My friend Ian Ogilvy — best known for playing Simon Templar in THE RETURN OF THE SAINT — has several new websites devoted to his wonderful and hugely successful MEASLE series of children’s books. You can learn more about them here:
Some Velvet Morning
I was saddened to learn today that Lee Hazlewood, one of my favorite singer-songwriters (and guilty pleasures), has passed away. He was famous for his work with Nancy Sinatra ("These Boots Are Made for Walking," "Summer Wine," etc.), but for me, his best stuff was the obscure albums he recorded after Nancy and during his years in Sweden. Even his bad songs were strangely interesting. I’m going to miss him.
Monk gives Ed a Bookgasm
Ed Gorman gives MR. MONK AND THE TWO ASSISTANTS a rave over at Bookgasm. He writes, in part:
Lee Goldberg wrote one of my favorite novels of the past few years, THE MAN WITH THE IRON-ON BADGE, and he brings that same kind of skill to focus on the novels he writes about the TV detective Monk, which also happens to be my favorite TV show. MR. MONK AND THE TWO ASSISTANTS is the best Monk novel yet.
The New York Times Publishes Morons
Craig Mazin beat me to the punch and perfectly skewers Brooks Barnes’ inane editorial about TV & movie residuals in The New York Times. Barnes starts off by saying:
Jasper Johns isn’t paid based on the number of years his flag paintings remain popular attractions at museums. Rem Koolhaas doesn’t cash a check every time an architecture fan takes a trip to Seattle to see his space-age public library. So why should the writers, directors and actors responsible for box-office bombs like “Gigli” be able to pocket some cash every time somebody buys the DVD?
That just gives you a hint of the stupidity to come. Barnes doesn’t seem to grasp the difference between looking and selling. If someone wants to reproduce Johns’ painting in prints or t-shirts, Johns gets a royalty.
Unfortunately, this is only the beginning of Barnes’ idiotic rant which Craig does a wonderful job skewering, point by point. I just hope Craig sent his post the the NY Times as well.
LiveJournal Pounces on Potter “Slash”
CNet reports that LiveJournal has created an uproar by deleting blogs that feature sexually explicit drawings of Harry Potter doing the nasty with other men.
The users’ journal entries contained "drawings depicting minors in explicit sexual situations," which represented a violation of LiveJournal’s policies, according to copies of the letters posted by their recipients.
In ponderosa121’s case, the offending image depicted an unclothed Harry Potter of ambiguous age receiving oral sex from sometimes-villain Severus Snape.
[…]the latest episode has fanfic devotees once again encouraging livid LiveJournal users to switch to "clone" sites in protest and to register their discontent through feedback emails.
Predictably, and laughably, the irate fanficcers are trying to equate Harry Potter porn with larger social issues in an effort to gain mainstream support. Good luck. The blog Darkside Rainbow says:
now users are wondering: who’s next? Will a mother be suspended for posting pictures of her baby’s first bath? Will a gay male be suspended for posting a photograph or even a drawing of himself and his boyfriend kissing? Will a closeted lesbian be suspended for using LiveJournal as a safe haven to discuss her erotic thoughts about other women? Will artists and writers be censored in their creativity because LiveJournal believes that writing or drawing about an act – be it sex, violence, etc. – construes endorsing and promoting it?
I don’t know what’s scarier…that these idiots can’t see the difference between Potter Porn and a picture of a mother bathing her child…or that the so-called "artists" of the Potter Porn are considered "respected members of the fanfic community."
Handselling Joe
I was standing in line at my local Barnes & Noble when I witnessed an amazing thing: A woman was buying several mysteries, and as the salesguy was ringing her up, he asked: "Have you read J.A. Konrath?"
She said no, she’d never heard of him, and that’s when the salesguy pointed to a stack of Konrath books right there on the counter.
"This writer is amazing," The salesguy said. "I sent him an email and told him so…and look what he did." The sales guy picked up a book and pointed proudly to a blurb on the back.
"That’s me!" the guy said.
"Wow," the woman said. And bought the book.
