Authors First. Always.
Your Book. Your Royalties. Your Way.
Take
Control
of Your
Story
Authors First. Always.
Don't settle for boring/bad cover designs.
Let Us Transform Your Manuscript Into a Masterpiece
We're bridge builders not gatekeepers
Laney House is a different kind of publisher.
We don't handle your royalties. You set up your own distributing accounts in your name, with your bank account. We guide you through the process and provide professional support. When your book sells, the distributor pays you directly. We never touch your royalties. Ever.
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✅ You set up your own publishing accounts (KDP, IngramSpark) in YOUR name
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✅ Sales go directly to your bank account, we never touch your money
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✅ You own your ISBN (even under Laney House imprint) AND Copyright
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✅ Need author copies? You order directly with your chosen distributor, not inflated vanity press prices
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✅ You can walk away anytime: no hostage contracts
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✅ You set your own pricing and control distribution
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✅ We provide quality line editing, proofreading, formatting, & cover design
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✅ Transparent pricing means you pay what we advertise, never upsold
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✅ Try our Enhanced Manuscript Review* - we're so sure you'll love it, it comes with a $999 credit towards our Premium Service! (There's nothing to lose)
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✅ With Laney House, you go from manuscript to full publishing package and support, in a matter of months
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✅ There is NO cost to submit, and NO obligation to publish if accepted
*Enhanced Manuscript Review includes: line editing, proofreading, formatting for eBook, and eBook cover design only. (Copyright, ISBN, and other Premium services are not included)
No contracts. No royalty shares.
The power of a professional publishing house
-with-
the independence of self-publishing.
Publish everywhere that matters - with expert support.
Why Laney House Exists
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I learned very early how easily writers can be misled.
In high school, I attended a poetry workshop at my school in rural Arkansas. At the end, we were told to select our best poem to be published. For a young writer, that word hit like lightning. Published. It felt like the door had opened.
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Only later did the other part come out.
​To be included, we had to preorder the book—$35 a copy, and we needed to try to sell 9 more to our families. In the 1990s,
for a community like ours, that wasn’t pocket change. It wasn’t really about publishing our work at all. It was about selling books to the writers themselves. That was my first lesson, even if I didn’t yet have the language for it.
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Years later, when I tried to publish seriously, the pattern repeated—just louder and more expensive.
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Once my name was out there, vanity presses found me. Emails. Promises. “We love your book.” One even pitched a children’s book (which I never published) for $6,000 upfront (and obviously hidden fees). The illustration samples they sent were bad. The praise was generic. The excitement faded fast, replaced by the sinking realization that this wasn’t about my work. It was about my wallet.
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A few years before, I had been diagnosed with Ménière’s disease, a disabling condition that changed my life and my finances. Like many writers, I didn’t have thousands of dollars to gamble—especially not on something that felt dishonest.
So I researched.
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Vanity presses turned out to be a rabbit hole of scams dressed up as opportunity.
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Traditional publishing? A gated community—agents, margins, rights stripped away, and endless querying with no guarantee of being read.
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Self-publishing? A mountain of conflicting advice, paid “gurus,” and new traps for hopeful authors.
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None of the paths felt built for real people.
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So I did something different: I built the book myself.
I designed The Church Notes Notebook, then another, and another. I learned formatting. Cover design. Editing. My first historical fiction novella began as a Kindle Vella experiment before becoming a finished work.
Along the way, I realized something important:
This process didn’t have to be predatory. Or opaque. Or elitist.
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I was good at this. And more importantly, I could explain it.
Laney House Publishing exists because there is a gap:
between vanity presses that profit from authors,
and traditional publishing that shuts most authors out.
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That gap keeps good books from readers.
And it’s kept deep by gatekeepers and scammers alike.
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We’re building bridges across it.
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No toll booths. No false promises. No games.
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“Authors First, Always” isn’t just a slogan, it’s a promise.
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If you’ve felt excited, then disappointed.
Hopeful, then wary.
Talented, but shut out.
You’re not imagining it. And you’re not alone.
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— Joshua M. Huckaba
Founder, Laney House Publishing LLC
Authors First. Because we're authors too.
​Submit Your Manuscript
Free, No Obligation
Take the next step toward publication-ready excellence. Transform your manuscript into a story readers can't put down, without sacrificing control of your creative work.
What Happens After You Submit
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We review your submission (3-4 weeks)
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If aligned, we contact you to discuss next steps
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If not, we will let you know that as well
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Accepted authors receive a customized publishing proposal (no upsells)
