Anthologies like “Equality” can also be a great way for established authors to expand their readership.
by Anne R. Allen
Anthologies have long been one of the best ways for new writers to get publishing credits and start building an audience. They’re also an excellent way for authors at any stage of their careers to increase visibility.
Collections of short memoir pieces like the Chicken Soup series do especially well, but theme anthologies that include fiction and poetry can be strong sellers, too, and their popularity is growing in the digital age.
Short pieces of all kinds are perfect to read on the go on phones, tablets and e-readers.
Unfortunately, anthologies have a bad rep with many writers, because so many vanity publishers and scammers have used them to bilk newbies.
But once you learn to look for the tell-tale red flags, you can submit safely. Getting into a good anthology is a fantastic way to jumpstart your career or take it to the next level. You might even get paid. 🙂
I’ve had the privilege of contributing to a number of great anthologies over the past decade.
The latest, a collection of personal essays on the subject of “Equality” debuts today with Vine Leaves Press. The editor is multi-award-winning editor and author Paul Fahey—former editor of Mindprints magazine. It includes an essay by yours truly and some big names like Dennis Palumbo, Mara Purl, Catherine Ryan Hyde, and Anne Perry.
Paul will be visiting us next week to talk about writing the short memoirs and personal essays that are so popular with anthology readers.
Here are some types of good and not-so-good anthologies you may run into.
Scam Anthologies
Vanity Anthologies
The vanity poetry anthology has been around for decades—maybe centuries. I remember many years ago a well-known older poet in my small town got so excited by her “acceptance” into one of these scam anthologies that she sent out a press release to the local paper before she realized she’d been had.
The scam works like this: writers are invited to enter a “free contest” with a “prize” of inclusion in an anthology. The problem is, every piece entered gets accepted and the books cost $40 or more. So for $40 a copy, you get the privilege of seeing your work crammed into a huge book with a boatload of dreck.
As Joe Konrath said, “Do the numbers. If there are 3000 poems in the book, and each writer in the anthology bought at least one copy, the publisher made $120,000.”
Poetry dot Com aka the “The International Library of Poetry” was a famous vanity poetry anthology outfit that flourished in the last decade. (The amateur poetry-sharing website now using that domain name is not related to the vanity anthology.)
Vanity anthologies mostly target poets, but they can also target fiction and memoir writers. Some scams are as silly as the old Nigerian Prince story, but some are more sophisticated.
The important thing to remember is that vanity anthologies make their money selling to their contributors, not to the general public.
Here are a few red flags to look for:
- Testimonials: real publishers don’t post testimonials about how much their authors love them.
- Is the book for sale anywhere? Search for the anthologies on Amazon and other retail sites. Not there? Probably a scam.
- Are there offers of huge prizes, lavish awards banquets, your poem engraved on a fancy plaque and other frills to go along with your “acceptance?” You’re in scam territory.
- Is it free? Most poetry contests charge a fee, so if there’s no fee and a big money prize, do some investigating.
- Unknown sponsors? If you’ve never heard of the organization, start Googling.
- Do the publishers exist anywhere on the Internet besides their own site?
- Google some of the poets in their anthologies. How good is their poetry? Do you want your poem next to theirs on the page?
Pay-to-Play Anthologies
The bogus poetry anthology is bad, but there are other, even nastier scams out there. Victoria Strauss at Writer Beware tells of two vanity anthologies who bilked writers out of up to $5000 each in what she calls the “pay to play” anthology scam.
These anthologies of personal essays often mimic the Chicken Soup books, but instead of paying you, they expect you to pay them. Lots.
The Wake Up…Live the Life You Love series boasted that they had articles by well-known inspirational speakers like Dr. Wayne Dyer. Only problem—those pieces were simply reprints of old articles. Contributors had to pre-pay for up to 500 books each at a cost of several thousand dollars.
Another series, published by Inspired Living Publishing, required contributors to pay big bucks for worthless “marketing packages” as well as a huge number of overpriced books.
Always check Writer Beware before you sign on the dotted line.
