Publishing; The New Paradigm

I'm getting so sick of new paradigms. I mean, I haven't even figured out the old paradigm yet. But new it is. As a matter of fact, by the time you get to the end of this blog post, I'm sure it will have all changed again.

Maybe new authors have it better than "established" authors. Maybe because new authors aren't stuck with the old models and can easily move forward without the old prejudices. I've had to rethink, re-do, and reinvent so often I'm a bit confused these days.

This is my roundabout way of saying that the publishing world is still evolving and welcome to my merry-go-round!

Once upon a time, there was the vanity press, where authors whose work wasn't good enough to be published by big New York publishers could publish it themselves. If you signed with a vanity press, you essentially paid to be published. And it doubly sucked because not only did you pay this money thinking that they would take care of it and you'd start selling like mad, but you didn't sell anything because bookstores certainly wouldn't look twice at you, and you could forget about reviews. There was no such thing as ebooks and Amazon yet.

Then Amazon took the book world by storm, and pretty much opened the door to ebooks (because they had this Kindle Kontraption to sell and needed content) and suddenly it didn't really cost you anything to get published. Except it cost the rest of us, because there was still the problem of lousy books getting "published" that wouldn't ordinarily have seen the light of day. And a LOT of them. Some 250,000 self-pubbed ebooks published each year now. But then more changes happened. Print on demand or POD technology became a viable way for authors to also get print copies of their work out there. (Because POD is just what it says. No need to warehouse books when you just wait for orders to come in and print them when...well, demanded.) And authors with a following, with an established record of publishing with big and small publishers, started to self-publish their out-of-print backlist as ebooks and then print books. Suddenly, it wasn't such a bad thing to self-publish, a formerly dirty word.

But as always, promotion is the bugaboo. A big publisher will at least have your book in their catalog from which libraries and bookstores could order. They'd send your books to reviewers. They'd get you your ISBNs and offer a way for bookstores to connect with distributors. They'd edit, proofread, and design your book, at no small expense. Of course that was all they'd do. No tours, no ads, no placement in endcaps or on tables in the bookstores. Not even a freakin' bookmark. Not for Ms. Midlist, anyway.

And if this last year has taught me anything, it's where promotion is good and where it is lacking.

It wasn't too long ago that if you couldn't get placement in a bookstore, couldn't get your book noticed there, then at least Amazon was another spot where sales could rise. After all, you simply went to your social media "Friends" and asked them to review your book or even "Like" it. Those mysterious algorithms on Amazon would catch those reviews and likes and creep your title up the chain of "if you liked this, then you'll like this" right into the faces of prospective buyers. But then the floor fell out from under all that with the emergence of the "Sock Puppet." A sock puppet is when an author not only pays people/companies to write glowing reviews of their own books, but to write scathing reviews for that of their rivals, whatever that means. (Authors don't really have rivals, not like, say, detergent companies have rivals. When a reader gets done with the latest medieval mystery, for instance, they don't just sit on their hands, feeling loyal to one writer and doggedly waiting a whole year until the next one comes out, forsaking the efforts of all other medieval mystery authors. No, they just go to the next author and buy theirs, and buy the next. And when that first author releases a new book the next year then of course there the reader is buying the latest. And the cycle goes on.)

Amazon got wind of these sock puppets and started deleting "suspect" reviews. Mostly by other authors. The problem was they weren't sock puppets. Authors do read books, you know, and are actually fans of other authors. I know I am. But that didn't matter. And so now the whole paradigm of getting lots of reviews doesn't seem to work anymore. So now what?

I've discovered over the years that tours really aren't worth it either. There is the meeting of bookstore owners and librarians, and those are worth a lot to establish those relationships, because a bookstore seller will hand sell the book of a writer they like, and similarly, so will a librarian when a customer doesn't know what to read next. But it's too expensive to run a hit and miss tour for oneself. After all, I'm the one footing the bill.

