Evernight Publishing / Evernight Teen

Did you check your spam? Good luck!

sashamarie said:

Did you check your spam? Good luck!

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I've been checking all my folder's compulsively every hour for the last two weeks like a complete nut ball. Thank you!!

summontherats said:

While there have been a lot of comments on this thread lately, I don't think anyone's arguing that Evernight is a bad publisher, and they're certainly not posting because they expected to make a living off Evernight. Like all the stuff in this part of the forums, they're asking, "How does Evernight compare to other similarly-sized presses?"

And I think everyone can admit that Evernight does a really phenomenal job on cover art and a fair job on editing. So in terms of small presses, Evernight's got a few strong things to recommend it. (They also pay on time and are nice people. Hurray!)

But publishers also do promotion, and while most small presses can't do oodles and oodles, it is worth discussing what they do offer.

And... that's a fair question. I've been watching this thread with a lot of interest, honestly, because I have one book out with Evernight, in a genre they don't specialize in (YA and not romance) and my first quarter sales are... my friends and family. We're talking first quarter sales, during its launch, in the teens. I don't think Evernight netted me any sales at all.

This was an experiment for me--I was going to shelve this book otherwise--and I did almost no self-promotion. So I'm not heartbroken. But if they offer essentially no promotion at all, I am curious if other small presses are the same. Because that's a pretty genuine argument for "if you aren't going the agent route, you should really just self-publish."

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I agree with the comment above.

As I've mentioned previously, Evernight has beautiful covers.

The other thing is the payment: even earlier than I expected. Yes, the people are also nice.

I heavily promoted the one book that I have with Evernight because I loved the storyline and cover so much. Then again, the story is in a similar genre as my other books with two other publishers. Unfortunately, the sale number isn't good at all. To be fair, I only have the sale figure for the one on Evernight website itself.

I'll most likely do much better on Bookstrand because I'm slightly more well-known there and most of my readers are there. In fact, my Evernight Book actually managed to hit the bestseller chart (peaking somewhere in the high 70s), which wasn't horrible considering the fact that Bookstrand was more biased toward its own books and when my Evernight book was released, I was a newbie writer (only two months old in the writing world). Even Amazon would probably do well, too.

I really don't see any visible promotion done by the publisher, other than the ones on its Twitter and Facebook accounts. Initially, I was hoping for Evernight to do more marketing in addition to what I did for my book, but I really didn't see any (other than my own efforts).

This is by no means a bashing attempt against Evernight. It's my personal experience that I'm sharing with y'all. =)

My novel titled SEE will be released by Evernight Teen in June. SEE is my first Evernight title. I will say this from experience. I don't care who you pub with--you get out what you put in. I have been a writer for over 30 years, and I am the former Senior Editor of a digital romance publisher. If you want your book to be successful (or give it the best shot at success), you must be an avid self-promoter, no matter who your publisher is. Sitting around the editor/agent table at a conference back in my editing days, I heard an editor with a Big 5 publisher tell the story of a writer who was paid an advance in the 6-figure range for his book, and he thought he'd "made it," so he sat back on his laurels. They promoted his book to a certain degree and told him to do the same. Well, instead of taking some of that advance and putting it toward marketing for his book, he assumed the publisher would do all of the promotion. Well, his book didn't earn out the advance, and said writer has been unable to sign another contract for future books. All this said to make the point, any publisher who offered me a large advance for a novel would never have to tell me to use some of that advance to promote it. It would've been my first thought, especially with a Big 5 publisher's name to back me. And before I ever queried Evernight, a full promotional plan and monies to support that plan were already in place. Our books are our babies, and we love them. We should want to shout their praises from the rooftops. No one loves my work like I do. Who better to promote it? Just my thoughts and credo I live by. Good luck (and good planning) to everyone!

