What The Heck Is Hybrid Publishing?

Featuring Guests Leslie Schover and Suzanne Uttaro Samuels

A Quick Recap

Before taking a close look at Hybrid Publishing, here’s a brief overview of the different models of publishing.

For a more in-depth description of Traditional Publishing and Self-Publishing, please refer to my post, "Sixties-Plus Female Authors Are Challenging Ageist Stereotyping."

The Hierarchy

• Top Dogs - the Big Five Publishing Houses

• Independent Hybrid Publishers

• Self-publishing or Indie Publishing

• Vanity Press

Traditional Publishing

When you sign with a traditional publisher, you sell the rights to the book, and the publisher’s money comes from book sales and the sale of other rights. Hence, the publisher hopes that the book will be a big seller. The publishing house covers all upfront costs, thus absorbing the associated risk, and the author may receive an advance against future royalties, although this is becoming less common. The author is expected to market and publicise the book. This includes being active on social media.

Self-Publishing or Indie Publishing

In this model, the author has full creative control and funds all aspects of the publication, including printing costs. There are numerous options for an author to hire freelancers, such as editors and cover designers. Authors can upload their books to online stores, such as Amazon. The author has to be willing to run their self-publishing as a business, and the biggest challenge for an Indie author is discoverability in a sea of millions of other books.

Vanity Press

With a Vanity Press, the author pays for the entire publication process, so they do not need to go through a selection process. A Vanity Press will often outsource the editing and book cover design to someone else, for which the author pays, of course. The fees paid by the author are the Vanity Press’s primary source of revenue rather than royalties from book sales.

Hybrid Publishers

Here, I am highlighting Sibylline Press as they are Suzanne’s publisher, and She Writes Press as they are Leslie’s publisher. These two hybrid publishers exemplify the hybrid publishing model.

Independent Hybrid Publishers are a cross between traditional publishing and the author’s contribution model.

• Authors submit an application, and the best hybrids have high standards. Julia Park Tracey, Executive Editor at Sibylline Press, informed me that their acquisition process is “rigorous”. If they receive a complete book that they love (not merely like), then they will move to the next step, which is to have a conversation about “…if we think the book would sell.” Only then will they reach out to the author.

• She Writes Press only publishes manuscripts that they deem to be publish-ready, based purely on the merit of the writing and not on author platform or other subjective measures. Submissions are a two-tiered process. For details, go here.

• The hybrid publisher receives an income stream from book sales, hence the need to be selective in the books they choose to publish. Book sales are the primary source of revenue for Sibylline Press, not “‘pay for play’ hybrid or vanity publishing.” Sibylline Press ask that authors help promote the book.

• A hybrid package may be far more expensive for an author than self-publishing independently, and quality may vary. At Sibylline Press, authors are asked to co-op by sharing in the marketing. The fee can vary, but it covers a publicist, advertising, social media branding and beyond. For a Sibylline Digital First imprint’s marketing co-op, an author can expect to pay US$7500. For more details about an author’s contribution and investment, go here.

• At She Writes Press, they offer one all-inclusive package at US$10,000. For more information about this package, go here.

• Because a Sibylline Press Digital First imprint will be distributed mostly online, it is a 6-9 month publishing process. If a book is selected for their trade imprint, an author is invited to be their partner and take part in a two-year intensive publication process.

• The author’s contract with Sibylline Press gives Sibylline Press the rights to publish the book, but the author retains copyright. This is in complete contrast to the traditional publishing model.

• At She Writes Press, the author invests in the publishing package up front, but retains 60% of the net profits on their print books, and 70% of the net profits (minus a small distribution fee) on their ebooks.

• The hybrid model is perfect for an author who wants to maintain control while also benefiting from the backing of a team of experienced professionals.

Today’s Challenges For Traditional Publishers

• High tariffs on books printed in China will harm the publishing industry, not to mention the cost of shipping containers. Kathleen Schmidt argues that this is why publishers have become more selective in publishing specific categories.

