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Source: https://writers.stackexchange.com/q/43577
License name: CC BY-SA 3.0
License URL: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/

I have been communicating with three PoD companies.

I was considering the first, it has been in business for years and provides a certain number of copies to the author, the rest are sold from their site.

I have since discovered a company that, for a considerable outlay, will do multiple rounds of content edit and then offer your work to many stores as well as online through various outlets. The royalties are higher with them, so I was considering them. They primarily print in Canada.

The third company, which contacted me believing I had written a children’s book, does a round of copy editing and publishes the book as the others do - however, they assign an agent to try and find one of the big five who might take you on. If potential in other media exists, they will also seek out producers etc and try and get a deal.

The third company does less to the actual book than the second does, but seems better in the distribution and promotion aspects. It also costs about a third of what the second one does.

My question is, how likely is a literary agent who is part of a self publishing company to be someone who actually knows the people who should see my mss?

If the agent is an effective professional, my choice seems clear, but how likely is it that such a person could compete with those who are purely literary agents and know the editors of the various houses well?

The third company has an A rating on BBB otherwise I would not have considered it. Now that I have checked, all three have A ratings on BBB.

The first one does not try to sell your book and the quality of their PoDs is less than I would like. A friend used them and gave me one copy of her first book.

Original score: 7