Rebellion Publishing "Forgets" To Release Fantasy Author Mark Hodder's New Book And Refuses To Give The Rights Back
Phillip K. Dick Award-winning author Mark Hodder had a rude awakening of how disastrous mainstream sci-fi publishing can be with his latest work, A Dark And Subtle Light which has been inexplicably canceled from Rebellion.
Mainstream publishing is always a precarious situation for authors in the modern era, with many striving to get contracts from big houses and imprints only to find they are unable to make a living off of what they provide.
Mark Hodder has been a science fiction writer working professionally in the field since 2008, winning the Phillip K. Dick award for his The Strange Affair of Spring-Heeled Jack in 2010, and fans were excited about his new book, A Dark And Subtle Light which was supposed to release in October 2024.
However, the month came and went, and there was still no sign of the book. Now that we’re into a new year, fans began asking questions about what happened to the book on Reddit.
One fan posed the question, “Does anyone know why Mark Hodder’s A LIGHT AND SUBTLE DARKNESS was not released? It still shows as for sale on many sites, but any order seems to be invariably cancelled within a few days, and I’ve seen a brief reference on Hodder’s instagram to the book’s ‘disastrous non-publication’. What happened?”
Another commenter replied,
From the goodreads page for the book:
‘UPDATE: I contacted Mark Hodder on BlueSky and he was kind enough to give me the low-down. In summary: -"The publisher purchased it as "work for hire" ... meaning they owned the character and concept of the brief. The idea was that it would be the first of a series with other authors working on subsequent novels featuring the same main character" -"They set an Oct '24 date for publication. However, the editor who had suggested the idea left the company. They decided to put the project on hold, forgot to tell me & forgot to remove the scheduled pub. date from Amazon.’
They . . . ‘forgot’ to tell the author they cancelled publication of his book. That is brutal.
But, there is still a possibility that we'll see this book in some form in the future, so I'm leaving it on my TBR list.
Having a publisher simply forget to publish a book is beyond absurd, but the author himself eventually chimed in on Reddit to explain how incompetent Rebellion is.
Hodder posted,
I'm afraid Rebellion (I'm now naming and shaming) have not only taken the novel off their schedule but they are also refusing to give it (or even sell it) back to me. Their stance is that I got paid so I don't really have anything to complain about. A fucking atrocious attitude. Not only does it ignore the fact that a) the novel would earn me royalties, and b) whenever I have a new novel published there's a spike in sales for my other work and my audience grows, but it also presumes that I write for money rather than to entertain. No author writes for money. Publishers pay a pittance.
To put it into perspective, Rebellion paid me £7000 for the novel with royalties set to kick in (after that £7000 had earned out) at a rate of 7% of the recommended retail price up to 14,999 copies; rising to 8% on 15,000 to 29,000 copies; rising to 10% on 30,000 copies onwards.
I'll get none of that. The novel took a year to write and all I have to show for it is the initial £7000. The MINIMUM annual wage in the UK is £21000.
So, yes, financially, Rebellion has fucked me over. But the real issue is that I consider it one of the best novels I have written and I am royally PISSED OFF that no one will get to read it.
The shocking details that Hodder presents on how terrible the mainstream publishing is to its authors are hard to believe. Not only does a full year of work only net an author around $8,600 with current currency conversions, but for a company to own the book outright as a work for hire, refuse to put it out, and then not even allow the author to get the book back so he can sell it to his fans is a story more common than not.
Unfortunately, mainstream publishing for the vast majority of authors does not pay a salary that can keep someone going as a career, which is why people increasingly turn to independent self-publishing where an author can control his own destiny.
What do you think of Mark Hodder losing his book to Rebellion with little to show for it? Leave a comment and let us know.
For a great alternative to modern publishing. Read this sci-fi trilogy with spy thriller action, starting with The Stars Entwined on Amazon!
I feel for the man, but as he said, they bought the book. They can do with it what they want. If they want to sell it, they can. If they don't, they don't have to.
That's one of the reasons why I no longer want an agent or a big publishing company to buy my books.
I operate under the umbrella of, "If you don't own it, it's not yours."
Maybe everyone should tell the big publishing houses to kick rocks and go into business for themselves.
Self publish. Michael Sullivan does that, him and his wife. They are great at it. Ryan Cahill is another. Don’t trust these immoral companies.