Who will fill the gap if B&N collapses

[DiapDealer]

Originally Posted by Cinisajoy

On your first point about the royalties, yes if you self-publish you get either 35% or 70%. Now the catch is, you are responsible for all the costs involved in getting the book ready for publishing.

What you call a "catch," many simply see as a "choice." One that was never previously viable (and never offered regardless).

[HarryT]

Originally Posted by DiapDealer

What you call a "catch," many simply see as a "choice." One that was never previously viable (and never offered regardless).

It always has been available in the form of "vanity publishing". Whether anyone's ever gone on to commercial success via that route, I don't know.

[DiapDealer]

Originally Posted by HarryT

It always has been available in the form of "vanity publishing". Whether anyone's ever gone on to commercial success via that route, I don't know.

That's what I meant by "viable". I don't consider pre-digital, pre-internet self-publishing to have been a viable means to even moderate success.

[GlenBarrington]

Originally Posted by darryl

Your second point depends very much on your personal political views. I'm trying to think of an actual book requiring extensive research that itself brought a corrupt politician down, but the examples I consider all seem to have been written well after the event. In these days of wikileaks and the internet, politicians have arguable never been subject to greater scrutiny. Good investigative journalists in the MSM are nice, but we are hardly reliant on them, let alone on large publishers.

Yeah, politicians tend to bring themselves down, not because of their favorite form of corruption, but because of their laughable attempts to cover it up or explain it away. From wide-stanced senators to congressmen who take, ahh very personal selfies and send them to children, it's NEVER what people write about them, so much as it is their own hubris.

[barryem]

Originally Posted by nabsltd

They can give useful advice, but the vast majority of general-stock (i.e., Borders, B&N, etc., not something like Mysterious Books in NYC) bookstores have nobody that can help you with what you want. They might have a clerk who can point out what the clerk likes, but almost none have a clerk who can give a meaningful answer to "I like pretty much everything some older author has written...do you know of any new authors like them?"

Maybe things have changed. I moved from Houston to rural Arkansas a decade and a half ago and I haven't been in a bookstore since. But in Houston I was always going into book stores and asking that sort of question. I didn't always get a good answer but I often did and often when a clerk didn't know they'd find another clerk who did.

Barry

[darryl]

Originally Posted by HarryT

It always has been available in the form of "vanity publishing". Whether anyone's ever gone on to commercial success via that route, I don't know.

I agree with Diap Dealer that this was never a realistic option. There are however exceptions which prove the rule. I have heard a couple of stories of authors going on to commercial success by this method after multiple rejections. Generally they would outlay funds to do a smaller print run, often at great personal hardship, fill up the boot and do the road trip from book store to book store, begging such stores to take their books. Extraordinary individuals. One I can recall off the top of my head is Matthew Reilly. The below quote is from http://matthewreilly.com/about/

SELF-PUBLISHING
Following rejections from all the major publishers, Matthew famously self-published Contest in 1996, printing 1000 copies. He produced a big-budget-looking novel which he sold into bookshops throughout Sydney, one shop at a time.

‘I knew Contest had the goods,’ Matthew said, ‘and I just wanted to get it noticed. I knew that publishers checked out bookshops so that’s where I needed my book to be.’

In January 1997, Cate Paterson, then a Commissioning Editor from Pan Macmillan Australia walked into Angus & Robertson’s Pitt Street Mall store and bought a copy of Contest. She tracked Matthew down through his contact details in the front of the book. Interestingly, those original self-published editions of Contest have now become much sought after collectors’ items. One recently sold on eBay for $1200!

Cate was thrilled to find Matthew working on his next novel, Ice Station. Based on Contest and the first few chapters of this new novel, she signed Matthew for a two-book deal with Pan Macmillan Australia.

I should add that I read Ice Station, one of this author's earlier books, years ago, and whilst I wish him all the best I was not impressed. From memory he certainly writes well enough and is worthy of being published, though I found the book a little too over the top, even for this genre. I still recall being irritated in some action scenes by the use of italics to highlight a particularly unrealistic but exciting action.

[darryl]

Originally Posted by Cinisajoy

On your first point about the royalties, yes if you self-publish you get either 35% or 70%. Now the catch is, you are responsible for all the costs involved in getting the book ready for publishing.

Absolutely correct. But authors now have actual choices. The more help
they want, including financially, the lower the royalty rate. Even those in whom no publisher is interested now have viable self-publishing options other then the much maligned vanity presses.

[SteveEisenberg]

Originally Posted by darryl

I'm trying to think of an actual book requiring extensive research that itself brought a corrupt politician down, but the examples I consider all seem to have been written well after the event.

Read about Nixon*. It took more than one book. You can say that he was even more taken down by newspapers, but newspapers are in steep decline, while trade publishers are still reasonably string.

Originally Posted by darryl

Good investigative journalists in the MSM are nice, but we are hardly reliant on them, let alone on large publishers.

Maybe if I was an Australian, I'd agree.

But from where I sit, investigative non-fiction is a significant issue.

As for fiction, I want strong authors treated fairly. But I'm afraid that there always will be lots of outstanding fiction authors who can't make a good lifetime income writing books. Putting them in a situation where they can't even out their income spikes with a thorough multi-book deal and/or by signing away all rights will only make it worse.

Even though I do read fiction, I don't worry about its future. I think it will remain positive for readers, but only consistently good for a handful of full-time authors. Most of the rest will need a day job, regardless of the publishing model.
___________________
* I don't mean to argue, in this hopefully non-political thread, that he was, or was not, corrupt. I'm just saying that professional, paid-in-advance, writers of intensively researched non-fiction were crucial in bringing about his downfall.

[SteveEisenberg]

Originally Posted by DiapDealer

If they have no intention of ever publishing a book they own the rights to, then they need to either accept a reasonable buyout offer for those rights, or risk the rights reverting automatically to the author after a reasonable amount of time.

