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Crushing Hearts & Black Butterfly Publishing / Hot Ink Books / Steamworks Ink

folieadeux

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Preditors & Editors

Preditors & Editors still lists CHBB as a company to avoid.

http://pred-ed.com/pebc.ht

"Crushing Hearts and Black Butterfly Press: Not recommended. A publisher of dark paranormal, urban fantasies, anthologies, and speculative fiction. See this thread for more details why they are not recommended." (Links to this thread)

I don't know if being a part of CHBB would earn Hot Ink and Vamptasy their own listing or not, but they don't even show up regardless
 

Amberley

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Even recently it seems their internal drama hasn't met its end yet. For several days now my feed has been filled with multiple CHBB authors posting about people having "issues" with SJ and standing up for her. I won't fault them for standing up for someone, but if there is a "cult mentality" (I believe that was the phrasing) -- which seems to be a recurring theme through several pages here -- I'd wonder if this isn't more of it manifesting.

I wouldn't submit here. Not between the continuous editing issue (which SJ previously evaded when she was responding to this thread awhile ago), and the apparent struggle that's ongoing within.

This too has been clogging up my news-feed for the past week, and I too have been seeing the whole #loyalty repeated over and over by many of their authors.

But what strikes me as odd, is their "cult" like mentality. Regardless of who crosses who, is this any way for them to behave? I had assumed that with them being a "leading" publisher (I use that loosely) then why behave like a bunch of children at school?

Obviously, if someone has a problem with this SJ Davis, maybe this person has a good enough reason, and their"followers" are acting on orders from those high up within the publishing house.

Just a thought!

I still would never submit to them. I have the feeling that would be the end of my career and reputation.
 

Filigree

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Actually, if the publisher cared about its reputation, its principals wouldn't pull stuff like this. It makes prospective authors look back more carefully at the earlier thread. Maybe the publisher got its act together now. But this kind of reputation management is clueless, dangerous, and an automatic red flag for me.
 
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CaoPaux

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I'll just shut up in the future when criticizing publishers, because they might start out rocky but end up as something good a few years later.
Please don't be silenced. Shutting up only allows them to hook the next fish.

Also, of the hundreds of rocky-start publishers discussed here, how many survive, much less have become anything approaching "good"? N.B., it's no small thing that the professionalism required to become "good" includes the ability to take criticism.
 

