Eltanin Publishing

Alessandra Kelley:
Has anybody seen this recent thread in Kindleboards, on which yet another person has re-invented the vanity publisher? The sad thing is, she was a professional editor at Houghton Mifflin before she got the bright idea for "A New Publishing Model". She really seemed to not be aware.

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Probably should have a new thread started for it. Interestingly, I Googled the poster's name and couldn't find any connection with Houghton Mifflin so if she was there, she wasn't there for long. In fact, the only person I can find with that name on the web is a temp at IT bod at the University of Vermont.

MM

That Kindleboards thread seems depressingly familiar.

Alessandra Kelley:
I assumed that was because it's so difficult to find specific editors associated with specific publishers. Now that I think about it, there's no reason to trust her word on it.

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I find that with most editors or editor's assistants there'll be some kind of reference to them on the web (even if it's just an author mentioning them on their blog by way of thank you). The fact that I can't find the person behind Eltanin doesn't mean they weren't there, but it's noteworthy that they didn't leave much of an internet impression.

Personally, I would want to know precisely which books they worked on while they were at Houghton so I can verify the same - particularly if they're planning to offer editing services, because I notice that the emphasis on the thread seemed to be mainly on copy editing when an editor's job is so much more than checking spelling and punctuation.

MM

I'm honestly boggled by this post, where the Eltanin lady says she was unaware of the existence of publishing scams. If you really were a publishing professional, you could have said this with a straight face ten years ago. Now...not so much. You might not have a detailed knowledge of scams, or even know the names of the main players--but you'd have to have your head stuck pretty deep in the sand not to be at least peripherally aware of the issue (not to mention the red flag of submission fees).

She gives her name as Catherine Leah Ryan. I Googled her, and apart from the Eltanin thread, this is all I found, and it provides no backup for her claim to have worked at Houghton Mifflin (actually Houghton Mifflin Harcourt)--which anyway does a lot of non-trade publishing. Eltanin's URL is registered to Mystic Publishing with a Vermont address, which is consistent with the info at the link on Ms. Ryan (Google turned up nothing on Mystic Publishing in Vermont, though there are a number of listings for Mystic Publishing in other states).

Just looking at the Eltanin website, the fact that there's no information whatever on who's behind the venture is a red flag all by itself. I also question that providing copy editing is sufficient to, as they say in their mission statement, "nurture quality writing."

- Victoria