Scylla Publishing Author Submissions FAQ

What do you publish?

Are you writing books with sapphic main characters targeted at mature sapphic readers in a Speculative Fiction genre?

Great! We are looking for you, and so are many thousands of readers.

Why publish with Scylla Publishing?

Traditional publishing offers all-too-rare opportunities for a very small number of sapphic authors, and when they do you usually end up in the perennially underserviced mid-list. You should consider working with us if you WANT to work with a small publisher. If your goal is to work with a big publisher and seek that life, please keep chasing your dream! Small publishing is not a nice fallback or “next best thing” to that. It’s a very different experience, a different market, a different way of working. We offer a road that some authors might wish to follow by choice because they want to stay hands on and connected but still get support, and we are committed to getting sapphic stories out into the world that give the audience more of a choice of what to read. Fewer gatekeepers and mechanisms in indie publishing means books that have an edge, and we’ve got no interest in blunting your edge or changing what makes you special as a writer.

Are you trans inclusive?

Yes.

Why wouldn’t I just self-publish?

Yes, self-publishing can be a good choice for you. You take on all the costs but you also get all the profits, but it can be a lonely and scary road. Scylla Publishing is kind of that in-between place, we offer the opportunity to be published and have your queer story nurtured into the world by a small press who are wild about your ideas, but you stay involved at every step and get a higher share of royalties.

If you’re a first time author wary of going it alone, or an indie author who is tired of handling it all on your own and struggling to get traction, we believe we can help. We are open to reprinting and repackaging your backlist. Writing a book is hard enough, why not share the load of publishing if the option is there? Our editors and freelancers fully intend on publishing our own books under the Scylla banner too, so we are in the trenches with you! We are writers first, publishers by choice, and we all have day jobs. We get it.

What’s your publishing model?

To be clear, we are a traditional model publisher in the sense that Scylla Publishing will never ask authors to pay for any part of the publishing process, from submission to publication and beyond, BUT you are 100% involved from end to end, from final creative choices, to feedback on cover design, whatever you want. We provide wholesale prices for authors to buy their own print books to market locally, and effective, continual marketing for all books in our catalogue.

We ask for worldwide 5 year exclusive English language publishing rights for print and eBook formats. If we think Audiobook is right for your book we will discuss that. We do not ask for translation rights or subsidiary rights over other formats. At the end of that period, you can stay on, or the rights revert back to you.

With a focus on eBook and print on demand, all marketing is geared to online sales, advertising, online communities, and algorithms rather than the considerable costs involved in bookstore distribution. We try not to overreach and under deliver. We’re not a big publisher and we won’t try to be.

That being said, many independent bookstores stock indie authors and books by small presses through wholesale, and we will aggressively seek them out in Australia and New Zealand where there is a strong culture of independent bookshops still out there. We share the same print distribution networks as the traditional publishers.

We may switch it up and look to new and innovative delivery models in future, such as serial publishing or subscription models. Publishing is changing pretty fast and we are small and can pivot to take advantage quickly! The goal is to get your work in the hands of readers willing to pay for it, wherever they want to consume it. That’s it.

What help do you offer?

We need great books. We roll up our sleeves and use our years of experience to help you to develop and edit the book, get it laid out professionally, and create the kind of impressive, impactful cover that tells your story visually before readers even read the first page.

But more than that, we are a shoulder to cry on, a taskmaster if needed, a coach, a mentor, a friend (we hope). We’re like an agent and publisher all in one. We are the voice in your corner to help make your book the best it can be, and your biggest fan and amplifier when you launch it into the world. Writing is a solitary path, it’s better to do it with company. Our team of publishers and freelancers/contractors are with you at every step. Over time we are looking to build a stable of talented authors all with the same goal, to bring queer stories to life. That stable of authors will become your Scylla Publishing family.

Do I need an agent?

You do not need an agent to work with us or submit to us, but we’ll happily work with your agent and accept submissions from agents if you have one, or are one.

Do you offer advances?

Not yet. One day. Instead of offering a minimal or token advance right now, we offer a higher level of sales as royalties back to the author in all formats than traditional publishing, so both author and publisher share in whatever success we can generate from your book. We also get to market faster so the wait between writing and publishing is not so long. We pay royalties quarterly instead of twice a year. It’s a collaborative model, and we all have skin in the game to make it work. Royalty rates are currently 50% of net revenue for eBook, 30% of net revenue for Audiobook (if we decide to go down that road-production costs for audiobook are much higher), and can vary for print depending on how large the book is and the physical costs of printing, so we talk to you about that if we decide to publish.

Does that mean you expect authors to do their own marketing?

Every publisher in the world is going to tell you that YOU and your voice are your biggest asset, and to build a career you must participate. We’ll drive marketing and more importantly INVEST in it, but readers love that connection to their favourite authors, especially indie authors. Press releases, industry reach out, seeking reviews, submitting for prizes, working the algorithms, running and paying for advertising, and other publicity tools used to promote your book are handled by Scylla Publishing. Once again, the scariest thing about marketing a book is doing everything alone. Having a team in your corner who have a passion for building buzz and enthusiasm around your book is key.

Book tours are not (today) part of our marketing mix, and if we do end up doing in person events, it’s likely it would start with Australian authors. I suspect we will work all this out as we go depending on what kinds of authors we work with. If you’re extroverted and love working a crowd, we can work with that. If you’re introverted and would rather die than be on stage or on a podcast, we want your work too. Most of us fall somewhere in between, we are writers after all…

I’m an illustrator too—are you open to me including my own drawings?

Fabulous. Bring it on. We do not publish comics or picture books, but if you want to include drawings, maps, characters, special chapter headers in your novels, if we are taking on the book we’re on board and we have artists here who can help/comment/edit, whatever you need. We can also help you source freelancers to do those things.

What does success look like?

Sales are super important, don’t get us wrong, but small/indie publishing has wider goals. We measure our sales in hundreds or thousands, not millions, we know that. It takes a smaller number of copies sold for us to declare success and for you to get money coming in. Niche publishing by definition reaches smaller audiences, but those audiences are no less passionate about what they love. We think success means that a collaborative group of talented people publish what they want to read, and work their butts off to get it in front of as many appreciative readers as possible. We believe that can be commercially viable, and ultimately rewarding.

Interested?

Wow. You’re still here. That’s great :)

Author submissions are open NOW. We are currently open to novels and novellas from ANZ authors, and anthology submissions from anywhere.