Updated with more links.

If, for some reason, you haven’t heard yet romance megalith Harlequin announced this week that they are opening a self-publishing branch of their company. This is so very wrong, but don’t just believe me. Here’s a short index of who is saying what:

• Mystery Writer Allison Brennan
• Writer Beware
• Nora Roberts
• Ashley Grayson Literary Agency
• Jackie Kessler
• Suvudu
• Mystery Writers of America
• Lee Goldberg
• SFWA
• Smart Bitches
• How Publishing Really Works
• Ann Aguirre
• Agent Kristin Nelson
• Dear Author
• Preditors & Editors (who now lists Harlequin as a vanity publisher)
• Teddy Pig
• Emily Veinglory
• Absolute Write’s Thread on the topic
• Shiloh Walker
• Agent Jennifer Jackson
• Nathan Bransford
• Paula Guran

My issues break down like this:

1. The cheapest package is $499 and you still only get 50% of net profits. If I am going to pay someone to publish my work I am going to also get all the profits myself.

2. Harlequin is billing this as “Be published by Harlequin” which is deceptive, predatory and a slap in the face to the authors who fought through the slush pile to be “traditionally” published by Harlequin.

3. Harlequin has included in their announcement that when they send rejections they will include flyers for or special offers for their self publishing program. This skews the business to the point where Harlequin could easily make more money from rejecting and funneling would-be authors to the self publishing imprint than from publishing books as a legitimate book publisher (rather than just a book printer). This is the kind of BS that led to reading fees for agent being deemed scammy.

4. Harlequin has stated that the self publishing imprint won’t have Harlequin anywhere on it, and the distribution, book quality and such will depend on what you pay. This is a bait and switch as they are using the Harlequin name to draw in writers, but the people buying the books will NOT see Harlequin products. In fact, since most bookstores do not order or stock self published books consumers aren’t entirely likely to see products at all.

5. Harlequin hints that they *might* pick up a successful self published title for their normal lines. This preys on those people looking to circumvent the slush pile, or those who have well received but still unpublished novels. It gives them false hope and again Harlequin gets paid to reject people rather than getting paid to publish, market and sell books. And, because of #1 they also get paid TWICE to reject people.

This whole deal is like a strip club. Harlequin is selling the fantasy of being a published, Harlequin author but the price is high and in the end it’s just the fantasy they’re selling. They ain’t gonna sleep with you.

Does Harlequin, in this corporate age, have the right to do this? Well some of these things are a little fuzzy and definite fall into “Read the fine print and know what you’re getting” category, but yes, they have the right to do this. And MWA, SFWA, and RWA are all absolutely right in saying “If you want to go down that path you no longer qualify as a non-vanity publisher to us”.