Is my friends publisher being a bitch?

[KandiKane1]

I am a fairly experienced editor and self publisher (Amazon and Google). My friend has currently finished his first novel (he's Syrian, the book is in English), and his old university professor who is also a friend of their family has pretty much taken over with the publishing and editing of his work. For context this woman has no experience in the book world apart from having a PHD in literature (Arabic), which she teaches. She is planning to sell the book for £70 per copy and is talking about going to India as it will be "cheaper" to get it published there. I voiced my concerns to my friend that this was all abit weird and pointless as most of it can be done online now and published simultaneously in 70 countries. After discussing it, he was eager to have me on board as an extra editor and publisher (we explicitly stated to his professor we were not trying to replace her), and jointly drafted a nice letter asking for me to join the process. She completely flipped out, screaming to him that I was trying to take control, she didn't even want to talk things through she just blocked me completely. He tried talking to her and she said I "might" be able to help her in the future, which sounds to me like I'd be expected to be some token lackey. Am I being unreasonable for wanting to help my friend, or is she being a controlling and jealous B? I don't know if they've discussed money but I'd be willing to help him out for free, just to give him a start

Don't get involved.
Your friend is spineless.
This woman will ruin his chances.
He'll learn a valuable lesson.
You step away from the drama.

This sounds like an absolute farce. He needs to send it to an agent or actual book editor in the first instance. Not sure what you can do here except try and stop him being scammed by the deluded "friend".

I'd take a big step back from it all if I were you. Maybe your friend is naive, but he's an adult and can make his own decisions.

I can understand the "taking over" thoughts, but she could have been gracious enough to discuss things with me in a civil way. We didn't even get a response to our message (jointly written by me and my friend), just instant blocking

I would just ask your friend to look at other books in the same genre as his 'thriller fiction' or whatever he's classing it as. Ask him to look at the retail price of those books. Most of the self-pubbed ones will, I'd guess be going for the 99p 'sell loads very cheap' bracket, or maybe as far as the £7.99 paperback sector.

Just maybe this might make the £70 penny drop. If not, and he seriously thinks he's going to make any money from it, back off. Reality will bite soon enough.

That’s right. I’m an academic, and £70 is correct for this genre. But for a novel? No way. If your friend has published before, they can be a member of the Society of Authors which offers excellent impartial advice. They even have a lawyer on staff to look at publishing contracts.

She’s saying he’ll get £70 per book? She’ll charge him a huge amount of money to get the books printed with a promise of profit.

I've tried to explain this to him, and he says he doesn't think she's helping for any financial gain

£70 for a novel?

Ye Gods.

I love reading and will sometimes pay for a hardback version if I can't wait for the paperback version. But I have never ever paid this amount and cannot image ever paying £70 for a novel.

Does she control or coerce him in other ways? Doesn't sound good

He had a few struggles at university including failing his final exam several times (she was his teacher), She says he caused himself as other students passed. I thought this was abit crappy of her, just passing the blame

I mean, you could step away, or you could see if there are peer support or community organisations and activities that might get him out of what sounds like an unboundaried and stifling connection

Not the point of the post but can I ask what the point of self-publishing is?

Do you actually make any money off it?

Would you expect him to make money off it?

And yes she sounds mad but it’s his problem not yours.

Not the point of the post but can I ask what the point of self-publishing is?

That's a big question! In broad terms, if you self-publish, you get to make all the decisions yourself (release date, length, editing, cover design, etc). And you get to keep every penny of sales yourself, rather than giving X% to your agent and Y% to your publisher. Plus, you can just bring out your book into the world without having to get it past the "gatekeepers" (agents and publishers).

Those are some of the plus points - there are minuses too, but I won't go into those here, since you didn't ask.