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Aspen Mountain Press

kitzheng

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Nya, did you ever find an alternate person to write to? I had a story contracted by AMP around two years ago, but my editor left the company before we got very far, and my story has ended up orphaned. I was told I had been reassigned to a new editor, but never found out who; since then I've been trying to get updates from the EIC, or ask for my story back, but it's been quite a while since I've received any reply, and I'm not sure who I should try next. So if anyone has any suggestions, I'm very eager for them. :) Thanks in advance?
 

Nya RAyne

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Nya, did you ever find an alternate person to write to? I had a story contracted by AMP around two years ago, but my editor left the company before we got very far, and my story has ended up orphaned. I was told I had been reassigned to a new editor, but never found out who; since then I've been trying to get updates from the EIC, or ask for my story back, but it's been quite a while since I've received any reply, and I'm not sure who I should try next. So if anyone has any suggestions, I'm very eager for them. :) Thanks in advance?

You've been waiting two yeasr? Wow and OMG!! I'll definitely PM you her email address.

To everyone else (Ms. Kane), I want to let you know that I sent my email as advised and was rewarded five days later with an introduction to my new editor. Since then we've started working on the edits, I've learned my definite release date (April 11th), and we've started working on the cover art.

So far everything is going great.

Thanks for the advice guys and gals. I'll keep you all informed.
 
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Birol

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That's a good question right now.
Actually, Nya, the assignment to a new editor had nothing to do with any e-mail you may have sent. I never saw it and I am the individual who, through the end of this month anyway, assigns editors. As I told you originally, all the editors had full plates at the time your original editor resigned her position. As soon as there was an availability, which included hiring and training replacement editors, I assigned your manuscript. It was as simple as that. I also never received any follow-up e-mails from you.
 

Nya RAyne

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Actually, Nya, the assignment to a new editor had nothing to do with any e-mail you may have sent. I never saw it and I am the individual who, through the end of this month anyway, assigns editors. As I told you originally, all the editors had full plates at the time your original editor resigned her position. As soon as there was an availability, which included hiring and training replacement editors, I assigned your manuscript. It was as simple as that. I also never received any follow-up e-mails from you.

Birol, I assure you I did send the email a week or so ago and a few months ago to the 'blahblah'@aspenmountain.com address. If you didn't get it then that explains alot...lol. Anyway, that's neither here nor there; I'm just happy to be moving forward with this project.

Thanks for stepping in and letting us know how it works.

:snoopy:
 

Birol

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That's a good question right now.
Birol, I assure you I did send the email a week or so ago and a few months ago to the 'blahblah'@aspenmountain.com address. If you didn't get it then that explains alot...lol. Anyway, that's neither here nor there; I'm just happy to be moving forward with this project.

Thanks for stepping in and letting us know how it works.

:snoopy:

Well, it is sort of here and there. You've publicly registered a complaint about lack of communication, which in the publishing world can be a very big deal. You came to one of the premier watchdogs and said, "This publisher is a bad idea and here is why."

You probably did send an e-mail to the EIC. I can neither confirm nor deny if she received it because I'm not the EIC, nor do I have access to her e-mail account.

What I'm saying is, you did not send the e-mail to the person who was coordinating your submission and whose e-mail address you did have. If you had done so, you would have received a response.

I don't know what happened to your e-mail to the EIC, but I know outside freelancing, I've worked with several executives who, if they received an e-mail related to someone else's duties, they would ignore that e-mail because they would assume their subordinate was handling the matter. I thought I had handled the matter by letting you know the assigned editor had resigned and that I would assign you another when one became available. I was not aware of your additional concerns because at no point did I receive communication about them.
 

veinglory

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Well, it is sort of here and there. You've publicly registered a complaint about lack of communication, which in the publishing world can be a very big deal.

She described an experience, apparently accurately. That is kind of what we encourage around here. I am generally happy with my experience as one of their authors and very happy with their sales (much higher than from similar sized/aged epresses). But there have been organisational issues and my coauthor is following up with them on a paperwork issue (lapsed contract). This is part of the overall story and IMHO doesn't need to be swept under the rug, just put in perspective.
 
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Birol

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She described an experience, apparently accurately. That is kind of what we encourage around here. I am generally happy with my experience as one of their authors and very happy with their sales (much higher than from similar sized/aged epresses). But there have been organisational issues and my coauthor is following up with them on a paperwork issue (lapsed contract). This is part of the overall story and IMHO doesn't need to be swept under the rug, just put in perspective.

I know, which is why I haven't been weighing in. I'm not asking for anything to be swept under the rug, but in Nya's case, I did feel there was more to the story. The other side, if you will, which is something else AW has also encouraged in order to provide the fullest picture.

It's an awkward position, to be both a long-term, presumably respected moderator here, while watching a thread evolve in B&BC about a publisher I've been freelancing editing for. Which, again, is why I have not been commenting, but there is that perspective thing.


ETA: I'll go back to silent observing.
 
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Nya RAyne

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For the record, my intention was never to wage a complaint against anyone, especially not the publisher of my first novel. I was simply looking for help and advice as to what to do next via a group of people whose advice I trust.

