Quote:
Originally Posted by SteveEisenberg
All of this could be true. There is some actual evidence that total books sales increase a bit when there are humongous best-sellers:
http://www.csmonitor.com/Books/chapt...rcent-for-2012
What I don't see in links such as the above is whether book sales increase, or even stay steady, in years of stupendous best-sellers -- subtracting out the super best-sellers. The optimists in this thread, like yourself, are making the latter claim.
How about this for a different criticism of the Shepherd thesis:
Just as some folks love to find unknown authors, others gravitate towards celebrities. If J. K. Rowling and Suzanne Collins bow out, others will fill their place, and the mid-list will remain the mid-list. |
I have made no such claim. I have not claimed that book sales increase, only that it is
not demonstrated that sales of other books will decrease as a result of a big name author moving into a new genre, that it is not demonstrated that people have a fixed amount of money that they will spend on books. The money has to come from somewhere, but it doesn't have to come from other books.