The saleguy did it with the next customer, too. And sold another one of Joe’s books.
I was stunned. It was hand-selling in action…and positive proof that Joe’s unique approach to promoting himself and his books works. I told the guy that I knew Joe and that I’d let him know about the salesguy’s hard work.
"Great," the saleguy said. "Would you like to buy a copy?"
Now I’m wondering if Joe is also paying a commission…
A Lulu from Lulu
Publisher’s Weekly reports this week that Lulu.com is,and I quote, "Turning Bad Books Into Big Bucks."
"We publish a huge number of really bad books," admitted Bob Young, the Canadian entrepreneur who founded the digital publisher Lulu.com in 2002.
He doesn’t care whether the books he publishes are are good or bad. His job is to play on the ego and despiration of aspiring authors who are eager to see their unpublished (and usually unpublishable) manuscripts printed in book form so they can delude themselves into thinking they have been published. Lulu, like most vanity presses, makes the vast majority of their money on authors, not readers.
Andrew Pate, Lulu’s vp of global fullfillment (now there’s an interestig professional title….I wonder if his wife agrees with it?), provides a statistic that puts Lulu’s business into sharp perspective: 80% of their orders are for ONE copy of a book. Can you guess who is buying that copy? The author, of course.
"Retail is still a low percentage of sales," said Pate. About one million people have signed on as members, with about 60% of those buying an item from the site and 40% using the site to create a product.
The company is heading towards revenue of $30 million this year
Back in the USA
I got back to the U.S. late Sunday after nearly four months in Europe and it feels good, though I was wide-awake at 4 a.m. this morning.
I’ve already starting wading through the unbelievable mountain of mail I’ve accumulated while I was away…it’s like the back room of the post office. It’s also like Christmas…the boxes I’ve opened so far include maybe 100 Emmy screeners, some copies of the Polish editions of my MONK books, and stuff I forgot that I ordered on Amazon, DeepDiscount DVD, and eBay.
But I am not stowing my suitcases just yet. I’ll be returning to Germany in about four weeks to finish post-production on FAST TRACK and to be a keynote speaker at the Cologne Conference 2007, along with guys like Steve Bochco and Paul Haggis. And I may be hitting the road with Action Concept’s international sales team to help secure worldwide presales for FAST TRACK in advance of the broadcast of the pilot in Germany (which will happen some time before the end of the year).
Dom-inating
I am back in Cologne, Germany, and enjoying the view of the Dom cathedral out of my hotel window.
We had a wonderful little European roadtrip through Belgium and Holland. The highlights for me were Brugge, Belgium and Ultrecht, Holland, two incredibly beautiful cities with lots of canals, bridges, wonderful architecture, and colorful gardens. I have to visit both places again some day.
I wasn’t wild about Brussels — the streets made me nd my GPS go nuts. The Brussels city planners must have been drunk when they devised their traffic flow scheme. Antwerp left me cold, too.
Amsterdam was interesting. I might have liked it more if I hadn’t seen Brugge first. It was also way too chaotic for me…crossing the street meant dodging trams, buses, bikes, motorcycles, cars and crowds of people. I felt like I was in a meteor shower. We also inadvertently strayed into the red-light district…where my 12-year-old daughter saw lots of, um, interesting things. It wasn’t the prostitutes sitting in the windows that was unsettling for her, it was the window displays in the sex shops (then again, there was nothing there she didn’t see later in the front window of the sex shop right next door the Intercontinental Hotel here in Cologne). It wasn’t easy explaining to her why a woman would wear a giant, rubber penis strapped to her waist. My wife told her it was to keep her hands free while she made scrambled eggs, but my daughter didn’t buy it and demanded that I tell her "exactly" what it was for. So I told her the truth. I said it was a clothes hanger.
My family returns to L.A. tomorrow but I have to stick around for a few more days to do some post-production work on FAST TRACK before finally returning home. This is the longest I have ever been away from the U.S. and I am beginning to feel home sick, even with my family here with me. It will be nice to sleep in my own bed again and stop living out of a suitcase for a little while.
More later…