Intrigue Publishing cancelled my publishing contract because I told them their copy editing of my manuscript was unprofessional. Here are a few examples of their handiwork:
P.77:
"No," he replied, "just a message from Meredith Higgins, suggesting that all New Wave associates forgo attending any of tonight's receptions,"—his voice assumed a high, preachy tone—"'lest we appear callous in the face of New Wave's recent loss.'"
was changed to this:
P.78:
"It would be a far cry from eight hundred thousand dollars. A ten-thousand-dollar stack could be replicated with"—she did the calculations in her head—"less than three hundred dollars. That means we'd need"—more quick math—"just under twenty-four thousand dollars in all."
was changed to this:
P.88:
"Yes," she said, turning the thong inside out. "See"—she pointed to the crotch—"these actually have a gusset lining."
was changed to this:
And that was after they gave my contemporary adult thriller a "final" cover that not only looked like the love child of an early '90s YA novel and an early '90s textbook but also contained multiple typos in the amateurishly written jacket copy:
This is what I mean about it looking like a '90s YA cover combined with a '90s textbook:
After I begged them to remove the yellow line from the middle of the front cover and get rid of the yellow box around my name, they went an entirely different direction and gave me this cover, which is mostly all right:
Except for the part that looks like it was composited in Microsoft Paint circa 1995:
In case you're wondering, no I never actually told them I thought their covers looked like 90s textbooks composited in Microsoft Paint. I was always very polite with them, even in the end when I felt I had to be firm about the inadequate copy edits.
You can read more about the copy-edit issue
HERE.
There is a related thread
HERE.
And you can read all of my actual correspondence with the publisher
HERE.
