Scott Turow: The Slow Death of the American Author (NYTimes)

[BearMountainBooks]

Originally Posted by fjtorres

*My* take on the "triple" metaphor (and the reason *I* cited it) is that just because Turow got lucky from the start in finding a willing sponsor for his work and because he was successful from day one, he has never personally experienced the travails and mistreatment of other "lesser" writers. So, to him, the BPHs are great partners and facilitators. He never had to work the count, take one for the team, or try to steal a base. He was already standing on third with zero outs at the start of *his* game. Instead of hitting a triple, he got a walk and moved to third on a wild pitch.

To bring up another baseball metaphor; he never spent time riding buses in the minors, but instead went straight to the big leagues. When you travel first class all the way, you can't exactly appreciate what riding in steerage is like. Life is very different from where he sits than it is for a writer whose book brings in a couple hundred bucks a month and he's happy because that is his car payment. (Or meal money.)

Which is why he sees the tech and market changes the industry is experiencing as negatives instead of positives for authors because in his whole point of view anything that is bad for publishers is by definition bad for authors.

I agree! And I get you meant luck in the sense of the publishing end--not the writing end. It's just an analogy for the journey, not necessarily the writing style or competency. She's trying to say that if you start at the top, you don't have a lot of experience discussing the other pieces.

[fjtorres]

Originally Posted by BearMountainBooks

I agree! And I get you meant luck in the sense of the publishing end--not the writing end. It's just an analogy for the journey, not necessarily the writing style or competency. She's trying to say that if you start at the top, you don't have a lot of experience discussing the other pieces.

Much more concisely put.

Normally I'm not a fan of populist/class-warfare arguments but to a certain extent the Schism in publishing *is* a class warfare issue.
The systen-that-was rewards the million seller authors at the expense of everybody else whereas the emerging system offers up the *hope* of earning an honest buck or two from writing to the "less fortunate".

We're not at the pitchforks and torches stage yet but it isn't totally out of the question.

[fjtorres]

BTW, when it come to Turow the writer, the name that pops to mind immediately (for me) is John Grisham.

Both have done extremely well for themselves writing legal thrillers but the factoid that sticks with me is that Grisham started by self-publishing...at a time when self-pub was supposed to be a death sentence. He bucked the system and succeeded that way.

Worth a nod of respect instead of the Bronx cheers Turow has earned.

[BearMountainBooks]

Originally Posted by fjtorres

Much more concisely put.

Normally I'm not a fan of populist/class-warfare arguments but to a certain extent the Schism in publishing *is* a class warfare issue.
The systen-that-was rewards the million seller authors at the expense of everybody else whereas the emerging system offers up the *hope* of earning an honest buck or two from writing to the "less fortunate".

We're not at the pitchforks and torches stage yet but it isn't totally out of the question.

One point that hasn't really been brought up here (well, maybe it was, but I missed it) is that all these changes are going to likely result in lower priced books in the long term. Think about it--some of these backlist books get into ebook--and there are hundreds of thousands of them out of print and suddenly you have millions of books that never go out of print. How to get attention? How to get that sale? Lower prices. As more and more get added, prices will be unable to rise unless an author has already established a large following (or worked from the bottom to create one). So if Turow thinks he has problems now, wait a few years. Gatekeeping and the way it worked is only going to get worse.

More sites will come along that help sort genre, quality and so on. More books that were already vetted up to a certain level of quality will come online. There will be newcomers who never published who will find a niche. But, by and large, the publisher HAS to be cut out because the prices of books are going to get pushed down and stay there for the most part. That means the pricing can't pay for a large corporation and all the expenses that go with it. Some of the middlemen have to be cut out.

[fjtorres]

Originally Posted by BearMountainBooks

One point that hasn't really been brought up here (well, maybe it was, but I missed it) is that all these changes are going to likely result in lower priced books in the long term.

Short-term, too:
http://www.digitalbookworld.com/2013...est-level-yet/
https://www.mobileread.com/forums/sho...d.php?t=210460

I was particularly impressed by the pricing on Tobacco Road: $1.99.
A sign of things to come.
A properly-priced backlist is a license to print money as the books are, as you said, pre-vetted and many are broadly known by their reputation. Perfect impulse buy fodder.

Originally Posted by BearMountainBooks

More sites will come along that help sort genre, quality and so on. More books that were already vetted up to a certain level of quality will come online. There will be newcomers who never published who will find a niche. But, by and large, the publisher HAS to be cut out because the prices of books are going to get pushed down and stay there for the most part. That means the pricing can't pay for a large corporation and all the expenses that go with it. Some of the middlemen have to be cut out.

Price bands.
We're already starting to see the emergence of different pricing zones for different products depending on the audience. The days of a midlist author's sales getting crippled by too-high pricing are limited.

