Man, I'm sorry to hear that.

I have said here and in other places that you enter a contractual agreement with any one at your own peril if you don't first consult intellectual property counsel. The relationship between a young or new author and a publisher is anything but arm's length. The publisher is going to be more sophisticated and the author is going t be extremely enamored of the very idea of being picked up.

The imbalance of bargaining power is enormous.


The presence of the attorney can get an awful lot of things out of the way right up front such as choice of laws and forum for any dispute resolution or litigation how royalties and other funds are to be distributed there's a checklist of hundreds of things (some very complex) a good IP attorney will be pouring over in every such negotiation seeking at every hand to increase the advantage of his client.

I understand that an attorney is not cheap and most writers don't have much money but the long term results of having counsel at the inception reach out with positive results and benefits no matter whether the relationship between the writer and publisher ends in conflict or is a happy beneficial one. The lawyer will get you the better deal and protect from potential weaknesses in the beginning.