Good evening, everyone.
I really wasn't going to jump in here, but since it looks like GMTA has to stand up and defend themselves from people who've ranted about us anonymously on a forum since 2012 (almost two years and you're still shooting Kitty down? Really?) then I thought I'd come and offer my two cents. Or pence, rather. Culture gap.
I'm a signed author with GMTA and have been since September, and I've made more sales with them than I ever did by myself over the course of almost one and a half years. I had my cover art done independently by a guy I knew before I signed with GMTA and I like his style, but if I didn't have him then I'd be fine with what GMTA would make for me. (Just gonna go giddy for a second here, the guy also made an EPIC book trailer, eeeee~!) I had to have my book re-edited before Kitty would publish it and I don't regret it at all. And even though GMTA doesn't offer any specific editing services anymore, there are editors recommended to us that are both professional and co-operative. My new editor, Lisanne Cooper, is phenomenal at her work and I wouldn't have anyone else edit my books right now with how much improvement's been made to my second book. In fact, quite a few of the books we've published have excellent grammar and spelling, but people on this forum seem to be focussing solely on the ones that back up their argument, which seems to be one in every seven or eight. You want to play that game? Okay, I'll bite.
You want to look at books we've done that have sold well and have good grammar and spelling? Take a look at Dimidium Angelus' by Dennis Parker. It may not have the most reviews, but it was in the Top 3 on fantasy on Amazon for a few days not too long ago. Not satisfied yet? 'Fireflies', P.S. Bartlett, won the Readers' Favorites silver book award 2014 just a month or so ago and it's very well written and laid out. Again, not the most reviews on Amazon, (just 50+, giving her a total of 5 stars on her book,) but also quite a few ratings on Goodreads and B&N, averaging between 4 and 5 stars each. Funny thing, both of those websites seem pretty excluded in this thread. Maybe that's because Amazon is more mainstream, but if you want to construct an argument at least go for more than one source. And if not both of them, at least check Goodreads, which is a site primarily dedicated to amassing reviews on books. And I know that he isn't with GMTA anymore (let's not go into that) but Brian D Anderson's critically acclaimed 'Godling Chronicles' series was originally made famous by GMTA. He wouldn't be where he is now without the hard work and dedication that Kitty puts into every book she accepts. And frankly, I've seen the numbers of submissions she gets. She accepts probably... around one in a hundred? Two hundred? Maybe more, maybe less. But of course, some people would rather pick at a few bad reviews. Guess what: reviews are opinions. Beauty is in the eye of the beholder. And when you use other people's opinions to back up your own opinion and present it as a fact, that just makes you seem petty. Even more petty than shooting down a professional who only wants to do her job and help people for the better part of two years. Want more names of pretty successful authors Kitty's represented? Carrie F Shepherd, 'The Scribing of Ishitar'; Forbes West, 'Nighthawks at the Mission'. And, of course, GMTA also published a number of books written by Keith Rommel, like 'Hunter No More' and 'You Killed My Brother'. That's the same Keith Rommel whose book with Sunbury Press, 'The Cursed Man', is a nominee for the BTS Red Carpet Award for mystery/suspense this year. And it's also being made into a major motion picture in California. Just sayin'.
But of course, that doesn't address the recurring matter of occasionally improvable grammar and editing in a few of our books. Of course, if that is a resounding issue, then by all means it should be addressed and handled properly. Because, I mean, it's not like any famous authors run by huge traditional publishing houses have ever published books that haven't been perfectly edited. Except Darren Shan. And Derek Landy. And Darren Shan. And Christine Feehan. And Darren Shan. And Rick Riordan. And Darren Shan. And Lemony Snicket. And Darren Shan. Okay, so there's a fair few. My mistake. ...Also Anthony Horowitz, Obert Skye, Stephen King and, once again, Darren Shan. Seriously, with that guy it's like a book-by-book Easter egg hunt to find the mistakes. (Love you, Mr Shan!) And if we're going to go into the whole good-books, bad-books argument, 'Fifty Shades' got published by Random House. 'Fifty Shades'. That speaks for itself.