• As the costs of production, marketing and distribution rise and squeeze profit margins, publishers will not want to take risks on new authors in these categories because ‘…consumers will baulk.’ Schmidt states this is a serious problem looming for the industry, and authors must be aware of it.

• There is still an underrepresentation of historically marginalised voices—people of colour, the LGBTQ+ community, individuals with disability and various ethnic and cultural groups. Older women are also underrepresented, stemming from a combination of ageism, sexism and societal biases that undervalue the perspectives and life experiences of older women.

• Print publishing revenue has declined as consumers’ preferences for online books (ebooks and audiobooks), magazines, and newspapers have increased.

• Publishers are being forced to adapt and take a position on the use of AI, from writing and editing to narration.

• Reports show that major publishing houses accept less than 1% of submitted manuscripts. But with the advent of self-publishing and hybrid publishing, traditional publishing is no longer the only option. They have competition. Authors have other options that don’t take 18 months to two years to get a book to market.

• Authors are also exploring new ways to bypass the need for traditional retail channels, for example, selling directly from their author website.

• According to Schmidt, book publishing has become over-reliant on BookTok, ‘and it’s unhealthy’. She suggests that publishers must act more like brands and ‘…experiment with Reels (longer-form videos)’, for example, on Instagram.

• Given that publishing is a for-profit business, it is unacceptable that salaries in the industry are so low. As a consequence, morale is low and departments are understaffed. This impacts the quality of service an author receives.

• The stigma around paperback originals should be removed. Hardcover editions should be published after a big audience has been built for the author.

• There’s a need for a fairer, more transparent ‘author advance’ system to be created.

• Putting the onus on authors to get pre-orders for their books is a waste of time. Expecting people to pre-order a book months in advance is unrealistic. A better system is needed.

We are in the midst of big challenges and changes!

My two guests in this post have opted to go with hybrid publishers.

I’m excited to learn how they made such a decision!

Introducing Leslie Schover

Leslie is a psychologist who has previously authored four non-fiction books. Now she has taken on the challenge of writing her first novel, Fission: A Novel of Atomic Heartbreak, to be published in January 2026 by She Writes Press.

Leslie has also started writing her second novel, entitled Golden Pearls. This novel is about a 70-year-old physician who retires and discovers her breast cancer has returned. Our intrepid author is venturing into the challenging waters of writing Boomer sex scenes. She shocked her reading critique group by describing the man in the sex scene as using a vacuum erection pump because he has erectile dysfunction!

Kisane:

Your novel Fission was inspired by your parents, and your heroine is based on your mother’s experiences…

#1: How does being later in life give an author the freedom to write fiction based on a family saga?

Leslie:

Writing a saga that is at least partially based on family stories, I found myself worrying 1) about hurting people’s feelings; and 2) about accuracy (both of the family tales themselves and of my memory of them). Now that I am seventy-two, and both my parents and my older sister are long gone, those concerns are diminished. Since Fission: A Novel of Atomic Heartbreak takes place during World War II, anyone who worked with my parents or knew them in Oak Ridge is highly unlikely to be alive.

I still find myself a little concerned that readers will conflate the reality-based scenes of life in Oak Ridge with the totally fictional love triangle I created between the heroine Doris (based on my mother) and a Soviet atomic spy (based loosely on two actual spies who operated in Oak Ridge). As far as I know, my mother never had an affair during those years. Would she have been angry that I invented one? I think not, because she was a woman who felt she had a right to sexual pleasure, and she also had a sense of humour. However, I would guess that my father, if he were still alive, would be quite indignant. I also include unflattering portraits of members of my extended family and one of my mother’s friends. Again, they are all deceased, so I felt able to exaggerate a few of their negative characteristics in the interest of the plot.

