The Most Common Problems with Academic Presses

We interviewed several scholarly authors who have had negative experiences publishing with academic presses, uncovering some common sources of discontent. The authors we spoke with—anonymized here to protect their privacy—voiced similar frustrations, pointing toward both the limitations of traditional models and concerning recent trends.

What common issues arise for authors when publishing with an academic press? (And why should you consider an alternative like Flatpage publishing?)

Inaccessible Pricing

Most academic publishers sell very few copies of their titles to customers other than libraries, so they tend to set prices with these institutions in mind. Since libraries are willing to pay higher prices than general readers, it makes sense for publishers to maximize profit for the few hundred copies the title will most likely sell.

For authors, however, this approach can be frustrating—especially when they might receive few complimentary copies for family and friends. Academic books are frequently priced around eighty to one hundred dollars. Sometimes they are even more expensive. This is more than many readers are willing to pay, so the price of the book can become a barrier to any author hoping to reach a wider audience.

This creates a larger dilemma, where the inaccessibility of research contributes to disconnects between subject-area expertise and the general public’s understanding. In a country where funding for research is under attack and trust in academic institutions is low, these accessibility problems are not only frustrating for authors, but can inadvertently amplify cultural knowledge gaps with potentially dangerous political implications. 

Unreliable Outsourcing

Over recent decades, many publishers have downsized or restructured. With fewer in-house editors, many have resorted to outsourcing in academic publishing, particularly for certain types of editorial work, such as copyediting and indexing. Although this can be cost-effective for publishers, several authors we interviewed shared their frustrations with this approach. 

One author we spoke with had an indexer do such a terrible job that she ended up redoing her book’s entire index herself—despite still having to pay for the indexer selected by the publisher. The author discovered that the editorial company the publisher employed had very little experience with academic editing, a shortcoming which was made evident by the quality of the copyedits and index she received. “The index they sent me was completely unusable,” the author told us. “They were pulling out weird things, like words that I used once in a description of an image.” Despite her protests, “they still ended up still charging me full price for it, even though I had to go and write the index pretty much from scratch myself.” 

Another author found so many errors in her page proofs that she doubted whether her book was even copyedited by a human. She ended up hiring an additional proofreader at the last minute, feeling as if her publisher had failed her. Both writers were debut authors who cared deeply about the quality of their work and trusted the publisher’s recommendations for outsourced editors. They both were disappointed in the lack of editorial care their projects received.

Despite the extra time and money these authors poured into revisions, some errors could not be corrected in time for the publication of their books. One of the authors spoke of her frustration reading reviews for her first academic book, which pointed out the number of typos in her text—many of which a professional copyediting service should have been able to catch. 

AI Horror Stories

In recent years, unwelcome use of artificial intelligence in publishing (AI) has increasingly become an issue. This is particularly the case in connection with outsourced editorial work—a common yet disturbing complaint we heard from authors and editors alike. As we mentioned above, several authors we spoke to shared stories of publishers outsourcing editorial work to third-party companies that did a noticeably poor job and introduced numerous errors into the text. From the types of errors introduced, however, multiple authors strongly suspected that these third parties had used AI in editing their manuscripts. 

“It was clear to me as a techy person that they had used an AI to copyedit the text, and there were a lot of odd errors that were introduced as a result of that,” one author told us. “I had to do a lot of re-copyediting myself.” In such cases, authors end up spending hours redoing a job themselves—or else pay for another copyeditor or indexer to get the job done properly. When authors feel like they alone care for the integrity of their project, taking on this frustrating, time-consuming, and often costly burden hardly feels like a choice. 

Stories like these are becoming more and more common. Not even the best-known and most reputable academic publishers have been entirely exempt from AI-related complaints. 

Poor Communication and Lack of Accountability

With third-party organizations involved, communication can easily suffer. In our conversations we’ve had multiple authors recount significant communication breakdowns.

According to the authors we interviewed, outsourcing can allow publishers to avoid taking accountability in the editorial process, even as they hand over the project to a third party that may not have been properly vetted. When the author has issues, the publisher maintains deniability, and may refuse to take ownership or bear the financial burden for newly-introduced errors or unprofessional mistakes.

“Because you’re dealing with a third party, once you get the publisher involved, they’re sort of like, this is not my issue anymore,” one author told us.

Editors are normally an author’s primary contact throughout the publishing process. Some authors complained of unreachable and overworked editorial assistants, or found communication challenging even with the editors themselves. One author we spoke to was never notified or given a new point of contact when her original acquisitions editor left the publishing company. 

Miscommunications and mishandled errors can delay production timelines in academic publishing and put the overall quality of an author’s book at risk—not to mention compounding stress and potential financial burdens when an author comes to mistrust the publisher’s handling of their book.

Slow Timeline

Academic publishing is notoriously slow. Most books take years to get published, even after the manuscript is complete. Bureaucratic processes and peer review can be lengthy, and overburdened editors may find it necessary to prioritize certain projects while postponing those further down their list. Despite an editor expressing interest, some authors submit their manuscript only to find their project neglected for months at a time, if not forgotten completely. 

This can be particularly frustrating for authors working on time-sensitive projects—anyone hoping to offer timely commentary on current events or planning their project’s publication to coincide with a historical anniversary or event may be left sorely disappointed.

One author we interviewed spent years waiting for her editor to make progress on her project. This author described rushing to complete her manuscript in 2022, hoping to publish it for a relevant anniversary in 2026. An editor at a well-respected university press had expressed interest in publishing it, and after receiving the go-ahead from the editorial team, the author submitted her manuscript that fall. The author heard little to nothing for months, and then years. When, two years later, the author reached out once again, she learned that the editor still had not even read her manuscript. Not for the first time, she was promised it would be read “soon” and be sent through peer review. 

In the summer of 2025, however, the editor announced that she could no longer take on the project. After three years of waiting on unfulfilled promises, the author was left with nothing to show for it. Now, the anniversary she had once hoped to meet seems barely attainable. She is considering self-publishing, discouraged at the prospect of starting the academic publishing process all over again. 

“I was totally neglected,” the author told us. “She just forgot about me.”

Lack of Control Over Text

Last year, academic authors were horrified when Taylor & Francis sold access to their research to Microsoft AI without any compensation or even notification. One author affected by this described the frustration of her fellow authors, who were not even given the courtesy of a direct notification from their publisher about the deal—much less any choice to opt out of it. “I know it rubbed a lot of people the wrong way,” she said. “We weren’t notified at all. I read it on the news.”

As AI models evolve and expand, it is crucial for publishers to prioritize protecting authors’ privacy, research, and intellectual property. Academic publishers must maintain open, transparent lines of communication regarding any text or data being sold or shared.

Change is Needed

Academic publishers may be struggling with reduced resources and overburdened staff, but clear communication with authors and production quality should not be compromised. Many of the above issues were avoidable—outsourcing work to third parties may necessarily complicate editorial processes, but publishers can prioritize establishing clear, direct lines of communication for authors at every step. Transparency and accountability when it comes to outsourcing, AI use, and selling authors’ data is crucial to controlling for quality, respecting authors’ privacy, and maintaining relationships of trust between authors and academic publishers. The level of care and attention to detail a project is afforded reflects a company’s priorities. Maximizing profit and output should never come at the expense of quality, trust, and care.

Happily, change is already under way: many authors are already considering other options for publishing their scholarly books, including smaller presses, hybrid publishing, and even self-publishing. Beyond academic and traditional presses, there are plenty of other options for academic writers. Innovative independent publishers like Flatpage offer personalized, author-centered alternatives, reimagining the publishing process to better support authors at every step.