Now let's take a look at the matter of royalties, because if you're not a writer who just wants to be published, then you're one who wants to make money, apparently. Because having a passion for writing and entertaining and educating people took a leap out a thirtieth-storey window around the 1800's, right? Anyway, GMTA takes 60% of the royalties, whereas self-publishing takes about 90%, after taking away the cost of printing, the deductions from Amazon and your POD service, the pre-publication fees on the ISBNs, the cover art, and the annual holding fee if you're using LSI or some other POD company. And that's not even considering the extra fees if you want to make an edit to your book on LSI or actually market yourself with deals by marketing groups or order a box or two from your POD to have your own event copies or just a few to give to your friends. So if you take away all those deductibles (just those last ones, not the first set,) if you're in the same boat as most other self-published authors in terms of sales, that leaves you with around... 70-60%. That's marginally better than the 40% we get, but 40% of 100 books sold is still better than 60% of 10. I'm just rounding down numbers there for the sake of the analogy, of course. 'But there's those self-published authors who have a lot of sales,' you say? Amazon Prime free days and countdown deals, folks, which only takes away from your eventual royalties because no one can resist free stuff; there's also the perk of non-commitment with buying a free book rather than one that costs money, so if it's shit, then nothing's wasted. Either the free day deals or 'spending money to make money' with huge advertising deals costing over $100 or so. So would you rather just jump in with all that by yourself and keep a bigger percentage, or would you rather take what you can get from someone who knows what they're doing and has done it for several years? Kitty has connections with advertising agencies and media figures across the world within six degrees. In fact, when you reach a certain sales threshold, 10% of your royalties go towards mass marketing campaigns through those connections. And that's not taken out of YOUR share; it's taken out of HERS. Wow, that's pretty money-grubbing, isn't it?
But let's compare that to a big publisher like Orion or Penguin. They would take about 70-80% of your royalties right off the bat, and you wouldn't see a cent of your royalties until you paid off the few thousand or so they gave you at the very beginning so they could buy the publishing rights. And then there's the fact that NO MASSIVE PUBLISHING HOUSE WORTH THE SPIT IN THEIR HUNGRY GOBS would accept a manuscript from an author who wasn't represented by a literary agent. Literary agents also need to get paid. They'd take a cut of your royalties, too. So instead of 40%, you're left with 10%, 15% maximum.
Let's go back to editing just for a second here. You go to a big traditional publishing house, and they're bound to have 'suggestions' for you. Like 'let's make this happen instead', or 'ooh, kill this guy off and make the reader squirm'. When you sign with one of them, the story isn't yours anymore. You're not writing to write anymore. You're writing to get it accepted by your own publisher, who doesn't want to put out your story; they want to put out a story that people will buy. Kitty doesn't do that. Creative control rests in the hands of the authors. Would you tick that box on a publishing contract? Or would you rather have Penguin's editorial team dipping their big chef's spoon into your gumbo and bastardising your story? Kitty and Lisanne (and other editors we're connected with) often do make suggestions, but there's no pressure. Their rule is that editing isn't done until YOU'RE satisfied. That sounds like a pretty friendly approach, doesn't it?
I'd like you to think about that for a second, and I'll answer the question that comes up a lot here: what does Kitty do? Well, first of all, as opposed to a cold, all-business big publishing house, Kitty is... well... Kitty. One woman with a heart of gold who'd lay down her life for her family and her authors, and openly encourages communication between us. She even built an entire set of email lists and discussion forums and Facebook groups for us all to get acquainted and cross-promote, because the publisher doesn't do everything. She's more than just your publisher; she's your friend, and she gives you face time, a voice and a choice in what happens to your paperback babies. She's open to discussion and treats you with respect, gratitude and love. She doesn't just sign you into a deal; she signs you into her family. You wouldn't find that sort of connection with the head honcho at Orion. As for what Kitty does, aside from all the accounts, the formatting, the marketing and the publicity, is work her fingers to the bone trying to get our books sold so we all make enough to do what we love: write. She connects you with other people and opens doors for you to do your own branding and make a name for yourself, as well as spreading that name and your works across the internet on websites I'd never even heard of, as well as setting up blog tours and promo events and getting more and more useful connections to help us be heard about every day. You may not see our titles on the shelves in Barnes and Noble all the time, and you probably won't find us in a Waterstones or a WHSmiths, but that's because we're not a huge publishing house (yet). We're just a family of openly-communicative, hard-working writers who love what we do and who we do it with. And Kitty isn't a money-grubbing woman in a snazzy suit sat in a swivel chair in a huge office on the top floor of a skyscraper in the Big Apple. She's a perfectly real, down-to-Earth, hardworking woman sat at her desk practically 72 hours a day, probably in a t-shirt and yoga pants, surrounded by a veritable zoo of pets and a beautiful, outstandingly brilliant daughter that she would die for, and potentially the biggest family on Earth. She's a human being.
So there's the facts, and our side of the story. I wouldn't normally write something like this, but like I said, Kitty is a part of my family. You don't talk trash about someone's family. Kitty is a great publisher and I've never seen a reason other than the highly exaggerated problems you keep bringing up over and over on this forum, most of which don't mean anything two years later. If the choice was working with Kitty, or working for the suits at Penguin, or going at it alone again, I know who I'd pick and I'd pick her a thousand times over.
And if you think that this post is long and rambling and a post for TL;DR, chew on this: my side of the argument took me an hour. Yours has taken you two years.
