E-books are not the problem

Sandra Parshall

As many of us head off to Malice Domestic, where the traditional printed book is the focus, news from the publishing industry is grimmer than ever. In the first quarter of this year, while e-book sales jumped by 169.4%, sales of print books in all categories fell a total of 25%.

According to the American Association of Publishers, e-books and trade paperbacks were tied in the early part of the year as the leaders in all book sales.

Nielsen BookScan, which covers approximately 75% of retail book sales, reported that in the first quarter mass market paperback sales dropped by 26.6%. (The AAP statistics show an even steeper fall of 36%.) Hardcover fell 7.2%, and trade paperback dropped 6.4%.

Adult fiction lost the most ground among the various categories, falling 18.3%. (By contrast, adult fiction is the strongest segment among e-books, accounting for 61% of sales.) Juvenile nonfiction fell 11.7% and juvenile fiction dropped 8.1%. Only adult nonfiction, with a 1.1% drop, avoided a precipitous fall in print sales.

The soaring sales of e-books takes some of the sting out of the decline in print sales, but the sad truth is that books in all forms are losing their attraction as a source of entertainment and information. Vast numbers of people simply do not read books. Ever. In any format. However, the average Facebook member spends more than seven hours on the site every month. The average American watches more than 84 hours of television each month. Video games also claim a huge share of our attention span, and a single video game will sell more units in a month than all the top 20 New York Times bestselling books combined.

In a recent issue of Publishers Weekly, independent publisher Rudy Shur of Square One Publishers noted that our concern over the rise of e-books and the decline of print books is misplaced. The real competition isn’t between different forms of books but between books and other forms of entertainment. Putting a book on the Kindle won’t suddenly turn non-readers into readers.

All the evidence is that reading as a pastime began to fall out of favor when computers and then the internet became ubiquitous. That decline continues. But as fewer and fewer people bother to read books, those of us with an emotional, intellectual, or financial investment in all forms of publishing spend our energy arguing about whether e-books are good or bad. We should be talking about how to turn more people on to reading. We should be trying to figure out what it takes to lure kids away from video games. We should be trying to reawaken the love of reading in people who may have given it up because they were too busy raising kids and working. We should be persuading parents that reading to and with their kids is good for all of them. While we’re at it, we should support our local libraries in any way we can.

E-books, print books – what good will any of them be when no one is left to read them?

Print Snobs and E-bullies

Sandra Parshall

It was inevitable, human nature being what it is. The so-called e-book revolution is already bringing out the worst in some writers, dividing them into two equally unpleasant categories: print book snobs and e-bullies.

Not all writers are taking defensive/offensive stances, but plenty are pouring their emotions into angry, insulting internet postings.

The print book snobs are unmovable in their convictions:

Only a stack of paper bound between covers can be called a Book.
E-books are merely an additional source of income from works that have first been properly vetted and produced by A Real Publisher.
People who go straight to digital are doing so because their work is amateurish and unreadable and no Real Publisher will touch it.


On the other side, the e-bullies respond in equally nasty terms:

Writers published in print are fools clinging to a dying format.
Any writer who gives a slice of profits to a publisher and an agent is an idiot.
A writer who hands over production and sale of her/his work to a publishing company is lazy, stupid, or both.
Any writer who really tries can make a lot more money from e-books than print books.


I don’t know about you, dear reader, but I’m sick of this argument already.

E-books are transforming the way we view publishing, no doubt about it. I respect anyone who can make money from e-books without first becoming a bestseller in traditional book form. (Right now, the print and e-book bestseller lists are virtual mirrors of one another.) To me, a book in e-format is as much a book as one in print form. A “book” is the words, not the platform on which those words are brought to readers. I hope every novel I ever publish will be available to readers as an e-book. I believe e-books will help many midlist authors find an audience and keep them from giving up on their writing.

On the other hand, I am passionate about printed books. Love the smell of them, the feel of them, the beauty of them. I have shelf after shelf filled with books I may never open again after the initial reading. I keep them because they’re beautiful, and because they represent gateways into other worlds. I love libraries for the same reason, and one of the most thrilling moments of my life was seeing my first novel in a library.

I understand why people become defensive and downright nasty when their choices are challenged. I don’t understand why anyone assumes the right to challenge another person’s choices.

All writers are struggling to understand the changes sweeping through the publishing world. Why can’t we respect each other, support each other, and walk into the future hand in hand?