Uilasel

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Unfortunately, I have been an author of CHBB and Hot Ink Press. That is a year of my life I will never get back. They were nice at first, SJ Davis (publisher) especially. You hand in your book and she tells you how amazing it is and everything.
I had her do it with me. And like every author with a book they want published, I fell for it.
Then came signing the contract. And what a contract it is. In a Word document and the publisher didn't even sign it, just typed in her name. So I did the same. Now I think back, I do wonder why I even continued from that point on.
She invited me to various private groups for just CHBB/ HIP/ Vamptasy authors and introduced me to the group. They were welcoming and everything and I felt like I was home. In the groups, you're given access to all their files, including pages to promote and stuff. And you think, wow! it's great how everyone works together to make each other successful! And my doubts over the contract disappeared.
But months later, I hadn't heard anything to do with my book. I contacted SJ various times and she ignored all my messages. Until I wrote on her Facebook wall. She didn't like that at all. So she set a release for my book at CHBB. I asked about the cover and she told me to contact one of the cover artists and ask what I should do.
Isn't it the publishers job to do all this?
But I stupidly didn't question any of it. Still on a high that something might actually go right for once, and I contacted the cover artist. She explained that I needed to go onto shutterstock, choose an image I liked and she will do the rest.
Let me tell you, I hate choosing an image for my covers. I'm with two other publishers and I just fill out a Cover Information Form and they do all the work. I love being surprised. But again, I didn't question it, even when I had to ask multiple people to help me find an image because I didn't even know how to use the damn image website. I found one in the end, a nice zombie one for my zombie book. I asked the cover artist if I could have the Lady holding a certain weapon and a shadow of a man with large wings on the wall behind her, to show someone out of the view of the camera stood in front of her. A simple thing to ask, but one that took a month to sort out. I was asked to go back to shutterstock and pick the images I wanted...again...I hate searching for my own cover. The image I have in my head is completely different to what someone else makes. And I couldn't find the images, so again, I asked for help.
And so the process of the cover began. She did it in about five minutes and what I got back just made me wish I never went with them. It was horrible! As though a five year old had created it. But I'm a nice person and I couldn't tell her that, so I stuck with it. Posted it for all my fans to see and tried to imagine my release day instead of the horrible cover my beautiful story had.
It wasn't that simple when a cover artist came along to my page and slammed me for the awful cover design. She told me no one would buy the book because the cover will repel them. I ignored her, and her doting fans when they wrote abuse on my page. It's what SJ told me to do. Told me to suck it up because that was what being an author was about.
So, unfortunately, I did. I continued on and wrote another book, this time for Hot Ink Press, which would be released the day after my first book. This time, I had a cover that was reasonably beautiful and completely forgot about my first book. Until the release day.
No, I didn't miss the all important thing that every author should go through at least three times before their book is published. Edits. I never got any. Didn't see one lick of anything to do with edits or anything. I hated that. My editor at my second publisher completely tore my book apart and I loved every single second of the gruelling three day editing I did for the first lot of edits. So I was definitely disappointed in that. But hey, I ignored it because it was release day and I had two events to run.
I did events for both books and put up the links too. No one brought my CHBB book, but a lot of people brought my HIP book. I know because they wrote the order number on the event page for a chance to win a HUGE SWAG bundle. I began to get super excited to receive my royalties and never once questioned anything that I'd begun to question when I first joined them. I was happy, ranking and had others promoting me happily.
Pay day came and I received a whopping amount of...nothing. Yep, you read right. I got nothing. Not a penny. But I put it off as people returning my work and felt disappointed that people would stoop that low to win a big bundle of goodies. The book had released at just 99 cents.
So I carried on. Promoted the hell out of both books, but my CHBB one still made no sales. My second one continued to rank and all was good with that one. I waited patiently again for my royalties...and they never came. Once more, I got nothing.
I gave up after that. Six months of being in the top hundred in erotic and I had nothing to show for it. I stopped promoting, and my rank went down. I found myself not caring in the slightest.
That's when I noticed posts from authors who had been with the publisher, going as far as to call SJ and some others a colt. Not only that, but since my rank fell, the authors of CHBB/ HIP and Vamptasy had stopped promoting me. Instead, they began to promote Rue Volley and her Hellhound series.
That's when I found out that SJ doesn't pay for short stories. It hit me then. I had a lot of readers assuring me they never returned my book, and I still didn't receive a payment. I asked the authors who had left what happened, and they replied honestly. SJ had been abusive to them, and they were never paid for their stories. She even told them that she didn't want their work because it wasn't selling. She told them that unless they rank, they wouldn't get any help and if they didn't sell, she would make it hard for them. She drove them away and then had her merry band of loyal, ass kissing authors give them hell.
I decided to listen to my head then and messaged her asking if she could pull both of my books. I had a complete valid reason. I was, after all, with four publishers at the time. I wanted to leave without trouble. She pulled my books within a second of me asking. She didn't even fight to keep me there, where as my editor at another publishing company fought to stop me from pulling one of my books because I had blanked with the second one. I didn't get that same treatment from SJ. I decided I'd made the right choice. I was glad I did it without causing trouble.
Yeah...I wish. She wouldn't give me my rights back, told me I had to wait three years before the contract was up. And then she began to make my life hell. She continued to sell my work, keep my money and all the while, I had no idea what to do. I contacted my editor at my first publisher out of sheer desperation, and she, alongside my publisher, talked me through what to do. But that only poked the dragon in the side and made her angry. SJ ignored all my emails, my messages and blocked every post I made. But little did she know, I could be a bitch when the time called for it too. I found a loophole in the contract. She didn't sign it! Therefore, the contract was null and void.
Happy days! I gave my books to my first publisher. She had helped me through it after all. And received a contract within minutes. A proper one! I happily posted on Facebook that I was republishing my work.
And so I'd stabbed the dragon in the eye. She contacted me and told me I was lucky she wasn't taking me to court and I'd made a big mistake. Soon, I found book pages that happily promoted for me, blocked me from their page. Groups had banned me, and the ones that hadn't, deleted my posts whenever I posted.
Also, a lot of people went onto my author page and wrote some horrible stuff. And I mean horrible. No matter how many times I deleted them, more popped up. And what hurt most was that most of it was from my readers who I thought supported me. I contacted them and they all said the same thing. SJ told us...
So then I knew. I unfortunately deleted my page, lost all my readers and most of the places I promoted. All because of SJ.

I'm slowly bouncing back but it's like starting all over again, only this time, everyone knows who you are, and they want nothing to do with you. It's such a low blow but I'm stronger than that and I'm not letting that woman pull me under the water.

I just hope my horrible experience can come to some use at least, by me getting it out there and warning others.
 
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Undercover

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So sorry that happened to you. But it's a good bad example to newer writers: choose your publishers carefully.

And I will repeat: Choose your publishers carefully, research the hell out of them, FIRST before you sign. Sorry about the experience you had, Uilasel. I'm glad to hear you finally got out of it and were able to re-publish.

I had a contract offer from Crushing Hearts and I thought it was just lousy so I passed right away. Glad I did.
 