GoodReads? I find it hard to get the word out about my books there. Twitter? Some swear by it. Facebook? I found that social media might be a bit deceptive as to how popular you might actually be. The number of "Friends" doesn't necessarily reflect the number of people who will buy your books. And as some of you may know, I am now shopping for a new publisher once the latest Crispin Guest book comes out in the fall of 2013 (SHADOW OF THE ALCHEMIST). I'm not done telling Crispin's story but my publisher is. Besides signing with a smaller publisher, my first and most favored option, I do have another option, one that my agent wouldn't be too happy about. That is--dramatic pause--self-publishing them.

Why, after all my disparaging remarks over the years about self-publishing would I even think about the possibility? Sure, Barry Eisler turned down a rumored $500,000 advance from my very publisher (by the way, my advances are not only far from that ballpark, they aren't even in the same state!) in order to self-publish his next thriller, which he did. And he did just fine. I mean, he could afford to hire a publicist, a decent editor, a book designer and cover artist. And he already had a huge following. Self-publishers get a much bigger margin of profit from their ebooks than you'd see from a traditional publisher, something that publishers barely even cared about in their contracts five short years ago.

But I'm not Barry Eisler. And didn't he just sign with a publisher again? Yeah, it's easier with one than without.

Self-publishing wouldn't be free. You do have to hire an editor/proofreader. A decent cover artist. The book must be professionally turned out. Your readers would expect nothing less. But will it be worth the outlay? It's possible I could still get them into bookstores with the POD print editions (in paperback only. They be more expensive because the bookstore needs to make a profit, I need to make a profit, and the book printer/distributor needs to make a profit). It's possible with a little extra marketing on my part, I could get them into some libraries. It's even possible that I might be able to finagle a print review or two. But it seems that I would make a lot less than I'm getting now. Or would I? Is the higher percentage of royalty worth it? Might it turn out being about the same money? I'm already doing the lionshare of promotion myself, but there is more going on behind the scenes that a publisher can do that I can't (like this article in Publisher's Weekly that my St. Martin's publicist placed last year). What are the odds of my doing better? And as a writer, is it better to simply drop a series and write a new one, one that a publisher will want to publish? Is that how writers should roll these days?

The paradigm has shifted yet again and there are no answers.             

There and Back Again

by Sheila Connolly

Recently I found myself browsing in a used bookstore in Brooklyn.  I was with friends, and we were waiting for a table at the restaurant next door, and of course I spotted the bookstore before the car even stopped moving. And of course I bought something.

 

What I found and fell in love with was a thick and yellowed volume titled Scarborough's Official Tour Book for New York, New Jersey, Canada and the East, copyright 1917, issued under the aegis of the New York State Automobile Association.  Since I had great-grandparents and grandparents who lived in New York, New Jersey and New England about that time, and I grew up in New Jersey (and learned to drive there), I had to have it. 

 

Consider it the Google Maps or MapQuest of its day, because the book provides step by step directions from getting from here to there—when the world was a very different place.

 

The entries are arranged by trip.  Let us say we wish to travel from Atlantic City to Philadelphia in 1917, some 61 miles. The details appear on p. 138, and begin by informing us that there is a very good gravel road as far as Berlin, then macadam thereafter.  I won't give you the entire itinerary, but it includes such details as "go south on Atlantic Ave., following trolleys," followed by "bridge."  At 9.3 miles you pass a cemetery on the right; in Elm, at 34.9 miles, you go under a viaduct, then over two viaducts in short order.  At 41.1 miles, "Danger.  Turn left under viaduct, then curve right, and cross railroad."  When you arrive at the Pennsylvania Railroad Station in Camden, you take a ferry across the Delaware River to arrive in Philadelphia.

