We believe that those authors who are talented if not brilliant, enjoyable if not mind-blowing, saleable if not mass market, are also entitled to be published and read.

Self-financed publication is no longer regarded as the final option to get into print but as a viable and sometimes preferable alternative, and we have authors on our lists who have actually turned away from potential deals with mainstream publishers in favour of publishing themselves using the bona fide and quality services we can provide.

Equally, we have authors who started with us and secured a book deal with a mainstream publisher and we support your endeavours in this. After all - we just want to empower you to test the market.
Before exploring the many alternatives of self-financed publishing, we urge authors to really understand and know their personal objectives, and to appreciate the time and financial investment that is required.

By all means, come and talk to us if you want to learn more about the book industry and publishing process - and to help you, we have tried to summarise our approach.

Our approach

We produce books under a pre-agreed contract. You can rest assured that you will receive the guaranteed number of books within the time frame and prices quoted to you at the outset. You are guaranteed a well-produced book - books that we are proud to put our Quality Mark onto.

We offer a range of pre-publication services - from an initial reader's report to editing, design, typesetting, registrations and printing. For this, we make a one-off charge which is very reasonable and competitive. The author funds the publication of his/her book to test the market using our services, experience and contacts, rather than completely going it alone, and we will fund subsequent print runs.

However, there is more to publishing than just the creation of the book. Pen Press offer a range of post-production services which involves stock management, distribution, fulfilment, royalty calculations and a partnership in promoting your book. For this, we share in the royalties of sales from your book.

Pen Press empower the author to choose the degree of partnership
We have set up a flexible system whereby you can choose either to use our services to create a top quality book, and you retain all royalties* by undertaking all post-production distribution and promoting.

Or… you can choose to retain Pen Press services through the distribution and marketing process, for which we take a percentage of royalties* - our incentive to sell. The percentage split is based on who is paying for ongoing print runs.

Pen Press is leading the way in partnership publishing in the UK today
Our experience shows that authors have flexible needs and demands; some authors want to buy into a far greater level of support and pay for this via royalty* share, whilst other authors want to retain as high a percentage as possible, and are prepared to dedicate their time to achieve this. We have created a flexible service to meet your needs.

We have been in business for nine years and published 300 titles
Our service sets us apart from our competition