The Book World after the Revolution

Sandra Parshall

We’re in the middle of a publishing revolution, and people are behaving the same way they do when any great upheaval takes place. Some are jumping onboard enthusiastically. Some shake their heads and predict it will blow over and everything will return to “normal” – meaning, in this case, that traditionally published books will reign supreme. Others stand on the sidelines, having decided to wait and see how it all shakes out.

Those who deny what’s happening remind me of people who swore 30 years ago that they would never own a computer. Typewriters would never disappear. Yeah, right. Just like printed books and the stores that sell them will never disappear.

A few recent bits of news in the publishing/bookselling world:

In September, bookstore sales were down 7.7%, making it the worst month of 2010, while e-book sales rose by 158%. In the first nine months of 2010, e-book sales rose 190% over the same period last year.

The small independent chain Joseph-Beth Booksellers filed for bankruptcy protection and announced it will close four of its eight stores by the end of the year.

Barnes and Noble plans to close six to 10 stores annually for the next three years. Meanwhile, Borders continues its slow slide toward near-certain death.

I have to wonder where the optimists get their certainty that traditionally printed books and brick-and-mortar bookstores will survive. Those of us who buy and read books are a distinct minority of the population. If a million people watch one episode of a TV show on a major network, the show is an instant flop and gets yanked off the air. If a million people buy copies of a book, it’s a gigantic runaway bestseller. Relatively few authors sell well enough to support themselves with their writing. The vast majority sell fewer than 5,000 copies of each book. Books are not an important part of most people’s lives. They get their entertainment elsewhere. And people who do buy books are increasingly resistant to high cover prices.

Some in the publishing industry predict that e-books will make up 25% of all book sales within two or three years. (The current figure is around 10%.) What will the e-book share of the market be in 10 years? Fifteen years? Will print books be the expensive exception by then – collectors’ items?

The revolution is here. It’s happening. It’s not going away or slowing down. Why are so many people, even those who own Kindles and no longer buy print books, acting as if nothing much has changed or will change?

I have a million questions about the future. I’d like to hear more people talking about these issues, even if we can’t predict the answers with any certainty.

Will big publishers transform themselves into e-publishers just to stay alive?

With fewer print books being produced and sold, what will happen to bookstores? The indies have been dying left and right for years. Most people have already written off Borders. Can Barnes and Noble change enough to stay in business?

When will writers’ organizations, some of which currently have strict definitions of what “published” means, realize they have to adjust their criteria?

When will conferences start giving equal space on the program to e-published writers?

What will the “book room” at the typical conference look like in 10 or 15 years? Will it consist of lines of kiosks where conference-goers can purchase POD copies of books or instantly download digital books to their readers? Will signing times for authors be eliminated when they no longer have print books to sign? 

 
How do YOU see the future for the small minority of the human population that loves books? What will the book world look like after the revolution?

An Editor's Advice on Publishing

Sandra Parshall

John Betancourt’s Wildside Press is hundreds of miles from New York, but from his vantage point in Bethesda, Maryland, he has a clear vision of what’s happening in publishing and what the future holds. His wide-ranging talk at a recent meeting of the Sisters in Crime Chesapeake Chapter had me furiously scribbling notes so I could share his comments with PDD’s readers.

Betancourt is a successful science fiction author of many short stories and about 40 novels. He and his wife Kim started Wildside Press in 1989 to publish speculative fiction, but it has grown over the years and now publishes mysteries (including my friend Sasscer Hill’s first book, Full Mortality, out in May) as well as nonfiction, e-books and magazines. One of the company’s imprints, Juno Books, became a co-publishing venture with Simon & Schuster as of January 2009, with an emphasis on dynamic female protagonists in contemporary/urban fantasy/paranormal fiction. Authors like Carole Nelson Douglas are publishing with Juno. One of the imprint’s budding stars is Washington area writer Maria Lima, who began with an obscure small press but moved to Juno after Betancourt read her first book and fell in love with her captivating style and voice.

He came to our meeting to present the chapter’s new anthology, Chesapeake Crimes: They Had It Comin’, which Wildside is publishing. The anthology is a trade paperback, one of the formats that Betancourt believes will replace mass market paperbacks. “I’d like to see mass market paperbacks go away,” he said, pointing out the generally low quality of the paper and binding used in the books. He believes e-books will replace a lot of the print book market within a few years and could become the favored way to introduce new writers. He predicts that e-books will soon be making more money than mass market paperbacks. For print, trade paperbacks and hardcovers are of higher quality, last longer, and earn more money per copy for both the author and the publisher.

