The contract.

All of it, as it stands. The copy you sign has your name, your book and our registered name and address in it, and that copy is the one that counts.

This agreement is between wrong.page, of Virginia ("we", "us"), and [your name] ("you"). wrong.page is the name we publish under; it is not a separate party. This agreement is about your work titled "[your book]", as you sent it to us (our reference [our reference]) and as edited with your approval ("the book"). It covers no other work. It begins when both of us have signed it.

1. What you give us

You give us the exclusive right to publish and sell the book as an ebook and in print, in English, anywhere in the world, for as long as this agreement lasts. That includes paid reading through libraries and subscription services. While this agreement lasts, you will not publish another English ebook or print edition of the book, or let anyone else do so.

We may let printers, retailers and distributors do what they need to do to sell the book. We may not pass these rights to anyone else, and we will only use services that let us withdraw the book when this agreement ends.

To promote the book we may use its title and cover, your name, any biography or photograph you give us for that purpose, and short excerpts of no more than a tenth of the book in total. We may give printed copies away to promote the book, as section 6 describes. We will not give the ebook away, or make the book free to everyone, without your agreement.

2. What you keep

You keep the copyright. The book is published under your name, or a pen name you choose, with a copyright notice in your name. You keep every right not given to us in section 1, including film, television, audio, translation and adaptation rights, and the right to decide whether the book may be used to train AI. You are free to write and publish anything else, with anyone. We have no claim on your other work.

The edited text is yours. Any rights we hold in the edits made to your words pass to you as they are made. A cover we make and the page layout stay ours. A cover you supply stays yours, and you let us use it, with our mark on it, for as long as this agreement lasts.

3. What it costs you

Nothing. We pay for editing, cover design, typesetting, publication and promotion, and none of those costs is ever taken out of your share. You never pay a fee, never have to buy copies, and never repay what we spent if you leave. The only money you could ever owe us is described in section 10, if a promise you made there proves untrue, and in section 14, if you leave early for another publisher.

4. What you are paid

You receive 70% of receipts. We keep the rest.

"Receipts" are the money retailers and distributors actually pay us for the book, for sales and for paid reading through libraries and subscription services. That is what is left after the retailer has taken its own commission, any printing cost it charges for each copy, sales taxes and refunds. Nothing else is deducted, and our own costs never reduce receipts. If we sell copies ourselves, receipts are what buyers pay us, less what those copies cost us to print, sales tax, postage, payment fees and refunds.

We pay you within 30 days of the end of each calendar quarter, for receipts that reached us during that quarter, and send you a statement showing the receipts and how your payment was worked out. If the amount due is under $20, it carries over to the next quarter.

We pay in US dollars, by a method we agree with you, and we bear the cost of sending it. You are responsible for your own taxes on what we pay you. If the law requires us to withhold tax, we will, and we will tell you how much. If we cannot pay you because we do not have your payment details, the money waits for you.

If a retailer later takes money back for a refund, we deduct your share of that sale from a later payment for this book. You never have to pay it back out of your own pocket. We do not hold money back against possible future refunds, we do not charge one book's costs against another, and we do not withhold your pay because someone has made a complaint.

5. Checking our figures

We keep the book's sales and payment records for at least six years. Once a year you, or someone you appoint, may ask to see the retailer reports behind your statements, and we will send them within 30 days. If they show we have underpaid you, we pay the difference within 30 days. If the shortfall is 5% or more, we also pay the reasonable cost of the check. Accepting a statement or a payment does not mean you agree it is right.

6. Promotion

We promote the book at our own expense and in our own way. We do not use social media, and we do not publish our methods.

We decide how to promote the book and how much to spend on it, and we promise to make a real effort for it, in good faith. We do not promise any particular amount, method or result, and we do not report what we spend. None of it ever comes out of your share.

Copies we give away earn nothing for you or for us, whoever ends up selling them.

7. Editing, cover and price

We edit the book with you. Every change we propose is shown to you, and no change is made to your words without your approval. Silence is not approval. You approve the final text in writing before publication, and any later change to it. Typesetting that does not change your words needs no approval.

We make the cover, or work with one you supply, and put our mark on it. We take your views seriously. The final decision on the cover, the format, the price and where the book is sold is ours. We will tell you before changing its regular price.

8. Publication

We will publish the book as an ebook and in print within 12 months of you approving the final text, and in any case within 24 months of this agreement beginning. If we miss either date, you may end this agreement immediately by telling us in writing. Once the book is published, we keep both editions on sale for as long as this agreement lasts.

