My experience with Publish America

Hi, I am very new to all of this. My name is Nikki Noffsinger. I am 35 years old and I have loved to write since I was a young child. I have literally tubs and boxes full of notebooks and folders of things I have written. In high school I wrote a short story about a vampire who stalked a young woman and the vampire was evil incarnate. Before I go any further-I have always been a horror movie fan especially with vampires but Im not one of those who have went over to the other side with it. Okay now back to my story, any how it was just a short story that I played with and put away. It was not until my sister found it that she begged me to go somewhere with it. I didn't want to because writing to me is so intimate and I am always the worst critic of myself. Anyhow after she kept on and on, I began to write some with it. Now, this comes after the whole Twilight phenom but I in NO WAY was trying to copy Stephanie Meyers but instead of a complete horror story that was going really no where I invited more characters and developed it more. I was like a woman possessed writing and filling up 4 composition notebooks. I let her read it-I mean I thought at this point that it was more of a gift to her and the proof I could write more than just short stories. She begged me to type it out and I humored her and well I have to admit it got my mouth wet to see how much more I could give my story. I did so and a little under 400 pages of rewrites and grammar corrections and additions as well as subtractions I handed her the disk. My sister began submitting it. The first was to a WLA and when they contacted me at first I experienced a moment of euphoric exhaultation until I did some searching and found them to be a scam. So I was a bit down hearted. My sister kept urging me to send it out and to find someone. Reluctantly I started. I want to stop right here and go on to say that I admire writers so much more because to get someone just to resond even if its a denial is an act of God I think. I got few denials and more no responses. So it was then one night when I couldn't sleep that I came upon Publish America. I read every inch of the site and like an idiot submitted expecting to hear nothing or another denial. A week passed and I got a call-an actual phone call. Now during this time I had looked up PA and there was alot of unflattering comments. Then I started getting emails from other PA authors and had ppl calling me and I thought well maybe its not as bad as ppl say. Well I am here to tell you that I did everything they asked and what I got was what everyone said ppl like me would get! For one, my book is a 30 dollar soft cover that is ill constructed and written-Now I use spell check ALOT because taking 3 years of French ruined my spelling but I have taken college courses and my conception of grammar as well as sentence structure is not that of a 5th grader who is failing English. I am mortified and humiliated and I feel like there is a big flashing neon sign that says, "I TOLD YOU SO" somewhere going off. I don't understand how these places even with their open but vague contracts can operate! I really cannot believe it! I can't do book signings because even chains like Borders and Books A Million will not carry a book that costs that much and I can't afford to buy consigned copies. I love to write and I still believe what I wrote was a good story but I feel a bit lost and heartbroken. So having a friend by the name of Diane Taylor that writes for an Ebook Publishing company she sent me to Author's Den and then to here so here I am. I feel broken up but I don't want to give up-at least I don't want to be at the end of my life wondering what could have been because I didn't try! So are there any otehrs out there that is where I am? Did you get published? Did you ever escape PA in tact? How can we get these places shut down or can we?

Thanks Merrihiatt! I don't intend on being a victim and I have HOOTS more stories and maybe even some that are better than the one I sold them. I am learning quickly about how not to be such a naieve person. I don't think i could stop writing even if I wasn't trying to get published. I just hope that more ppl see them for what they are and not what they portray themselves to be and perhaps when they've screwed over enough ppl and broken enough dreams they'll be forced to either go legit or close shop.

The places I sent my book were first all the ones that took submissions that were from books I already had such as Kennsington,St.Martins Press, Avon books, Signet, ect. Then I went to the Writers Beware who had literary agents/publishers that were listed on their sites as legit. Then I scanned the web for literary agents and most were bunk but there were a few like 3 Seas Literary Agency and Great Wolf Publishing-but they are only for biographies,autobiographies, and religeous(not my bag baby). I think the total was about 70-74 copies both electronic and via snail mail. Out of all those sent out, I got maybe 8-14 responses back. It is REALLY hard to get any of these ppl to look at your work is my whole thought and I was in a low point and found PA. I actually got a phone call from them and I was ecstatic. The rest you read about in my original post.

Cyia said:

Nikki,

The places you sent your book before PA - were they agents or publishers? Most publishers want to work with agents, so if you're going to try for publication again, try sending a query to agents, not publishers. You can post it in the Share Your Work section here for help if you want some outside eyes on it.

There is life after PA, and some of the authors on this site are proof of that. They've gone on to sell other books to commercial publishers.

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