Search Results for: vanity anthologies

Anthologies, once a staple of genre publishing, have become a rarity at major publishing houses over the past couple of decades.

Vanity anthologies are a popular way for unscrupulous companies to make money on writers’ hunger for publication. By far the most common vanity anthology scheme is the free contest scheme, in which writers are enticed to enter poems or stories in a competition, and then pressured–though usually not required–to buy the anthologies in which their work appears.

Once upon a time, there was an infamous vanity anthology company called the International Library of Poetry, also known by the name of its website, Poetry.com.

Every January, I look back over this blog and pick out what I think were the most useful, interesting, and/or important posts of the previous year. Here goes.

If you’ve been reading this blog for long, you may have guessed that I’m not a big fan of writing contests.

Writer Beware hears from a fair number poets. Much of the time, they’re contacting us to ask about self-publishing, or to check the reputation of a journal or a contest. Sometimes, unfortunately, they’ve gotten mixed up with one of the vanity anthology companies, such as Eber and Wein.