Why PublishAmerica Sucks Eggs: Part I

Sorry, I've been so busy with school and writing my novel that I've kind of forgotten about my blog. So as promised, here's another part of the PA story:

Why PublishAmerica Sucks Eggs: Part I—The History of an Author Mill

Once upon a time, in a place far far away called Amsterdam, there was a child named Wilhelmus Johannes Frans “Wim” Meiners born on January 6, 1949. This child would one day grow up to be a man, a man whose name would be well-known (or completely ignored...) everywhere across the web by authors of all experiences, and reputable agents, editors, and publishers.

How did he become well-known, you ask? By running one of the biggest literary scams in history, using his expertise in psychology to lure and manipulate naïve and inexperienced authors, or to write the infamous so-called “tone letters” against those who dared to (gasp) question PA’s practices, (bigger gasp) make complaints, and (ginormous gasp) ask to be released from their contracts and have the rights their books returned to them.

But let’s rewind the tape a little bit to a few years before the birth of his monstrous offspring.Before PA's CEO Willem “Wim” Meiners hooked up with web-marketing consultant Lawrence Alvin “Larry” Clopper III to create the author mill, he ran a vanity press called Erica House, which charged its authors up to $8,000 to “publish” their books. His (presumably) ex-wife Erica ran the Erica Books Literary Agency, charged huge fees for representation, and fed her clients straight to AmErica House, where they would be fleeced some more, usually of thousands of dollars.

In 1999, Wim and Larry hooked up to create PublishAmerica as a "traditional publisher" who mainly published "first-time authors who didn't have any other experience in the industry." The first year, they "published" about 700 books. Over the next four, five, and finally six years, they went from less than 5,000 to "almost 20,000 very happy authors."

Authors receive a "symbolic" $1 advance and royalties of 8 percent "on sales price." Many of their authors are perfectly happy with their publisher. Their Testimonials page is filled page after page is excited PA authors who thank PA for "taking a chance on them and their book."

Many authors, however, were far from happy.

Back in 2003-2004, the time period when many of the ex-PA signed their contracts with them, there wasn't a whole lot of information on PA, its principals, and why it wasn't a legitimate publisher. In August 2004, Publishers Weekly ran an article about 100 or so unhappy authors planning to sign a petition against PA demanding to be released from their contracts.

Also around then, Kevin Yarbrough, a dissatisfied (now former) PA author, decided to prove that PA would accept anything. He took 30 pages of a book and copied and pasted it ten times to make a 300-page manuscript and called it "Eli Smith and the Purple Pony." He sent it, and PA accepted it. When he revealed his trick online, PA sent a (mostly likely fake) cop to his doorstep to threaten him that what he did was fraud and had to settle things with PA. The cop wouldn't show his badge, which scared him and his wife.

2004 would also be the year another sting manuscript was born: Atlanta Nights, which resulted in a plethora of news articles exposing PA as a vanity press with questionable practices. Atlanta Nights, however, deserves a post of its own, because it is so entertaining and hilarious.

This time I promise I'll continue the story.