 

Or say we wish to voyage from Morristown, New Jersey to New York City, a trip I made with my family countless times when I was young.  Start at the east corner of the park (what park? Where?) in Morristown.  Go under the railroad—Washington's Headquarters will be on the left (yes!).  Go straight at the four corners, then follow the stone road to a bridge.  At Florham Park (just down the road from my high school), go straight, "soon leaving macadam (for what?)." A school will be on the right.  Go over the bridge, and the macadam reappears.

 

Then we wend our way through South Orange, Newark (cross a couple of bridges there, then "turn sharp left at open space into park…bear right at fountain), Jersey City, and Weehauken, where you have to take the 42^nd St. ferry.  Apparently you arrive in New York only when you reach Columbus Circle.

 

These trips take place in fairly well settled areas (relatively speaking). How about taking a trip from New York to the Hamptons on Long Island?  When we arrive at Amagansett, after 109 miles, we are warned of a mile of "sandy dirt road" and then at 113.5 miles we find this:

 

From here … you will have very poor road of deep sand.  Follow directions of the occasional white pointed boards.  The red pointed boards point out the worst ways. (These board pointers are changed occasionally owing to the trails becoming cut too deep in sand.) After reaching mileage 18.9 you have mostly dirt road with occasional sandy places.

 

If you survive that, there's a large summer residence on the hill at the left at 113.6 miles.  There is also a saloon one block to the left at mile 115.1 (are the authors suggesting you may need one by then?).  And BTW, look out for the large rock on sharp curve at mile 127.9.

 

Travel must have been a real adventure in those days! No highways, no bridges over the big rivers; no guarantee you'd ever find a paved road where you were going. Most of the navigational benchmarks were viaducts, bridges, trolleys and cemeteries.  You'd better travel with a companion to read the directions out load, since if you stop, you might end up sinking into the sand or mired in mud on an unpaved road.

The book is also sprinkled with illustrated advertisements for hotels ($1.00 to $3.50 per day), plus ads for garages (some of which promise "NEVER CLOSED"—those unpaved roads must have been hard on cars, not to mention the people bouncing around in them. 

 

P.S. If anyone wants to know how to get from Point A to Point B in the eastern US in 1917, let me know.

 

 

City Mouse, Country Mouse

by Sheila Connolly

I've always lived in the suburbs.

That sounds like the first line of a bad novel, doesn't it? But it's true—for most of my life I have lived somewhere on the outskirts of a city—New York, Philadelphia, Boston, San Francisco. I sometimes joke that I can't sleep without the sound of a commuter train rumbling by, because there has been one close enough to hear as far back as I can remember.

One of Aesop's fables tells the tale of the City Mouse and his cousin the Country Mouse. City Mouse of course thinks his lifestyle is the better one, but Country Mouse disagrees (after being confronted by two large and angry dogs at City Mouse's residence) and goes home to his less opulent but more peaceful place.

But what do you do if both sides appeal to you? Every time I visit New York or Boston or Philadelphia, I remember the excitement of a city—the richness of the cultural assets available all the time (if you can afford them); the ease of getting around, whether you prefer broad sidewalks, buses, trains or even taxis; the wealth of restaurants; and even the interesting food from street vendors (roasting chestnuts in New York, hot pretzels with mustard in Philadelphia). There's an almost physical boost that you feel from all that energy around you.

But then, I love the country. I've never been sure why, since I had little experience with it in my early life. My mother spent her high school years on a farm in Maine and hated it, so much so that she never went back. We were once driving together somewhere—Massachusetts? New Jersey?—and I was admiring the landscape, and she said "I hate the country." But I was always in love with rolling hills and open fields and…maybe it was the absence of people. Being alone has never frightened me.

The first time I visited Ireland, it felt like coming home. I likened it to putting on an old shoe—it was familiar and comforting, and I just slid into it like I belonged. Is there such a thing as an inherited memory? I found myself standing on the land where my Connolly ancestors lived for centuries—which still looks much like it would have when they were there—and saying to myself, how could they have left? Okay, maybe they were too busy trying to eke a living out of raising sheep and cattle on too-small fields to admire the view, but it had to have been imprinted on them from birth.