I was in no way telling anyone to use or not to use AMP, I was simply stating my experience with them thus far. And in keeping with that, I will go on record to say that since I've been working with my editor, the process has been smooth and swift. It almost makes the wait to get to this point, worth it. My particular editor seems knowledgable, enthusiastic, and more than willing to answer any questions I have.

So, that's my story and I'm sticking to it. :)
 
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mscelina

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For the record, my intention was never to wage a complaint against anyone, especially not the publisher of my first novel. I was simply looking for help and advice as to what to do next via a group of people whose advice I trust.

I was in no way telling anyone to use or not to use AMP, I was simply stating my experience with them thus far. And in keeping with that, I will go on record to say that since I've been working with my editor, the process has been smooth and swift. It almost makes the wait to get to this point, worth it. My particular editor seems knowledgable, enthusiastic, and more than willing to answer any questions I have.

So, that's my story and I'm sticking to it. :)

No one's telling you not to 'stick' to your story. However, if you weren't directing your inquiries to the editor who was managing submissions and editorial assignments then it's not really surprising that you weren't getting a response.

I'm also a senior editor at AMP and the managing editor at the AMP historical imprint Aurora Regency/Aurora Regency Historicals. I also write for them and was one of the first non-romance writers signed by the company. The standard wait time for me between signing the contract and beginning edits has been in the vicinity of 6-8 months.

At Aurora, where we are building a stable of authors and are getting manuscripts released a little quicker than AMP, I'm still contracting manuscripts that won't make it to an editor for at least 5-6 months and won't get released for a minimum of 6. So your experience is pretty standard for our company at least.
 

JL_Benet

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There was some talk about Aspen Mountain starting to release some of their books as dead-tree books. What ever happened with that? I've searched through their books and I can't seem to find any that have been released in non-eBook format.
 

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Where/when did you see that talk? In my experience they are an epublisher. That is what I sighed up for when I submitted to them.
 

CaoPaux

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From their submission guidelines, as of Sept '10:
Our contracts request rights to the contracted work, including digital and print formats as we will provide some of our titles in print later this year.
 

mscelina

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From their submission guidelines, as of Sept '10:

I believe that was from the Aurora Regency guidelines, which was intending to go into small print runs around the end of the year. That project has been slightly delayed for the following reason:

In the interests of transparency, I feel it is important to let B&BC know that the publisher for AMP is taking an leave of absence due to health and personal issues, and the senior staff at AMP (including myself) are assuming responsibility for the operations of the company. We have hired an office manager who will be addressing any and all inquiries regarding royalties. We expect a full audit of all royalties between 2009 and the present to be completed within a month or six weeks. We are also restoring full and immediate communications within the AMP publishing family. We have implemented a new structure within our organization, one based on frequent communication with our authors and staff--and when our publisher has sufficiently recovered her health and stamina, she will be concentrating in future upon the editorial side of the business, which is something she excels at and loves.

As the acting managing editor, I am willing to answer any and all questions about AMP that are asked in this forum, and if I don't know the answer I will find it. But as a longtime member of AW, I have no intention of repeating some of the fairly ridiculous errors of judgment that I've witnessed in regards to B&BC. I am currently addressing the backlog of contracted authors and building the release schedule, and I or other senior staff members are committed to not only addressing the concerns or our authors and staff, but to eradicating the communications issues of the past couple of years.

*whew*

Not easy to write this, but it has to be done. AMP authors, editors and staff received a special notice today, informing them of these changes, and for me the next logical step was to post those facts here.
 
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IceCreamEmpress

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Thanks for the update, mscelina. Best of luck with resolving outstanding issues and moving forward.
 

michael_b

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In the interests of transparency, I feel it is important to let B&BC know that the publisher for AMP is taking an leave of absence due to health and personal issues, and the senior staff at AMP (including myself) are assuming responsibility for the operations of the company.

Thanks for letting us know what's happening and being perfectly upfront on detailing the issues and how AMP plans to address them.
 

mscelina

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The senior staff at AMP is committed to correcting the problems that we have identified within the company and getting the company moving forward. Our Aurora Regency imprint hasn't experienced the same issues as AMP, and we are going forward with the launch of our new speculative fiction imprint, Aura, this fall under the editorial direction of Nebula and Locus-shortlisted author/editor Peg Robinson, who trained under me at Aurora. In the past few days, we have already set our release schedule and assigned editors to stranded manuscripts, initiated the uploading of our backlist to our third party vendors, begun the self-audit into royalties, and have addressed any and all author/staff communications as they came in. If any AMP authors wish to contact me directly, they may do so at our email addresses (I am montoring all of them) or off-list here at any time and I will be happy to help.
 

mscelina

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I'm fine. Very sad--AMP was my first home for my writing--but fine. I have no idea what will happen to AMP in the future. I think we were making good progress with our business plan, but we hit an insurmountable obstacle with the owner and determined that since we could no longer affect AMP in a positive manner, we needed to depart.

The owner did come out and make a statement that AMP was not closing its doors, and I can personally vouch that the company has a healthy and big release schedule until late winter of 2012, along with a full editorial staff hired in the last couple of weeks. And my books that are still in contract are remaining at AMP for the time being.