Good point, Lee. It's just that we should spend just as much time searching out and researching the best avenues for promotion (and marketing if you want) to obtain the best results. I know publishers whose idea of heavy promotion is to blast Twitter and FB every day for each book. This type of repetition is meaningless, it can really irritate and turn readers off. You can spend a fortune on full page and banner ads with no result, because you're not hitting the right audience.. I myself, have landed on the front page (with four different books) of our largest newspaper, the Times Journal, and received no sales or even comments. Small paper? Wrong Audience? You really have to find what works for you, or what is working today with authors. It's tough out there--tougher than it's ever been. Experimentation might be the answer. Likewise, my guest blogs and blog interviews have been useless. I'm sure others have had different results. Many, many new releases can hit the top 100, or even the top ten, because of an initial surge: this is all fine and well, but the trick is to stay there and maintain that high rank.

Very true, Tri! None of us have a magic wand. And what worked several months ago may not work now as far as promotion goes. It is all trial and error, but you still just have to put it all out there when it comes to your books. Thanks for the comments. Total truth!

Congrats!

Yes congrats and thank you for sharing.

I remember reading this thread before I signed my contract with Evernight a couple of years ago and I know that this thread is still the one that indexes in Google search results so I wanted to come back and give another perspective. I do think that most of what is in this thread is accurate, you do get paid timely and without exception. The cover images are great. The editorial staff is quick and easy to work with. However, I would caution anyone from signing a publishing contract with Evernight if you have long-term career goals and want to be regarded as an author in the romance publishing industry.

Evernight puts their emphasis on speed and quantity over quality. The only publicity they offer their authors goes to the authors who seem to crank out a new book every month or every other month. The authors that get the most publicity have dozens of books published with them and consistently post in the Facebook group about getting bad or negative reviews and yet they are still the ones getting the publicity pushes. When my book released I got exactly two posts on their Facebook page and maybe that many on Twitter. They profess to send your book out to dozens of reviewers they work with to get you reviews but by my count not one single person from their reviewer list posted a review either on their website or on Amazon. On my own I was ble to generate over 25 reviews but that was all my own legwork and nothing from the company's end was done to help or promote any of those high quality (4/5 star reviews). When one of the reviewers I contacted pointed out in their review that there were grammatical errors in the book I contacted the editorial team and was told, and I quote "some grammatical errors are expected in a work of fiction of this length".

Over the two plus years I've been under contract with them I have contacted them numerous times with promo opportunities including scheduling a sale email blast (similar to BookBub) only to be told that discount prices wouldn't be offered. For those authors who do manage to get BookBub deals they are expected to pay at least half of the cost of the blast out of their own pocket. Evernight will cover half the expense if you meet their criteria which is never spelled out.

As for print, my book was only available in ebook format for the first year despite having rave reviews and excellent sales I was told that print books are expensive and take time to create and typically don't sell well in "adult" content. My book is not erotica but most of their titles appear to be erotica so that's their stance. Despite that I pushed (and pushed!) and got my book available in print. I have contacted them several times to let them know when I've gotten it placed in Indie bookstores but they don't seem to really care, once they did post it on their social media pages but they didn't mention the store (even though it is well-known) and they linked to Amazon for purchases.

I have several other titles that have been published by other means since that title was published and my royalties for those other titles paid MONTHLY far outpace the royalties I receive quarterly from Evernight. Most of the time my royalties from Evernight wouldn't cover a cup of basic coffee at a fast food restaurant (i.e. they are generally under $5 per quarter).

My title is with them for 5 years and they have right of first refusal in any other book in that series that I would write, so I have not written any more in that series. Once my 5 year contract is up I intend to request the rights back to this title and publish it elsewhere.

I always hate to hear bad experiences like this but I can relate. I bypassed Evernight because I'd heard the same unflattering things and I could tell that they seem to only promote two authors. It's the same two authors who get the bulk of promotion and yes, these two authors release frequently and sometimes more than one book a month. At one while, I thought they were the publishers themselves with the treatment they receive. If someone on the outside like me who has never published with Evernight could pick up on the favoritism I can imagine how it felt to be an author with this company.