New content from established "names" might command $10 or higher (as well as scholarly non-fiction) but there is going to be a lot of backlist action in the $0.99-$2.99 range and a nice entry-level band at $2.99-4.99, depending on genre, with established mid-listers stabilizing in the $4.99-6.99 range. The signs are out there and it makes sense for both authors and readers; a bit more for a known commodity and a bit less for an older work or an unknown quantity. (We'll probably even see a bit of windowing, ala BAEN.)

But as you say, with even the higher band running up to $6.99 or so there isn't enough money to be able to cover a typical BPH overhead at the lower volumes that look to be the norm for the next few years. Something *has* to give. Things will eventually stabilize and the level where they're headed doesn't allow room for the old cost structures. I doubt any amount of sub-contracting and author squeezing will let the BPHs stay in the market for mid-listers.

This, in turn, means that for more and more authors, trad-pub won't even be an option even if they pine for a traditional contract. (Which is where the predatory Author Solutions and its brethren will be trolling.)

A thorough understanding of the pitfalls of publishing is going to be a pre-requisite for newcomers isn't it? I fear we'll be hearing some painful horror stories shortly.

[BearMountainBooks]

Horror stories are already out there. I can't count on both hands the number of authors who have purchased "editing" and gotten a couple of commas fixed. I do editing on the side and I don't charge 1200 dollars for an editing package. But I know there are editors out there doing so. And that is all find and good IF YOU EDIT THE THING AND DO IT WELL. It's buyer beware--educate yourself. Know the difference between proofreading, storyline editing and copyediting. KNOW YOUR OWN WRITING and WEAKNESSES so you know where to spend the (most) money. Personally I wouldn't hire an editor who "makes the changes for you" but everyone has to do their own thing. And if you decide to go that route...you might want to check those changes.

There are a number of authors with backlist who don't understand how to upload a book or scan it. I know one author who paid 60 dollar for each conversion/upload. Then if the author wanted to update anything (typo, bio, etc) there went another 60 dollars. SHOP AROUND. Find out what is involved...

Same as any business.

And as for contracts, well, you probably better hire a lawyer or get a good agent. Even that may not save you as some agents make a grab for rights as well. Writer beware. Study first, jump later.

[Fbone]

I would be more concerned about the slow death of the American reader.

[BearMountainBooks]

Originally Posted by Fbone

I would be more concerned about the slow death of the American reader.

Ha! Good point. Can't have one without the other...don't NEED the one without the other!

[Katsunami]

Originally Posted by taustin

And we, the readers, have access to a diversity of available books that was unimaginable even ten years ago.

This is so true. With regard to music, I would have prefererred to live in the 50's to 70's, because I'd be able to visit some bands live, that do no longer exist now (or one or more of the members are even dead already). With regard to reading however, I'm glad to live in 2013, because the genres I like to read most as casual reading really started to boom in the mid-eighties and early nineties.

Most of the books I read nowadays are written in the last 25 years or so.

[Andrew H.]

Originally Posted by fjtorres

*My* take on the "triple" metaphor (and the reason *I* cited it) is that just because Turow got lucky from the start in finding a willing sponsor for his work and because he was successful from day one, he has never personally experienced the travails and mistreatment of other "lesser" writers.

It sounds to me like you *are* trying to take the element of talent completely way from Turow. Because if he was just "lucky," then success is purely random and shouldn't people who are "successful" don't deserve any credit for what they actually have achieved.

But that's ridiculous on its face. "Presumed Innocent" wasn't Turow's first book; that was 1L, a somewhat popular book about Turow's first year in law school. I think it's still in print, but it wasn't a blockbuster. PI was a blockbuster and it was really, really good: the kind of book that everyone talked about when it came out.

So, to him, the BPHs are great partners and facilitators. He never had to work the count, take one for the team, or try to steal a base. He was already standing on third with zero outs at the start of *his* game. Instead of hitting a triple, he got a walk and moved to third on a wild pitch.

Again, you are trying to deny his talent and assume anyone could have done what he did.

To bring up another baseball metaphor; he never spent time riding buses in the minors, but instead went straight to the big leagues. When you travel first class all the way, you can't exactly appreciate what riding in steerage is like. Life is very different from where he sits than it is for a writer whose book brings in a couple hundred bucks a month and he's happy because that is his car payment. (Or meal money.)

I agree with this analogy, I think.

Turow is like Michael Jordan or Peyton Manning or Willie Mays - the kind of talent that only comes along once every couple of years and is immediately recognized as being very very good.

He's not - to use the analogy from Rusch that I disagreed with - on third because he was born there. He's on third because he hit a triple. However, the coach can't set up a game plan assuming that everyone else on the team is going to hit a triple as well.

Which is why he sees the tech and market changes the industry is experiencing as negatives instead of positives for authors because in his whole point of view anything that is bad for publishers is by definition bad for authors.

