On Writing and Publishing

Jan Constantine, General Counsel of the Authors Guild, testified before the House Judiciary Committee yesterday afternoon on mass digitization of books and so-called orphan works. Those topics, of course, are at the heart of two Guild lawsuits, Authors Guild v. Google and Authors Guild v. HathiTrust. An advance copy of Jan’s written testimony is available on their blog. Here are three highlights: 1. We’re proposing that Congress empower the creation of a collective licensing organization (something like ASCAP or BMI) to deal with both mass digitization and “orphan” books. Such an organization would pave the way for a true national digital library, but it would have to be limited in scope, just as ASCAP is. Here are the key components: A. Authors get paid for the uses, naturally. B. Licenses would be non-compulsory. Authors get to say no. C. Licenses would cover out-of-print books only. No disrupting commercial markets. D. Display uses only. . . .

In an article this morning in the New York Times reporter Julie Bosman writes how surging rents are forcing booksellers out of Manhattan. Once a literary city, NYC is now a bookstore desert. “Rising rents in Manhattan have forced out many retailers, from pizza joints to flower shops. But the rapidly escalating cost of doing business there is also driving out bookstores, threatening the city’s sense of self as the center of the literary universe, the home of the publishing industry and a place that lures and nurtures authors and avid readers,” writes Bosman. She then details the closing and moving of book stores out of the city. “The Rizzoli Bookstore was recently told that it would be forced to leave its grand space on 57th Street because the owners decided that the building would be demolished. “The Bank Street Bookstore in Morningside Heights announced in December that it would . . .

[If you write books. If you read books. You might want to take a look at this long New Yorker piece by George Packer (Togo 1982-83)] CHEAP WORDS Amazon is good for customers. But is it good for books? BY George Packer February 17,2014 Amazon is a global superstore, like Walmart. It’s also a hardware manufacturer, like Apple, and a utility, like Con Edison, and a video distributor, like Netflix, and a book publisher, like Random House, and a production studio, like Paramount, and a literary magazine, like The Paris Review, and a grocery deliverer, like FreshDirect, and someday it might be a package service, like U.P.S. Its founder and chief executive, Jeff Bezos, also owns a major newspaper, the Washington Post. All these streams and tributaries make Amazon something radically new in the history of American business. Sam Walton wanted merely to be the world’s biggest retailer. After Apple launched the . . .

HOW TO WRITE A NOVEL IN 100 DAYS With tips about agents, editors, publishers and self-publishing By John Coyne HowtoWriteANovelin100Days.com “You start John Coyne’s book for the advice, and you keep reading for the stories – tales from the fertile and barren desks of great writers past and present. Did you know that Katherine Ann Porter began Ship of Fools by writing the last page, and then spent twenty years finishing the novel? Read this book and avoid the same fate.” Peter Hessler, Staff Writer for The New Yorker, author of River Town, and MacArthur Genius Award Winner • Everybody’s got a great story in them, but most of us don’t know how to get that story out. In How to Write a Novel in 100 Days, novelist and teacher John Coyne explains — with wit and sass and not just a little bit of inside knowledge — the process that . . .

The October 21, 2013 issue of The New Republic has a detailed section on “The Book Industry Is Thriving! Somehow.” There are articles on Publishing, Agents, Editors, and Writers. (Them too!) You can down load the whole issue on your iPad, by the way. Or you can buy it. Some interesting tidbits. The book industry see 3 reasons for optimism 1) The crash is over–just like everywhere else. 2) Great literary novels are still marketable–and can still make money. 3) Awesome, quirky novels get lost in the din–but the Internet bails them out. Particularly interesting is an essay by Lionel Shriver entitled, “The Rancid Smell of Success” that is a most read.  Her most recent novel is BIG BROTHER. Check out the issue.

The novel A Naked Singularity written, and self-published, by a Manhattan public defender in 2008 has just won the $25,000 W. Bingham Prize given by PEN. The book had been rejected by mainstream publishers before being self-published, and then four years later republished by the academic press of the University of Chicago. So, perhaps, there is hope for all of us who self-publish. The plot of A Naked Singularity is this: It tells the story of Casi, a child of Colombian immigrants who lives in Brooklyn and works in Manhattan as a public defender–one who, tellingly has never lost a trial. Never. In the book, we watch what happens when his sense of justice and even his sense of self begin to crack–and how his world then slowly devolves. It’s a huge, ambitious novel clearly in the vein of DeLillo, Foster Wallace, Pynchon, and even Melville, and it’s told in . . .

The July 29, 2013 issue of The New Yorker has a nice piece on this topic. I think you might be able to see it on-line this wee. Some points in the article, which is on page 23 of the issue, are that a recent report from the Codex Group shows browsing in stores is still a far more common way of finding new books than either online search or social media. Also, Independent bookstores are now thriving, thanks in large part to their close ties to both publishers and customers. There is still the idea that books are  “technologically obsolete” and the book industry is heading down the path that the music industry took because between 2009 and 2011 e-books sales rose at triple-digit annual rates. However, last year, according to industry trade groups, e-book sales rose just forty-four percent. As the article points out, “This kind of deceleration . . .

