Sepulculture DIY Publishing

Molly Crabapple to Speak at SXSW & NYC Comic Con

2009-02-05T17:43:00.003-05:00

Molly Crabapple will be a panelist at this year's SXSW Interactive Conference in Austin, Texas March 13th through March 17th.

She will also be signing book at this weekend's NYC Comic Con at the Javit's Center, February 6th through 8th.

2008 Calendar Sale!

2008-01-14T18:35:00.000-05:00

We've slashed the price of our 2008 Calendar from $15.00 to $10.00

They're even cheaper if you buy multiples: 2 for $18.00 or 3 for $24.oo

And for a limited time, anyone who orders 2 copies of Dr. Sketchy's Official Rainy Day Colouring Book will receive 2 FREE calendars.

Order now while supplies last!

Molly's Book Signing at Comic Con

2007-07-23T22:16:00.000-04:00

Molly will be signing copies of Dr. Sketchy's Official Rainy Day Colouring Book at the Last Gasp booth (#1616) on Saturday July 28th from 3-5 pm. Stop by to if you are at the convention!

Dr. Sketchy's Comic Con Party

2007-07-20T20:35:00.000-04:00

The San Diego City Beat is going to write up the Dr. Sketchy's Party at Comic Con, which was also just mentioned in The San Diego Beat.

Molly and I are both going to be at Comic Con, so if you're around please say hello.

Comic Con 2007

2007-07-02T17:44:00.000-04:00

Exciting news: Molly and I will be at Comic Con this year, and Molly is throwing a big Comic Con after party for the launch of Dr. Sketchy's San Diego.

If you're going to be in San Diego for the con, stop by the party:

7:45pm - 9:45pm
The Bluefoot Lounge
3404 30th Street
San Diego, CA 92104

Molly will also be signing copies of Dr. Sketchy's Official Rainy Day Colouring Book at the LAST GASP booth at Comic Con.

Dr. Sketchy's in the News (God, aren't you just sick of it already?)

2007-04-18T15:39:00.000-04:00

More new, awesome features of Dr. Sketchy's Official Rainy Day Colouring Book. This time on Venus Zine (one of my favorite magazines) and on Needled.com (a fantastic body art site).

If you're like me, you are just sick of hearing about all this media attention Molly has gotten. No one likes hearing about how popular other people are. Friends keep congratulating me on all of the coverage, like I had something to do with it.

Nada.

All of this amazing coverage is the result of Molly busting her butt -- emailing and calling every editor, writer, and blogger she can -- to get her book featured or reviewed. She deserves all the credit. The only smart thing I did was sign her up for a book deal.

This is instructive for both authors and publishers. Success in the future of book publishing (especially for what the industry calls "midlist") is going to rely heavily on the author's ability to self-promote.

The reasons for this are many, and not entirely (or even mostly) the publisher's fault. A lot of this has to do with our current level of media over-load, and our personality-obsessed culture -- neither of which publishers can control (so stop blaming them for everything!).

Publishers would be smart (when dealing with midlist authors and small print-run books in the future) to reconsider their level of internal spending on marketing versus the small amount of financial support that could help the author build his or her own empire. These could be small things, like helping them build a simple website, printing postcards or stickers they can hand out everywhere they go, splitting costs on local tours.

We can't top-down publish every book.

Dr. Sketchy's on BoingBoing

2007-04-10T17:09:00.000-04:00

BoingBoing just posted a write-up on Dr. Sketchy's. And within minutes of that post, we sold a book. Thanks, BoingBoing! (the check is in the mail)

Dr. Sketchy's in San Francisco Chronicle

2007-04-09T12:35:00.000-04:00

The San Francisco Chronicle just ran this excellent coverage of Molly's event at Modern Times Bookstore in San Francisco on March 31, 2007. The story was also picked up by Shelf Awareness.

In the back room of the Modern Times Bookstore in the Mission -- a locale that looks more like a Sunday school classroom than a venue for erotic entertainment -- a curvaceous dancer blithely stripped down to pasties and panties while a crowd of onlookers furiously sketched her every wriggling detail.
The two women who took the stage, or rather the red-tiled floor, on March 31 were part of the neo-burlesque movement -- a campy revival that harks back to the vaudevillian striptease acts of the turn of the 20th century. (continue reading...)