Rights-Grabs
All anthologies will offer you some kind of contract. READ IT CAREFULLY! You only want to sell the right to publish your piece in that anthology. Usually they want “first rights” or sometimes they’ll take a reprint.
Some anthologies pay a flat fee on acceptance or publication. Others pay a small royalty. Charity anthologies usually pay little or nothing, but they will offer proof they have donated the proceeds to a legitimate charity.
What you don’t want to do is sign away your copyright. I’ve heard of some anthologies that sneak in a clause demanding all rights. NEVER sign away your rights, no matter how tempting the deal.
Some of these people want to use your essay to sell as student papers, and others want to republish the stories later under different names, so READ THE FINE PRINT.
***
However, most anthologies are fantastic venues for your writing. There are many good ones, both in print and ebook. The more well-known print anthologies may even get you onto bookstore shelves.
Great Opportunities
The Traditionally Published Personal Essay Anthology
These are a boon to newbies. The venerable Chicken Soup for the Soul anthologies and their cousins are an excellent way to start a professional writing career. Chicken Soup anthologies pay a flat fee of $200 for each story. Others pay royalties. Acceptance can be a ego boost, and they’re a nice credit for your query letter or author bio.
Anthologies are usually put together by an editor, like Paul Alan Fahey, who either invites selected authors to submit or puts out a call for submissions. Anthology editors may already have a publisher–or may work for a publisher–or they may wait until they have a number of vetted submissions before they shop around the book proposal.
Paul’s first anthology, a collection of essays called The Other Man, (JMS Books), got fantastic coverage in the trad print magazines as well as online kudos and went on to win a Rainbow Award. In 2015, playwright Bernard Rice turned three of the essays into a play.
So those authors got major print magazine coverage, a big award and well-reviewed play–all as a result of submitting a short essay to an anthology.
The Traditionally Published Fiction or Poetry Anthology
Short fiction is hot because it’s ideal for reading on phones and tablets.
Publishers often put together an anthology with a theme and issue an open call for submissions. They can pay a flat fee for first rights or pay a royalty.
C. Hope Clark’s Funds for Writers, Authors Publish Magazine and Poets and Writers classifieds, are great places to find vetted anthologies looking for submissions. We sometimes include calls for submissions in our “Opportunity Alerts”
A few years ago, I found a call for submissions from the Silver Boomer Press in Funds for Writers and sold a poem to the anthology: From the Porch Swing, Memories of our Grandparents . It felt great to be a “published poet” at a time I couldn’t give my fiction away.
The Indie Group Anthology
Genre groups like Sisters in Crime sometimes put together themed anthologies like Somewhere in Crime, and Deadlines , collections of short mysteries from the members of the Central Coast Sisters in Crime chapter.
Our local writing group, SLO Nightwriters also put together an anthology of our contributions to our column in the local Tolosa Press. The Best of SLO Nightwriters in the Tolosa Press offered a number of our members a chance to get their work between book covers for the first time. I have a couple of pieces in there too.
These days, a launch party for a single title isn’t terribly cost effective, but launching an anthology for a group of local writers gets on the local news and can garner everybody more visibility on their home turf. (We happen to be doing that today. See below.)
Online groups can put together anthologies, too. The Insecure Writers Support Group has put together two anthologies and the first anthology, The IWSG Guide to Publishing and Beyond is FREE.
Sometimes indie authors get together to put out a theme ebook anthology like the WG2E Martini Madness. Since I happened to have a story on hand about drinking appletinis with an alien, I rushed to contribute to that one.
The overhead on an ebook or POD anthology is much less than the old print anthologies so they’re cheaper to put together—and they showcase all the authors to each others’ fans.
Charity Anthologies
Charity anthologies can be a great way to get your work in front of new readers, too.
No, you won’t make any money directly, but you’ll get free publicity and exposure to new readers.
Plus you’ll be doing a good thing.
Also, a charity anthology saves the editor the paperwork headaches trying to get small royalties to dozens of people.
Probably the most successful charity anthology I’ve been involved with was the inspiring Indie Chicks Anthology of personal essays by independent women authors, which donated all its proceeds to breast cancer research.
