Heard it before

It came as an email, and the first glance and first reading sounded good.  An interest in "The Obedience of Fools," and invited  me to submit the work to a... competition!

 Hey Martyn Taylor,

'The Obedience of Fools' caught my eye. My name is Lauren and I am a Marketing Manager at a publishing company. We're looking for authors to promote in our current writing contests, and we're still accepting submissions until the end of May.
I would love to tell you more about our publication process. How does that sound to you?
P.S. If you win we'll spend a minimum of $6000 on your book marketing to get 'The Obedience of Fools' into the top 50 on Amazon.

Sounds familiar. I'm sure it does to anyone who's self-published a novel on line.

There was more...

You can check it out here: www.inkitt.com/getpublished?utm_source=sw_ds

P.S. If you win we'll spend a minimum of $6000 on your book marketing to get 'The Obedience of Fools' into the top 50 on Amazon.

Natural scepticism, if it sounds too good to be true. It probably is and being distracted by something else the email was shelved to be dealt with later.

That started with a question on google, and a check through a couple of sites known for collating and exploring the hazards of being an independent writer.

Writer Beware had what seemed a quote from Monty Python; Spam, Spam, Spam, Spam. Originally posted in April 2016, but good advice lasts with the passage of time. the piece is worth closer scrutiny. There are links within the post that take the story further.

David Gaughran was more recent and linked to a Kboards forum page. the thread of the conversation followed the line of be careful.

Anyone getting spam from "Lauren" who works at a "publishing company" and which promises to spend $6k on marketing? https://t.co/84WPODnOBA

— David Gaughran (@DavidGaughran) May 25, 2017

I spent a little while chewing it over.

I appreciate that someone is interested in one of my novels, but the reference to the $6000 prize on marketing for the winner furrowed the forehead, I missed a bit, that flicker in the corner of my eye. A chunk of money for marketing, what about the bits that come before marketing. Proofing, editing, etc. Basically the mechanics of publishing a novel. information on who was covering the cost of that angle was scarce.  Experience has shown that is a common feature of the hybrid/vanity end of the publishing market.  Inkitt has a distinct operation; the focus is on the competition angle where readers of the site vote on the books offered.

We're definitely not looking at a traditional publisher, nor the familiar concept of Vanity/Hybrid either, I'm not sure how I would describe Inkitt.com.

There's more digging to be done here!

Given the proximity of the deadline for the competition and the publication of this blog, The Obedience of Fools isn't going to be on the list. If you're curious about the story check The Grange Series at Smashwords. Obedience is the fourth in the series,