Dr. Sketchy's Goes West

2007-04-01T12:31:00.000-04:00

Having taken the East Coast by storm, Molly Crabapple and Dr. Sketchy's headed west this past week for appearances in Phoenix, Los Angeles, and San Francisco.

Molly and Dr. Sketchy's were covered by the SF Chronicle, the SF Bay Guardian, SF Weekly, the Phoenix New Times, Frontiers, LA City Beat, and on Pirate Cat Radio in SF, and Aural Salvation on MusicPlus TV in LA!

East Coast media was good to Molly as well, with reviews and features in the Baltimore City Paper, the Raleigh-Durham News & Observer, Richmond's Style Weekly , and comics blog Broken Frontier.

And much like Dr. Sketchy's itself, this video from Jigsaw Comics in Durham NC is both strange and awesome. Check it out: http://mirror.video.blip.tv/Jigsawfanclub-jigsawEp23DrSketchy808.m4v

West Coast Dates

Date:	Location:
March 24th	Phoenix, AZ Book-signing at Perihelion Arts with the brilliant Liz McGrath 1500 NW Grand Avenue (at 15th Avenue)
March 25th	Phoenix, AZ Molly hosts Dr. Sketchy's Anti-Art School PHX The Trunk Space 1506 NW Grand Ave 7-10 pm
March 28th	Los Angeles, CA Book-signing and mini Dr. Sketchy's at Meltdown Comics 7522 Sunset Blvd 7-10 pm with gorgeous fetish model Zoetica Ebb
March 31, 2007	San Fransisco, CA Book signing and mini-Dr. Sketchy's at Modern Times Bookstore 888 Valencia Street with burlesque queen Sparkly Devil and free booze and cupcakes 3-5 pm
April 1st	San Fransisco, CA Molly hosts Dr. Sketchy's Anti-Art School Barbary Coast The Stud 399-9th St @ Harrison 4-7 pm

Dr. Sketchy's World Domination Tour

2007-02-27T18:37:00.000-05:00

If you missed the illustrious Molly Crabapple and the Dr. Sketchy's crew at this past weekend's NY Comic Con (see photos from Wired), you still have a chance to see her as she begins her tour today in Washington DC at The Palace of Wonders (1210 H Street NE, $10, 21+, 7-10 pm with the lovely Amber Ray modeling and performing her peacock dance). She will also be visiting these fair cities:

March 2nd, 2007	Richmond, VA Signing and mini-Dr. Sketchy's at Chop Suey Books 1317 West Cary Street 6-8pm with the ladies of Nouvelle Burlesque
March 3rd, 2007	Greensboro, NC Molly hosts Dr. Sketchy's with body-painted burlesque goddess Foxy Moxy at Two Art Chicks Studios 609 South Elm St.
March 4, 2007	Durham, NC Signing and Dr. Sketchy's at Jigsaw Comics 305 South Anti-Mall 305 South Dillard Street 4-7 pm with comedy by Jennifer Dziura from 7-9 pm
March 5th, 2007	Norfolk, VA Molly hosts Dr. Sketchy's and does book signing at Relative Theory Records 6:30-8:30 pm 271 Granby St, Suite 200
March 8th, 2007	Baltimore, MD Signing and Mini-Dr. Sketchy's at Atomic POP 3620 Falls Road with the lovely Kitty Victorian 7-9PM

And if you can't make it to any of those events, you'll just have to settle for all the amazing coverage Molly has been receiving lately:

And finally, because we love you all so much, we're extending our Valentine's Day 2-books-for-$30 promotion, which is available only at www.sepulculture.com. Hurry while supplies last! (or before we swap out the promotional code from the website)

It's a Sketchy New Year!

2007-01-12T20:13:00.000-05:00

In case you thought my silence meant that nothing much was happening in Sketch World, behold the amazing happenings so far in this 12-day-old new year!

On January 2nd, Molly, the lovely Amber Ray, and Dr. Sketchy's were featured on New York's Channel 11 Morning News (see the video here on YouTube).

Our first foray into television was followed by a feature in the New York Press, a feature in the Los Angeles Times, and two great pieces written by John and Molly on LargeHeartedBoy's BookNotes blog. Molly and I even got our picture in Publisher's Weekly!