Writing the novel, even at this stage of my life, helped me with unresolved grief for my mother. As a child, I was very close to her. By the time I reached my teen years, she was quite bitter and depressed. She repeatedly confided in me about problems in my parents’ marriage, until I finally got enough insight and assertiveness to stop her (no coincidence that I became a psychologist). She apologised, but I found her despair so aversive that I distanced myself from her, which I know was another source of pain. She died at age sixty-nine, when I was thirty-nine and pregnant with my son. Writing about her young adulthood helped me understand her dreams and the harsh realities of being a gifted woman in that era. I cannot go back and remedy my lack of compassion, but I did give Doris a happier ending.

Kisane:

#2: In your upcoming novel Golden Pearls, you take on many challenging scenarios: cancer, Boomer sex scenes, and the inevitable death of the protagonist. Where does your courage to tackle such issues stem from?

Leslie:

The older I get, the more I think about death—how and when it will come and whether I can meet it with some grace and pride in what I have accomplished in my life. Julia, the heroine of Golden Pearls, also confronts those issues. Most humans in our modern, sanitised post-industrial world think of death as little as possible. I did not have that luxury, having spent most of my career as a clinical psychologist working with cancer patients. Two caveats: much of my job involved research and program development, rather than direct clinical work; and my speciality was helping people with sexuality and fertility issues (life in the shadow of death).

When I was in my early sixties, I had localised breast cancer two separate times, although I do not seem to have any of the genetic mutations that confer increased risk. I have also had a couple of scares in recent years. I found a lump under my armpit and had an abnormal mammogram and biopsy. Luckily, they were false alarms. The extra misery of being a health professional who knows a little too much (but never quite enough), and simultaneously being a patient, is something I wanted to write about. My career in treating sexual problems also focused on the ones associated with ageing and chronic illness, so Golden Pearls is, in multiple ways, writing what I know.

I am trying to find a balance between portraying dread and also keeping humour and satire at the forefront. Some of my favorite scenes so far include a send-up of Big Pharma drug ads for breast cancer medications (Live your best life!); Julia’s interactions with her sister, who keeps trying to get her to try alternative medicine remedies (such as what Julia calls the Kermit smoothie, a bitter green brew of arugula and Manuka honey); and a parody of PBS specials on cosmology and the universe (Julia’s son is an astrophysicist). And of course, I am having fun writing Boomer sex scenes! (See Nuclear Fiction Newsletter, #10).

Kisane:

#3: What criteria did you use to pick She Write Press as your publisher?

Leslie:

I have written three novels: my World War II historical, which will be published by the hybrid press, SheWrites, in January 2026; a psychological thriller (currently in evaluation at two very small presses); and Golden Pearls (still in first draft stage).

When I started writing fiction in 2022, after almost a fifty-year hiatus since my undergraduate creative writing days, I took workshops and paid for an edit on Fission. Partly because I published four nonfiction books with traditional presses (and an agent) in the Jurassic age, and partly because I have always been a perfectionist, I started out querying agents. I read repeatedly that one should not give up before querying a hundred agents, but after around thirty without a bite, I was quite discouraged.

I have rarely felt the impostor effect in my psychology and nonfiction career. I knew my skills. However, I struggle with evaluating my fiction writing. I learned about hybrid publishing from an author who published with Brooke Warner, the owner of SheWrites Press (@Writerly Things with Brooke Warner). I liked the idea that SheWrites was selective, had helped to define hybrid publishing, and was definitely not a vanity press. I also read an article that Brooke published about the extra difficulty for older authors in getting an agent. She actually had some statistics on book deals to back up her observations. I find this understandable, if sad, since most agents hope to find authors who will write a whole series of marketable novels. Although as a retired professional, I have lots of time to write, I may have a limited time horizon!

I quickly educated myself about hybrid publishing and SheWrites’ track record. It seemed like a reasonable option for a debut novelist who had a minimal chance of getting traditionally published. In addition, SheWrites had recently partnered with Simon & Schuster to market and distribute their books. I somewhat impulsively submitted my manuscript. When they accepted Fission, I did a deeper dive. I found out that Brooke was an old friend of my writing workshop mentors, who encouraged me to go ahead, if I could afford it.

