Levels of Publishers

I've said I wanted to take a step up for my John Dunn historical novel. By that I mean a step up in publishers. Unofficially, I see publishers as being in five different levels.

Level 1 are The Big Six: These are the long standing traditional publishers who pretty much dominate the publishing world. They're run like big corporations and have tons of imprints, each one a significant publisher on its own. They publish pretty much every category, every kind of format, and represent the vast majority of books in any bookstore. They include Simon and Schuster, Penguin, Random House, Harper Collins, Hatchette, and MacMillan.

Level 2 are the large independent publishers who emulate the big six in many ways, meaning they too are run like corporations, publish pretty much every category, every kind of format, and represent the balance of books not published by the big six in the bookstores. These include Kensington, Knox Robinson, Prometheus, and Samhain, among others.

Level 3 are small independent publishers, and they are not run like corporations. They're more like family businesses with small staffs. These are the POD publishers, meaning they publish only eBooks and trade paperbacks, which are printed "on demand." The setback with these publishers is that buyers can't find their books in bookstores. Purchases have to be online, whether in the digital format or the printed book. Melange and Penumbra would fit into this category, but there are many more. In fact, I think most publishers nowadays would fit into this category.

Level 4 are the even smaller independent publishers, called ePublishers. ePublishers only publish eBooks, meaning they'll only publish and release digital copies of their entire book line. They are hoping for the future of publishing to be exclusively digital, as in PDF files, HTML, Kindle, Nook, Kobo, and all the other digital formats.

Level 5 are the ever-growing line of self-publishers, aka vanity publishers, aka subsidy publishers. These publishers are like predators. That's what Preditors and Editors would say. Thus the name Preditors and Editors. They prey on those authors who cannot get accepted by any of the above publishers. They offer a road to publication no matter how bad the writing might be. And since they offer no means of editing, the writing might be very bad indeed. These publishers include any publisher who charges the author, and those charges can be as much as several thousand dollars to publish a single book! They include PublishAmerica, Tate Publishing, and hundreds more.

So for John Dunn I'm hoping to go from Level 3 to Level 2. And who knows? Maybe one day I can reach level one. You just keep on trying. That's all. You only fail if you quit.