So here I sit, on the outermost reaches of a Boston suburb, with a commuter line that runs at the top of my street. If I could go anywhere I wanted, where would it be? Luckily for me I do it in my head, because I'm writing three series. The Orchard Mysteries are set in one of my favorite areas of western Massachusetts (where I had many generations of ancestors), where streets still bear the names of the farmers who settled there first, where small towns cluster around a green where the settlers' livestock grazed, and later the militia mustered for the Revolution. And I write the Museum Mysteries, set in the heart of Philadelphia, where I can revisit any number of the interesting museums, both large and small, as well as historic sites such as Independence Hall. And I'm going to be writing a series set in Ireland, where the past and the present collide in interesting ways: people who live in a stone cottage built in the 18th century have a satellite dish on the roof. They may work in a high-tech industry, but they still know when your great-grandfather emigrated. I get to enjoy each vicariously (with a few real visits thrown in—research, you know).

So which do you prefer? City or country? And may you find yourself where you want to be this holiday season!

An Anniversary: Me and My New York Building

Elizabeth Zelvin

Tomorrow, December 21, is an anniversary for me: forty years since I moved into my apartment building on the Upper West Side in Manhattan.
It’s also the anniversary of my long-ago marriage to my first husband. We spent our wedding night in the spacious one-bedroom apartment he’d been renting for $120 a month. The honeymoon consisted of a long weekend knocking out walls so we could expand the kitchen and sweeping up the resulting homosote crumbs. He was that kind of guy.

I remember looking at myself in the lobby mirror as I waited for him to park the car. I thought, This is who I’ll be for the rest of my life. Oy, was I mistaken. I have reinvented myself several times along the way. We changed apartments, to a $190 two-bedroom one floor up and one door over, when my son was born. We got divorced, he moved out, I remarried, my son grew up and moved out too. And the rent, rent control notwithstanding, has gone up and up and up. But until they throw out rent control altogether—as the landlords keep trying to do—I’m not moving out of the building. No way.

Gradually, the old guard has died off or gone to nursing homes. Only a handful are left. The yuppies who move in stay until they find a mate or have a second baby, and then they move on. And the rent goes up again. The apartment next door to me—directly above that first apartment—is vacant. I’ve been watching—and hearing—them sand floors and paint and renovate. The building staff swear they’re not told the rent, but I pounced on a couple of prospective tenants looking it over and asked how much it was going for. My old $120 nest now rents for $2,800 a month.

I’ve been thinking of throwing a party. I’ve thought about sticking a sign up in the elevator or the lobby: “Forty years in the building—time to meet the neighbors.” New Yorkers guard their personal space fiercely. Down the hall from me, the ladies in the D and E apartments, whose doors faced each other, used to chat in their bathrobes and curlers as if the narrow hall were a backyard fence. I don’t think they ever entered each other’s homes.

I say hello to the more longstanding residents in the elevator and on the street. But we never invite them in, nor they us. I probably know more of the building’s dogs by name than the newer tenants. Harry, the aging Sharpei with his worried wrinkly face, is everybody’s favorite. Maybe he’s worrying about the rent going up again and where we’ll all live if they manage to kill rent regulation altogether. Not in Manhattan, I’m afraid.

In the meantime, I love my building with its thick walls and ceilings. Barring the occasional loud party or especially vituperative marital squabble, the only neighbor I’ve heard in forty years was Marmaduke, the Great Dane in the apartment directly overhead. Until we met him, we hated our unseen noisy neighbors. We thought they must be moving furniture every night. But once we knew, our rancor melted: we understood that a Great Dane plays whenever he wants to.