E-book sales increased by 45 percent in 2012 to make up 20 percent of the trade book market, according to a report released in May be Bookstats….Adult fiction, particularly romance novels, showed the strongest growth in e-book sales….Overall, trade book sales increased 7 percent in 2012. “The growth in trade book sales occurred despite the loss of numerous brick-and-mortar stores in 2012.”… Online retail appears poised to surpass brick-and-mortar stores soon. In other news. At a symposium held on December 12 at the Library of Congress, where the U.S. Copyright Office and the Center for the Book cosponsored a discussion on the part and future role of the professional author, Louisa Thomas, author of Conscience: Two Soldiers, Two Pacifists, One Family-A Test of Will and Faith in World War, make this comment: “I had thought that when I published a book in 2011, the hardest part would be selling the . . .

My son found this on tumbir–and you think it is tough to get published! Behold what is either the best or worst rejection letter we have ever seen (depending on your capacity for cruelty), sent to Gertrude Stein in 1912 by publisher Arthur C. Fifield. Given that the manuscript in question became Three Lives (among other things) we suppose she had the last laugh. And as an editor, you can’t help thinking: Just how much time did this guy have on his hands?

[This piece on self publishing and the link between authors and agents is a must read for writers. The agent mention, Trident, is my literary agency so I had particular interest in the piece.] April 16, 2013 New Publisher Authors Trust: Themselves By LESLIE KAUFMAN When the Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright and author David Mamet released his last book, “The Secret Knowledge: On the Dismantling of American Culture,” with the Sentinel publishing house in 2011, it sold well enough to make the New York Times best-seller list. This year, when Mr. Mamet set out to publish his next one, a novella and two short stories about war, he decided to take a very different path: he will self-publish. Mr. Mamet is taking advantage of a new service being offered by his literary agency, ICM Partners, as a way to assume more control over the way his book is promoted. “Basically I . . .

A number of Peace Corps writers have asked, “what is a ‘Hypermodern Editions’ after I posted the recent blog item on História, História by Eleanor Stanford (Cape Verde 1998-2000) and wrote that it was published as a “Hypermodern Edition, only 100 pages written on pages 5.75 by 4.38 inches (or a twice-folded sheet of typing paper). They must have thought I knew what I was talking about. Hello? So I asked Jason Pettus, the publisher at Chicago Center for Literature and Photography, and he emailed me that “Hypermodern Editions is just a blanket term for all their  handmade books, to differentiate them from the ebooks and the trade paperbacks we’re going to start doing in 2014. The term “hypermodern” comes from the world of book collecting, and refers to any collectible book less than 30 years old.” I also ask him about the pricing of this book, i.e., as it . . .

What Self-Publishing Can Not Accomplish By Jason Boog on October 25, 2012 3:07 PM Literary agent Janet Reid offered some self-publishing advice on her popular blog, ( http://jetreidliterary.blogspot.com)  urging aspiring writers to take a realistic view of the indie route. Jason writes: According to her post, self-published writers need to sell “more than 20,000 copies” to get the attention of traditional publishers these days. These are tough numbers for any kind of author, setting daunting odds new writers. What do you think? Check it out: “This post is not to dissuade you from self-publishing. Have at it with all your might. BUT be realistic about what self-publishing is, and what it can accomplish. And more important what it can NOT accomplish. First among the list for what it can’t is launch a mystery series.  Publishers are not keen on picking up Book #2 if Book #1 sold fewer than a 100 copies. . . .

Simon & Schuster has created  Archway Publishing to help writers self-publish fiction, nonfiction, business and children’s books. They will run the new service with help from Author Solutions, the self-publishing company. Archway Publishing will include “editorial, design, distribution and marketing services” for its authors, all these tools coming from Author Solutions. Fiction options range from $1,999 Author package to the  $14,999 Publicist package.  The business book optons start at $2,199 and go as high as $24,999. Here’s more from the release: the following services will be Archway Publishing exclusives: Concierge Service – Authors will have the option to work with a dedicated publishing guide who will coordinate each step of the book production process. Bookseller Catalog – Archway titles will be included in Edelweiss, the leading, industry-wide online catalog available to major retailers, wholesalers, libraries, bloggers and thousands of industry professionals. The Archway Speakers Bureau, powered by Speakerfile, helps authors connect to a world of . . .

The president of the Authors Guild, Scott Turow, writes in the Summer 2012 Authors Guild Bulletin that the Authors Guild is now welcoming self-published author as members of the Guild. However, they have to be self-published authors who have earned at least $500 in writing income in the 18 months prior to applying for membership to qualify to be associate members; those earning at least $5,000 qualify to be regular, voting members. Now, any writer published by a traditional American book publisher continues to quality for membership, as do freelance writers who publish three articles, stories, or poems in broadly distributed periodicals in 18 months. The Authors Guild marks its 100th anniversary this year.

Our RPCV Publishing Guru Jason Boog (Guatemala 2000-02) reports on  Galleycat: The First Word on the Book Publishing Industry  that Harper Voyager, HarperCollins’ science fiction and fantasy imprint, is now accepting complete and unagented manuscripts for two weeks. From October 1 until October 14, authors from around the world can send their manuscripts through special submission portal. You can find all the submission details at: http://harpervoyagerbooks.com/harper-voyager-submission-form/. Here’s more from the publisher: The manuscripts will then be read and those most suited to the global Harper Voyager list will be selected jointly by editors in the USA, UK and Australia.  Accepted submissions will benefit from the full publishing process: accepted manuscripts will be edited; and the finished titles will receive online marketing and sales support in World English markets. Voyager will be seeking an array of adult and young adult speculative fiction for digital publication, but particularly novels written in the epic fantasy, science . . .