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I also got published by CHBB and my experience was the same. SJ Davis hired someone to edit my book--they didn't do it on time so the publication date was delayed and the editing was terrible. SJ Davis was very unresponsive to my advertising campaigns and her royalty statements were vague and infrequent. I waited until my contract was up because I didn't want to keep my book there, and then when the contract was up she said she wasn't renewing it because she expected authors to publicize their books--she's got to be the worst publisher ever. I am trying to market my book to other publishers.
 

millymollymo

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CCHB has an imprint they are currently pushing social media for submissions. Steamworks Ink. I have no experience with them, and only came across this thread by researching CCHB - SJ Davis appears to be involved. Caution required!
 

millymollymo

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Steamworks Ink (Publisher)

This new imprint crossed my path aggressively on Twitter, I have no experience of this publisher they have been live for about two months, however a background check reveals they are an imprint of CHBB.

CHBB's has plenty of warnings to stay away listed on Preditors and Editors http://pred-ed.com/pebc.ht and on AW here: <snipped>
 
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mrsmig

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Adding link: Steamworks Ink

Have to add that if you don't add the "Ink" to a Google search, you get a bunch of carpet cleaning services. :Shrug:
 

Filigree

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Another criteria in my 'Publishers To Avoid' list: when a publisher creates too many 'new' imprints to either whitewash their reputation or latch onto publishing 'trends'.

BTW, while I love the genres to bits, most commercial industry insiders note that steampunk and associated genres are getting heavily saturated now. Great works will still get published by reputable publishers...but they have to be great. For now, expect to see a lot of second-tier steampunk stuff show up more in small presses like this or self-published. Why I'm adding this? Because small-press and self-published authors need to know what they are getting into, as far as being able to actually sell to readers.

Based on the previous thread posts and general sales rankings of this publisher's novels, I'd say self-pub may be a somewhat more profitable and less stressful option.
 
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OhMyGosh

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My facebook feed has been flooded with authors who have been let go, I wonder what that is about.
 

CaoPaux

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I've received a report that CHBB is trimming their imprints to provide better support to the remaining authors. Assurances were made they're not in financial trouble.
 

DonnaDuck

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I was referred to them by an author friend of mine and I submitted my manuscript. They got back to me after about three weeks asking if it was still available for publication. I said it was and I had a few questions. I asked whether I should ask them now or if they wanted to send over a contact, I can read through it, and just pose all the questions in one go. After about 4 days I got a response to just go ahead and ask the questions I had. So I did. Very basic publishing questions about royalties, distribution, marketing expectations, things like that.

That was on February 2nd. To date I have not received a response. I sent an email on February 28th officially withdrawing my manuscript, just to have it in writing. Still no response.

I submitted to them before researching (bad, I know) but it was a situation where I'd received so many rejections I honestly didn't think I'd hear anything. When I did I went I have to research them. And then I found this read and read through the entire thing. I then promptly went "fuuuuuuuuuuu . . . ." So . . . blessing in disguise? I work in a professional business setting and it's one thing to lose your head and accidentally delete an email or something. I've done it before. But radio silence is something else, especially when the conversation was already started and the other person just stops talking.
 

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Holy moly... this is a bunch of rubbish. Thank goodness they rejected a short of mine and I felt weird about querying a full manuscript. PHEW! SO sorry that happened to you, Uilasel. Thank you for sharing!
 

MMauthor

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This company has a new imprint called Encompass Ink. It focuses only on LGBT topics. I have read through this entire forum on CHBB/HIP/VP/EncompassInk and I can tell you with 100% certainty that this is all true beyond question. I only wish I would have seen this before I signed. I have since withdrawn all my titles. Not only are the women there abusive, but they are downright bullies. I have seen firsthand what they do, how they treat "their own", and how they "deal" with those that leave. Their web of hate doesn't stop when you leave. They will torment you well after. If I can do anything at all I would warn anyone from signing with this company. I've read in this thread about people saying they are a "cult" and I would say yes, yes, yes. The mental anguish these people put you through is terrible. I've also read that they will report people, and this to is TRUE. Please, authors looking to sign, READ THIS THREAD. It is 100% TRUE.
 

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I can say that this is true. You posted this over a year ago and I can tell you, it has not changed. The only thing is her loyal ban of authors are even more vicious and will do anything, including reporting you to facebook, twitter, and amazon. They will try to ruin anyone that leaves.
 

MMauthor

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Another criteria in my 'Publishers To Avoid' list: when a publisher creates too many 'new' imprints to either whitewash their reputation or latch onto publishing 'trends'.

BTW, while I love the genres to bits, most commercial industry insiders note that steampunk and associated genres are getting heavily saturated now. Great works will still get published by reputable publishers...but they have to be great. For now, expect to see a lot of second-tier steampunk stuff show up more in small presses like this or self-published. Why I'm adding this? Because small-press and self-published authors need to know what they are getting into, as far as being able to actually sell to readers.

Based on the previous thread posts and general sales rankings of this publisher's novels, I'd say self-pub may be a somewhat more profitable and less stressful option.


They have cut Steamworks Ink, but have since made a new one called Encompass Ink(an LGBT imprint). They ride on the popularity of who's selling.