended' on P&E. The founder said he'd clean up his act, and I gather he rallied the troops to send in their positive reports.
This was followed shortly by his saying it was all too much for him, and handing the company over to a friend in-whom-he-had-complete-faith. Friend was published by him, and may have been an editor (don't have solid info on this) but no track record in publishing himself. The website went down and came back up again.
Most recently, the website has gone away again, the former owner is being treated for depression, and the new owner has sent out a curt note saying something like "I can't deal with the guy anymore." Neither of them seems to be available to explain what's going on.
(The website used to be something like www.treesidepress.ca - I suppose there's cached info somewhere.)
What I'm wondering about is this. I've read a bit about what happens to the authors' rights when a publisher goes bankrupt, over on the PA thread (short answer: It depends), but what happens to the rights if the publisher just vanishes?
Is she stuck in limbo? Are publishers legally dead after seven years? Or what? I'm not sure of the details of the contract - I think the book stays in their catalogue? for two years, and if you want out of your contract after that they'll think about it. But I don't have the language, so that's no help.
-Barbara
However, roughly, they're an e-publisher and PoD, and their contract got them a 'not recommended' on P&E. The founder said he'd clean up his act, and I gather he rallied the troops to send in their positive reports.
This was followed shortly by his saying it was all too much for him, and handing the company over to a friend in-whom-he-had-complete-faith. Friend was published by him, and may have been an editor (don't have solid info on this) but no track record in publishing himself. The website went down and came back up again.
Most recently, the website has gone away again, the former owner is being treated for depression, and the new owner has sent out a curt note saying something like "I can't deal with the guy anymore." Neither of them seems to be available to explain what's going on.
(The website used to be something like www.treesidepress.ca - I suppose there's cached info somewhere.)
What I'm wondering about is this. I've read a bit about what happens to the authors' rights when a publisher goes bankrupt, over on the PA thread (short answer: It depends), but what happens to the rights if the publisher just vanishes?
Is she stuck in limbo? Are publishers legally dead after seven years? Or what? I'm not sure of the details of the contract - I think the book stays in their catalogue? for two years, and if you want out of your contract after that they'll think about it. But I don't have the language, so that's no help.
-Barbara