And the hits just keep on rolling. . . . Look for Dr. Sketchy's in the March issue of VENUS ZINE, an upcoming review in Time Out New York, and Molly just did a photo shoot with the Associated Press for an Arts feature.

I am also quite pleased to announce that Last Gasp has agreed to carry Dr. Sketchy's and will have it listed very soon in their catalog (which I encourage you to check out because Last Gasp kicks ass!). If you can't wait that long to get a copy of Dr. Sketchy's, the book is now available at Amazon.com, Powell's Books, and as always at Sepulculture.com.

As if that weren't enough, Molly is also going on TOUR this spring. In February she'll be in Boston MA, Washington DC, Richmond VA, Greensboro NC, Norfolk VA, Durham NC, and Baltimore MD. Whew! In March she hits the road again (or the skies, actually) to Portland OR, San Francisco CA, Los Angeles CA, Las Vegas NV, and Phoenix AZ. For dates, times, and locations, see her tour schedule here.

And lastly, in an un-Sketchy-related piece of bad news, many of you are probably unaware that major cornerstone of independent publishing called AMS (the owner of book distributor Publishers Group West) filed for Chapter 11 Bankruptcy recently leaving a number of small, independent presses hurting, including some good friends of our at Soft Skull Press. Soft Skull was a huge help and inspiration in making Sepulculture possible, so please support our fellow Brooklyn indie press. Soft Skull's books are incredible, and I invite you all to order some from their site right now. I personally recommend Sam Brown's Amazing Rain. You won't regret it!

Okay friends, until next time, be well.

Books Have Arrived!

2006-11-22T13:48:00.000-05:00

Exciting news this week: copies of Dr. Sketchy's Official Rainy Day Colouring Book have arrived in the warehouse (the Sepulculture warehouse being some extra space next to my refrigerator) and will soon be ready to ship out to all of the people who pre-ordered a copy! Molly will be signing the first 66 copies, which go to the first 66 people who ordered. I asked her to sign the first 666 copies, but she just gave me that "you're a slave-driving publisher" look, so I dropped it.

The Sepulculture Warehouse & Refrigerator

There have been some interesting developments on the publicity front as well. Molly met one of the Nerve Blog-a-Loggers, Sara (aka SJ1000), and showed her a copy of the book. Sara wrote about it glowingly on her blog:

The BOOK turns out to be this adorable fucking magical world of fun called "Dr. Sketchy's Official Rainy Day Colouring Book." She runs this "cabaret life-drawing class" called Dr. Sketchy's Anti Art School, and there are like 13 schools around the world and each has a "mistress" and anyway, the book has dirty jokes and pornographic paper dolls! And games! Or at least one game. I was mesmerized and I was like, "Dude, give me your info, I need to write about this." ... It is SO WEIRD and hard to explain, but really well-made.... And I don't even have a copy of it yet, so I can't get further into it...but I thought it was really unique and strange and exciting.... It cheered me up to know that something like this existed in the world. Yaaaaaay!

I could not have written a more enthusiastic piece myself, and the best part is that it actually help sell some copies of the book. This is the one thing that's happened so far for the book that I can honestly say resulted directly in sales.

Now I've worked in book publishing for over seven years. I started out in publicity. I've worked in marketing, advertising, and promotion, both online and in the "real" world, and there are very few instances in which I've ever been able to put my finger on one review or one advertisement or one promotion and could honestly say "that sold books." Save endorsements from Oprah, there are few things that you can say had a direct impact (at least in the way that major publishers are able to measure these things).

I have however seen all kinds of media coverage have NO impact on sales, even major television and print coverage. I think there is a belief in our business that any coverage is good coverage (even negative press can be good, as the saying goes), that we should seek out as much attention as we can and be reviewed, profiled, featured, and interviewed in every channel and medium available so long as the gatekeepers of those forums are interested. Perhaps we shouldn't. Maybe we're wasting a lot of time and money getting our "product" in front of audiences that don't care. Maybe we should skip the ones that don't care and really focus on the ones that do.

