The Newer Never-Ending PublishAmerica / America Star Books Thread

Agent Emily has about as much chance at selling a manuscript as she does trying to remember her lines.

I was googling today and encountered a Google ad for PublishAmerica that talks about a $50 advance. But the link only takes you to PA's web site, at the "Author Information" page, which says nothing about a $50 advance, except one question, "Did you hear about our new $50 advance?" The same web page says the amount of the advance "will be outlined in the contract should we accept your work." I couldn't find anything more about it on PA's web site.

Has PA abandoned the symbolic $1 advance? I'm think the $50 advance must have a huge Catch-22 to it in the contract, because there is no way PA is going to pay new authors $50 up front. Does anyone know more about this?

Queen of Swords said:

You'll need to scroll down a bit, but I found several videos here.

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Thank you!!! I don't know why I didn't find that PA page on Facebook by doing a search. I found the other pages regarding PA. Now I've got it bookmarked.

ctripp said:

Merri, here's the PA Facebook page http://www.facebook.com/pages/PublishAmerica/138270496236018
I know, there are soooo many pages that pop up, even with only typing in p,u,b

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Thank you!!!

Don Davidson said:

Sorry, I'm either blind or I'm not getting the "PA Scam" link. I don't see it anywhere. Can someone possibly provide a link to it here on AW?

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http://www.facebook.com/#!/pages/PublishAmerica-Scam/128768743843643

Or just log onto Facebook and do a search for "Publishamerica Scam".

Don Davidson said:

Has PA abandoned the symbolic $1 advance? I'm think the $50 advance must have a huge Catch-22 to it in the contract, because there is no way PA is going to pay new authors $50 up front. Does anyone know more about this?

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I don't have any information, but I immediately thought of the minimum self-purchases some other POD/vanities require. $1 for no contractual purchases, $50 for 50 contractual purchases?

That's got my bet. Afterall, PA's only customers are the authors, so why not obligate them to more copies during the honeymoon than they are likely to purchase before they catch on?

Sneaky! I wouldnt be surprised if you're right. Especially because new PA authors generally have no clue how high their book prices are actually going to be. The price is often their first nasty surprise.

DreamWeaver said:

Sneaky! I wouldnt be surprised if you're right. Especially because new PA authors generally have no clue how high their book prices are actually going to be. The price is often their first nasty surprise.

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It was for me. The sad thing is I could have spent 30 seconds in the PA bookstore and priced books of similar size. I might not have signed the contract if I had.

Gillhoughly said:

http://www.facebook.com/#!/pages/PublishAmerica-Scam/128768743843643

Or just log onto Facebook and do a search for "Publishamerica Scam".

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Thanks. Found it. And liked it.

Gillhoughly said:

Yes, and they're trying to get 500 "Likes."

However, there's a campaign to top them with the PA Scam page. Just click the "Like" on it instead.

http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=1191774805#!/permalink.php?story_fbid=233071890042716&id=1191774805

If anyone does a FB search on PA the scam page will always appear with it!

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That's great. I'm sure it really helps a lot of people.

James D. Macdonald said:

I bet it's up to fifty dollars. $1 is "up to" $50.

They could as easily have said "advances up to $5,000,000."

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If I'm remembering how charges for false advertising run, though, doesn't PA have to have paid out the top amount once in order to claim it without being sued?

It's a lot easier to pay out $50 once than to pay out $5,000,000 once.

jamiehall said:

. . . doesn't PA have to have paid out the top amount once in order to claim it without being sued?. . . .

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Who's going to sue? With what standing to do so? Seems unlikely that anyone would have a case over such a penny ante matter anyway. And the defense would be simple: "We have not yet had a book submitted that justifed an advance of more than $1, but we are open to the possibility of one worth as much as $50, but not more than that (that is, 'up to $50')."

--Ken

Chris P said:

The sad thing is I could have spent 30 seconds in the PA bookstore and priced books of similar size. I might not have signed the contract if I had.

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Buying a book or two from any publisher you're submitting to is a good idea for this reason - it shows at once whether the books are priced reasonably or not.

Though that does assume the writer has a passing familiarity with book prices and doesn't consider $24.95 a great deal for an e-book...

http://www.facebook.com/pages/PublishAmerica/138270496236018

Adding comments to Video #10, the "current" Operations Manager, has been disabled.
I wonder why.

[qote]But ... comments are turned on. They'd better pray that no one sees those videos.[/quote]
Not for long.

Sorry, I still don't have edit buttons to fix my typos or delete and start over.

Queen of Swords said:

Buying a book or two from any publisher you're submitting to is a good idea for this reason - it shows at once whether the books are priced reasonably or not.
. . .

...

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Would one have to make a purchase to determine that? Why not look them up at amazon.com or bn.com or publisher's website or whatever?

--Ken

Well, if one couldn't "look inside" because the feature wasn't activated, it would be well worth the $24.95 (or whatever) to see the quality with one's own eyes.

Funny, there are no videos of Author Support folks.
C'mon PA, give them credit for the difficult job they have to do.

How nice...she gives both the email that they never reply to and phone number that they never answer.
Too bad the comments feature has been disabled.

ResearchGuy said:

Would one have to make a purchase to determine that? Why not look them up at amazon.com or bn.com or publisher's website or whatever?

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True, though buying a book is also a good way to check the editing, design, level of gatekeeping and so on. I own books by quite a few small presses, and the quality varies widely.

I haven't been around in quite some time for reasons that aren't very exciting. Anyway, tonight I was reading the customer comments about a book on Amazon. One commenter immediately proclaimed himself to be an author and there was just something about his review that screamed "PA customer" to me. So I checked on his book and sure enough, he was. (The horrendous cover was my first clue.) But the best part was the single review of the book. It was quite favorable -- this reader had an amazing time reading the book. He finishes the review saying, "I think this is one of the very best reads I have enjoyed this year. I would very highly recommend it."

And then I looked at the reviewer's name and it was the author himself! He didn't even pretend to be someone else. He just reviewed his own book as if he were a random, happy reader.

I'm now really hoping he isn't a member of AW because I don't mean to be making fun of him. It just brought up both the humor and sadness and desperation of Publish America customers. Truth is, I was hoping that something miraculous had happened and PA was no more. Sadly, I see that this isn't the case.

-- Joanna