9. AI

You should know how we work. People read the manuscripts, edit the book and make its cover. No AI service has read yours.

We will not use the book to train AI and will not let anyone else do so. If it is ever sent to an AI service, that is only under terms that forbid training on it.

10. Your promises

You promise that you are 18 or older; that you wrote the book; that its text was not written by AI (help from AI with ideas or editing is fine, passages drafted by AI are not); that you have the right to make this agreement and nobody else holds the rights you are giving us in section 1; that any cover or picture you give us is yours to give; that you have told us about anything in the book that is someone else's work, and about anywhere it has been published before; and that the book does not copy anyone else's work, defame anyone, invade anyone's privacy, or break the law.

If one of these promises proves untrue, and that leads someone else to make a claim against us, you cover our reasonable costs from that claim. "Proves untrue" means a court has decided so, or you have agreed so in writing, or the claim was settled with your agreement. An accusation alone is not enough.

11. Our promises

We promise that we have the right to make this agreement; that we will publish the book as you approved it; that we will pay you on time and keep accurate records; that we will keep your unpublished manuscript and your personal details private; and that the cover and anything else we add to the book will not copy anyone else's work or break the law. If one of these promises proves untrue, by the same test, and that leads someone else to make a claim against you, we cover your reasonable costs from that claim.

12. If someone makes a claim

Whichever of us hears of a claim about the book tells the other promptly, and we help each other answer it. Neither of us settles a claim in a way that binds the other without their agreement. If there is a credible legal claim, we may pause sales while we look into it, and we will tell you why at once. If sales are still paused after 60 days, you may end this agreement immediately.

13. Ending this agreement

Either of us can end this agreement at any time, for any reason, by giving 90 days' notice in writing. Leaving costs you nothing, apart from what section 14 says.

You may end it immediately if we miss a date in section 8, if sales stay paused for more than 60 days under section 12, or if we stop publishing altogether. Either of us may end it immediately if the other seriously breaks it and has not put that right within 30 days of being told in writing.

On the day it ends, every right given to us in section 1 returns to you, whatever else is still unsettled, apart from what section 14 lets us keep for a while. We tell retailers to take the book off sale by that day, or within five working days if it ends immediately, and we stop promoting it. Copies already sold stay sold, readers keep the ebooks they bought, and we cannot stop second-hand sales or remove old listings and reviews.

Within 30 days of it ending we send a final statement, pay everything we owe whatever the amount, confirm in writing that your rights are back with you, and send you the edited text as a file you can edit. Money that reaches us later for earlier sales is shared and paid in the same way, with no minimum.

The edited text is yours to use however you like. A cover we made and the layout files remain ours unless we agree otherwise.

14. If you leave early

This section applies if you end this agreement by notice before the book has been on sale with us for 2 years. It does not apply if we end it, or if it ends because we missed a date in section 8, broke it, or stopped publishing.

We may keep selling our edition until those 2 years are up, paying you your share as before. From the day your notice takes effect our right is no longer exclusive: you are free to publish the book yourself, or with anyone else, at the same time.

If another publisher takes the book and wants our edition gone sooner, tell us and we will withdraw it. In return you pay us 15% of what that publisher pays you for the book, as it reaches you, until the 2 years are up. If we had not yet published the book when you left, the same share applies for 2 years from the day you left.

15. If either of us changes

Neither of us may transfer this agreement to anyone else without the other's written consent. If you die, it continues for your estate, and payments go to whoever inherits your rights.

16. Notices and disagreements

Notices under this agreement go by email: yours to the address we write to you from, ours to the address you gave us. Either of us can change address by telling the other, and either of us may ask for paper instead.

If we disagree, we first try for 30 days to settle it between ourselves. After that, any court case about this agreement must be brought in the state or federal courts located in the State of Virginia. Each of us pays our own legal costs unless a court orders otherwise.

17. General

This agreement is governed by the law of the State of Virginia. It is the whole agreement between us about the book, and it can only be changed in writing agreed by both of us. Email counts as writing. If any part of it cannot be enforced, the rest still stands. Letting something go once does not give up the right to insist on it later. We are two independent parties, not partners. The person who signs for us signs for wrong.page and not personally.

You may sign electronically, by typing your name, if you separately agree to do so on the signing page. That has the same effect as signing by hand. Each of us keeps a copy of the signed agreement.