I spoke to friends who published with them a few years ago when I thought of submitting and was warned away. Two even said they didn't think Evernight did any editing and another said it's like they just run your books through Grammerly or something. The thing is though, these authors' books did sell well, but I am suspecting it's because they write BWWM romance and that sells well anyway. I doubt it was due to anything Evernight did or maybe they pushed these books because BWWM is hot. I don't know but the BWWM authors I know who were with them always did pretty good. After a while though, the other issues outweighed the sales. I'm glad I listened to the warnings though and just wanted to chime in to say your experience appears to be the norm. Outside of those two authors it seems.

With all the pubs closing I am surprised Evernight has hung on this long to be honest.

I do suspect that at least one of the authors you're referring to is the owner writing under a pseudonym but can't prove it. Like you, with all of the small publishing houses folding Evernight doesn't seem to be following that trajectory but still the experience has left a bad taste in my mouth.

SuzyQToYou said:

I do suspect that at least one of the authors you're referring to is the owner writing under a pseudonym but can't prove it. Like you, with all of the small publishing houses folding Evernight doesn't seem to be following that trajectory but still the experience has left a bad taste in my mouth.

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I think the same thing about that "author". It's like her books are the only ones getting published regularly and getting pushed. It's been speculation for a while she's not just an author with the company. I'm sorry you had this experience. I had more than a few bad experiences with publishers as well so I know how it feels.

I have a book with Evernight Teen and another with another small press, and while both pay royalties on time, etc., I can agree that I'm underwhelmed. It's why I've gone back to focusing on my self-published work. I get far more ROI with those books.

I thought I’d share my experience with Evernight since I’ve been published with them for over a year. Like some in this thread, my experience has not been very positive.



Pros:

•They pay on time, quarterly.

•The covers since 2017 are really eye-catching, but the bar at the top with the Evernight Publishing name has actually gotten my book disqualified from many cover contests because it was deemed ‘ugly’ from the get go, and “vain of the publisher”.



Cons:

•They’re pretty vague with information. For example, they send out a “Welcome to Evernight” email with info, and on the document, it says “We will pay half of the fee if your book is accepted for a deal with BookBub (series books only. $0.99 on Amazon), but they don’t specify you need at least three books published with them before they do this

•They also discourage you from even trying to get Bookbub because “it’s not worth the money”

•In that same email information kit, they tell you they send your book out to dozens of reviewers they work with to get you reviews. I actually emailed those reviewers to ‘check in’, and 90% replied back that they never had received my book from Evernight, and this was around six months after my book had been published

•They do not send you your files in advance so that you can promote ahead of time

•You usually receive your cover five days before your book is scheduled to come out (and that’s if you’re lucky)

•There’s barely any promotion on their end for upcoming releases so your book is going to just appear out of nowhere unless you promote yourself (which is difficult without a cover, and without any of your files). No build up unless you’re one of their “favorite authors”

•They don’t use NetGalley which a lot of reviewers ask for

•I had to email several times in order to get my covers, but they kept insisting I pick a date for some time soon

•The editing is… well, what editing? Two rounds, and I found a bunch of mistakes while reviewing myself that the editors missed after two rounds – that doesn’t say much. And I've dealt with more than one different editor there

•They don’t give you any kind of timeline, so you have no idea when your edits are going to arrive. If you happen to be on vacation, you’ve got one week to return them. Great.

•Did I mention they don’t promote?

•I understand that authors need to promote their own works – I’m fine with that, but if Evernight does basically no promotion, I don’t know why they’re getting 55% of my royalties

•Becoming a full-time author with Evernight is not going to be a possibility. From what I’ve gathered from the authors who have made this possible with this publisher, it’s either because they have a partner who works, or they have self-published books, or are published with other publishers – that’s what I noticed in the Facebook group anyway

•Some stores will not hold anything from Evernight Publishing because they refuse to work with them (as I’ve been told) due to the fact that they do not list/tag their books properly. For example, I had bought a book with a content warning of BDSM, impact play, and anal sex, when in fact, it was a non-con book (non-consensual)

•They are about quantity, not quality. And I’m not just throwing that out there. The marketing person wrote that to me in an email when I asked for more time to promote my upcoming book