Online publishing, he believes, can be a good way for beginners to attract attention and break in. “Online publishing is your friend,” he said in answer to a chapter member’s question. “Even if it doesn’t pay, it can get attention for your writing.”

The inevitable questions about finding an agent led Betancourt to tell his own career story. He has sold his books himself, then hired agents to negotiate his contracts. He doesn’t believe agents are particularly good at selling books because of their limited contacts and their tendency to give up quickly. However, with big publishers that accept submissions only through agents, writers have no choice but to use them from the start. He advised meeting personally with an agent before signing with him or her. A personal meeting at a conference or workshop is the best way to find an agent, preferable to cold querying. Be at your best for such a meeting, he said. “Make them want to know about you and your writing. Be outgoing, funny, charming.” Sell yourself and you’ll make the agent eager to sell your work.

Publishers have become frighteningly quick to drop writers these days, Betancourt pointed out, so after signing with a publisher, you have to be pleasant to work with, or you might discover that you’re replaceable. He recalled a bestselling science fiction author of Star Trek novels who phoned her editor several times a week for lengthy conversations. The writer’s contract was dropped. The moral of the story: “Don’t piss off your editor.”

The internet offers a lot of opportunities for self-promotion, Betancourt said, but a heavy-handed me-me-me approach will turn off potential readers. Don’t plaster the internet with self-promotion and “don’t push yourself as a writer” on internet groups, he advised. “Be interesting, be entertaining, contribute something.” Nobody will read a blog that is about nothing but the writer and her new book, and if the only time you show up in an internet group is when you have something to sell, you won’t win over any readers.

A few other bits of Betancourt advice culled from my notes:

Make sure people remember you and your books. Memorable titles and memorable author names are always a plus. Betancourt advised Lynda Hill to use her middle name, Sasscer, for writing. He advised Maria Y. Lima to drop the middle initial to make her name flow more easily off the tongue. Change the spelling of your name if that will make it stand out.

Try to avoid selling the paperback rights to the same company that brings out your hardcovers. You’ll get more money by going elsewhere.

Never let an editor keep anything for more than three months. Always hold editors to the time limits they give in their guidelines or on their websites.

Try writing intelligent, thoughtful online reviews of other people’s books as a form of self-promotion. If readers respect your opinions, they’ll check out your writing.

Life's not fair. Neither is publishing.

Sandra Parshall

I can’t recall a time when writers, myself included, weren’t complaining about the dire state of publishing – the difficulty of selling a book, the difficulty of staying published once you’ve broken in, the unfairness of it all.

The cries of doom have risen to fever pitch in the last week, with news of widespread layoffs and downsizing at some of the biggest publishing houses. When Timothy Egan’s column titled “Typing Without a Clue” appeared in the New York Times last Sunday, a lot of writers seized on it as the perfect expression of their own frustration with a business that chases bestsellers and spends money on books of little merit instead of nurturing real talent.

I have to admit I’m bemused when I see mystery writers praising Egan’s piece as if he has championed their own cause. While Egan raises valid questions – what can Joe the Plumber possibly have to say that warrants putting his thoughts between covers, and why would anything written by Sarah Palin be worth a $7 million advance? – I don’t think he's speaking for crime fiction writers. Like most people who rant on this subject, Egan seems angered by the lack of support for literary novels and, as he says, "extraordinary histories" and "riveting memoirs" as well as the works of foreign writers who “struggle to get past a censor’s gate.” I don't think he's upset by the difficulty of getting a new cozy mystery or police procedural published.

(Egan himself writes history, by the way, and he is a Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist. His one work of fiction, a 2005 novel titled The Winemaker’s Daughter, was described by Publisher’s Weekly as “scattered, clumsy and overearnest.”)

Plenty of people would say that crime fiction is part of the problem in today’s publishing business. They look at all the mysteries and thrillers on the bestseller lists and denounce them as garbage with no lasting value. They deplore the big advances paid to authors like James Patterson, Patricia Cornwell, and David Baldaccci. Yet readers love those authors' books and buy them, literally, by the millions. Patterson often has two or three books on the bestseller lists simultaneously. Can anyone realistically expect the folks at Little, Brown to turn their backs on profits of that magnitude and concentrate on “small” books that might sell 3,000 copies each? Of course not. And to hold onto a writer like Patterson, the publisher has to plunk down a lot of money up front.

