Dreaming Robot Press

I'm sorry but the covers are hideous, like someone did it from their basement at home. That in itself right there says to me, no way.

I had a short story in their 2015 Young Explorers Adventure Guide. Middle-grade/YA, sci-fi and its variants, emphasis on protagonists that are less-frequently tapped-- female main characters, less-common cultural backgrounds, the differently-abled. Six cents a word; paid promptly either via paper check or Paypal; good communication; very straightforward edits; two contributor copies plus a copy of the ebook version; everything went smoothly and according to the timeline. They caught a small error after they'd sent out their first round of authors' copies, so they reprinted and sent around a second batch of authors' copies with the mistake fixed.

I'd encourage anyone to give their 2016 anthology a try.

Sorry, but to me, any mention of Kickstarter signals "underfunded." Wait two years and see if they're still around.

Looking through my emails-- I believe the original anthology was supposed to be 20 stories. Due to the Kickstarter, they were able to expand it to 24 stories. The first stretch goal was to include a story by Alvaro Zinos-Amaro; the second stretch goal was to add a story by Douglas Smith; etc. So that's nice they were able to get some names in. The Kickstarter had the additional benefit of donating "sponsored copies" to libraries, so there was a link for school and public libraries to request a sponsored copy. They were at 52% of their goal by the end of Day 3, so I was impressed they were able to get that much support for things. If I recall correctly, authors were paid prior to the Kickstarter launch.

Vanessa MacLellan, one of the authors, did a nice round of author interviews on her blog. Visibility Fiction had a nice little write-up.

They sent out newspaper press releases. Since I live in the middle of nowhere, I don't know how that went-- I had the impression that it was part of a marketing package they'd purchased, but I'm not seeing the message that had given me that impression, so that may be an error on my part.

In addition to posting things to the internal FB group, the editors periodically send us encouraging words from parents/librarians/places that have enjoyed the anthology.

So-- I'm not really sure how the marketing side of thing compares to other "YA/Middle Grade Sci Fi Anthology Publishers" out there, especially since I'm not tuned into the publishing world like I used to be when I was in charge of YA/Children's at my library, and keeping on top of my publications/periodicals/what's-going-on-in-the-biz. I really do live under a rock these days. But just judging from the amazing promptness with which the Kickstarter reached its goals, and then its stretch goals, they seemed to have a lot more visibility in the field than I had expected based on things like, say, cover design.

--edit-- If it helps any, my background was mostly in the unglamorous world of content-writing, so I was more used to writing my piece, sending it out, doing any edits, cashing my payment, and focusing on the next project, rather being super-invested and taking a super-active part in things to boost sales and royalties (like, say, I see a lot of romance authors do). So that's also part of my lack of being in-tune with that aspect of writing-- I just sort of figure publishers have marketing plans, and I pitch in where requested, but otherwise am pretty oblivious to how they maximize their own investment.

Checking over the contract-- the six cents per word was for "First Rights and First Electronic Rights", limited to this anthology and its reprints (in various formats, languages, etc), and the author retains all rights not specified. The publisher has permission to post excerpts for marketing. You're allowed to sell reprint rights, but not until a year has passed from its initial appearance in the anthology. It addresses "reasonable efforts" on both side for editing. It has a reversion of rights clause in case the publisher doesn't come through on their end. I thought the contract was very fair and straightforward for a flat-fee anthology.