•My quarterly royalties are around the price of a Starbucks coffee


I don’t want to be the next J.K. Rowling – I mean, if I did, I wouldn’t complain! – but it is possible for authors to make a living off their writing. It’s possible even if you might need a part-time job. But with Evernight, it’s just not likely. I love promoting because I also get to socialize on social media, but I don’t need to pay 55% of my royalties for getting nothing in return. I can get my own cover designer, and hire an actual editor. I’ll have the ability to put my book up for 0.99$ whenever I feel like it, and not have problems every single time I’ve tried doing this with Evernight. They are just not dependable. Once my 5 year contract is up, I’m looking forward to requesting the rights back to my titles and self-publish them myself.

Having worked with Evernight Publishing, I can honestly say the whole thing has caused me nothing but stress, disappointment, and frustration. Like a few mentioned on this forum, the experience has left a bad taste in my mouth.

Thanks for sharing and sorry for the experience. I made up my mind years ago that EN seems to be an author mill. They rack up authors and never promote and as you said, the editing is nonexistent. Many of the things you mentioned, I'd heard from friends who warned me against EN back when I was still interested in publishers.

The parts about Bookbub and Netgalley really stuck out to me. Wow, that's some BS to say Bookbub isn't worth the money. Definitely not true and it's probably what they say because they either can't afford Bookbub or don't wanna spend the money. As for Netgalley, seems to be the same issue. Too cheap to put any effort into it.

The reason I say EN might be an author mill is because their business model seems to be signing up tons of authors and counting on making a little bit of money off them opposed to putting effort into the process or selling books.

It has amazed me beyond belief they've lasted this long. I also agree about the covers. Always thought that black band at the top was tacky. Why not have a tiny simple logo like other pubs? Could it be another way they advertise for potential authors? Hmm.

I can second everything authorofbooks said. My book came out two years ago and was meant to be the first of a trilogy, but (a) it didn't sell very well, and (b) the publisher never asked for the additional books, so I've focused on the stuff I can self-publish and actually make money on. EN supports the authors who spit out a book every couple months because those are the ones that make money, I guess. As was mentioned, it's quantity over quality. I wish I could write faster, but it takes me about a year to craft a book, sometimes longer, so I'm not their kind of author, I don't think.

I'll second, third and fourth all the sentiments about Evernight. I just flatly refused their contract. Actually twice. Unfortunately we have been loaded down with small press mills that demand quantity or quality, and even force the issue. It hasn't gotten any better in my 27 years. I think it was James McDonald who said small press will garner you about $75 to $100 for the life of the book. Damned if he wasn't so very right on the target. It's true. An agent must sell your book, and even then that's very difficult. We just hang in there and hope for the best--a decent return for our time and talent.

The best of luck, author. You'll win this one, it just takes a wee bit of time.

Am I the only one shocked that with the gazillions of pubs closing that Evernight is still open? Especially with the horrible stuff I've heard.

Well, I'll give them this: they pay royalties on time. (Not that I've ever had many from them.) Apparently that's not as common as it should be. Still, now that I know what an author mill is, I have higher standards. And I've done better with my self-published work anyway.

Heh. I still get caught in an author mill every now and then. My research-Fu is lacking in that regard. I have to slow myself down and not take things for granted.

I'm seriously considering the Indie. Gawd knows I have enough edited and finished books to print. I've just got to find someone who will give me a good price on e-book and print formatting. I just can't learn that the right way--I've tried and I'm too format stupid to get it to sink in. If you know of anybody who formats for Kindle on the side, please let me know.

I use Vellum (a computer program) to format my books, and they've turned out beautifully. Costs a bit but has been totally worth it.

Tri, Amy Atwell does very good work--I do my own formatting, but I've had her upload to iBooks for me in the past before I got a second-hand Mac, and she's a thorough professional. www.authorems.com

Marissa D said:

Tri, Amy Atwell does very good work--I do my own formatting, but I've had her upload to iBooks for me in the past before I got a second-hand Mac, and she's a thorough professional. www.authorems.com

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Thanks, Marissa. I'll check that out, and some of the other messages here.