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Enchanted Trinkets Complete--a hardcover book containing over 500 magic items for your D&D games!

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Message: <blockquote data-quote="JohnNephew" data-source="post: 767220" data-attributes="member: 2171">FWIW, paying someone to publish your work is pretty much the definition of "vanity press."To quote <a href="http://dictionary.reference.com/search?q=vanity%20press" target="_blank">dictionary.com</a> :"vanity pressn. A publisher that publishes a book at the expense of the author."It has negative connotations because if a publisher is making their money from the author, not the reader, then one assumes they don't really care if what they publish is of any interest to readers or if it has any quality.  The only quality that matters is measurement of the author's bank account.  Doesn't matter to them if it sells or not.One may also assume (fairly or not) that if you're paying someone to publish your work, it's because no one found it worth paying you to publish it.Note that vanity press and self-publishing are not actually the same thing.  Often the former gets thrown around as a pejorative description of the latter.It's worth noting that many of the world's classics were originally self-published.  Works that are truly groundbreaking often have trouble fitting into the plans and pigeon-holes of established publishers.  It would not surprise me if some classics were in fact vanity press publications at first, in spite of the bad rap, though I don't know of any offhand.For a vanity press in action, read about the book publisher in Umberto Eco's novel Foucault's Pendulum.</blockquote>

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