America Star Books, formerly PublishAmerica, is a Maryland-based print-on-demand book publisher founded in 1999 by Lawrence Alvin "Larry" Clopper III and Willem Meiners. Some writers and authors' advocates have accused the company of being a vanity press while representing itself as a "traditional publisher".

History

, the executive director of PublishAmerica was Miranda N. Prather. In 2005, the company had 70 full-time employees of various functions.

In June 2005, PublishAmerica identified Willem Meiners as "PublishAmerica CEO" and Clopper as "company president".

In August 2005, PublishAmerica was sued by Encyclopædia Britannica for trademark violation over PublishAmerica's PublishBritannica imprint. The matter was settled out of court, with PublishAmerica agreeing to stop using the "PublishBritannica" name. However, PublishAmerica continued to use the website address on letterhead as late as 2008.

In late September 2005, PublishAmerica announced its books would be returnable by the bookseller if they failed to sell, a standard practice among other commercial publishers. The announcement stated that this applied to "all" of its books, though it noted that there would be "a few exceptions initially" and that the offer would apply to United States booksellers only. In 2009 PA's site said that "many of our books are returnable."

Prather left PublishAmerica (renamed America Star Books) in 2016.

Criticism

PA pays advance fees of US$1–$1,000 Other PublishAmerica authors have spoken out in support of the publisher, denying it is a vanity press and highlighting the opportunities it gives to unpublished authors.

Acceptance of hoax manuscripts

In an attempt to demonstrate a lack of editorial oversight at PublishAmerica, several authors have written "sting" manuscripts. For instance, in December 2004, PublishAmerica agreed to publish the novel Atlanta Nights, which was later revealed to be a deliberately badly written hoax, featuring every "bad writing" trope the authors could conceive of and one chapter randomly generated by a computer. PublishAmerica also accepted another author's manuscript that featured the same 30 pages repeated ten times. learned that no book stores were able to order copies of it.

He took PublishAmerica to arbitration for breach of contract. Dolan also alleged accounting irregularities: despite a clause in his contract allowing him to inspect PublishAmerica's accounts, his accountant was denied access. Dolan received royalties for fewer copies of his book than he was able to account for having sold himself. He was awarded an unspecified amount in compensation for PublishAmerica's breach of contract, and his contract was rescinded.

Lawsuit

In June 2012, a class action lawsuit was filed in Maryland District federal court against PublishAmerica LLLP, by plaintiffs Darla Yoos, Edwin McCall, and Kerry Levine.

New name

In January 2014, PublishAmerica changed its name to America Star Books. In 2017, America Star Books became ASB Promotions and ceased accepting new authors.

References

  • PublishAmerica – official site
  • J.K. Rowling and PublishAmerica's unfulfillable promise