I know the Indie Chicks are partly responsible for the success I’ve had since. The anthology included some of the top indie authors in women’s fiction, mystery, and romance. Since they invited me just as my first novel Food of Love made its re-debut with Popcorn Press in 2011, I got to ride on their coattails right onto the bestseller lists. Their many fans read my piece and checked out my work. I’m very grateful to this terrific group of women.
I’m also grateful to the Literary Lab, who accepted my work for two of their anthologies: Genre Wars and Notes from Underground at a point when my fiction writing career had stalled. Proceeds went to literacy charities. Not only did I get my work into print again and put my name back into the marketplace, but I met a group of awesome writers who were supportive and helpful at a low point in my career.
Remember how I keep telling you that networking on blogs will help your career? This is one of the ways. Invitations to submit to most of these anthologies came to me through people I met on blogs.
***
Party Today!! January 15th
Today we’re launching Equality at local indie bookstore, Coalesce at 845 Main St. in Morro Bay. (It’s the model for Camilla’s bookstore in the Camilla Randall Mystery series.)
Five of us are also signing copies of our latest books. That means I’m not going to be here this afternoon to answer comments. But I’ll be back this evening.
So any readers in this area, please do come by and get a signed copy of Equality (or maybe So Much for Buckingham.) Plus professional narrator C. S. Perryess and I are going to read from from So Much for Buckingham. There will also be readings from Equality and four other books.
There will be wine. And chocolate. Plus other goodies. From 1:00 to 4:00. We’ll be reading at about 2:30 from So Much for Buckingham. It’s funny.
posted by Anne R. Allen (@annerallen) January 15, 2017
What about you, scriveners? Have you ever contributed to an anthology? Was it a good experience? Have you ever been scammed by one? Have you discovered new authors by reading anthologies?
BOOKS OF THE WEEK
‘EQUALITY: What Do You Think About When You Think of Equality?’ presents thought-provoking and compelling personal essays that probe a concept professed to be the very foundation of our democracy – a concept that may even be more vital today than in the past.
available in ebook or paperback at Amazon , iTunes, Kobo, Nook, and Vine Leaves Press
“…the perfect antidote to current politics in America. Instead of pontificating and posing, each writer takes on the subject matter with a sense of both urgency and introspection, and by the end of the book you feel edified, as well as quite a bit saner.” Keith Banner, author of Next to Nothing and The Smallest People Alive
Anne, I’m with you on the value of submitting to quality anthologies. I’ve had the good fortune to get my work into a few anthologies. Rubbing literary elbows with some of my writing heroes & heroines is pretty darned exciting & has definitely increased my audience.
And I’ll see you this afternoon for the Big Bash at Coalesce (A Bookstore & More) in Morro Bay.
CS–Anthologies have been a huge benefit to my career. It’s that “rubbing literary elbows” thing that really pays off.
See you this afternoon!
Very useful!
I was nearly caught by one contest organiser who let slip that they would publish ALL entries – we were said to be ALL winners!
Barbara–That’s the tip-off, isn’t it? Everybody’s a winner! Nope. Everybody’s a loser.
Look for those warm fuzzies like “We think all writers deserve to be published!” New writers who are getting lots of rejections get sucked in. They forget how awful some of those rejected pieces can be.
Anne, thank you so very much for the mention of my anthologies, The Other Man and our new one, Equality. Really looking forward to the readings today at our four author event in Morro Bay. I think we’ll have quite a crowd. I can’t say enough about contributing to anthologies. Not only do you get exposure, as you mentioned, but you build your writing credits as well. And often get paid a stipend. I’ve contributed to many in the past and still do. It’s a great way to get your work out there while you work on your WIP. Brava! Another great post. See you today and next week I’ll get to meet your readers on your blog. I’m really looking forward to it. All my best, Paul
Paul–Your first anthology was such a huge success. I know this one will be too. I look forward to your post next week. People will find it enlightening!
So much to watch for. I’d heard about the poetry scams. They’ve been around forever.
Thanks for mentioning the IWSG’s two anthologies! We are working on a third with a publisher and it is royalty paying.
