EDITORIAL STAFF: Sandra Mason, Ruth Harrison, Ellen Caldwell
Our Services
Submitting a manuscript
We publish high quality literary work by mostly Pacific northwest regional authors. Send a query about submitting your manuscript.
1. Submit an inquiry to turnstonebooks@gmail.com including a description of your manuscript (genre, length, graphics, etc.) and your back story in producing this work. Work must be original and not published elsewhere. Don’t forget your contact information.
2. If we give your application a green light, we assess a reading fee of $25, payable in advance by check only. Checks should be made out to Sandra Mason.
3. If we accept your manuscript, you will need to help defray the costs of publication. Depending on manuscript type and length, this will vary from $500 minimum to $2000 or more for a longer work, depending on the amount of editing required. Costs of ISBN, submitting to contests, and charges for proof and postage will be your responsibility as well. Our rates follow the industry standard of 2¢ a word for prose and $60 an hour for poetry.
4. Mss. should be submitted in Word in an editable attached document, 12-point type in a standard font with minimal formatting. For prose, use only a single space after a period, please. At least one-inch margins all around; double space prose, please.
5. Turnstone Books of Oregon, LLC retains all rights of final decision-making in editorial and formatting matters.
6. If we publish your book, we will advertise it on amazon.com and turnstonebooks.com as well as various literary bulletin boards online. We do not warehouse books or market them to book stores in general, although we will send a notice to Powell’s in Portland. You may contact your own local bookstores and supply books directly to them or through standard distributors like Ingram.
7. You may supply art work for a cover, which we will produce for you. The book is printed through a print-on-demand service.
8. While production timelines vary, we can generally marshal your book through the editorial process within an eight-month period.
Editorial services
We also offer detailed professional manuscript evaluation, perhaps leading to our publishing of your manuscript.
1. First send an inquiry to turnstonebooks@gmail.com with a brief description of your manuscript and the kind of assessment you would like.
2. Depending on our backlog of projects, we will ask for your ms. in an attachment AND hard copy by mail (including payment). We will assign your ms. to one of our editors, who can, within six weeks, return to you one of the following:
a. Narrative assessment only, with observations about strength and weaknesses of the ms., broad suggestions for revision, focus on style, diction, form, character, voice or point of view, and audience. 2¢ a word.
b. Narrative assessment AND line-editing suggestions throughout. 3¢ a word.
c. Opening chapter critique only, $100, up to 7,500 words, additional pages at $5 a page. Does your work get off to an effective start? Are the key elements laid out for capturing interest and setting the groundwork for the rest of the work?
3. Cost for evaluation, payable by check to Sandra Mason in advance, is according to industry standards.
Our Catalog: all are available on amazon.com
Our Catalog: all are available on amazon.com