What is reasonable?

The answer can't be simple. That thus seems like it would be a pretty complicated law one to deal with what sounds like a rare situation. Also, if the law forced publishers to write contracts in a way that limits their rights to a book, they are going to pay less for the book.

Is there case law on a situation, other than a textbook, like you describe? I mean one where the publisher paid the author an advance, the author supplied a publishable manuscript without plagiarism or other legitimate legal issues, the publisher refused to publish, the author had it published elsewhere, and the publisher successfully sued the author?

If there is a case where the author sold the book to another publisher, and then had to pay back the advance to the first one, I'm probably going to think it was fair. If the author released the advance-paid-not-published book to the public domain, and that's what got him sued, I'm more likely to sympathize with said unfortunate author. Has that ever happened?

[DiapDealer]

Originally Posted by SteveEisenberg

What is reasonable?

The answer can't be simple.

Again with the false assumptions. I never suggested a solution would be simple. But the concept certainly is. Even if you paid the author an advance to write the book, it's not their fault that you (the publisher) never gave the book an opportunity to earn that advance back by publishing it. The money you're out is a completely self-inflicted wound.

And as far as "reasonable" goes, that one IS simple. If you've decided you're not going to publish the book, how much can the rights be worth to you? How is holding the author's never-to-be-published-by-you work hostage ever going to give you ANY return on your investment if you don't sell them? So in this case, "reasonable" is something, as opposed to the big, fat "nothing" you get by continuing to hold it hostage.

Accept an offer for the rights to a book you have made it clear you're not going to publish, or lose the rights after a fairly short period of time. It's not rocket science. To do otherwise is pointless vindictiveness.

Originally Posted by SteveEisenberg

Has that ever happened?

No clue. How is it relevant? I'm talking about changing the status quo. Not researching past practices. Those practices are the problem.

[darryl]

Originally Posted by SteveEisenberg

Read about Nixon*. It took more than one book. You can say that he was even more taken down by newspapers, but newspapers are in steep decline, while trade publishers are still reasonably string.

Nixon was taken down by the truth getting out. The books came once the truth was well and truly out and already doing its work. I'm not sure if any particular book was out in time to have any impact whatsoever even in this. What is important is that there be mechanisms for the truth to get out. The Internet has proven to be a very powerful tool for this to happen. Governments seem to be more terrified of wikileaks than any investigative reporting, at least to judge from the reaction. Personally I find your view that non-fiction books play any significant role curious, and your example of Nixon unconvincing.

Perhaps there may be a few examples where "investigative non-fiction" has played a major role, but I simply can't come up with one so far. I suggest that if there are such examples they are isolated ones. Such books generally involve far too long a lead time to have any significant impact.

Originally Posted by SteveEisenberg

As for fiction, I want strong authors treated fairly. But I'm afraid that there always will be lots of outstanding fiction authors who can't make a good lifetime income writing books. Putting them in a situation where they can't even out their income spikes with a thorough multi-book deal and/or by signing away all rights will only make it worse.

What do you mean signing away all rights. Most who enter a tradpub deal have few if any such rights left to sign away. At least anecdotally there are many self-published authors who are making a living from their books who would never have done so under the historical tradpub novel. Many authors were able to obtain reversions of their rights and make money from works which had long been out of print and making them nothing from tradpub. One only has to read blogs by authors like Joe Konrath or Kris Rusch to understand the weaknesses of the tradpup model which will in my view doom those publishers who do not take steps to remedy them.

Originally Posted by SteveEisenberg

Even though I do read fiction, I don't worry about its future. I think it will remain positive for readers, but only consistently good for a handful of full-time authors. Most of the rest will need a day job, regardless of the publishing model.

Even many best-selling tradpub authors still needed a day job. This is what happens when one party in a venture is greedy and takes virtually all of the proceeds.

[ZodWallop]

Originally Posted by darryl

Perhaps there may be a few examples where "investigative non-fiction" has played a major role, but I simply can't come up with one so far. I suggest that if there are such examples they are isolated ones. Such books generally involve far too long a lead time to have any significant impact.

Darryl, overall I agree with your views. But Steve did have a point about decreasing advances negatively impacting the quality of non-fiction. I think he made a mistake taking it to politics. There are non-fiction books that have had an impact. Silent Spring for instance.

[pwalker8]

Originally Posted by ZodWallop

Darryl, overall I agree with your views. But Steve did have a point about decreasing advances negatively impacting the quality of non-fiction. I think he made a mistake taking it to politics. There are non-fiction books that have had an impact. Silent Spring for instance.

Alas, it turned out that Silent Spring was fiction rather than non fiction, at least from the standpoint of the scientific evidence of the effect of DDT on bird eggs. Advocacy books can have a lot of impact. But the trick is to remember that they are advocacy books. Powerful stories tend to be one sided.

[DiapDealer]

Originally Posted by ZodWallop

Darryl, overall I agree with your views. But Steve did have a point about decreasing advances negatively impacting the quality of non-fiction. I think he made a mistake taking it to politics. There are non-fiction books that have had an impact. Silent Spring for instance.

But his point fails to take into account that many of us don't worry about the future of non-fiction publishing (since he's made it clear that he doesn't really worry about the future of fiction publishing).

[darryl]

I don't think there is any cause to worry about non-fiction. Academia provides a constant stream of titles on many subjects, and also much of the research. Experts or faux experts on subjects seem to have no problems producing books. Neither, unfortunately, do advocates and activists, though their work is ofter better described as fiction.

@Zod. IMHO there may be some books which are not written because of the decline of the system of advances. Though we can never really know, I expect these will be books which have so few potential readers that they would not be viable under any model but patronage.