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Bombadil Publishing

Charles Farley

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This is the home page of the site quoted word for word. I'll let them explain

Bombadil Publishing is a new world of publishing where young people write for young people!

Our world is all about commitment, passion and drive; dreams, stories and passions. It is about expressing and sharing ideas and stories with others, creating, publishing, marketing and selling the perfect books for young people by young people between the ages of 12 and 26.

Books are a reflection of the soul and the authors’ dreams, and Bombadil aims to change the world by letting young people’s voices be heard and allowing them to express their views freely and without shackles and borders, though always with empathy and respect in focus.

By giving a voice to young people, Bombadil Publishing has expanded fast and now has young people in 90 countries writing across the globe. We are proud of this success, but we are even more proud of our authors. Books provide knowledge and share stories of value to the individual person.

We publish all genres and and all types of books, whether they are reality-based, fictional, non-fiction or poetry.

If there is a dream, if there is passion – there is a book worth publishing. Sometimes a little help is needed to finish the master piece, so at Bombadil Publishing we work with mentors instead of traditional editors. These mentors help ensure the quality but are also there to guide the author through the amazing and awe-inspiring road from manuscript to finished book.

Welcome to our world! Welcome to Bombadil!


http://www.bombadilpublishing.com/
 
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Kerosene

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Is this suppose to be an advertisement, or are you questioning them?
 

Charles Farley

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I suppose its just for people to check out and see what they think . . . I wasn't sure about the procedure here . . .

The people behind it are trying to expand so I thought I would post this and see what happens . . .
 

Aggy B.

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Their books appear to be unavailable at this time, even through Amazon (though they say they are). Also, misspelling in their Books, Etc page.

There seems to be some sort of mentorship aspect to the publishing effort. Which makes me think it's working less as a publisher and more like a forum/school.
ETA: I see. They don't use editors, only "mentors" who guide the author through the publishing process.

Aggy, a little confused
 
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Charles Farley

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I'm getting the owners to join here . . . they can answer whatever questions come up . .
 

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Whole site has a Pied Piper feel to it. What's to recommend them?

What's to recommend them? Nothing, as far as I can see.

The writing on their site is just dreadful. It doesn't bode well for their editing, or their ability to focus on the publishing process.
 

Kerosene

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Please quote text when you want to quote them--that way, it's not your word or you passing their word as your own (which is plagiarism).

Well:
- "In 90" countries" would be amazing, but do they mean they distribute to 90 countries that get internet? Because they haven't translated any works out of English.
- They have four books out, all published 4 years ago, and (as far as I can see) only one still in production without some startling asking price.
- Their covers look anywhere from badly drawn with colored pencils, to bad photoshop paintings.
- Their talk of "mentors" sounds like "paid mentors" to me.
- And they're hosted on wordpress with a plainly default page setup--their site has very little information about themselves.


I don't have a facebook account, so I'm not going to make one to view their facebook page.

As it stands, I wouldn't touch them.
 

mrsmig

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Peculiar site. Can't really tell what they're selling. It sure doesn't seem to be books.
 

Marian Perera

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What does this even mean?

Bombadil aims to change the world by letting young people’s voices be heard and allowing them to express their views freely and without shackles and borders
Young people's voices can already be heard. It's not as though publishers only accept manuscripts from people who are over 18. As for "change the world" and "shackles and borders" - what is this, a Michael Jackson song?

If there is a dream, if there is passion – there is a book worth publishing.

I know reality is important, but I am in a world where, to some extent, the imagination becomes reality, and thus happiness is imagination... I think the world of books and publishing is my happiness. What is your happiness?
This is all just so head-in-the-clouds that I can't take any of it seriously.
 

Charles Farley

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Well . . It is for 12 to 26 year olds . . . like I said . . I'm talking to one of the guys now . . . they can join and explain . .
 

Marian Perera

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Well . . It is for 12 to 26 year olds . . .

I think 12- to 26-year-old writers deserve to be treated just the same as the rest of us.

That means good editing (I looked inside one of the books put out by this press), professional covers and books actually available. As opposed to "I'd like to bake a cake full of rainbows".
 

Charles Farley

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ok.

username [removed email address] is waiting for activation to answer questions . .
 
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Charles Farley

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I think 12- to 26-year-old writers deserve to be treated just the same as the rest of us.

That means good editing (I looked inside one of the books put out by this press), professional covers and books actually available. As opposed to "I'd like to bake a cake full of rainbows".

fair enough

They can talk about it soon . .
 