This thing with the Nerve Blog-a-Log I think illustrates another point about media: it is by it's very nature supposed to be objective. This, more often than not, translates into bland. Reviewers cannot gush about how much they love a book, or tell everyone to go buy it, or talk about how it reminds them of a particularly personal thing that happened to them a long time ago. They can't do this because they think of themselves as journalists and as professionals, and they want to maintain some semblance of objectivity and decorum. Well, decorum doesn't get too many people excited about anything. I mean, we all love an objective, intellectual analysis on topics of importance, but not everything fits that category.

I have been fortunate to get into this business when I did. When I started, blogs technically existed, but no one besides a very, VERY small community of computer enthusiasts really knew what they were, what they meant, or what they could do. So I have been fortunate to watch the world change right in front of me. And the world has changed. Media is not powerful in the same way it was seven years ago. Now individuals have the power to change opinion and influence others in a way that only major media could before. Blogs and social networking software have made the personal recommendation champion over the objective, journalistic review. When I did that interview with Darren Levy on WNYU, he asked me what Sepulculture meant. This cultural shift in how we communicate and spread information is what it means. The logo, the name - they are both signifiers of a part of which has passed. And now we can move on.

Real Advice for Frustrated Writers

2006-11-18T10:32:00.000-05:00

Working in book publishing and being accessible online, I hear from a lot of frustrated writers asking me for help in getting published. I don't know if every industry person does this, but I always listen to what they have to say and almost always read what they've written. Generally, they all fall into the same category: the writer has been rejected everywhere, by every major publishing house and literary agent, and they don't know what to do next. A very good example of this is an exchange I just had with a gentleman named Justin, who sought my insight in this capacity. The advice I gave to Justin probably applies to a lot of writers out there, so I wanted to share it.

Here's what Justin said:

Hello, I am justin. I am seeking your advise on getting published. I have been rejected from main stream Lit Agents citing my story is to dark, or to depressing, or it isnt a positive story that we would market. Fuck that. I feel my novel is a great read and an inspirational story about finding how fucked up and mad people can become when they are confronted with the real pain in life. Anyways, any help you can give me would be great. If you say get a copy of the WRITES MARKET I may puke, it is getting old hearing that one. THanks for anything. Justin.

So I wrote back to Justin and said, "Okay, send me something." He sent me a sample of his writing, which I read, and the problem was immediately clear: it wasn't good. The lit agents who rejected him had done so for good reason. Unfortunately, they weren't giving him an honest explanation of why they were passing on his work, which is precisely the kind of feedback that might have helped Justin become a better writer. I suppose it's easier to be "kind" and say "it's just not right for us" instead of being brutally honest. Sure, these writers work very hard on their craft and it's tough to say to such a person, "it's just not good enough." But that's the only way they're going to improve. To give someone a sugar-coated rejection is to give up on them and assume they won't become a better writer.

This is what I told Justin:

Justin,

The problem with your story is not that it's too dark or depressing; the problem is that the writing is not good enough to be published. Your story lacks a useful structure, style, and an engaging voice. Without those things (or at least one or two of them), you're sunk. Maybe those lit agents didn't have the guts to tell you their unvarnished opinions, but I don't care. If you listen to what I tell you and don't let your pride get in the way, you'll be a better writer.

You're not ready to be published right now. You need to get more critical feedback on your work, which means more people reading your stories and telling you (honestly) what works and what doesn't. Find a local writers workshop and join it. Find some other writers whose opinions you trust and ask them to tear your work apart. If you don't know anyone near you and can't find local workshops, look for them on the web.

There are plenty of writers just like you who are trying to improve their trade, but can't get the kind of critical feedback they need -- usually this is because most readers are too kind to say the writing isn't good. All of you however are sophisticated enough as readers to be able to tell each other what works and what doesn't.

I hope you're not offended. I just want you to understand why the agents said no, but more importantly, tell you what you need to do to get better. If this is something you really want to do, you have to constantly push yourself to do it better.

Good luck, and don't give up.

Scott

So, my advice to all of you is: if you find yourself in a similar situation of constant rejection, go find some readers who will give you honest feedback and help you improve. You can't trust agents and publishers to give you honest explanations of why they're rejecting your work.

Scott & Molly Talk Books on the Radio!

