A recently launched ePublishing house, Quartet Press, is the vision of four forward thinking book publishing pros: Kat Meyer, Kassia Krozser, Kirk Biglione and the elusive fourth partner, Mister X.
Here the fab foursome (actually threesome: Krozser is answering for herself and her husband, Biglione) answer 5 questions about their new publishing venture, including why writers should consider teaming with a digital publishing house.
Mark your calendars now, Krozser and Meyer (and possibly Mister X?) will be on the Editor Unleashed forum this week for a live chat:
Wednesday, July 29, 1:00 p.m. EST
1. Can you summarize the mission of Quartet Press in your own words. And what’s your vision for its future?
Mister X: Our vision is about community of readers, authors and other bookish types making themselves at home and being treated to a 1st class experience, not just romance, but across the spectrum.
Krozser: As we build our vision of a high-quality, community-centric digital publishing house, Quartet Press focuses on three things: readers, authors, and stories. We believe strongly in communication, which includes listening and responding—and transparency. Most important of all, we love reading and we love talking about great stories.
Some of our vision for the future is addressed in the questions below, but let’s start with big picture. Digital publishing is the most exciting place to be in the book world. We’re building a serious business from the ground up, and we’re building it in manner that allows us to grow and respond to a rapidly-changing market.
Meyer: Totally agree—we are inspired by the bookish community and making the world a better place for everyone who loves writing, reading, and talking about books. In addition to that, we’re investing a lot into this business and a big part of our mission is to build a financially successful and fun place to work.
2. You’re launching with the Quench romance imprint, and it seems that you’re focusing on the romance genre for now. Any plans to branch out into other genres in the near future and if so, which ones?
Mister X: We do think there are opportunities in other genres, particularly mystery and thrillers (broadly defined) sci-fi and believe it or not, literary fiction.
Krozser: We are starting out in romance—romance readers and authors are early adopters of technology, and eBooks are an ever-expanding part of the community’s reading experience. These are readers who read constantly, even while managing the myriad responsibilities associated with modern life. When we say our mission is to focus on readers, we’re thinking about this community. Busy lives, reading on the go, and sometimes looking to buy books at 3 a.m. We want to do everything we can to make it easier for these readers to immerse themselves in great stories.
We want to include other genres in our mix as soon as possible. I personally read across all types of fiction, and know I’m not alone. As more readers adopt eBook technology, whether it’s a device like the Kindle or via an app on their phone, demand for mystery, suspense, and crime fiction will grow. As will demand for interesting literary fiction. As with romance and science fiction/fantasy, many of these readers will be seeking the kind of different stories that have been a hallmark of small press, including digital publishers.
Meyer: Yup, we are all very intrigued with the prospect of branching out—not only into other genres, but possibly into offering our services to other indie publishers as well. With both those goals in mind, our focus right now is on getting the design, production, marketing, delivery and community aspects of our publishing model fine tuned. For the reasons given by Kassia, the romance reading community is a wonderful audience to be starting with.
3. Do you think similar eBook focused publishers will be popping up? Any other new ones that you’re aware of on the horizon?
Mister X: Lots will be popping up. Couldn’t be a better time to be starting a digital publishing biz—much easier than transitioning a traditional one.
Krozser: Absolutely. We’re not the first in this space—we owe a lot of the publishers who have gone before us—and we’re hearing about new projects all the time. OR Books is making headlines, and we’re thrilled to see them, and Richard Nash and Dedi Felman announced their venture, The Round Table (recently re-christened, “Cursor”) at BEA this year. We’re huge fans of both, and love the community-minded approach they’re taking.
Meyer: I have seen very cool eBook focused publishers popping up, and become aware of existing ones that I hadn’t know about until jumping into this space. Some of the coolest are in the area of comic books and graphic novels, and kids books. Sylvan Dell has a great eReader for teachers and parents that allows for recording your voice to read along with the eBook. The innovation out there is incredible.
4. Does Quartet accept both agent and un-agented submissions. Any other tips and suggestions for submissions?
Krozser: We accept both agented and unagented submissions. I’d strongly advise reading our submissions page, which also includes a link to our contract summary. We’ve spent a lot of time on our agreement, including listening to authors as they discuss contract terms that are important to them. In fact, we made a key change to our standard agreement after hearing reasonable arguments about the impact on authors.
Even though we are a digital publisher and queries are done via email, I would strongly advise spending time writing a good query letter. This letter is the first impression I or our other editorial staff will have of you, and a bad letter (or no letter at all) doesn’t help that impression.
Also, while very few authors enjoy synopsis writing, a good synopsis is a key tool. It has to tell the whole story in a clear, concise manner. Don’t withhold key information in an attempt to keep plot twists a secret until the manuscript is read. We need that detail to make a determination about the story!
5. In your opinion, why should writers consider publishing with an e-publisher instead of focusing on getting published by a traditional publishing house?
Krozser: Authors should consider the best publishing experience for their career. Both digital and traditional publishing houses have their strengths and weaknesses. Digital publishers generally offer higher royalties, faster turnaround from acceptance to print, increased creative freedom, and payments flow to authors faster.
We’re better prepared to take advantage of the evolving marketplace since we don’t have to restructure our workflow from the ground up (while trying to run our existing business—a challenge for traditional publishers, and we are impressed with those who are making this happen), and digital publishers are very often on the cutting edge of trends, which is great for readers who are tired of what sometimes seem like the same story with a different cover and authors who are leaders in their genre.
Meyer: I agree with all that Kassia said. It’s up to the author to consider their individual goals and look for a situation that best works for them. Terms and agreements vary widely among both print and e-publishing houses. In addition, an author should take into account seemingly intangible qualities such as the marketing and publicity efforts that a publisher will be undertaking on their behalf, and the kind of reputation a publisher has in the greater bookish community.
Quartet is making it a huge priority to be the kind of house an author will genuinely find rewarding to publish with—both financially and from a visibility standpoint. We’re investing in an infrastructure that will ensure any work we stand behind will be of the utmost quality and we are working to make community outreach between authors and readers easy and fun. Plus, we are all present and listening to what authors and readers have to say and we’re willing to make changes in order to make our authors and readers happy.
For submissions guidelines and more of the Quartet Press story, check out their website. And be sure to stop by the forum this Wednesday, 1:00 p.m. EST for a live chat with the Quartet Press founders.
-Maria Schneider
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{ 3 comments… read them below or add one }
I’m fascinated by the various start-up digital publishers springing forth, most seemingly from within the industry as a “solution” and not organically from within the communities they aim to serve, filling a clear need. Quartet seems to be the latter, in spirit at least, but it will be interesting to see who the audience really is for their initial offerings. On the traditional side, you’re selling into established distribution channels, for better or worse, but with most digital natives, it feels a bit more like a vague, “if you publish, they will buy” approach.
On a side note, I’m kind of surprised (though not really) that some established genre authors haven’t decided to leverage their platforms to launch their own digital imprints. Publishing is hard work and the financial rewards are small, at best; most writers want nothing to do with the business side, and most readers couldn’t care less about the inside baseball stuff that results in their favorite books hitting the shelves, literally or virtually.
Thanks for a great post. It helps explain the company very well.
I am looking forward to the books you will publish.
Best wishes from Canada
twitter.com/RKCharron
:)
Heeeeeeeey, Quartet! Thanks for the Sylvan Dell shout out :) We love people learning about our eBooks! Keep it up!