Hey there,

Sorry for jacking the thread, but here at our fiction publishing house, New Dawn Publishers Ltd, we've been pretty much sitting around twiddling our thumbs for some time now, actively on the look-out for new authors for some time now.

We are a proper publisher, producing both printbooks and ebooks; and while we do have a selective submissions policy, only publishing the work of students or graduates, we feel that our system is far fairer that other publishers' refusals to take unsolicited manuscripts. Here at New Dawn Publishers, we reward authors who invest the effort to improve their writing, not those with connections in high places.

Those who may be interested, and those who may be eligible, please, come and visit us at www.newdawnpublishersltd.co.uk.
Will it be your work which occupies the next spot on our roster...?

NewDawning

do you mean students or graduates of creative writing courses? Or of any discipline?

We accept submissions from students & graduates of creative writing courses, as well as from those students & graduates who can present a good enough case for their courses relating to the field of creative writing. For a more detailed explanation, visit http://newdawnpublishersltd.co.uk/submissions.

Hi New Dawn

That's an interesting approach - although it's not the case that no publishers take un-agented submissions, of course. Nor does any publisher who IS actually a publisher take everything they're offered. The latter is confined to the vanity publishers, and the self-publishing companies.

Can you confirm that what you'd be offering is a conventional publishing contract, with money always flowing to the author, as the phrase is, not away from him or her?

In other words, is what's on offer a conventional contract based on an advance on royalties, and no obligation to buy any books?

Or is it some variation of what is variously called subsidy/vanity/co-operative publishing, where the author is expected to contribute, either by paying up front, or by buying a set number of copies?

We're not saying that every other publisher asks for solicited manuscripts, and we're certainly not saying that we take any work we're offered.
However, you yourself seem aware that far too many of those who do take unsolicited manuscripts turn out to be vanity publishers and glorified self-publishers when you get to the contract stage.
I can confirm that New Dawn Publishers Ltd is not counted among these. Here, we offer conventional publishing contracts, never asking for authors to either pay for the privilege or to buy copies up front.
If you'd like to look at the terms & conditions of our author agreement in full, well; there's only one way to find out...

<Added>

-clarification- we're certainly not saying that we take EACH & EVERY piece of work which we're offered. If we feel that a piece of work isn't good enough to get published, we let people know why, trying to help them bring their writing up to the standard we ask of our authors.

I haven't undertaken a Creative Writing degree or anything, so it counts me out. Not that I mind at all, as I'm not ready yet, but thought I'd still look at the New Dawn website.

You might be interested to hear there are quite a few typos on the 'submissions' page. I haven't checked out the other pages, but spotted the glaring typos immediately.

This may be a case of pots and kettles, but it's probably more important for your website to be typo-free and look professional than my many typo-ridden posts on WW.

A publishing house who have typos on their website - not exactly a good advert is it!

Are you a print on demand house, it is not clear?

I'm still unpublished but I'd never prefer e-publishing

Sharley,
I went back to edit the submissions page immediately after recieving word that there were

quite a few glaring typos

; however, after scouring through it several times, I could only find two, both of which have been corrected. Please, let me know if I've missed any.

Katerina,
As I said to Sharley, I believe that the typo issue has now been resolved. Even so, you'd be surprised at just how common it is for publishers' webistes to have typos. So, a friendly challenge- excluding those who just have pictures of the titles they print, do you know of any others that don't have s single typo? When/if you find any, let us know...

Ben Yezir,
New Dawn Publishers Ltd is not a 'print-on-demand house' in the manner which you seem to be implying. The sales & marketing, distribution and retailing of our authors' books is all carried out by us. Even so, we are still a young, relatively small publishing house. We don't have a huge warehouse to stock large print runs, so you could argue that, in effect, we do print on demand for the wholesalers and retailers we supply. However, by the same token, there are probably less than 10 publishers in the U.K who don't- and given that we aren't raking in multi-million pound profits yet, we don't expect to be joining them any time soon.

We accept submissions from students & graduates of creative writing courses, as well as from those students & graduates who can present a good enough case for their courses relating to the field of creative writing.

Why exclude everyone else?

Dee

LOL. You've quoted me as saying something I didn't actually say:

quite a few glaring typos

I actually said:

You might be interested to hear there are quite a few typos on the 'submissions' page. I haven't checked out the other pages, but spotted the glaring typos immediately.

I'm being pernickity, I know. It's just that quote boxes should be used for what people have written.

Anyhow, in the spirit of Christmas, which I need to go off and find, I wish you well in your venture. I don't often find typos on websites run by publishing houses, but I'll look out for them in future

Sharley,
I know, the quote didn't quite come out right. It was the sort of thing I should have put in inverted commas rather than in a quote-box, but cut me a little slack. I am kind of a noob when it comes to posting on the WriteWords forum, after all.

Dee,
At first glance, from a purely egalitarian point of view, it may seem unfair that we only accept submissions from students and graduates. However, we firmly believe that those authors who have invested the time, effort and expense to improve themselves as writers, should be rewarded for their qualifications, in the same manner as professionals would be in any other vocation. We don't believe that our submissions policy is unfair, any more than that of a theatre would be in recruiting performers from drama academies instead of holding open auditions, or those of US sports franchises- NFL, NBA, NHL etc- are unfair in drafting players from College (/University) instead of signing them from high school.

I wasn't suggesting it was unfair - simply that you're excluding a large sector of potential clients.

I do, however, now think you're being just a little judgmental; not everyone has the time, opportunity or finances to take a creative writing course - it doesn't mean they are not fully committed nor good writers.

Dee

I'm sorry but this sort of thing really angers me.
I am a graduate (a few years ago granted and in a unrealted discipline) but I would be excluded from submitting material to your publishing house, because I do not have the finances to undertake a creative writing degree. This, for me is the sole reason.

I consider myself a pretty committed writer however. I work, I have two under 4's and write whenever I have a spare moment.

I agree totally with Dee's comment

Eve