[Publisher] Pegasus Books / Pegasus Pony

[JanetW]

Has anyone heard of Pegasus Books? They are the first one to tell me my work needs editing, however, they would accept my manuscript if I used their editing service for $$$. I had my work intensively edited by a professional. Obviously I answered my own question. Just wondering what others have had with them?

 

[Drachen Jager]

1) Which Pegasus Books? There are two, .net and .com

2) Always check Preditors and Editors if you're unsure whether to submit to an agent/publisher.

3) Never give money to a publisher unless you are self-publishing.

4) This should really be in the Bewares, Recommendations, and Background Checks sub-forum.

 

[Calla Lily]

JanetW, please post a link to which Pegasus Books you mean and I'll merge this thread with the appropriate one in the Bewares forum. Thanks.

 

[Calla Lily]

I'm on my phone so I can't cut and paste parts of quotes.

However: Jamesaritchie, I know you know better than to make blanket stetements about the writing skills of others. I'm refering to your sentence above where you label anyone who can't edit their own work as useless "even at the writing stage "

This crosses the RYFW line, as you know. Please reread your posts before hitting the Post button..

 

[Deborah F Anderson]

This is a scam

 

[amergina]

Going back to the OP, a publisher asking for money for editing is a scam.

 

[Bryan Methods]

Run far far away!

 

[JanetW]

Pegsus Books

Sorry for the delay in my response, cold and flu season, make it go away.
There are 2 Pegsus Books one is the UK and the other is USA, I didn't hear any positive about the UK but nothing about the USA, there website is in the UK says UK, the USA web site is .net. Either way I think they both should be on a beware list. I have them on my red line list. The amount of $$ they were talking was frightening, someone could loose a lot of hard earned money.

 

[JanetW]

Pegsus Books and edit service

Jamesaritchie: OUCH I'm sorry you feel that way and maybe I didn't make myself clear. I had someone punch it up for me, just for Grammar and punct. I would never use someone to rewrite my own MS. It's my work and I agree the writer can loose their own voice. I just wanted a clean MS that's all. I will in the future be more aware of how I word everything. And keep quiet. I hope I avoided someone from being taken from this company.

 

[Cochinay]

Has anyone heard of Pegasus Books? They are the first one to tell me my work needs editing, however, they would accept my manuscript if I used their editing service for $$$. I had my work intensively edited by a professional. Obviously I answered my own question. Just wondering what others have had with them?

I'm curious what happened?

To me it also sounded like they wanted to take a good stab at editing, reworking, etc. It they were only intending to work on punctuation and things like that, wouldn't you turn them down, anyway, and just do that yourself, unless you were certain they were really accepting your work with a view toward a significant future partnership and endeavor?

I could see a problem with a company getting paid for "editing" by giving the impression that something big awaited around the corner.

By the way, you're reading the thoughts of a writer with a .028 query success rate, so definitely factor that into your thinking.

 

[JanetW]

Pegsus

Cochinay: They wanted the money for editing as I have heard of others doing. I was under the impression Pegasus was a better publisher. Just wanted to give others a heads up on the Beware, if they were more interested in my ms I would talk about some revisions if needed. But I didn't think they would take it any further.

 

[CaoPaux]

I believe the one the OP's talking about is actually: http://www.pegasusbooks.net/.

The Pegasus Books at pegasusbooks.com is a legit small press.

 

[Calla Lily]

Apologies! I had no idea. Deleting incorrect link in 3...2...1...

And gone!

 

[Deb Kinnard]

James Ritchie, your post about not having your work professionally edited -- well, it needs some clarification.

I have eight titles in print via a small press, and three more currently indie-published. All of them -- ALL of them -- have been professionally edited. That is to say, by someone other than me. I cannot edit my own work competently, though I can catch typos and I'm starting to recognize SOME of my own bad habits by now. I would never, ever send a submission to my small press that I hadn't gone over thoroughly myself. In most cases, my crit partner, who is a vicious and most valued editor, has taken her red pen to it, too.

As far as my indie stuff, I pay an editor whom I trust to whip my manuscripts into shape before I release them to my readers. I would no more expect to be able to edit my own novels with sufficient competence to make them good enough for to go out under my name, than I would expect to perform brain surgery on myself.

 

[JanetW]

To all Thank you;
I didn't mean to start a problem, I had a situation that I felt needed attention for others to prevent a problem. It is hard enough in this business to weed out the good from the bad. As far as editing, a fresh pair of eyes is always good. I'm lucky to have someone who is awesome at looking words. Plus I wanted her to be the first one to read my work, she is honest to give me a thumbs up or down on my work. Again, to all thank you for responding and make a rejection more reason to love your work.

 

[CaoPaux]

Apologies! I had no idea. Deleting incorrect link in 3...2...1...

And gone!

No prob. To recap:

Pegasus Books (San Jose) has nothing to recommend it.

Pegasus Books, LLC (New York) is an established independent press.

The Pegasus "in the UK" is most likely the vanity operation Pegasus Elliot Mackenzie Publishers, Ltd.

