When is an epublisher not an epublisher--veinglory Teresa Wayne started Mardi Gras which closed in a cloud of enmity and non-payment. Then she started LA Media which promptly went underground. The publisher has no website per se although Teresa is still using the domain as her own site. However LA Media still exists to the extent that it is the correct publisher of record for those few new books and listed as a publisher of these books at fictionwise.

Now some books previously sold by Mardi Gras are now listed on Barnes and Noble with LA Media as the publisher (e.g. Premonitions). This has lead to a rumor that these books are being sold or will be re-released by LA Media, when neither Mardi Gras nor LA Media has the rights to them any more. For what it is worth I don't see it. The listings are all for 'out of stock' books and the books are not for sale. I am thinking that Teresa changed her profile's publisher name and this automatically changed the vestigial listings of these books. She needs to correct this immediately.

I certainly understand not giving Teresa much benefit of the doubt. But at the same time I think authors should understand that if a book has every been listed, that old listing tends to stay up on distributor and review sites indefinitely. This is for archival purposes and to allow vendors to list and sell used copies at places like Amazon. There is an old saying that you should never ascribe to malice what can be explained by stupidity. I would add that you can't even blame human stupidity when an automatic computer process is the likely culprit.

Now I don't think even expired books that were once with Mardi Gras should be listed with LA Media as the publisher--that should be changed. But I don't think this is part of a great malicious plan to sell books that are no longer contracted to Teresa at either press. Of course if she really is up to something like that, boy will I look dumb. But I really doubt it so now I am going with the simplest explanation of simple carelessness.

UDATE FROM TERESA AT KAREN'S BLOG: "ALL Mardi Gras Publishing books have been listed as out of print with Bowkers. L.A. Media has aquired the remaining un-used numbers. Unfortunately, Bowkers does not allow to bust up a log. So all numbers were switched in ownership, although, NO books are being sold out of contract."

Labels: LA MEDIA, Mardi Gras

  ¶ posted at 10:52 AM by Emily Veinglory