The big drawback of hybrid publishing is that the author must invest a large sum of money—certainly more than a savvy author would pay to self-publish. I did not really consider self-publishing at that stage in my author education. I still find the idea daunting. In addition to the SheWrites basic package, I was required to have a “copy-edit” (more like a structural edit) of my manuscript. I also paid for help in securing copyright permissions. I will probably fund a small print run later this year. Very few hybrid fiction or memoir authors (my estimate, after online research, would be fewer than ten per cent) earn back an initial $15,000 and up outlay, even with the higher royalty rates offered. Another statistic I have seen tossed around is that ninety per cent of Indie novels sell less than two hundred copies.

A surprise for me, after signing the contract, was the request for every SheWrites author to hire a publicist, at a typical additional cost of $15,000-$30,000. I have also done a lot of research on the dismal, current state of book publicity and marketing (I would recommend Kathleen Schmidt’s excellent Substack

Publishing Confidential

).

Even if you ascribe to the maxim that you are investing in your “author brand” rather than expecting a return-on-investment in terms of sales, book publicists can accomplish a limited amount in today’s shrinking, traditional and social media environment. I decided, instead, to take an intensive course on do-it-yourself book marketing, Lainey Cameron’s 12 Weeks to Book Launch Success @ Best of Book Marketing. I now have a detailed DIY map of how I intend to publicise my book and am putting it into practice.

SheWrites Press has some unique advantages. I admire Brooke Warner’s wisdom and experience, as well as her commitment to her authors. She has fostered a “sisterhood” among the authors, including Facebook groups, “cohort” groups of authors publishing in the same quarter, weekly office hours, and encouragement of author mutual assistance. She knows that her author group skews to white, affluent, older women who can afford the SheWrites services, and dedicates some funds to publishing authors from underrepresented groups. SheWrites produces beautiful book covers, and their authors win many Indie book contests (although I have scepticism about the whole book contest “racket”. Each contest has large entry fees for its numerous categories. Prizes include runner-ups, honourable mentions, silver medals, etc.)

Kisane:

#4 What has been your greatest challenge while going through the publishing process, and what is your greatest take-away to help other female authors 60s-plus?

Leslie:

The biggest challenges have been my self-doubt about the quality of my fiction writing and my difficulty in giving up the desire to have an agent and be traditionally published. I want people to read my books and anticipate that finding an audience will continue to take a lot of work.

A great advantage for me in being a later-life author is that I am not depending on income from my writing to support my lifestyle. However, I also do not have the means to just heedlessly pour my retirement funds into continued hybrid publishing and traditional book publicity. I need to think strategically about how to publish my future novels. I enjoy writing tremendously. It fills my life and helps me create new networks of friends.

I encourage my fellow senior authors to keep writing! Staying mentally active and having social ties are two of the most important ways to age well.

Leslie’s Substack

Introducing Suzanne Uttaro Samuels

Suzanne has been a legal scholar and former college professor, and is an award-winning novelist and essayist. She has written three non-fiction books, and Seeds of the Pomegranate is her debut novel, published on September 2, 2025 by Sibylline Press.

Suzanne’s books have explored the themes of the complexities of family and social life, and the ongoing struggle for freedom and equality in the United States. Her next book is entitled The Orphans’ Wheel, and will be set in nineteenth-century Sicily during the Wars of Independence. This is the story of Rosina Inglese, the Nonna from Seeds.

Kisane:

You’ve spent the last fifteen years writing The Seeds of the Pomegranate. That’s a long time.

Kisane:

#1: How did your personal growth and journey during that timeframe inform and change your story and characters?

Suzanne:

During those years, I was raising my two children, caring for my elderly mother, and trying to launch my fiction-writing career. Between swim practices and hockey games, geriatrician consultations and doctor's visits, I tried to work out what makes a compelling story and a relatable protagonist.