Alex–Great to hear that the IWSG’s third anthology will pay royalties!
I think poetry anthologies were probably around in Homer’s day. You too can be in a scroll with Homer! That would be Homer Anthropopolus, who writes poems about his pet goat…
Not quite ready to declare the Year of the Hope Anthology, but this has definitely been on my mind in recent months. {MUST finish the WiP, you know how that goes.} But I had some success with writing a series of shorter tales for one book (kind of a single-author anthology) and if I can get my head wrapped around it, even an epic fantasy writer can come up with short(er) pieces!
One anthology a friend of mine is subbing to comes out of a workshop run by a famous author of genre fiction. So you work on stories, circulate and critique, then the workshop picks winners and I gather they would go out in an anthology featuring the famous author’s name. That sounds like a win-win to me.
I just need a lot of runway. Epic fantasy is an enormous jigsaw and trying to plonk down four pieces together far from the corner I’m working on could be tough.
Great thoughts Anne, and a necessary warning.
Will–Genre anthologies do work, but as you say, they take more planning. When you write scifi or fantasy, the world-building can make things tough. But if you can give folks a taste of your world, you may bring in fans you’d never have otherwise.
Anthos do sometimes come out of workshops, which can be a big perk of a good workshop.
I hear you about the WIP! Mine is languishing.
Anne can I bug you with a follow-up question, about the rights issue? If it is genre, let’s just say my genre, my world, does the anthology owner typically want the rights to that tale for all time? There’s no way I wouldn’t mention my characters again, the action of the story in other things I write- what do they want, and can I ever get it back?
Will–I wouldn’t go with an anthology that wanted any more than one-time rights. Unless maybe George R. R. Martin was attached and they were giving you $5000+ for all rights. Even then…think long and hard. What if they put it into an episode of Game of Thrones. They’re making millions and you got a measly $5000?
One time rights or don’t go there. Not worth it.
Exercise a lot of caution with charity anthologies. I used to submit to them for obvious reason–won’t do it any more. I got burned on every single one of the ones I was accepted to in some way or another. The problem is well-meaning lures writers to submit, but well-meaning does not help much if the charity organizers don’t understand publishing very well. You can get burned by well-meaning as much as a scam.
If you submit to one, make sure their guidelines look like something you’d see out of a pro-rate magazine. Those guidelines are very clear on what they are buying, how long the rights are for, what they are paying, and what they want. I’ve looked a charity ones where they take “everything”—what does that mean?–don’t list the rights they are buying, are vague where they need to be specific. Some have not even listed word counts. One that was a recent call was a charity for helping young adults with reading–and a nasty rights grab. If you submitted to them–just submitted a story, you gave away your rights to that story and they could use it in the library to help the young adults. No pay, of course. They clearly thought they were doing good, but it was horrendous for the writers submitting if they didn’t pay attention.
Linda–Thanks for the heads-up!! Rights grabs can happen by mistake, too! Charity antho organizers can be clueless. You can stumble into a quagmire if the contract is bad or non-existent.
The kind of rights-grab submissions you mention are the absolute worst! I didn’t even know they existed until I found one of the opportunity alerts I’d listed here was doing that: claiming rights to everything SUBMITTED to them. That’s pure evil.
We all have to learn to read the fine print. And when it’s for a good cause, we tend to take off our skeptic’s hat and submit without looking things over.
Everybody: Always make sure you are offering one-time rights ONLY! And never submit to anybody who wants rights to submissions that haven’t even been vetted.
Thanks for the reminder, Linda!!
I’m also a professional speaker, so at least once a month I get emails for those pay-to-play anthologies. Anytime part of the process involves the author’s money, authors need to run away and fast. There are legit anthologies out there.
Spunk–Inspirational authors are most likely to be targeted, but these scammers get lists from everywhere, so all authors should be aware of exactly what you say.
If you’re asked to pay up front, it’s a scam. They’re supposed to pay YOU.
I don’t know much about anthologies or the dangers of being scammed. Not surprised though. Thanks for letting us know what to watch out for and the good ones to explore if we’re interested. And congrats on your new release in the anthology. Hope you have a fun book signing!
