First off, let me just thank everyone on behalf of the whole Carina Press team for your interest in and all the enthusiasm you’ve shown for Carina in the past week. It’s wonderful to know that so many of you are just as excited about the possibilities as we are!

Earlier in the week, Malle wrote a post, answering some questions that came up immediately after our announcement. Today, I’m going to recap some of her answers to questions posed in the comments of that thread, as well as answer some new questions. One quick thing before I start, when the blog was first put up, the comments were set to be “threaded”. We’ve set the comments to unthreaded (tell me I’m not the only one easily confused by those threaded comments?) but because we’ve done that, the previous four posts’ comments might look a little confusing and messy. Which is one of the reasons why I want to restate some of the answers Malle gave here. Also, we have requested that a subscribe-to-comments plugin be added to the blog, so everyone can track the comments more easily (including us!) and hopefully we’ll have that added next week.

Will a sample contract be available for viewing?

Malle: No, we won’t be offering a sample contract online — my legal department would shoot me. (AJ: but we will answer what questions we can about contract terms)

What rights does the contract take?

Malle: We will be buying all rights.

Is the contract negotiable?

AJ: My favorite saying when I talk about contracts is that they should be negotiable but all things in them are not negotiable. That applies here.

What are the royalty rates?

AJ: 30% of the original cover price on direct sales, 15% of the original cover price on 3rd party distribution. There is no net, no hidden fees, it’s all based on cover price.

So the books will be sold through 3rd party distributors?

AJ: Yes.

Will the books through 3rd party distributors be sold DRM free?

Malle: We will be offering the stories DRM-free on the Carina Press site and we will be offering the editorial to other vendors. If they wrap their own DRM on it, that will be their call.

DRM free? Really? You’re not just pulling my leg?

AJ: No, really, DRM free!

What formats will the books be available in?

AJ: At this time we haven’t finalized which formats we offer, though we do know there will be epub and PDF (did I mention they’d be DRM free?)

What about cover price? What will that be?

AJ: Again, this is something we’re still discussing, but cover price will in-line with other digital publishers.

And will you be offering print in the future?

AJ: No possibilities should be discounted. At this moment, we are focusing on digital but who knows what may happen in the future.

About submissions, what is your minimum word count, you don’t really say?

Malle: We’re looking for genre novels between 50 – 100 K. Willing to consider bigger single titles over 100 K. And I think there is a sweet spot for shorter books/novellas between 20 – 30 K. Angie tells me I’m wrong and that there is a lot of great material between 30 – 50 K. I wait to be corrected! So basically we are wide open!

AJ: And what she didn’t say is that yes, we will take as low as 15k. I expect a lot of amazing short submissions and a lot between 30-50k so I can say “I told you so”

How do you figure word count?

AJ: Computer word count. Pretty much all publishers, digital or traditional, are happy with computer word count in this age of technology.

And what heat level?

AJ: We’re looking for all heat levels, so there are no minimums and no restrictions. You can have no kissing up to whatever sexy stuff fits the story. As it says in our guidelines, we’re not looking for Penthouse Letters, we’re looking for great storytelling.

And you’ll consider m/m or other GLBT?

AJ: Absolutely, we welcome it and look forward to it.

Does my book have to have romantic elements?

AJ: Not at all. Well, unless it’s a romance. But though we will focus on romance, we will look at non-romance genres, including books without romantic elements at all.

A friend of mine got a “not quite right for this line” rejection from Harlequin. Will the editors forward those submissions to you for consideration?

AJ: Since Carina Press is a separate company, with a different pay structure, we can’t assume that authors want their submission to be published through Carina, so your friend should submit it directly to us herself. If she got a “not quite right” it might be just up our alley!

My manuscript is written in UK English, do I need to change that?

AJ: Not as long as it’s appropriate to the story setting. If your story is set in the US, you might want to reconsider the UK English!

I don’t live in the US or Canada, can I still submit a manuscript?

AJ: Absolutely! We will happily publish authors living anywhere there’s computer access (hey, alien friends, send us your best stories!), as long as the manuscript is in English.

Can I mail you a hard copy of my manuscript instead of sending it via email?

AJ: Sorry, no. Since we’re a digital-only company, everything will be done electronically, from submissions to edits. Submissions need to be made electronically, following our submissions guidelines, and the author must have or be prepared to have a program that can work with track changes (OpenOffice is a free option).

Do you only want books that will become a series, or will you accept standalone novels as well?

AJ: We’re interested in good storytelling, so if your book is a standalone, we want to see it. If your book is intended as part of a series, we want to see it.

What are your marketing plans? Will the author be expected to do all of the marketing?

Malle:  You’ll hear lots more about marketing plans as we move forward.

In our description we were trying to stress the small, independent publisher feel we hope to offer within Carina Press. We will be working together closely with authors on marketing efforts. We expect authors who want to participate in social media, etc. will most likely sell better. It’s part of the nature of this space. But by no means do we mean the author will be doing all the heavy lifting! Heck, that’s why we stress what an amazing digital marketing team we have. One that has years of experience.

Are you hiring editors, copyeditors or cover artists?

AJ: You can send your letter of interest, resume or portfolio to generalinquiries@carinapress.com

Whew! Is anyone else exhausted after that marathon Q&A session? Now I know you’ll tell me what I missed, so bring on the follow-up questions! If necessary, I’ll do one more post to recap anything I missed.