A Patterson book will earn back every cent of the advance and a lot more in profit for the publisher. An investment in such a proven commodity carries no risk. Publishers run into trouble, though, when they fork over million dollar advances for novels that don’t interest readers. It’s easy to see how it happens. A book has the elements of previous bestsellers, plus some unique attribute – it’s the same but different, just what publishers want – and several editors become convinced it will be The Next Sensation. In their determination to get it, they bid against one another until the advance reaches a ridiculous amount. Sometimes the book does well, everyone profits, and a new star is born. Often it either flops or has mediocre sales. Then the publisher is in trouble, and so is the writer.

Aside from the established stars of the genre, few crime fiction authors these days are naive enough to feel safe because they have publishing contracts. I know a lot of writers who have been dropped by their publishers in recent years, not because their series were outright failures but because they didn't “break out” and become bestsellers. Even imprints that don’t expect bestsellerdom for every author may, nevertheless, routinely discard a series after two or three books if sales don’t grow rapidly. As far as I can tell, the only people who feel bad about this are mystery writers themselves and mystery readers. Maybe Timothy Egan cares too, but I have my doubts.

Publishing is an old-fashioned business that can’t seem to catch up with the modern world. Online marketing, for example, remains largely unexplored territory for some houses. But the people who run publishing companies have recognized one sad fact about modern life: the number of people who love to read -- really READ -- and have time for it has declined drastically. For people who want a book-like product without the heavy work of thoughtful reading, they publish junk food for the mind that is quickly enjoyed and discarded. Good commercial fiction -- the category the best crime novels fall into -- is several cuts above that, but it is still primarily entertainment. A healthy market remains for commercial fiction, and that drives publishers to take insane gambles in the hope of a big payoff.

The latest round of layoffs and restructuring reduced the number of salaries publishers have to pay but apparently changed little about the way they do business. I’ve never known a time when publishing wasn’t in trouble. I probably never will. And I doubt there’s anything writers – or readers – can do to change a business that isn’t willing to fix itself.

Late Bloomer

Sandra Parshall

I’m sure the man in the bookstore didn’t mean to hurt my feelings.

I was doing my thing, standing by a table near the door and inviting customers to stop and look at/hear about my books. I gave this particular man my spiel, including the information that The Heat of the Moon won the Agatha Award for Best First Novel of 2006. He picked up a copy, studied it, looked back at me and said, “This was your first novel?” Yes, I said with a smile. He scrutinized my face with narrowed eyes and finally remarked, “So I guess you took up writing very late in life.”

I wanted to grab the guy by his polo shirt and scream into his face, “Do you have ANY IDEA how many books I’ve written? Do you have ANY IDEA how hard it is to sell a book to a publisher? I'd like to see YOU try it. And I don’t look THAT danged old.” I could have simply hit him, of course, but striking the customers probably wouldn’t go down well with the bookstore manager. What I did was smile – by now, my smile felt fixed in concrete – and say, pleasantly, “Getting a book published is wonderful, at any time of life. I’m really enjoying it.”

And that’s true. Except...

Many writers have unsold manuscripts stacked in a closet, and although we may claim to be glad those earlier, imperfect efforts were never foisted on the public, a sense of regret is inevitable. Regret that books we labored over and loved at the time were deemed unworthy. Regret for the years of rejection that left permanent bruises on our egos. Regret that we had to wait so long to enjoy the satisfaction of sharing our work with readers.

I’ve been writing since I was a child. I started trying to get my fiction (short stories back then) published when I was in my teens. I started working as a newspaper reporter in my twenties and also began writing novels. I wrote and wrote and wrote and got absolutely nowhere. One agent after another took me on and failed to sell my work. One manuscript after another went into the closet. I never seemed to be writing whatever it was that editors were looking for at any particular time.

I didn’t even start reading mysteries and suspense until I was around 30, and it was years after that before I decided to write them. The Heat of the Moon was my first attempts at suspense. It didn’t do any better with New York publishers than my previous literary efforts had. One editor wanted to buy it, but shortly after she informed my agent she intended to make an offer, she lost her job in one of the corporate takeovers that were rampant at the time. My book deal went down with her. Another editor – my dream editor, in fact – loved the book. Wanted to publish it, but didn’t have room for it on her list. She asked my agent to resubmit it in three months if it hadn’t sold. My agent resubmitted, the editor read it again, decided she didn’t like the ending, and rejected it. All the other editors – 20, I believe – turned it down because they thought it lacked suspense and readers wouldn’t stick with it. I put it away and would never have submitted it anywhere again if a couple of friends hadn’t read the manuscript and urged me to keep trying. An editor named Barbara Peters eventually bought it, and Poisoned Pen Press published the book exactly as it was originally written. A year later, it won the Agatha Award. At last, I had bloomed – but late, very late, by comparison to my youthful hopes for a writing career.

