Z Publishing

[Clairels]

I received an email from these folks (zpublishinghouse.com) a few days ago, referencing a recent story I had published in a South Dakota-based lit mag, and asking me if I would be interested in submitting to their "America's Emerging Writers" series edition (for South Dakota) as an "invited submission," whatever that means. I also don't live in South Dakota (but I doubt they care much about that).

The intro to one of them says they started in 2015 "as a Facebook group designed to bring emerging writers together," so needless to say, there are no seasoned publishing professionals behind this operation. Their submission guidelines say they're looking for "almost anything." (Yikes).

They're apparently doing one of these anthologies for literally every state in the U.S. They've already published similar poetry anthologies. They don't look horrible, per se, but they're giving me major traumatic flashbacks to the American Library of Poetry.

Anybody want to weigh in?​

 

[Polenth]

Selling stories to small hobby projects isn't always bad, as long as they pay and they're run reasonably. Such books don't tend to sell many copies, but with non-exclusive rights, one short story can be sold many times. It's less of a risk than selling novels to such projects, especially if you're selling a reprint.

However, I personally wouldn't submit to this one. Here's a link to their FAQ: https://www.zpublishinghouse.com/pages/faq-regarding-the-americas-emerging-writers-series

Firstly, they don't pay. You will be "paid for all of the sales that you personally generate". If I'm going to submit to a little project, I expect to be paid a set amount at the start. Royalties or sales commissions or anything like that... you either won't get paid or it'll be pennies.

Secondly, their editing is not done in the usual manner. Usually, a publisher sends editing notes to the author. The author makes the changes. It goes back and forth until the final version is agreed. Here, they make the changes, then send it to the author, with a strong layer of it being "strikingly rare for one of our contributors to take issue with our edits". It doesn't set up an environment where you can say no to an edit without withdrawing completely. And they're paying you the grand total of zero dollars for that potential grief.

I don't see what you'd get out of this.

 

[frimble3]

"paid for all of the sales that you personally generate"

So, why do I suspect that you will get a pittance for each sale you make to your friends and family (who are only buying it because of your story) and so will your fellow 'invitees', while Z Publishing will get the lion's share of total sales?
And, yeah, that whole 'trust us, you'll like our editing, or too bad' from a bunch of people you've never heard of, does not sound reassuring.

Also, maybe I wasn't looking in the right places, by I don't see any names of their 'two dozen' employees, except for 'Zach' which, considering the name of the company, could well be pseudonym for sorting the mail.

 

[CaoPaux]

Here's what Writer Beware has to say about them: http://accrispin.blogspot.com/2018/02/the-new-face-of-vanity-anthologies-z.html