Right of reply

The Bookseller recently carried an article about Unbound which seemed to suggest that authors might have been able to do more to protect themselves from what happened with the publisher. This didn’t seem to be a fair or accurate representation of the circumstances, so a number of former Unbound authors wrote this letter in reply.

This letter began in response to a piece recently published in The Bookseller, offering lessons for authors to draw from Unbound’s demise. As authors directly involved, we wanted to take the opportunity to redirect the article’s focus - because the crucial lessons to be drawn from this experience, we believe, are lessons for the publishing industry in general, and for the current and former management of Unbound and Boundless in particular.

CLARITY

As the authors of the books at the centre of this conversation, we’ve always been the public representatives for our projects. That’s never been more painfully obvious than in the past few months, which we’ve spent responding to query after query from readers who are rightfully upset, angry and confused. And we’ve had to do this with a toolkit of vague, fragmentary and inconsistent information.

For some published authors, this search for clarity has been a much longer journey. In many cases, we now know that royalties, profit share, foreign rights monies and other fees had gone unpaid for months and even years - and that some authors had initiated legal cases long before Unbound went into administration. On top of this, a number of authors have come to realise that the tracking of their sales figures appears to have been flawed at the very least (and sometimes, from what we can understand, misreported to an alarming degree).

In the period leading up to Unbound’s closure, the company created a sense of reassuring transparency. It provided updates about its cash flow issues, assured us of its commitment to our books and authors, and asked us to refrain from speaking to journalists who were then beginning to investigate the business.

Through this same period, some authors sought direct confirmation that their books weren’t at risk. Some tried to cancel their projects entirely, only to be persuaded to stay on with assurances that the company had a viable path forward. But in reality, as we now know, Unbound’s leaders had begun speaking to administrators by January 2025, and laying the foundations for what would become Boundless. When that new enterprise launched, it did so with yet more assurances, and promises of deliverable payment plans for the money they owed: a promise they reneged upon within three months of their foundation.

Authors of cancelled projects (some fully funded, and deep into production) didn’t even get that. Unbound chose not to offer affected customers any direct apology or explanation - leaving matters to a third-party email, notifying readers that the business had entered administration, without offering any further detail. So, in addition to losing years of work, those authors have had to devote much of their time and energy to informing and supporting disappointed readers.

At its heart, the company’s model was clear: readers pledged money to books, which authors wrote and Unbound then published. It was a principle on which, we all believed, everyone was clear. It was embedded in everything Unbound communicated, from the moment they first launched the company: ‘A better deal for authors. A better deal for readers.’ Its founders made that clarity its core message: ‘although pledging involves handing over actual money,’ a Guardian feature on the company explained in 2011, ‘supporters aren't taking a risk, because if the book doesn't receive the required number of pledges, the project is scrapped and everyone gets their money back.’

Yet here we are. Many of us have had not received any money back; many have had only partial payment. Several have seen projects disappear entirely. Three months on, we’re no closer to understanding where that money went. And through all of this, it’s honestly shocking how rarely the single most important fact has been stated: at some point, senior figures in Unbound’s management structure decided they had the authority to take money raised by authors (through crowdfunding for books), and money owed to authors (for sales on published books), and spend it elsewhere without telling us.

SUPPORT

We all began our publishing journeys in isolation. While many of us were first time authors, we’ve had advice and assistance from agents, experts and industry organisations throughout those journeys. And in recent months - individually and collectively, privately and publicly - we’ve had welcome shows of sympathy and solidarity, from across the industry. But what Unbound’s demise has shown, to a quite alarming degree, is how little tangible, active advocacy is available to authors in this situation.

To a large degree, the only real support we’ve had has come from the network we’ve begun to build with each other; a structure that has afforded us the willpower and energy to challenge Unbound and Boundless on their handling of the process, and to begin to construct a partial, patchwork history of the company’s failure. As we’ve talked to each other, we’ve heard story after heartbreaking story, showing how authors have been left to deal with significant, entirely unnecessary mental, physical and financial hardships - for some, to a quite life-altering degree.

This lack of support isn’t an issue unique to the publishing industry: many of the difficulties we’ve faced, whether as authors or readers, come down to the blanket of insulation the administration process offers. But we would hope, at the very least, that our experience spurs the industry to find a way to give authors even a shred of the protection British law gives to businesses.

ACCOUNTABILITY

We’ve heard the word ‘sorry’, on multiple occasions, from senior figures at both Boundless and Unbound. But, each time, those words have been accompanied by statements that couch the company’s demise in loose, frustratingly abstract terms (‘bad decisions’, ‘financial troubles’, ‘historic mismanagement’) - as though it had fallen victim to a natural disaster, rather than to deliberate actions taken by its leadership.

To reiterate: Unbound went into administration, owing over 360 individual authors and editors a stated sum of at least £656,671.04 (but likely nearly twice that, due to accounting irregularities.) The sparse financial information publicly available offers us only year-end snapshots, however, with nothing to explain where and how money was spent on these projects - and who, in that process, made the determination to spend that money. But It’s become apparent that the company invested in a number of substantial projects in the last decade. And from the point, in February 2024, when directors began to tell authors that cash flow difficulties would result in postponed payment, Unbound continued to spend on everything BUT authors - including the Boundless substack magazine, launched this January. And the company continued to solicit pledges and sell to readers right up to March 2025.

Perhaps most importantly, through all of this, there’s been scarcely any mention of the readers themselves. Readers who paid Unbound money, in good faith, to support books - not to subsidise operating costs, or bankroll vanity projects. Readers whose status shifted, overnight, from ‘valued customer’ to ‘unsecured creditor’ - 7,894, all told, owed an estimated total of £390,564.82.

As authors, all we expected was for our books to be published in line with Unbound’s stated mission - and for their sales and profits to be honestly and accurately reported. As for readers, all they expected was the bare minimum any customer expects from any business; delivery of the product they had paid for.

Now, as a bare minimum, we all deserve real support, honest accountability, and clear answers. While we wait for these to materialise, we would greatly appreciate it if reporting could keep the focus on how and why this happened. And above all, on those who caused this situation, and who continue to avoid accountability.

Signed:

Ariel Anderssen

Kat Brown

Ella Buchan

Alex de Campi

Tom Cox

Did You Know Gaming (Matt Barnes, Dazz Brown, Greg S-C)

Rob Dwiar

Alice Fraser

Paul Gannon

Steven Goodwin

Paul David Gould

Daniel Hardcastle

Andy Kelly

Louis King

Soren Lily

Rosemary Mac Cabe

Sanjana Modha

Joel Morris

Liz O’Riordan

John-Michael O’Sullivan

Jane Perrone

Marie Phillips

Sophie Pierce

Rebekah Pierre

Mat Pringle

Aaron Reynolds

Maren Sheldon (on behalf of Kris Hallenga)

Julie Warren

Ben Fletcher Watson