So now I’ve arrived, right? I’m secure, no longer a wannabe. Well, one thing I’ve learned since becoming a published writer and getting to know others is that only the mega-bestselling authors are secure. In the past several years, a lot of wonderful writers with solid followings have been dropped by their publishers because they haven’t “broken out” of the midlist to major sales. I’m sure James Patterson sleeps well at night, but I imagine quite a few less prominent writers are having nightmares about being dumped in the near future.

It’s a hard world out there. Every aspiring writer should be aware of how difficult it can be to sell your work. But if you’re a true writer, the knowledge of disappointments ahead won’t stop you – it will only make you more determined. If you're a reader and you meet a middle-aged author selling his or her first novel, recognize that this probably isn’t someone who “started late.” In all likelihood, what you see before you is a survivor. Offer your congratulations, buy a copy of the book, and please keep your thoughts about the writer’s age to yourself!

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For another look at life as a middle-aged beginner, be sure to read this weekend’s guest blog by June Shaw. June is one of the most charming, vivacious people I’ve ever met, and she’s thoroughly enjoying her new career as a mystery author.

Interview with author Lori Devoti

By Lonnie Cruse



Today's post is an interview with author Lori Devoti. I first met Lori at a mystery writer's conference and was intrigued when I learned she'd been published in another genre. I asked her to chat with me about that here, and about her writing in general.

LC: Tell us about your books? And what was your inspiration?

LD: My dark paranormals are set in the modern world, but as if Norse mythology is real and operating in the background. My heroes so far have been shape shifters--hellhounds and garm. Both come from Norse myth, but I tweaked them. Neither were shape shifters. One was just a spectral hound and the other a massive wolf. My basic inspiration came from a book that had information on demon dogs, but each book has its own inspiration too. I start with a basic set up or conflict and things just build in my mind until I have a fairly complete idea of what is going to happen.

LC: You started out writing in the mystery genre and now write romance and nocturnes. Why the change? And which is easiest for you?

LD: I read all three of the big genres--romance, mystery and scifi/fantasy. I started with a mystery manuscript because that was what I was reading at the time. I moved to romance because I didn't want to get stuck trying one thing that might not work for me. I actually have romance, fantasy and mystery proposals out with editors right now.

LC: I know what romance is about, (married over 44 years, hehe) but what are nocturnes?

LD: It is a newish line at Harlequin/Silhouette. Two books are released each month in the line and most places if you don't get to the store in that month, the books will be sent back to the publisher. Some bookstores seem to be keeping the Nocturnes around longer though, and all of them are available to order either through some place like Amazon, or a local bookstore even months later. Nocturnes specifically are all dark paranormals with alpha heroes and sensual action-driven plots.

LC: Tell us a bit about Lori Devoti, what you read,what you write, where you hang out.

LD: As I said earlier, I read all the commercial genres. I'm not much on literary fiction though. I pretty much hang out at my house or the Y where I take spin class and a class called power pump--group weight lifting. On the Internet, I'm everywhere...MySpace, Bebo, Crimespace, Facebook, Linkedin, and Shelfari (my favorite).

LC: How did you find your publisher?

LD: My first publisher I sold to at a conference. My second, I had an agent, but it was my decision to try for a Nocturne. My first two books were light contemporaries and Nocturnes are dark paranormals--quite the change for me. However, I loved reading dark paranormals and really wanted to try and write one. To my surprise everyone took my proposal seriously.

LC: Do you work with an agent? If so, how did you connect?

LD: My current agent used to work for my previous agent. My previous agent and I had already parted ways, I was in the process of finding a new one, when Holly (Holly Root, Waxman Literary) left Trident (previous agency). I loved Holly when we worked together at Trident. I always said she was the person who would catch whatever you knew was wrong with your work, but hoped no one else noticed. I loved that. Anyway, when I heard she had started taking on her own clients, I contacted her.

LC: What sends you running to the computer to write? And what makes you bang your head on the keyboard in frustration?

LD: I don't think anything sends me running to the computer to write. That sounds horrible, but writing is hard, especially after you start getting paid for it and know other people are going to be judging it. My first manuscript was a breeze to write--it probably stank to high heaven, but it was darn easy to write. Now I know more and I want every book to be good--not just okay, good--the kind of book someone loves and is upset when it's over. What makes me frustrated is when I don't have the book (or more often the characters) thought out well enough and am just trying to force my way past that. It doesn't work. And it makes me sick to my stomach.
LC: How do you promote your books? What works best for you?

