On Other Blogs

Richard Wheeler is Blogging Again

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Ed Gorman reports that he will now be sharing his terrific blog, Ed Gorman & Friends, with famed western author Richard Wheeler…and that Jon Breen, Jack O’Connell and Terrill Lee Lankford will continue to offer occasional posts as well. Wheeler’s first post is an interesting story about an established novelist’s foray into self-publishing in the days before print-on-demand made it easy.

In the 1970s my friend Stanley Gordon West wrote a splendid novel called Amos.
It was about a man in a nursing home who fought its corrupt and sinister
administrator. It was successfully published by Houghton Mifflin and became an
Emmy-nominated TV drama starring Kirk Douglas. (It was the reason Kirk Douglas
became an advocate of reforming old-people’s homes.)

Then a funny thing
happened, one of those maddening things about the houses in New York. West was
unable to place another novel with an established publisher. For years he
patiently wrote novels, had various agents submit them, and was steadily turned
down. A few years ago he took another route. He organized his own company,
Lexington Marshall, and published one of those novels that had been rebuffed in
New York. ..

You’ll have to visit the blog to find out what happened next.

The Dollars and Cents of Writing II

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Author SL Viehl shares the royalty statement on her latest paperback.  The book is doing well and she has every reason to be thrilled and proud.  But if you’re an aspiring writer, the numbers will be an important reality check for you about the kind earnings/sales a successful (as opposed to bestselling) author can expect. You should also check out the nitty-gritty of novelist Alison Kent’s recent royalty statement and author Ian Irvine’s excellent article on how publishing works. The chart below, which I posted back in February,  is from his article:

Table 1: What you get in your hand after agents’ cuts, per book

                                                             

COUNTRY   HARDCOVER**   TRADE PAPERBACK**   MASS MARKET PAPERBACK
Pre-tax Price Your share ($A) Pre-taxp Price Your share ($A) Pre-tax Price Your share ($A)
Australia $A40.50 $3.44 $A27.33 2.32 $A18.13 1.54
Britain £17.99 3.21 £12.99 2.32 £7.99* 1.07
USA $US25.95 2.52 US14.95 1.45 $US7.99# 0.62

* Exch. Rate 0.38, royalty 7.5% to 20K, Aust publisher 20%, Aust agent 15%

# Exch. Rate 0.70, royalty 8% to 100K, Aust publisher 20%, Aust agent 15%

** Trade paperback and hardcover royalties 10%

 

No Oral for My Boys

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Over on my brother’s blog, he’s talking about the lynch mob that’s going after Paul Ruditis for his book RAINBOY PARTY (and he quotes a column from a wacko at Jewish World Review, which sure as hell isn’t this Jew’s world. This is the same nutcake who wrote "In Defense of Internment: The Case for Racial Profiling in World War II and the War on Terror" Need I say more?).

RAINBOW PARTY takes its title from high school parties where girls compete to give the most blowjobs to boys…and the boys compete to get the most head that they can.  Clearly, this isn’t the latest Nancy Drew, though if a guy is gonna win this, he’s got to be a pretty Hardy Boy.  I haven’t read the book, so I can’t say how graphic it is, or if its age-appropriate for teenagers. Be that as it may, I was struck by the Amazon review that Tod quotes:

Don’t buy it unless you’re going to burn it, May 25, 2005

Reviewer: PAUL C. FRY (Cleveland, OH USA) – See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

One reason that I’m giving this a lousy review because I’m a parent.
I’ve got two boys so far; I don’t want either of them giving or getting
oral sex when they’re teenagers. Or ever for that matter.

He doesn’t want his kid to ever have oral sex? And never  give it? Makes you wonder what poor Mrs. Fry’s sex life has been like (let me say here and now that when my daughter is an adult, I want her to have as much oral sex from her lover or husband as she would like. You go girl!). But Tod talks all about  the evils of oral sex, so I won’t belabor the point. What Tod didn’t do, and what I’ve done, is check out Mr. Fry’s Amazon wish list.  Most of the titles are right-wing political stuff and bible-related books like Scripture Matters: Essays on Reading the Bible from the Heart of the Church, They Think You’re Stupid: Why Democrats Lost Your Vote and What Republicans Must Do to Keep It, The New Faithful: Why Young Adults Are Embracing Christian Orthodoxy, Swear to God : The Promise and Power of the Sacraments,  Ten Things You Can’t Say In America, and Lord Have Mercy: The Healing Power of Confession. But he’d also like you to get him the  CD Sonic Bullets: 13 From the Hip by Bambi Molesters (I kid you not!).

Is it any wonder he  wants to buy a book to burn it…and prays that his boys never have to endure a blowjob?  Or, God forbid (literally, I suppose), that they should ever have to orally pleasure their wives’ milky womanhoods?

The Name is Goldberg, Lee Goldberg

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AvtakThe James Bond site MI6 is celebrating the 20th anniversary of A VIEW TO A KILL by giving my old articles about the movie (written for Starlog and the LA Times Syndicate among others) a slick, new presentation. First up is an interview I did with Roger Moore. Soon they’ll be posting my visit to the set… as well as some of my other 007 coverage.

My God, has it really been 20 years? I can’t believe I’m old enough to have written anything 20 years ago.

A Warehouse Signing

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For his novel WHISKY SOUR, author Joe Konrath did over a hundred drive-by signings last year (that’s bookstore-speak for dropping in to sign stock without an official booksigning event scheduled)   In some cases, he found himself driving for hours to sign three copies. Not the best use of his time. So, for his new mystery, he visited an Indiana book distribution warehouse and "handsigned" 3000 copies books.  He tells the story today on his blog. Was this four-hour warehouse signing a better use of his time than visiting one-on-one with various booksellers? Who knows. He’s certainly getting more signed books  into the marketplace than he would have personally visiting stores on a book tour…but is it the signed books that count, or the personal interaction with sellers and customers?

“Not Ready For Publication” Authors

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Novelist Karin Gillespie keeps running into a self-published author on the bookselling/hyping circuit and it’s pissing her off. 

Writing a book doesn’t make someone an author anymore than applying
a Band-Aid to a skinned knee makes someone a doctor. Reviewers of large
newspapers, publishing people and most media outlets can spot these
so-called “authors” fairly readily, but how can the average Joe tell
the difference between a real writer and a dilettante?

I know
I sound petty, but as a writer who went through a great deal of trouble
to learn my craft, I’m annoyed that my efforts and other authors’
efforts are diluted by not-ready-for-publication authors.

After
all, the public is deluged with plenty of traditionally published
books; it shouldn’t have to sort through the efforts of amateurs as
well.

Yikes.  I hope she owns a Kevlar vest.  My sister-in-law Wendy apparently hasn’t learned anything watching all the trouble her husband and brother-in-law get into expressing their opinions on self-publishing, fanfic, and well, just about everything. She dives head-first into the controversy with:

I can say I agree with the sentiment that self publishing, well, doesn’t count as being published.  Printed yes, published no.

Boo hiss. Tar and feather me. I am not a friend of the artist. I’m elitist; a cog in corporate America’s machine to destroy fresh, young voices. Oh, grow up.

I have this theory: not everyone deserves to be published. It’s not like kindergarten where every kid gets a gold star for showing up. It’s more like high school where not every graduating senior has the academic chops to gain admittance to Harvard. A harsh reality for anyone with a dream, but a reality nonetheless.

They are both echoing the fine advice that Richard Wheeler left on this blog the other day. Even so, I’m sure these posts are bound to create a firestorm of anger among the PublishAmerica an iUniverse customers who call themselves published authors.