 

[bobbrink]

There are three Pegasuses. The ones in the United States go by pegasusbooks.com, which is in New York City, and pegasusbooks.net, which is in San Jose, Cal. The New York outfit appears to be upstanding.

 

[LeeBWoods]

Pegasus.net, in the US, not the UK

Has anyone had any experiences, good or bad, re the Pegasus Pulbishers in CA? They say they are a traditional publisher, paying all costs, A to Z. I know the UK Pegasus has been called a vanity press, buy my question pertains to the US company. Thanks
Lee

 

[CaoPaux]

As there is no pegasus.net, I'll presume you mean pegasusbooks.net and move your post from Pegasus Elliot to that thread.

ETA: And, welcome. Pegasus Books in CA is still one to avoid.

 

[HilaryH]

Pegasus Pony Books?

Not sure if this is the right place to post this, but does anyone know anything about Pegasus Pony Books? Legit traditional publisher? Are they really part of Pegasus Books? A link is here http://pegasus-pony.net/
Thanks for any advice

 

[ctripp]

Not a traditional publisher and you can tell by that drawing on their site and their speaking to "you" the writer. Take a look at all the traditional publishers web sites, they show the books they are selling (they don't "talk" to potential Authors, they "talk" to readers/customers) and it will take a bit of doing to find their Author and Illustrator submissions section, if they have one at all (most do, the biggest ones may not)
The fact they are speaking to the writer, is saying you are their client. They mention partnership, so that will mean money from you.
They also say this,

we are able to hire and work with children’s book editors and graphic artists from India, Israel, Saudi Arabia, Argentina and Morocco. We want our books to appeal to children all over the world

No, they use foreign Illustrators because they work for MUCH less. Most of the Illustration used on the books shown on the site are very amateurish but one gets what one pays for.

 

[CaoPaux]

To no surprise, this is an imprint of the dubious Pegasus Books (in San Jose). Merging.

 

[HilaryH]

Thanks for the reply, ctripp. And for merging the threads. I get the picture Just needed to check as I hadn't heard of them.

 

[aliceshortcake]

Some of those illustrations look suspiciously like slightly-altered tracings of Care Bear characters.

Also, from the Pegasus site:

If we feel the submission is incredible though it will require a significant amount of work, or the appeal is to more of a niche audience, we recommend submitting it to Parnassus Press Publishing, which is more a boutique press, involving true author/publisher collaboration. At Parnassus Press Publishing, basic publishing expenses are shared, though content editing and custom requests (if required) are not. In contrast to Pegasus Books, the Parnassus Press Publishing contract provides authors with a significantly larger share of earned royalties. Because niche offerings sell fewer books, we want developing authors to make more money per book sale.
http://www.pegasusbooks.net/submissions/

Some gems from the Parnassus Press site:

By definition, Parnassus Press is not a traditional publisher, as traditional publishing, the brick and mortar walls an appropriate symbol of its inability to transform and adapt, will certainly be forced to redefine itself or become a less relevant player in the years to come.

All together now: publishing is broken!

What has brought about this transformation in the publishing industry? The short answer is DIGITAL TECHNOLOGY, which has eliminated the need for literal city blocks as book production and print facilities, has eliminated the requirement of “10,000+ unit” first-print runs and costly inventory requirements, and has reduced production-to-release times from 2-3 years to 2-3 months—all these advances—are great for authors, but not-as-great for traditional publishers, who are still heavily-invested in the old (traditional) publishing model and the out-dated rules, practices and cronyism that go along with it.

It's easy to publish a book in 2-3 months when you don't have to spend time and money on professional editing, cover design, publicity and marketing.

While many authors are understandably excited to finally release and promote their books, the truth is that globally, the average published book sells no more than fifty copies—this is because the title’s audience is typically exhausted after family, friends and workmates have evidenced their support.

WHAT? This may be true of many self and vanity-pubbed books, but commercial publishers who sold only fifty copies of each book would soon go out of business.

Five hundred books is outstanding and gets the attention of major market book buyers, while it takes up to fifty thousand books to reach the ranks of best-sellers.

Not sure what they mean by 'major market book buyers', but it sounds like the old canard about being able to get your book into shops if you sell a certain number of copies (which usually involves the author being pressured into buying their own books).

Without an author’s platform, most authors will not exceed fifty retail book sales, so at Parnassus Press, we will not accept a book that we do not believe will sell a minimum of one hundred fifty retail copies.
http://parnassuspress.net/

That's not an unrealistic number for a self-pubbed author with a niche market to achieve...without paying the likes of Parnassus Press. For a commercial publisher it's pitifully small.

 

[frimble3]

Well, if five hundred books is the number an author might be pressured to buy to 'get on shelves', then one hundred and fifty books sounds like an opening bid. "We will not accept a book that we do not believe will sell a minimum of one hundred fifty retail copies" sounds very much as though it was a thinly veiled hint, or at least could be taken as one by a new author, desperate to get published.