LD: Nothing works. :) (I say that and I'm an ex-advertising person) I honestly think the best thing an author can do for themselves is try and write the best books they can and then try to get as many out in a year as they can without compromising that quality. I do, however, probably do a lot more promotion than many authors. I have a web site and a blog. I'm on all those social networks. I have bookmarks, book plates, virtual bumper stickers and other things personalized for my books. I do a few group signings and I sign stock when I can. Basically, I do what I enjoy and what doesn't cost me an arm and a leg. I do not believe in spending a big chunk of your advance on promotion. I heard a NY Timesbest-selling author once say you'd be better off taking every penny of your advance and buying as many copies of your book as you can, than spending that advance on promotion. I haven't done that, but I believe her. Sales get publishers attention--not contest wins, or good reviews. And sales get you another contract and another chance to build your audience--until you have that base audience I think $2,000 spent buying your own books and maybe giving them away would be a lot more productive than buying a full color ad in some magazine.

LC: What else would you like our readers to know about Lori Devoti?

LD: My web site is http://www.loridevoti.com/ or readers can find me on one of the social networks I mentioned. If you are on Shelfari--find me! I love roaming people's bookshelves. :) LC: Thanks for dropping by, Lori. See you at Love Is Murder next month.

When a book is about to be released . . .

Lonnie Cruse

Reviews, do you read 'em? Write 'em? Know anything about 'em?

I just received the advance reader copies for my new book Fifty-Seven Heaven which will be released by Five Star (mystery line) on December 12, 2007. Now I'm faced with asking reviewers to review. Luckily, Five Star sends out a LOT of copies for review. BUT I'm expected to do my share and send to places they don't. Where to send? Eeeeek!

Okay, I'm in a small town in a very rural area. Two strikes. BUT we have lovely libraries, here and across the river in Paducah, so they are very high on my list. Then I'm sending to reviewers who loved my first series, the Metropolis Mystery series, featuring Sheriff Joe Dalton. Crossing my fingers that they will love this one as well. Crossing my fingers that the list of possible reviewers I got from friends and fellow Five Star authors will help, (networking, it's where it's at!) Crossing my fingers that the well-known reviewers who receive the copies from my publisher will decide to review it. Do you have ANY idea how difficult it is to type with every finger crossed?

It's also my job to get blurbers to blurb for the hard cover book. I've sent those books off to the agreeable authors I asked. Here again, networking was HUGE. I'd met each of these very well-known authors at writer's conferences, they know me, even if slightly, so they were willing to read the book and see if they can blurb it for me. If I hadn't met them, I doubt I'd have the courage to ask for a blurb.

This is a business of total opposites. Meaning we write in solitude, often threatening anyone or anything interfering with our "quiet time" with real physical harm. But getting the book criqitqued/edited, creating a decent synopsis or query, finding an agent or publisher, getting blurbs and reviews, marketing/promoting the book, those ALL require an author to come out from under her rock of choice and meet with others. Network!

Sooo, put on your sunglasses, lest the light of day blind you, come out of your cave, and start networking. It's fun, and you never know when you will run into one of your favorite authors. Sigh, time for me to go back into the darkness of re-writes. Thanks for stopping by!

Guest Blogger Don Bruns

One in four adults read no books last year. It's a lead story in newspapers today. According to an Associated Press-Ipsos poll released Tuesday, of those who did read, women and seniors were most avid and religious works and pop fiction were the top choices. The typical person read four books in the last year. Half read more and half read fewer. Excluding those who hadn't read any, the usual number read was seven.

Analyists attribute the listlessness to competition from the Internet and other media, the unsteady economy, and a well-established industry with limited opportunities for expansion.

If pasta dishes were overtaking beef dishes in popularity, the Beef Industry would band together and have a national campaign, and maybe do commecials that said something like "BEEF, IT'S WHAT'S FOR DINNER!"

Or if the milk industry was experiencing flat sales, the Dairy Industry would probably come up with a campaign that said "GOT MILK?"

Instead, the publishing industry keeps pushing top tiered authors, and their own books to try and capture the seven books per reader.

There's nothing wrong with that, but I wonder why the major publishers can't band together for a campaign that doesn't sell individual books. A campaign that promotes the excitement of reading. A series of billboards, television ads, print pieces, that show someone reading...on a beach...in bed...in an easy chair, on the train, on a plane, in a restaurant, in a library...and the catch phrase could be "A good book can go anywhere!" Or pictures of exotic locations, with the slogan "A book can take you anywhere." Or just a series of print ads that say..."Caught you reading. Read a good book lately?" Or maybe a campaign that shows a parent reading, and a little kid next to the parent with a book. The slogan could be "Kids learn good habits by example. Read a book!"