Amidst this, I discovered my great-grand aunt Mimi, who sacrificed herself to save my grandfather from perishing in a tenement fire. There was something about this—a woman who gave everything to protect the people she loved—that stayed with me and became the heart of Seeds of the Pomegranate.

Mimi stayed with me as I navigated the challenges of being a mother and daughter, whispering to me that I needed to hold space for the one, single thing that lit me up inside—my writing. She’s been my constant companion throughout, urging me not to lose myself while I cared for the people who relied upon me. Like so many others in the sandwich generation, this has been a huge challenge. Mimi—both my fictional character and my real great-grandaunt—helped me navigate it.

Kisane:

#2: What do you do when you hit a dead end in family research—when some unexpected twists or gaps can’t be explained?

Suzanne:

Great question! There were so many twists and gaps in the research for this book. The first was that the real Mimi was born in 1888, but when she entered Ellis Island in 1906, she was listed as being 12 years old. Why make her a child when she was eighteen years old? I discovered that this was a common practice when an immigrant was trying to hide that they had a wasting disease like tuberculosis. There were other gaps, too, like the fact that Mimi’s father, Antonino, wasn’t included in the 1910 Census Records, and that her Nonna, Rosa, had the same maiden name as her son.

Some of these questions were answered by doing more research or visiting Sicily to access the genealogical records. But some questions had no answers, and I had to get comfortable filling in the gaps by imagining who Mimi was and what she might have wanted.

Kisane:

#3: What criteria did you use to pick Sibylline Press as your publisher?

Suzanne:

I loved that Sibylline Press was woman-owned and that their historical fiction list was strong. Seeds of the Pomegranate had already gotten some acclaim in contests sponsored by the Historical Novel Society and the Women Fiction Writers Association, and Sibylline was excited to acquire the manuscript and was committed to distribution and marketing.

With Sibylline, I’ve had a true partner in the publication process. They worked with me to closely edit the manuscript, create original (and gorgeous!) cover art, and vigorously prepare for marketing and publicity around the novel, including a social media “audit,” crafting a publicity campaign, and coaching for bookstore visits and other promotional activities.

It’s an intensive process, beginning at least two years before the publication date. And every “Sibyl” is helped along not just by the press, but by her sister Sibyls. Together, we submit conference proposals, support each other in getting out the word for our books, help with questions and challenges, and cheer each other on in our successes.

There’s real power in that kind of community, especially for debut novelists like me.

Sibylline also committed to publishing my second novel, The Orphans’ Wheel, due out in September 2027. I’m excited to continue working with them.

Kisane:

#4: What has been your greatest challenge while going through the publishing process, and what is your greatest take-away to help other female authors 60s-plus?

Suzanne:

Imagining and crafting the book was a huge challenge. I came from a career as an academic and had written several non-fiction books. I began writing creative non-fiction to bridge the gap, and those early publications gave me the confidence to continue with my fiction.

A lot of this process was coming to understand that my non-fiction and fiction work was connected. I’d always been interested in how people make sense of challenges in their lives, and how they resist and persist.

The best advice I can give is to take one step at a time. First, write the best book you can. Surround yourself with people who believe in you, and find thoughtful and smart critique partners to help you work through the story. If you can afford it, have a professional developmental edit. Then you can enter the query trenches with the confidence that you’re putting your best foot forward.

Stay flexible and be ready to pivot. Give yourself grace when you stumble. Be patient. All of this takes time. Believe that you have enough time.

Suzanne’s Substack

Conclusion

How lucky are we to have the valuable input of two authors who have both had first-hand experience with two Hybrid Publishers! Suzanne’s book was published in February this year, and Leslie’s book will be out in January next year.

Suzanne’s book tells the gritty story of a woman learning to survive in 20th-century Gangland New York, and Leslie tells the story of Oak Ridge during the Manhattan Project. These are the kind of fascinating, historically informed books that are published by women in their sixties and beyond!

I hope this post leaves you with a good understanding of what you can expect if you opt for a Hybrid Publisher as opposed to a traditional publisher or self-publishing.

Looking forward to reading your comments!