How Times Can Change While You Write Your Mystery

Elizabeth Zelvin

I found a terrible blooper on page 2 of the galley proofs of Death Will Get You Sober, which my publisher sent for my review with a stern warning that if changes were more than minor, I might have to pay for them myself. The offending passage occurred in the first scene, when Bruce, my protagonist, wakes up in a detox ward on the Bowery on Christmas Day without a clue as to how he got there, thanks to the alcoholic blackout that followed the last he can remember. The guy in the next bed is smoking. A nun appears, asks Bruce how he’s feeling, and offers him a cigarette. What’s wrong with this picture?

When I first went down to the Bowery as a counseling intern in 1983, back before the last flophouses were replaced by fern bars, it was okay to smoke in detox. The unshockable nun in my story, at least in the first scene, was loosely based on a real-life nun whose trick for bridging the empathic gap between her and the alienated and defeated men some people still called “Bowery bums” was always to carry a pack of cigarettes that she could whip out and offer as a way to connect.

I thought up the title and wrote the first 2000 words of Death Will Get You Sober so long ago that I can’t remember how long it’s been, certainly more than ten years. I didn’t write the rest until after my second sojourn on the Bowery, where I ran an alcohol outpatient program from 1993 to 1999. Times had already changed considerably. The notorious men’s shelter, with its smoky lobby teeming with edgy humanity and its history of mayhem on the stairs and drug deals on the street outside, had been renovated and transformed into a well regulated social service agency. By the time I left, the fern bars had already started taking over.

I took out the manuscript and finished the first draft in 2002. In the next five years, while looking for an agent and a publisher and writing the next three in the series, I revised it many times. I condensed the first scene as I learned more about the craft of cutting backstory and getting to the first body. I deleted a couple of adverbs along the way. But it never occurred to me to tinker with that first exchange between Bruce, the smoker in the next bed, and the nun. Nor did my editor or the copy editor who reviewed the manuscript question it. Yet when I saw it in print for the first time, the problem leaped out at me. Readers in April 2008, when the book finally comes out, will know perfectly well that patients aren’t allowed to smoke in bed. I had to find another way for the nun to make her entrance.

Smoking’s not the only thing I’ve had to change in the course of writing the book and getting it to publication. The Bowery material in the book had its genesis in notes I took as an intern in 1983. One young black patient (not yet called African American) with whom I worked wore his baseball cap backwards. My comment: “An individualist!” That found its way into the first draft—and had to be deleted after a whole generation started wearing their baseball caps with the bill sticking out behind. Then there was the joke about not knowing whether someone talking to himself on the street is a schizophrenic or merely using a cell phone. That’s no longer funny, since cellphonistas are now a fact of life and far more common than the mentally ill on the streets of New York.

One of Bruce’s sidekicks, Jimmy, is a computer wiz, a handy plot device to help my amateur sleuths get needed information. In the early versions, I had Jimmy laboriously explain to his girlfriend, Barbara, how to search for something on Google. Now “google” is a verb, and Barbara would be odd indeed if she didn’t know how to look up simple facts. Originally, my main characters didn’t have cell phones. That would have flown if I’d sold the manuscript in 2002 when I first finished it, or even in 2003, when I got my first agent. But it didn’t happen that way, and I had to give them cell phones to keep the book from seeming hopelessly dated.

Time keeps rushing on, and publication takes its own sweet time. Meanwhile, the Bowery keeps changing. When I first walked south past Fifth Street in 1983, I entered a different world. In my book, I wanted to convey the flavor of that world before it vanished completely. Well, it has. I recently attended an event at the Bowery Poetry Club, my first time in the area in several years. When I came up out of the subway and looked around, I was dismayed to find the whole neighborhood has been swallowed up by NoHo. It exudes a homogenized trendiness. No trace of the alcoholic’s Mecca remains. My editor dismissed my suggestion that I convey in some kind of note or foreword that I’ve telescoped the gentrification of the Bowery for purposes of the story. Now I just hope that readers aren’t turned off by a greater disconnect between history and reality that I could have dreamed that time would bring about.