ZachJPayne

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I wouldn't trust anything that knocks off a Tolkien name without being tied to the Tolkien Trust. (e.g. Lorien Legacies). Just call that the fanboy in me.

And yeah, not sure if I'd touch this one with a ten foot pole, for plenty of the reasons set out above.
 

Charles Farley

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other user waiting to be approved

[removed email address]

as soon as these to users get approval they will talk about this themselves . .
 
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ShaunHorton

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Hopefully they have something good to say, I'm seeing quite a few red flags.

1. The quality on their page doesn't bode confidence in any of their editing skills.

2. Rather then the work of a full-on website, their page is just run through wordpress.

3. I question any company that claims to target a demographic which is unlikely to have any understanding of contract terms and conditions and is highly likely to sign just about anything without even reading the paperwork.

4. I also have to question the wisdom of using such a specific name from such a specific work. The estate of J.R.R. Tolkien may have something to say about that.
 

Filigree

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I await the comments of the founders.

As a personal observation, at age 12 I was reading adult-level fantasy, science fiction, history, and science non fiction. I started trying to write by age 13, but it was useless, adjective-laden fluff that never reached resolution. It wasn't good enough to publish. I didn't even get close to commercially viable work until age 23, but I was always aiming for adult fiction and adult readers.

Now, there are plenty of people in that age range who are much better writers than I was. Many of them are already on Wattpad, or are aiming for commercial MG and YA.

So, short of a 'nurturing' environment for young writers, what can this site offer?

The use of a Tolkien-associated name troubles me. Shaun also makes the point that contracts involving minors need to be very carefully written - and include adult guardians. There are so many younger victims of vanity and subsidy publishers, simply because those younger writers know very little about the business.
 
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ShaunHorton

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I did find this in their About section.

20-20-20-20-20

A core value of Bombadil Publishing is that everybody involved in the book creation process shall earn a share in the revenue produced. This is expressed as the 20-20-20-20-20 principle:

20% of the revenue goes to the author: as royalty for the idea and the bulk of the creative work

20% goes to direct support for the author: half to a mentor responsible for helping the author in finishing the book concept and bringing the storyline to a consistent plot, half for bringing the literary and graphical quality to a level expected from professionally published books.

20% goes to cover direct production costs: Setting the book in a format acceptable by printers, and printing paperback copies

20% goes to sales: Administration, marketing and transport. Note that customer discounts for large orders are not included here.

20% goes to overhead: Setting up the process, administrating the flow of the manuscript from interested author to book in the hand of the reader, supporting development of manuscript creation tools, etcetera.
 

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ok.

username [removed email address] is waiting for activation to answer questions . .

other user waiting to be approved

[removed email address]

as soon as these to users get approval they will talk about this themselves . .

Charles, you seem to be very involved with this company. What is your connection to it? Do you work for Bombadil in any way?

4. I also have to question the wisdom of using such a specific name from such a specific work. The estate of J.R.R. Tolkien may have something to say about that.

I've written a couple of books about Tolkien's books, and have dealt with his estate on each of them. It is fiercely determined to protect its intellectual property and does not hesitate to commence litigation.

I do hope the people behind Bombadil Publishing have cleared the use of this name with the estate. If they haven't, I suspect they'll be hearing from the estate some time soon.
 
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Niklas

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Hi!
I am one of the owners of Bombadil Publishing, and was directed to this discussion. First, let me say that I am very happy for the interest you are showing. :) And secondly, my sincere apologies for the current state of our website and the difficulty in getting hold of any of our books. We have just commissioned a comppete rework of the website, and that will include a support portal for authors and mentors. Our approach to support is to allow experienced mentors to support the writing process for our young authors. The mentors are not paid staff, but will receive a royalty similar to the authors on published books.
As soon as our new website is up and running, it will be possible to purchase e-books for download directly, and to order paperback copies of books in print. Give our programming team a couple of months to sort that, though. If you cannot wait, a few of our earlier books ARE available at , and why that doesn't show up on amazon.com, I do not know. Amazon has said it should, and we have nagged them about it.
Anyway, stay tuned, more info later - we are real, we have been publishing books since 2007 although so far no huge bestsellers even though the quality of authors in our age range is fantastic. WEll, the age range of our authors, I mean - I would not qualify for that.
I'm happy to answer any questions, although this happened a bit earlier than intended...