Pay to Play by Debbie Bennett
Standard advice for newbie writers seems to always be never pay to play . Generally speaking, that’s true – twenty years ago or so, you could confidently say that you should never, ever pay anyone to publish your books, that money always flows to the author and never in the other direction. These days, it’s still good advice – although there are occasions when it’s ok for an author to put his hand in his pocket. I’m not here to discuss vanity or even ‘hybrid’ publishing, and for the new writer just getting to grips with it all, I’ll only say to do your homework. Google. Look at reviews. Check out ALLI and Writers Beware before you part with a penny. And yes, it always has been perfectly ok to buy in editing and design skills if you don’t have them yourself. I’m a writer, not a designer, and while I can look at a bad cover and have an idea what doesn’t work and why, I couldn’t tell you what to do to fix it. My cover designer, on the other hand, can take my vague suggestions...