And this is probably right. Again, I don't agree with Turow's AG rant; I only disagreed with the suggestion that his being a successful author was only a matter of luck.

But there is a reason that most people don't follow Bill Gates retirement advice ("give away 40% of your wealth"); it's because what is best for him isn't necessarily best for most people. And the same is true for advice from people like Turow, or Stephen King, or even Dan Brown (or any one of the hundred-odd very successful authors) - what may be good advice for people who sell 10 million copies is likely not good advice for people who sell 5,000-10,000 books per year.

[fjtorres]

Originally Posted by Andrew H.

It sounds to me like you *are* trying to take the element of talent completely way from Turow. Because if he was just "lucky," then success is purely random and shouldn't people who are "successful" don't deserve any credit for what they actually have achieved.

Then I fear you're misreading my point.
(I am in no way a supporter of Malcom Gladwell's OUTLIERS theory, okay?)

He was lucky in the sense that he didn't spend years getting a dozen rejections, like Rowling (and others), before finding a publisher willing to publish his book. *That* connection is pretty much the luck of the draw and has nothing to do with the quality of the book or his talent.

Because he *didn't* spend years fighting with the big publishers and because his talent has brought him a lot of success he is not in the best of positions to judge the changes sweeping through the industry. Most people tend to judge by their experiences and his experiences with the BPHs have been golden.
*His* experience is that the universe took care of him.
Few others can say that, even among his peers.

[taustin]

Originally Posted by Sregener

The Author's Guild is a union, and unions always seek to protect the interests of their members, over-and-against the general public.

A good union. Often, however, unions seek to protect the interests of the union, and specifically, the people who run it.

Which still amounts to the same thing.

Turow's not acting in the bests interests of his union's membership, only a very, very small segment of it (one of who happens to run it).

[taustin]

Originally Posted by Katsunami

This is so true. With regard to music, I would have prefererred to live in the 50's to 70's, because I'd be able to visit some bands live, that do no longer exist now (or one or more of the members are even dead already).

That's a matter of personal taste, though. Music is also more diverse that it was not too many years ago, because of the internet. And indie bands make their money from live performances far more than selling mp3s on Amazon for 99 cents. It's a rapidly changing landscape, but the one thing that seems a sure thing is that there will be more diversity in the art than there used to be.

(Technology does one thing to pretty much everything, eventually: reduces the barriers to entry in to the market. A brand new technolgy is hand-made, each one custom. Then, small time assembly line production, and prices drop a bit. Then mass production, and prices drop a lot. Then, as the technolgy really matures, mass produced customization, and higher prices, but still affordable.)

[murg]

Originally Posted by Katsunami

In my library, I see a strange thing.

Almost every author, except some, have started writing in the 90's, especially fantasy-authors. Some even only turned out their first book when they were way into their 40's. When I look through my Calibre listing, I see some stuff from the 70's, something from the 60's, some classics.... But it's all dwarfed by the newer stuff, starting at around 1990: *BOOM!* Most of the books I've read at this point have been written between 1985 and 2010, and I've been reading since childhood.

It just looks like as if in the 90's, half the English speaking world decided to start writing; at least is does for me. Some (fantasy) authors are writing so fast that I'm actually starting to question if I should keep following them; turning out 2-4 books of over 450 pages a year can't be good for quality. Maybe I should start reading some of the older stuff again, from a time where a 450 page book took 4 years to write instead of 4 months.

Welcome to the PC revolution.

The 90's were when the technology of publishing changed for the first time (in modern times). The Personal Computer became readily available, and the process of authoring got much easier. No longer did one have to type a manuscript on a typewriter, it could be edited on the computer. Changes didn't involve retyping entire pages, only the passages that changed where changed.

The process of authoring went from being one where only driven people (masochists) did it, to one where anyone who had the desire could get over the process-being-difficult hump fairly easily.

And the size of the books has increased since then. Before the PC, the mechanical process of authoring required a lot of work, post-PC the mechanical process got much easier. This allowed authors to develop more longer and complex books.

The electonic publishing revolution has been going on for 25-30 years.

[taustin]

Originally Posted by murg

And the size of the books has increased since then. Before the PC, the mechanical process of authoring required a lot of work, post-PC the mechanical process got much easier. This allowed authors to develop more longer and complex books.

That actually has more to do with perception of the market. In the 70s, publishers wouldn't buy books that big, because they didn't think people would buy them. (There's a story about Katherine Kurtz and the third Camber book, that involved a metaphorical pair of scissors and the last 150 pages, due to the publisher insisting on her living up to the contract for 300 pages. Lois McMaster Bujold's first (written) novel was cut in the middle because she knew it'd never sell at the length it'd end up.)

The market has changed to accept longer books, so publishes buy longer books, so writers write longer books. This is facilitated, as you say, but the PC revolution, but that's not cause and effect.