Natalie–I wish there weren’t so many scammy anthologies, because there area also a lot of very good ones. Equality is brilliant. We had readings from a few of the essays today, and they brought tears to everybody’s eyes.
On the other hand, Charlie and I had everybody laughing. A good time was had by all.
And my brownies were too good. Not even a crumb left. 🙂
Glad you covered this, Anne
I was once invited to submit to an anthology of inspirational pieces. As I don’t write such, I declined. A few people I know did.
It was a Pay-To-Play approach but was not a scam per se. It was designed to help inspirational writers get more exposure. It was not cheap but included an extended workshop on writing and publishing. It included many of the things publishers offer (Vanity style) like editing, etc.
The larger trouble was the quality was very uneven and some of it wasn’t very inspirational. Secondly, the organizers hadn’t actually published themselves. The first edition was rather delayed by slow incapable writers and figuring it all out.
I spoke to a couple of people involved at some length and they recognized the limitations of the circumstance. In one case, it was like a bucket-list item – getting published. In the other, diversifying their exposure.
The group went on to do 2 or 3 more anthologies. Sales where mostly to friends – the income was through the workshops. So it really didn’t benefit them much as an author.
Funny how things evolve though. I once took an excellent publishing workshop by a “hybrid” press. They didn’t charge to publish but took a cut of proceeds. Because their works came from their students, they didn’t do all that well from the results. (writers are rarely good marketers) It didn’t take long for them to become a full Vanity press with a large staff.
I also visited Trafford early on. They were a new form of self-publishing that was revolutionary. But they where soon bought out and went full Vanity.
David–Those workshop/anthologies aren’t really a scam even though they’re mostly sold to the students themselves. That’s because they’re more like a showcase or a yearbook. They’re more like a student recital at the end of a cycle of music study. The book is meant to be a showcase of amateur work of a certain level, not a professional piece of work to be sold to the general public.
But I could see how that could easily grow into a full on vanity press. Vanity presses aren’t scams as long as they’re upfront about what they are. But mostly they aren’t. Outfits like Trafford pretend to be legit publishers, which they certainly are not now they are part of AuthorSolutions.
Thanks for bringing that up. There is a fine line there. I think it depends on intentions, and full disclosure.
Thank you for contributing your experiences with anthologies. There are a lot of new writers who could be lured into traps, and your post contributes to their education. Keep up the good work. I love the writing community because we all look after each other.
Cheryl–Thanks! One thing about the online writing community is we can keep newbies aware of scams like these. I’m sure the Internet has made a big dent in those phony poetry anthologies. We do have to look out for each other. 🙂
Anne, every time I read your blog I feel terribly guilty, so much information for free! it feels wrong to keep reading, like I’m cheating and yet, I keep coming back. Even though I’m new to writing and submitting, the fact that I’m not new to the world-I’m 57-helps me question anything that seems to good to be true. Thank you again for not only sharing your opinion, but following it with great links, strong examples and multiple resources for checking and double-checking.
Donna–Don’t feel guilty. Some of us feel we need to “pay it forward” and help the writers who are coming along after us.
As Ruth and I say, “We make the mistakes so you don’t have to.” No point in every writer who comes along having to get scammed the same way.
We are going to be putting some of our knowledge into ebooks for people who don’t read blogs or folks who’d just rather read stuff at their leisure rather than when it comes up on a blog. If you like our content, then maybe you can spread the word when our books come out. Thanks!
I don’t know much about anthologies but found this very helpful. It’s always good to be knowledgeable about anything that has to do with publishing and writing. Hope you had fun today!
Patricia–It’s good to keep anthologies on your radar, in case an opportunity comes your way. They can really increase your visibility. And the results can be long term–as opposed to a one-day BookBub ad. I’m glad you found it useful!
I’ve been in a few anthologies so far and luckily they’ve all been fine. I’ve been able to reprint the stories in my own collections and it has gotten my work in front of new readers. The only problem I can really see is when publishers promote anthologies off the back of one or two really awesome stories in the collection, meaning you feel a bit like a filler track on an album that was just really made to sell the singles!