It seems to me that the publishing industry could help put some excitement back into reading. And if we could just get each reader in America to read one more book a year...just one, it might be mine. Or yours.

Don Bruns is a mystery writer with a new release Sept. 2007.
Stuff To Die For is not only a book, but a short movie. You can learn more about both at www.donbrunsbooks.com

When We Were Orphaned

Barbara Fister (Guest Blogger) I’m a crime fiction fan. I want my stories to come with conflict and angst, plots that double back on themselves, and moments of sheer, gut-wrenching panic. So if I have to choose between a simple-minded fairytale and a good, dark thriller, which am I going to pick? I have to admit, in real life, fairytales are tempting. My life of crime started out that way. I wrote a book, threw darts at Literary Marketplace, sent out queries and got an agent. He secured a generous three book contract in a preempt the day after it went on the market. Big yawn. And they lived happily ever after. Where’s the conflict? Where’s the angst? Come on, you call this fun? Hold on. I’m just getting started. The editor who loved my character left the house, with all of the love apparently stuffed at the bottom of her briefcase. (Technically, this is called “being orphaned.”) Nobody could find the memo about why they’d bought the book in the first place. There were rewrites to do. Lots of rewrites. The economy started to slide downhill and on one sunny day in September the world became a darker place, cast in what Art Spiegelman so brilliantly called “the shadow of no towers.” All in all, it took more than three years from that fairytale beginning before On Edge was finally published. Some people liked it. The LA Times called it “gripping” and the San Jose Mercury News put it on their list of best mysteries and thrillers for 2002. But by the time it was on the shelves it was becoming clear no matter how many times I reworked the second book in the series, no matter how hard I tried to mind-meld with my new editor and figure out what I could do to fix the problems she saw in it, there really wasn’t a place for me and my series character at the fairytale publishing house. I should have known better. Should have noticed that gingerbread siding, the frosting on the roof, the suspicious trail of vanishing breadcrumbs. Bad things happen in those fairytale houses, and no wonder. Have you read any fairytales lately? The stories collected by the Brothers Grimm put their orphans through the tortures of hell, and Hans Christian Anderson . . . forget the Disney version, read the original. That dude was seriously twisted. Eventually it came, the phone call from my agent that I’d been dreading, giving me the bad news. (Technically, this is called “being dumped.”) He suggested I work on something new while he worked hard at discovering that nobody else wanted the sequel, either. I dealt with disappointment by being brilliant at my day job, seeking elegant-sounding euphemisms for “dumped,” and skimming through “Publication is Not Recommended,” a selection of rejection letters from the Knopf archives reprinted in The Missouri Review. Reading rejections of works by Jorge Luis Borges, Vladimir Nabokov, Sylvia Plath, and Stephen King isn’t just about finding good company for your misery, it confirms that publishing is, indeed, a crap shoot. And, of course, I wrote. Writing has always helped me make sense of things, makes me reach for meaning by taking whatever it is that’s bothering me and giving me a sideways approach at understanding it. When a social issue I’ve been reading about in the news is put under a fictional lens, I can examine the fissures and faults, the right and the wrong of it. The craft itself is all about making sense. Sometimes it doesn’t go well, and I delete more pages than I keep, but there’s something intrinsically satisfying in the effort to find just the right words, the right flow for a scene, the emotional heart of a story. And when it works, when things come together, when that problem you couldn’t wrap your head around when you read about it in the newspaper takes on meaning through the nuances and shades and structure of a story - that makes it all worthwhile. There’s a lot of emotion tied up in writing that has nothing to do with the stories we want to tell. Part of the grief of being dumped is knowing you’ll never get to learn the rest of the story of a character who was real to you, an orphan who will never have a home except in your own imagination. The other, less attractive part has nothing to do with writing. Humans are hardwired to have cravenly Pavlovian responses to praise or criticism, whatever its source. And sometimes that buzz turns out to be coming from a chainsaw.It’s hard to remember, in the clamor and clang of the attention economy, as those Pavlovian responses do bad things to your head, what the point of it all is. But eventually you get to a place where the clamor dies down and the chainsaw shuts off and in that sudden stillness you ask yourself, Why am I doing this? A question quickly followed by its ugly stepsister: Would you keep writing if you knew nobody would ever publish your stuff again?I wrestled with it for a while, then told the stepsister to get her ugly ass back to that fairytale where she belonged. I want to write crime fiction. Period. I want to keep looking for the perfectly-formed Platonic Mystery, the book that is exactly the one I want to read. When I find a book that delights me it makes me want to stretch my own muscles and try to find my own best voice. That’s the part that I love, the thing that got me started in the first place. I know it will come with setbacks and plot twists, doubts and moments of panic. Trouble is my business, after all. Down those mean streets a woman must go. I’m blessed with an agent who stuck by me. I was fortunate enough to have several people at St. Martin’s read the manuscript of In the Wind and decide they liked it enough to take the financial gamble of publishing it. It’s thrilling to work with an editor who reads with heart and skill, who can put her finger on something that seemed vaguely off but can suddenly be fixed. And yes, trivial though it is, it’s a relief to be able to stop searching for a better way to say “Actually, I was dumped” when well-meaning friends ask when my next book is coming out. Now I can say “next year.” As Chandler said in his classic essay, “The Simple Art of Murder,” in everything we call art there is a “quality of redemption.” He wasn’t talking about being published, getting reviews, getting praise while ducking the beatings that come with the territory. He wasn’t talking about “happily ever after” endings. He was talking about the writing itself, the adventure story that at its heart is a search for a hidden truth. Whatever happens in the next chapters of my life, that’s something I want to keep working at. As the man said: such is my faith.Visit the author's web site at www.barbarafister.com.

