Month: August 2010

Lori Jareo’d

by

No surprise:  Faster than you can say "Lori Jareo, " delusional fanficcer Lady Sybilla's self-published TWILIGHT sequel RUSSET NOON has been yanked off of Amazon. It's also now "on hold" on CreateSpace.

Lady Sybilla issued a press release after Hachette Group slapped her, Amazon and CreateSpace with a cease & desist order. She says, in part:

[…]However, the question still remains: Is this the end of Russet Noon? Does Lady Sybilla really need Amazon in order to continue to sell her controversial book?

And, last but not least, will Hachette Book Group go as far as suing Lady Sybilla in order to get a judge to determine whether or not Russet Noon is a parody?

Only time will tell.

For the time being, Russet Noon is still for sale via its official website at www.sequel-to-breaking-dawn.com. Moreover, according to a statement issued today by AV Paranormal Publishing, "Lady Sybilla has no intention of backing down. She will gladly stand before a judge to prove that Hachette's claims are unsubstantiated and that Russet Noon is, in fact, a parody, as it has undergone major rewrites since its online publication in 2009."

Let the legal battles begin.

Oh, I hope this goes to court. Hilarity will ensue.

It’s All About Buzz

by

If you read the newspapers, the blogs and the trades, there's no question that MAD MEN is a huge critical and popular hit.

But if you look at the numbers, it's a different story.

On Sunday, MAD MEN, drew 2.2 million viewers and scored a 0.8 rating. THE GLADES, which isn't getting nearly the same amount of buzz or adoration, drew 3.1 million and the same rating. THE GLADES also out-performed HBO's HUNG (2.5 million, 1.4) and ENTOURAGE (2.6 million, 1.5) in eyeballs, if not rating.

So THE GLADES has more viewers than ENTOURAGE, HUNG, and MAD MEN… and yet isn't drawing anywhere near the same amount of media attention or adoration. Which, I suppose, may prove it's not how many viewers are actually watching your show that makes you a hit… it's how many people in the media say that you are one.

 

“Stories That Drip Crap Out of Every Electronic Orifice”

by

The glow blogger/author Bryon Quertermous sees outside his window tonight is from the horde of enraged, self-published authors burning his effigy. He took a shot at self-published e-authors and their readers today on the aptly named Do Some Damage blog that isn't going to make him a lot of friends among the "indie writer" crowd. He wrote, in part:

[…] Other than improper use of grammar, mistakes regarding guns, and swearing, nothing seems to bother the legion of readers snapping up these Kindle books for $.99 with awful writing, poorly developed characters, and stories that just generally drip crap out of every electronic orifice. […] But it doesn't seem to bother readers. Sure, they'll comment on it in an Amazon review or whatever, but then mention that they still loved the story and will buy the next book by the author.

But my biggest insult comes from the fact that they don't seem to distinguish AT ALL the difference between an author who has slaved and sacrificed and put in the hard work to make their book the best they can be then run the gauntlet of gatekeepers, rules, traditions, whims, luck, and corporate landmines that hold together the publishing industry or the author who gave up on the traditional route and slapped up a rough draft with some zippy copy and a garish self-designed cover with some blurbs from their mom and their old aunts writing group. It's hard some days when the writing isn't coming or the rejections are coming too fast and I want to give up. But I've known all along that I don't just want to be published, I want to be published right. Call me elitist, call me traditional or stuffy or whatever, but that's what I signed on for and that's what I'm working toward.

So do you agree with him? Or are you going to bring the matches to the effigy-burning?

The Glades

by

Jim-longworth-forms-hypothesis Bill Rabkin and I wrote Sunday night's episode of the hit summer series THE GLADES on A&E. Our episode is called "The Girlfriend Experience" and I hope you enjoy it.  Our next episode, "Booty," is shooting now and will air sometime in September.

Dorchester Getting out of the Paperback Biz

by

Publishers' Weekly reports that Dorchester is getting out of the paperback book business and shifting to an e-book and POD model.

Mass market romance publisher Dorchester Publishing has dropped its traditional print publishing business in favor of an e-book/print-on-demand model effective with its September titles that are “shipping” now. President John Prebich said after retail sales fell by 25% in 2009, the company knew that 2010 “would be a defining year,” but rather than show improvement, “sales have been worse.”

[…]Dorchester will continue to do print copies for its book club business and has signed a deal with Ingram Publisher Service for IPS to do print-on-demand copies for selected titles. According to Prebich, some e-books that are doing well in the digital marketplace will be released as trade paperbacks with IPS fulfilling orders; the company, however, will not do any more mass market paperbacks for retail distribution.

I am running out the door, so I haven't had a chance to give this development much thought. I'll probably post more about it later. But I wonder what this means for their Hard Case Crime imprint?

UPDATE – Apparently, the Wall Street Journal was wondering the same thing:

Hard Case Crime, an imprint owned by closely held Winterfall LLC, said it may seek to move its mystery books from Dorchester to another publishing house.

"It's been a good run, but if they aren't publishing mass market paperbacks, we'll have to decide what to do. I'm a believer in the mass format, but I do understand the reality of the marketplace," said Charles Ardai, who owns Hard Case Crime.

The country's largest consumer book publisher, Bertelsmann AG's Random House Inc., said it continues to be a strong believer in mass paperbacks. One of the country's most successful mystery writers, the late John D. MacDonald, is available from Random House exclusively in mass paperback.

"It's still a viable, popular, lower-priced alternative to the other reading formats," said Stuart Applebaum, a spokesman for Random House. "It also has a committed readership. Will that commitment be forever in a transformative marketplace? We'll have to wait and see.

UPDATE: And Charles Ardai elaborated in a comment he left here, that says:

It means that future Hard Case Crime titles will most likely be published by a company other than Dorchester (although Dorchester may still distribute them to their book club members).

Interesting times. More info to come as things ripen…

Novelizing THE TUDORS

by

There was a very nice article in today's Waynesboro News-Leader about author & IAMTW member Elizabeth Massie winning the Scribe award for her brilliant novelization of THE TUDORS.

A two-time winner of the Bram Stoker Award, Massie is an accomplished writer of original horror stories, as well as historical fiction. She has had numerous short stories, novels and anthologies published since 1984. Her "Tudors" novelizations of seasons two and three were published in 2008 and 2009, respectively. The show aired for four seasons and ended in June. As a writer of original works, Massie's "Tudors" projects presented her with some unique challenges.

Massie, 56, was sent scripts for each episode and then wrote the season into one book at the same time it was being filmed in Ireland.

The books had to be loyal to the show, but the scripts, as they tend to be, were scant in details and description.

So Massie had to conduct historical research to bring the story alive on the page.

"The script would say something like, 'King Henry enters the room. He sits on a chair. He starts to talk,'" she said. "I had to fill in details of the way things looked, what they ate, how long did it take to get from London to Hever Castle (by horse and carriage). Things like that."

[…]Goldberg said Massie's "Tudors" work is especially unique because she wrote an entire season into one book.

"She managed to make the book read like a literary novel," he said. "She gave it this classy patina that these books don't often have…"

You can find out more about the challenges she faced in her chapter on novelizing THE TUDORS in TIED IN: The Business, History and Craft of Media Tie-In Novels, which is available in a Kindle edition and in a trade paperback edition.