Ephemera Bound Publishing

Tough call. I like their mission statement since I'm a good ole' pulp golden age freak. But when I tried to email them to ask some questions I got a delivery notice failure message. Maybe somebody else can get through?

Tri

http://www.ephemera-bound.com/about.php

Has anyone heard of this publisher, Ephemera-Bound?

While their catalog seems kosher, I don't like the tone of their submissions page:

We do accept submissions, as long as we are not innundated by manuscripts. Our eclectic mix is not genre specific, although we tend to lean more towards romantic, adventurous, erotic, and creative books; many of the works other publishers ignore for being "too artsy" or "too pornographic" are welcome here*. In the tradition of the pulps of bygone days, mysteries, pirate tales, sci-fi adventure, and tales of love are encouraged. Depending on the book, we are open to publishing reprints, or other works that had been published previously.

Unlike the bigger houses, we rarely pay advances; however, we balance it with commissions comparable or exceeding our peers.

Also, unlike our peers, we do not permanently tie up the rights for your books. The exclusive portions of our contracts expire, generally in a couple years, allowing you to shop future printings to bigger publishers (with some sales data in hand), or at the very least forcing both sides to reconsider the book's sales at a definite point in the future.

Epherema Publishing

Anyone have anything to report, good bad or indifferent, about this publisher? Checked the threads and didn't see a previous:

http://www.ephemera-bound.com/index.php?location=about

Beware Ephemera Bound

I signed a publishing agreement with Ephemera Bound Publishing for my novel, Blondie and the Beasty-girl, in Sept. 2005. I worked with an excellent editor, Tess Roberts, to bring the manuscript into publishable form (paid for by EBP). They paid for the cover art, which I hated, done by a caricature artist known only as, "Scooter." By Nov, 2006 the book was scheduled to be released in time for the holiday shopping season, and they were just waiting for a review from a radio personality to go on the back cover.

That's the last I heard from them. No book release. No response to email inquiries. Nothing!

I also wrote two short stories for their online site, Equalibri-yum.com. I received an email stating that one had been chosen as The Best of Equalibri-yum, and would be published in their quarterly print publication of the same name. I was to receive a copy of that publication as payment. I never received that copy.

My erotic vampire story was flagged to be included in an anthology they were producing called, Erotica with a Bite. Despite repeated inquiries, I still don't know if the story was included or the anthology even published.

Tess Roberts no longer works for Ephemera Bound, due to repeated difficulties in getting paid for the editing work she did for them.

Their unprofessional lack of communication on important issues, and their failure to follow through on signed agreements, makes Ephemera Bound Publishing an organization to be avoided.

~Papawayne

Experiences with Ephemera Bound

I would warn all writers to steer clear of Ephemera Bound Publishing, its parent and subsidiary operations.

A detailed account of my experiences is posted at the link below:
http://www.hulver.com/scoop/story/2008/8/14/154427/784

The short version:

* EB took an agonizingly long time to bring the book to market.

* The finished product was of poor quality - typos, inconsistent editing, fugly cover.

* EB reneged on my royalty rate just before the launch, telling me I had to agree or they wouldn't release the book.

* Important e-mails and telephone calls were ignored by EB for weeks or even months at a time, without explanation or apology.

* Despite promises of lavish promotions, absolutely no marketing was done on their part to push sales.

* EB attempted to hold up a film adaptation option deal by insisting on a massive fee for themselves, despite the fact that they did not explicitly hold any rights to adaptations in other media.

* I never received my contractually promised copies of the book for myself.

* Several readers waited almost three months for fulfillment on their prepaid orders directly from EB, without explanation or apology.

* EB tried to argue that the manuscript their editor tweaked constituted a derivative work under copyright law, and thus declared their exclusive ownership of my material.

* I never received my royalty cheque for units sold.

* In the end, in order to secure the rights of my work back I had to get lawyers involved (an expensive proposition).

In short, Ephemera Bound Publishing is a cruel scam. Stay away! Stay FAR away!

Yours,
Cheeseburger Brown
http://cheeseburgerbrown.com