Riding the Review Rollercoaster

Sandra Parshall

Now, at last, I understand my urge to publish novels.

It’s not a deep-seated desire to communicate. It’s not a need to purge my imagination of all those crazy made-up people who keep running around in their made-up world, doing shocking things. It’s not, heaven knows, a belief that publication will make me rich and famous. (I was never naive enough to believe that.)

No, it’s masochism.

I just love putting myself at the mercy of strangers. I take a perverse pleasure in releasing my creative children into the world and waiting, wide-eyed and eager, for the world to shatter my fragile writerly ego with those awful-and-wonderful things called reviews.

As my husband and friends never tire of pointing out, I can ignore reams of praise if I find a single disapproving sentence buried within. So what if the reviewer loved the characters, found the setting evocative, enjoyed the plot right to the end? None of that counts. What counts is that she thought some of my phrasing was... gulp... clunky.

Despair! I will never write again. I will toss the computer out with the trash because I am clearly unworthy to be called an author.

But the Library Journal gave my second book, Disturbing the Dead, a starred review. That means something, doesn’t it? Certainly it does. I am worthy after all! I am an author.

But... but... A reviewer said DTD has too many characters. Omigod. Here is a person who believes that some of the characters I love so much shouldn’t even exist. How can I go on writing now that I know this? Where did I put the razor blades?

Okay, calm down, Sandy, and go reread the advance reviews. Oh, look, Kirkus -- Kirkus, so difficult to please! -- declared DTD “fast-paced, chilling, and compulsively readable.” Whew. My life and sanity saved again.

But... but... Yet another reviewer (they’re multiplying like wire hangers in a closet) thinks DTD has too many Melungeon characters and, furthermore, I made too many of them poor. Now I feel like an insensitive wretch who traffics in stereotypes. Forget the razor blades. Bullets are faster.

What one reviewer praises, another will criticize. And it’s the criticism, seldom the praise, that sticks in my mind. Every review is a source of nail-biting worry before I read it and possible agony afterward. “Don’t take it personally,” everybody says. Impossible advice for someone like me to follow. Everything is personal.

I would not dream of challenging reviewers, because they’re supposed to give their honest opinions and I’m grateful to them for telling readers about my books. In my rare lucid moments, I realize that my reviews have been mostly positive and I have nothing to complain about. I try not to care that at least two reviewers think Disturbing the Dead takes place in North Carolina, even though the characters never venture outside Virginia. (True to form, I’m convinced that misapprehension is somehow my fault.)

But I keep wondering exactly which characters I should have left out of the book and which phrases were clunky. Is it too late to recall every copy and rewrite?

I regard my work-in-progress with a cold eye. Maybe I should kill off Greg right now. Heck, maybe Greg should never have been born in the first place. And clunky writing? Oh, good grief, the book is filled with it. No one will ever want to read the thing. It’s hopeless. I’m hopeless. Getting two books published was a fluke. It will never happen again.

But if, through some miracle, I do publish a third book, I’m not going to read the reviews. Not a one. Zip.

I am finished with this particular form of masochism.

Really.