Comments on: Tuesday Midday Links: Harlequin Horizon’s, A self publishing venture

By: soma uk

soma uk — Tue, 02 Mar 2010 23:11:35 +0000

how r u, spring is cooming! good post there, tnx for dearauthor.com

By: Chrissy

Chrissy — Tue, 17 Nov 2009 19:44:46 +0000

Massive shark jump.

By: Melissa

Melissa — Tue, 17 Nov 2009 19:43:30 +0000

@rachel: Chapters (Canada) has a similar program – self-pub, pay a fee, get your book in selected Chapters stores. As someone who spends a lot of money on their site and in-store I don’t like this one bit. I count on them to carry a quality product.

Personally, as an author, I don’t think I’d want to part ways with my editor given the amount of red ink I get back from her after the first draft. What she provides me and the readers is far too valuable – I’d rather my pub take their cut than put out something that’s crap and be known as a terrible author.

By: Fae Sutherland

Fae Sutherland — Tue, 17 Nov 2009 19:36:01 +0000

The canadian school actually isn’t the first. Maybe the first to use ereaders, but there’s a good handful of schools that have already gone all digital. AZ, California and Florida, just to name a few, all have schools where there are no textbooks, it’s all digital on laptops and in class desktops. In Vail, AZ, the school even provides free wifi so kids can research and such without needing paper books for that either.

By: Margaret

Margaret — Tue, 17 Nov 2009 19:31:46 +0000

More impressive than providing ebook readers to private school children is Uraguay providing a laptap for every elementary school child. This is where ebook technology is exciting.

http://gadgetcrave.com/uruguay-offers-laptops-to-every-primary-student/3920/

By: rachel

rachel — Tue, 17 Nov 2009 18:46:31 +0000

They set up an ebook line with editors, experienced harlequin staff and don’t link it to the brand. Then they set up a selfpublishing/vanity outfit where you have to pay $1k for editing which is linked to the brand. How many folks do you think are going to bother with the editing? I’m trying to understand the logic of this move. Trying and failing. This is going to seriously damage the brand. You will get all that tripe that is published by Publish America et al associated with the Harlequin Brand.

I feel ill and I’m not even published by Harlequin. If I was a Harlequin author I would not be very happy right about now.

I know Harlequin is about the bottom line but this is ridiculous. It really is someone too concerned about quick financial gain, rather than looking at the bigger picture. I think Harlequin is the only part of that company – Torstar? which is showing big profits.

By: Chrissy

Chrissy — Tue, 17 Nov 2009 18:37:58 +0000

I’m not a Harlequin fan for a variety of reasons, but this looks… well bad.

It’s ridiculous and will hurt the brand.

I do buy some of their books, but mostly the sub-imprints. This? Um. No.

By: Jim Duncan

Jim Duncan — Tue, 17 Nov 2009 18:29:48 +0000

Wondering if the basic 600 bucks is going to be worth the name recognition Harlequin brings. Is there going to be a site dedicated to the Horizons ebooks? Or will it be up to the author to get them up and out at the various ebook retailers? If this is going to be tied directly with other Harlequin ebook titles, i.e. you go to Harlequin site and you can link directly to Horizons books there, this might possibly work to promote self pubbed titles. If not, it seems like a lot of cash to fork up for file conversion and a generic cover, which of course one can do for a lot less money.

By: Melissa

Melissa — Tue, 17 Nov 2009 18:23:46 +0000

The e-reader in schools is a great idea. It will certainly cut costs, since many texts are available for free online and save the student a bad back from having to lug textbooks to and from home. Wish I’d have had one when I was in university!

By: tricia

tricia — Tue, 17 Nov 2009 18:16:05 +0000

My gut clenched thinking about issuing any of my past students with ebook readers. Those kids lost electronics they actually *liked*, so I could picture them misplacing Reader after Reader. Or damaging them. But I just googled the high school in question and it looks quite lovely–far from any of the schools where I’ve taught. It’s nice for the publishers of the textbooks to get new licensing fees each year from the school, for sure.

As for the Kindle here in Canada: Too. Late.

By: veinglory

veinglory — Tue, 17 Nov 2009 18:13:57 +0000

I think it will hurt the publisher brand when anyone who wants to can say they are a Harlequin author. To the extent that “Harlequin” per se means anything, it dilutes that meaning.