Icy–That’s another great thing about anthologies and short pieces in general. Thanks for the reminder! They can be used over again and you can publish them on your own later or even sell them as singles.
Sometimes a publisher will focus on one piece they think is more marketable, but often that’s not the one that sells the piece. I was once in a boxed set where my book got such a rave review compared to the others, they had to ask the reviewer to withdraw the review. 🙁 I never did get to keep a copy of the review, alas,
Thank you for this exhaustive piece on the ups and downs of anthologies, Anne. I love that our essays are parked next door to each other in EQUALITY. As I mentioned at our Book Party yesterday, the essays are absolutely stunning in their courage and honesty. I resolved read Paul’s aloud without getting choked up and just barely succeeded.
I have a couple of ideas for anthologies related to massage therapy and kidney donation that have been percolating for some time. I’ll definitely be keeping yours and Paul’s advice in mind should I pursue either venture. Great to celebrate writing with so many diverse authors yesterday. We loved your animated reading from SO MUCH FOR BUCKINGHAM.
Eldonna–Wasn’t that a great event yesterday? Charlie and I have so much fun reading together. You did a great job of reading Paul’s piece. I get teary every time, even though I’ve read it at least 10 times.
Paul will be here next week talking about how to take a chapter of a memoir and turn it into a piece of flash memoir or personal essay that can be marketed to anthologies and magazines. They’re a great way to market a memoir for new writers trying to build a platform when looking for a publisher.
I had to laugh, because one of my poems appears in a ‘Library of Congress’ anthology. Entry was free, and I did get a letter of acceptance from them, but I was smart enough not to buy the book. The poem appeared in a local paper, which was where I saw the ad for the ‘contest’.
Years later, a super nice guy in our writing group–very sincere, got something published. He was so proud of that, his voice was quaking when he stood up to read his poem out of the book.
Sound advice! In Science Fiction and Fantasy publishing, worthwhile anthologies are easily spottable by pay rates. Any editor with significant audience and prestige will be able to leverage that to pay the SFWA rate or better. That’s also why all the top SF&F magazines pay more than the average.
John–I did not know that the SFWA was the reason why SF&F magazines pay so well. Cue marching music. “I’m sticking with the union…” 🙂 Good to know.
Good advice. As in anything else in life, check it out before signing the dotted line. Caveat scriptor!
Mike–Caveat Scriptor indeed! Unfortunately, newbie writers tend to be easy targets. So we need to take care of each other.
Interesting. I had never heard of scam anthologies.
Jenny–Then I’m glad I posted about them. The scams have been around pretty much since Gutenberg, but each generation needs to hear the warnings, because these people are still out there.
The only problem I have with anthologies is that I’m a sci-fi/fantasy writer, and the shortest thing I have ever written that can be even considered a complete story was about 28,000 words long. I’m sadly stuck in that awful hypocritical place where I love to write long fiction, but I love to read short fiction. Mainly because my attention span is so short that if a novel manages to keep my attention the entire way through, it automatically earns at least a 7/10.
Yet I am somehow able to keep track of 8-10 novels’ worth of backstory, characters, plot, and setting for my own books in my head without any notes. My brain is weird.
And I’ve noticed it mentioned elsewhere in the comments, but yes! Read the fine print! It’s boring and time-consuming, but SO necessary.
Sarah–I think writing short fiction takes different writing muscles than writing novels. I’m more comfortable with novels myself. I just finished a short story and it took me nearly a month.
But there are plenty of great short story sci-fi and fantasy magazines and anthologies (and podcasts), so it can be done. It just takes practice–and that’s what Paul Alan Fahey’s new book The Long and the Short of it is all about.
His book tells you how to shorten or lengthen your work. It’s really enlightening for those of us who are stuck writing in one length.
He has an excerpt from it in this week’s blogpost https://annerallen.com/writing-memoir-think-outside-the-book/
I use the same technique Paul does for writing a synopsis. Instead of trying to cut down something huge, I start small–with a logline–and then I build on it. It’s so much easier to build than cut.