lagilman | on Harlequin, sadly.

Jackie Kessler breaks it down for you, so I don't have to

SFWA's response:

http://www.sfwa.org/2009/11/sfwa-statement-on-harlequins-self-publishing-imprint/

RWA and MWR comments, via Pub Rants:

http://pubrants.blogspot.com/2009/11/harlequin-news-flash.html

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As a Harlequin author and a SFWA member, I agree with my association's position on this. The establishment of a "pay-to-play" imprint damages the standing of the entire company in the eyes of both writers and readers, and cannot be condoned.

I hate this. I hated it when my then-employer did something business-wise I strongly disagreed with, and I hate it when a company I publish with does the same. It doesn't affect how I feel about my tiny corner of Luna, but... I'm really uncomfortable, all the same.

I love my editor and the rest of the folk on the front lines, and I understand that they are required to walk the company line -- been there, empathize with that. My complaint is not with them, but with the Corporate decision-makers who a) thought this would be a marvelous idea and b) don't see/care what this is doing to the reputation of a company that, until now, had the respect of many of us for doing a difficult job, well.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

My initial response to the sfwa announcement was very similar to yours. I'm not a Luna author, but I love many of their books and they seems to be a strong, committed and professional team who are being penalised for a decision over which they can have had no influence.

Given all of the corporate shenanigans in my industry (IT) that I've seen over the years, I swear that getting an MBA must involve getting a lobotomy. Or at least having your common sense carved out of you.

I feel for all of you caught in the middle of this. Truly.

The MBAs know little about the actual businesses they destroy and care less. They are there to squeeze money, sometimes out of a turnip even though the turnip is barely breathing.

It's not so much as that they don't care but that the decision making process is devoid of anything resembling common sense. When you reduce people and processes to numbers on a page, you distance yourself emotionally from what those numbers represent. While that may be the ideal that the MBA process is striving for, that lack of connection is usually where the problems begin.

ah, come on guys, let's not lump all MBAs into one soulless container. Some of them are just useless marketing lumps.

More seriously, I know "MBA" has become shorthand for "doesn't care about the people" but I have a lot of respect for someone who makes the hard bottom-line decisions, especially the ones who DO take into consideration the human element. This most recent disaster wasn't MBA-think, it was disassociation with what publishing is SUPPOSED to be about -- the bringing forward of the best work, not the ones with the fattest wallets.

It's great if someone can make the hard decisions, but I want them made with the human element. The owner of Malden Mills comes to mind, who continued to pay his employees even though the factory was destroyed by fire. I know that I personally would have a higher opinion of the suits (most of whom have MBAs) if more of them would actually render themselves subject to the same decisions that they make on others. When they use buzzword bingo to weasel their way out of being subject to their own dictates, I lose a lot of respect for them. Once example that comes to mind are some of the salary cuts that hit the IT industry. While in at least one case a CEO gave himself a 20% cut, that same CEO only cut his base pay, of which it was only 0.5% of his overall pay (the rest of which was in bonuses and stock options voted on by the board, and were exempt from his 20% pay cut).

This most recent disaster wasn't MBA-think, it was disassociation with what publishing is SUPPOSED to be about -- the bringing forward of the best work, not the ones with the fattest wallets.

While I can't know the decision making process firsthand, the fact that they followed the money is in perfect keeping with the desire to maximize profit. That it was done without regard to what publishing ought to be doesn't surprise me in the least.

Locally, the Baldwin Piano Company imploded when they brought on board a person outside the music industry to run the company. The CEO proceded to make a lot of decisions that seemed great on paper -they would all maximize profit- but were done without regard to how it would play in the music industry. Hence, a slow decline accelerated rapidly until Baldwin's assets got bought out by Gibson.

I'm hoping that this, too, will pass. That HQ will come to their senses, with such fast response from the pro writing orgs that are their only shot at any kind of prestige.

And the fact that three major pro writing organizations sounded off and stood firm, in unison, is encouraging.

Oh, damn, does Harlequin have some completely misplaced ideas. *stands on the sidelines cheering the writers' associations*

What's the difference between me paying two editors $2000 to "make my manuscript publishable" and me publishing on my own and finding a few hundred people who will pay to defer those costs?

If I understand correctly, you shouldn't be paying editors anything to "make [your] manuscript publishable" because said editors can't guarantee that your manuscript will be published. I'm an editor of scientific journal articles, and though I can clean up the English in a researcher's article,I can't promise the researcher that his/her article will be published.

With respect:
"publishable" (or maybe "more publishable" is more appropriate) is a service offered by many in the writer community.
"published" is never promised.

My point is the $2K:
Much dreck is published professionally.
My dreck is not.
Should I pay to publish my own dreck, or have someone with a track record go over my work and give it a better chance with a publisher with a recognizable logo?

I think you need to clarify your question a bit -- are you speaking specifically of the Horizins program, or in general use of an established freelance editor to help you with self-publishing? Because the two are vastly different.

The argument against self-publishing (dreck or otherwise) is that it requires the writer to be a small businessperson in order to actually accomplish anything other than spending money, and that a) is a tough thing for most people to do and b) keeps the writer from their most important job -- writing the next book.

I am not aware of the Horizins program, and Google isn't helping here.
True, in self-publishing the author is required to be a business owner and that takes away resources from writing. But so do solicitation of agents and publishers, attending cons and award ceremonies, book-signings, participating in Odyssey or Clarion (in that you pay to do something that you are already doing for free), and even Mill-and-Swill.
I'm currently of the opinion that if there is a difference between self-publishing and use of a freelance editor is that with the editor you can learn something.
But in a life that is brutal, nasty, and short, there is much to be said for just getting your words out to the few hundred people who may enjoy them.

You might want to follow the links in the post you're responding to, read up on what we're discussing, and then come back to this conversation.

on Harlequin, sadly.

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