in case of emergency press
We publish a small number of literary works every year: poetry, short stories, scripts, and longer fiction. If you have a manuscript ready, we'd be very happy to read it and assess it. But please be aware of the following:
As I hope you have understood from the above, you are unlikely to make lots of money!
So why would you submit your work to be published by us?
Well, not everyone is interested in trying to sell their own work. That's one good reason.
Another, perhaps more compelling, reason is that application for government grants is often conditional on having had work accepted and produced for commercial release. Works accepted for publication by us meet this requirement.
We also issue all our books with an ISBN which means your work is able to be found by any bookseller searching anywhere in the world. We also lodge copies of the book with the National Library of Australia and the State Library of Victoria, so your work is archived and preserved.
But the best reason for emerging writers to publish with us is simple: we don't tie you to producing future work and we make no claim on your future work. In other words, should the work you publish through us lead you to becoming well-known enough to attract the interest of a large publishing house, you are free to publish your next bestseller with them. And we don't steal (even a percentage of) your film, television, or games rights, either! So you're free to accept that blockbuster deal from Hollywood. All you'll hear from us is best wishes!
There is only one way for most writers to make any money these days, and that's to sell their work themselves. I know, everyone dreams of being a best-selling author with a fat contract with one of the global publishing houses, and should that dream come true for you, I rejoice in my heart. However...
... most writers will not be best-selling authors. Sorry. And many don't even aspire to it. They know that their work is likely to be appreciated by an audience of hundreds or thousands, but not millions. These authors are of no interest to the major publishing houses. That is not to say that they shouldn't make anything out of their work.
If you were to have a contract with a commercial publisher, you might make around $1.00 for every book you sold. You have to sell a lot of books to make any money. And I know what you're thinking... "But a commercial publisher will promote my book! My book will be placed in hundreds of bookshops and available through the internet!"
No, it won't.
Promotion costs money. Commercial publishers spend money on promotion for books that will sell in bulk. If you're not writing the latest Scandi-noir crime novel or celebrity diet cookbook, your title will appear on their lists selling a hundred a year if you're lucky until it's remaindered.
Successful fiction in Australia - and I'm talking about award-winning novels, pitched for general readership - may sell as few as 1000 copies. What if your work is of specialist interest only? What if you are trying to publish a first collection of poetry?
Do it yourself. Swallow your pride (or more correctly, your inaccurate conception of the publishing industry) and publish the book yourself. It is no less a book for that. Our books are priced so that you can expect to pocket a markup of $5.00 to $10.00 or more.
Where do you sell your book? Anywhere and everywhere. Farmers' markets, fetes, on your blog, at poetry readings, wherever you like. Set up a card table in the middle of the city and sell a few copies. You only have to sell 100 of your own books to make as much money as the award-winning, broke author who is published by a commercial outfit.