AEL Books: The Written Works of Aaron E. Lee

After I completed the second draft of Star Song, I submitted the manuscript to a "real publisher."  To my great surprised they called me back!  Then they said something I'd never thought I'd hear..."You'll have to pay for the marketing costs."

What?  I thought finding a real publisher meant that they would cover those costs and take it out of book sales... but not these guys - they claimed I wasn't going to have to pay for them to publish my book...just to market it.  What gives?

So I told them I would have to think about it - they wanted 1,000.00.  No kidding.  Well, self-publishing requires that you pay some out-of-pocket dough too, and I've never paid that much - and I let them know.  They called me back a few days later and said they would work with me and charge me the same as what I paid to self-publish!  I thought WOW - WHAT A DEAL!

But it almost sounded too good to be true.  So I did some digging.  The company had a lot of bad press.  But who knows?  Maybe it wasn't all bad?  So I asked a couple close friends who I knew would know a little bit more about how the insides of that company worked...and viola!  They said it was a rotten company as well...

So I decided against publishing with them.  They called once more and offered me half of what they offered before - if I didn't know any better I would have jumped on the opportunity.  They seemed pretty baffled why I wouldn't bite.  But I'm not gonna be scammed - even if it was less money, they were still asking me for something up front, which I don't think is right for a "real" publishing company to do.

So I'm working on draft 3 now.  I'm getting pretty happy with it.  Who knows, maybe I'll find a REAL "real" publisher.

PS: I don't reccomend Tate Publishing.