Not necessarily dodged a bullet but I wouldn't say they missed out on a great opportunity. There's plenty of similar small presses around - and many that are likely a lot better - plus there are some indications (albeit small) that they could be a vanity or hybrid publisher.
I came across them not long ago so their website is vaguely familiar. One of the first things that jumps out is that their book covers are fairly poor overall. One of them is weird in that the top half of it is actually quite good, but then the bottom half is poor ... but, yeah, most of them are not very good.
They are looking for what they call "escapism fiction". They open to submissions once a year - late in the year. Seeking quite a lot of genres, which can be a flag too:
- Fantasy
- Science-Fiction
- Romance
- LGBTQ themes and diverse stories
- Adventure
- Paranormal/Occult
- Comedy
- Historical
- Portal Fiction
- Speculative Fiction
- A blend of any two or more of the above
- Cross-genre, mixed genre, or things that don't fit genre norms
Note: We don't like to limit ourselves, so if you have something you think would fit with our current list of published works, please send it.
(To be fair, they're also quite clear about things they don't want, which I won't paste here as it's not really relevant - see the submissions page on their website for full details if you're interested.)
Pictures of 4 or 5 staff members on their About Us page but no names (not even first names, which is odd), no bios at all, no publishing credentials, zero details. I clicked the pictures, thinking it might bring up mini-bios, but they're not clickable. It's just a block of text about them, the company, then five photographs with no names (and the first picture could even be an author as it's just a person standing in front of a table of books at an event; actually all the pictures could be of their authors, not their team, it's unclear - but given this is the About Us page I'll assume it is indeed staff members or mostly staff members).
The mention of "partnering with our authors" could be code language indicating they're a vanity/hybrid publisher. (I'm not seeing a lot of other red flags indicating that, though.) "Partnering" is a vague term, but it is concerning. If not an indication of vanity/publishing/hybrid services being offered, it could mean they expect their writers to do a lot of their own marketing, especially as they also say that they "aim to market them together" (with the authors). I'm also not crazy about the term "traditional-style", which they use on more than one page of their site. That could also be language indicating a hybrid model.
This is what they indicate are their terms (with the concerning language and some vague (though they do specify "net") terms (also, there's no indication of things like length of contract):
We are a small, independent, traditional-style publishing house
For our part, we offer...
We partner with our authors to make the books we produce the best they can be and aim to market them together for maximum exposure. We're proud to be able to offer our books as both paperbacks and e-books. We offer higher royalties than the industry standard (50% of net profits), author copies at wholesale rate, and worldwide distribution. We respond to all queries we receive within six to eight weeks with a personal response, including suggestions on how to improve your manuscript even if it is not the right fit for us, so there is no need to send a follow-up inquiry. We accept simultaneous submissions and will review previously published works where the rights have reverted to the author.
Their submission policies are clear and their website (despite being vague) is okay in that it's easily navigable and not atrocious-looking, but that's really the best thing I can say about them. The rest isn't great - their book covers are not good, they provide no details on their staff or their staff's publishing credentials, they publish a lot of genres, and they will expect authors to do at least half their marketing even if they're not a vanity/hybrid publisher.
