When you’ve written a good book, be it prose or poetry, the next step is to find a publisher. If you are a relative unknown, you may be doing this without an Agent. If so, it can be hard to know what kind of publisher to choose.

Vanity Press

Typically a ‘vanity’ press refers to a publisher who takes some money upfront for their services. They may dress this up in a variety of packages but the bottom line is, they will ask you to pay for something. This is not to be confused with buying your own cover art.

Vanity presses do a good job of deemphasizing their ‘vanity’ aspect and focusing on the benefits. The reason for this is because for a long time publishing through a vanity press was considered ‘cheating’ by the publishing world at large and frowned upon.

This has waxed and waned as people…