Parker PublishersReviews of parkerpublishers.com

Parker Publishing makes it possible for unknown authors to become published in a more traditional sense, rather than the self publishing route. Your input is desired throughout every step of the way. This is a long process that was prolonged due to multiple factors. However, I think the end result will be worth it all. Thanks Parker Publishing!

What went wrong, you ask? What went right? I started working with Betsy in November. Turn-around time for their "editing" was 2-3 weeks. Okay, mine was a 450-page manuscript, no-one is going to get through it in a couple of hours. And 2-3 weeks would have been acceptable if the editing itself had been acceptable. But it wasn't. They were doing weird things to the manuscript, and their changes to the layout made the manuscript confusing. After five months and three rounds of their edits and my rejections, I finally had enough and said goodbye. My advice, learned too late, is (a) if a chat window pops up on their website, run; and (b) if they want an upfront payment, they are making money from you, not from your book, so, again, run. UPDATE: Since I posted this review, I have received phone calls and emails from Betsy, a couple of people in their "Compliance" department, and a marketing manager, in which they stress how seriously they are taking my review, to the point of suspending Betsy. Daniel from "Compliance" supposedly sent my manuscript to their "formatting team", after which it would be returned to me in four days for my approval. Given my past experience with their "formatting", this filled me with trepidation. On the fourth day I did not receive a file for my approval. Rather, on April 1 I received an email from Daniel stating that "Betsy has been suspended from her duties for a period of two months", BUT "should [I] choose to revoke the review, it may be possible to re-evaluate the duration of Betsy's suspension." So now they are holding Betsy hostage. And still no sign of the book. Update 2: On April 11, I finally received the books I had ordered in November, and they are beautiful. Once we got beyond the editing nightmare, the printing process proceeded smoothly, if not swiftly. They helped with the spine labeling, and the final product is better than I expected. In the interim, I sent my manuscript to Amazon KDP. Their process was much easier. They made zero changes to the manuscript, but ran the manuscript through a quality check and advised me of issues, leaving me to address the issues myself, in my own way. Amazon offers fewer printing options than Parker, and the end product isn't as handsome as Parker's, but the process was far easier. I'm upping my overall rating from one star to three stars: One star for Parker's pre-printing manuscript handling, but five stars for their printing.