Penguin Book WritersReviews of penguinbookwriters.com

Poor customer service. This is vanity publishing at its worst. Please find any other publisher.

I should have read the below review first. I fell for the PBW heist. The contract is worthless, they keep asking for thousands of dollars more, no further contract. It's a scam. Do not use them. I copied the below statement from another victim, it states exactly what happened to me. 'Penguin Book Writers lures first time authors into thinking they will get support to put their book online with Amazon and other entities. The first contract is a BAIT and the following "CONTRACTS" acting as the SWITCH. All of a sudden, they go from person to person and then bring up ridiculous prices for things like ISBNs and Copyrights - including the fact they are trying to charge you for "Annual Renewals". Guess what? ISBN's and Copyrights DO NOT REQUIRE ANNUAL RENEWALS! Marketing contracts are followed up with offers to do more for tens of thousands of dollars. I filed a complaint with the FTC and a review with the BBB. Beware of Penguin Book Writers. They are a complete scam of a company!' YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED - DO NOT FALL FOR THEIR BAIT AND SWITCH OPERATIONS!

In February of 2023, I engaged the services of Penguin Book Writers to fulfill a contractual agreement with the promise and expectation that my book would be professionally edited and ready for publication well before the end of the year. However, my experience with them quickly took a turn for the worst as I encountered numerous issues, delays, excuses, and repeated problems -- from glaring editorial problems that somehow appeared after I submitted my files (ex: duplicated paragraphs) to completely changed words (affect vs effect) that I had to remediate again and again. This was all within the first few months of our engagement. Despite raising my concerns with "the team," the situation did not improve, prompting me to request a refund at the end of 2023. In writing, Samantha Hayes, Carl Dust, and Frank Watson assured me that my refund would be processed promptly. However, despite their assurances and the passing of over three months, I have yet to receive the promised refund. Excuses from them have ranged “it’s too late to reverse the credit card payment” to “checks get lost.” Instead, they tried to upsell me and then get me to accept a book cover I could not use. I insisted on the refund and was told I would have a resolution in “a few days.” When I heard nothing, I finally filed a complaint with the Better Business Bureau. On March 14 Mr. Dust sent me this response via text: “Just got a final answer from Samantha and the finance department, they were quite disappointed from your review. She told me that we would initiate the refund through an alternative process once you take down the review.” There has been no response by Penguin to the BBB complaint. There has been no further communication from them and no, there has still not been a refund. Throughout this ordeal, I have been subjected to a barrage of excuses and delays, leaving me deeply dissatisfied with the level of professionalism and integrity demonstrated by Penguin Book Writers. The lack of transparency and failure to honor their commitments has caused me significant inconvenience and strain. The book was supposed to have been published and ready for my classes and workshops well over six months ago.

Penguin Book Writers lures first time authors into thinking they will get support to put their book online with Amazon and other entities. The first contract is a BAIT and the following "CONTRACTS" acting as the SWITCH. All of a sudden, they go from person to person and then bring up ridiculous prices for things like ISBNs and Copyrights - including the fact they are trying to charge you for "Annual Renewals". Guess what? ISBN's and Copyrights DO NOT REQUIRE ANNUAL RENEWALS! Marketing contracts are followed up with offers to do more for tens of thousands of dollars. I filed a complaint with the FTC and a review with the BBB. Beware of Penguin Book Writers. They are a complete scam of a company! YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED - DO NOT FALL FOR THEIR BAIT AND SWITCH OPERATIONS!

I lost $8500 AUD. They did not take me through the proper process. In other words what I paid for I was never going to receive. The so called evaluations I received appeared to be AI generated with no call to action. I formally terminated the contract and no final invoice received. I have reported these people to the FBI for investigation. Referring to Penguin's reply below, if you were a legitimate business I would happily do so. To prove that please show evidence of your business name registration and the legal entity that you purport to sign contracts with authors. In reference to your amended reply below I note that you have not proven that you are a legitimate business. If you were I would not have any need to put a review in.

Penguin Book Writers lures first time authors into thinking they will get support to put their book online with Amazon and other entities. The first contract is a come on. Suddenly they bring up ridiculous prices for things like ISBNs and Copyrights. Marketing contracts are followed up with offers to do more for tens of thousands of dollars. I filed a complaint with the FTC and a review with the BBB. Beware of Penguin Book Writers.

I loved the response to my review about Penguin Book Writers. I did receive a refund after I went to the company they do business with not directly from Penguin Book Writers. I did approve the covers only to realize there were still correction that had not been made that I had repeatedly asked for. Penguin Book Writers were asking for the refund back. They wanted me to continue with the project. I wrote them immediately and asked to cancel the project. They don't tell you that part.

Worst company I have ever experienced. They charged me $4000 dollars upfront for a large amount of copies without seeing one copy of my book printed first. It took months for them to edit it and got almost everything wrong including my address so it took a month for me to just see my book. The cover was off center and the pages bled through, I asked for a refund multiple times throughout the process and have been fighting with them for 6 months now. Wish I would of listened to my instincts when I first started feeling weird about this company. Avoid at all costs!!