2006-11-17T15:31:00.000-05:00

Molly and I did an interview with Darren Levy on WNYU's Citywide, discussing Sepulculture Books & Dr. Sketchy's, which aired on November 14th on WNYU 89.1 FM. There's a lot of me talking about the book publishing industry and why I started Sepulculture Books, a lot of talk about why Dr. Sketchy's is destined for world domination, and more heavy breathing than is appropriate.

You can now listen to the entire interview online here: http://citywide.podomatic.com.

Also, Molly & Dr. Sketchy's were just featured on Fleshbot! And on Chemistry Set, and on Until Monday: BKLN, and on Hello, Hilarious!

She'll probably be featured on five other sites before I finish writing this post.

Sepulculture Books

2006-11-08T18:39:00.000-05:00

It's no longer a secret: Sepulculture is now publishing books.

I have started my own independent, DIY publishing company to be named Sepulculture Books and the first book will be published this December. While blogging about the book publishing industry, it seemed so easy to talk about the problems book publishing faces or how to fix them, how to make it more fair or just simply how to make sense of it. So I decided to put my money where my mouth was, and see if I knew what the hell I was talking about.

So far, so good.

The other reason for doing this is that it will allow me to work on fun projects that I would never have the chance to do in my corporate gig, and trust me, the first book I’m publishing is going to knock your socks off (and possibly the rest of your clothing too).

Click on book cover to preview the interior

On December 6, 2006 Sepulculture will proudly publish DR. SKETCHY’S OFFICIAL RAINY DAY COLOURING BOOK by Molly Crabapple and John Leavitt. The book will be a full-color, fully illustrated paperback companion edition to the Dr. Sketchy’s Anti-Art School cabaret life-drawing class that happens twice a month in Williamsburg, Brooklyn.

To quote from our own marketing copy:

Dr. Sketchy's Official Rainy Day Colouring Book is one part DIY handbook, one part activity book on acid, and one part history of the Dr. Sketchy’s Revolution. To sweeten the broth, Molly Crabapple and John Leavitt have added dozens of photos, paper dolls, colouring book pages and puppets of burlesque models Amber Ray, Lolita Haze, Little Brooklyn, Audra Gwarskitty, and all your other favorite Dr. Sketchy's models. Much like popular Victorian cure-all tonics, Dr. Sketchy's Official Rainy Day Colouring Book is a natural cure for boredom, apathy, shingles, gout, sobriety, and erectile dysfunction. It can even buy you Love! (or at least explain how to hire her for an evening to strip down to her pasties). Lovingly illustrated, adorned with dirty humor and black wit, this book is just like James Joyce's Ulysses, except you won’t have to fake enjoying it.

The lovely Lady J has already pre-ordered her copy, and so can you...

And there's nothing more Sepulcultural than a huge....

BOOK PARTY!!!

We will be celebrating the release of DR. SKETCHY’S OFFICIAL RAINY DAY COLOURING BOOK at our book launch party hoted by The World Famous *BOB* at The Slipper Room on the Lower East Side on December 6, 2006 from 8pm-10pm.

Lifestyle Literature

2006-11-02T15:42:00.000-05:00

As a general rule, anything written in The New York Times or The Wall Street Journal about the book publishing industry is bound to be inaccurate, inflated, incomplete, misleading, misguided, misinformed, conflated, contrived, circumspect, or just plain wrong. And often it is all or many of those things combined. However, today, Julie Bosman of The New York Times actually wrote something useful about the industry and it's search for new markets, something I've been talking about with friends and colleagues for a while and something many of us in marketing and sales have been working towards for a few years. And while she relies on some misleading examples (she says that Starbucks' support of Mitch Albom's For One More Day helped "propel it to the top of the [bestseller] lists," which is kind of like saying a bird flapping it's wings helps propel a hurricane -- it's an example that undermines the real point she's making), other examples she gives of books that are actually finding their niche markets outside of traditional bookstores are the genuine article. It's a small victory for The Times and Ms. Bosman in a much larger war of journalism that's out of touch with the business it purports to cover, but we shouldn't fail to recognize a good point at the few instances in which they are made.

Something Rotten in the Slush Pile

2006-09-14T15:49:00.000-04:00

I let numerous suspect book promotions and publishing schemes pass by without comment, but I just can't remain silent about the Sobol Award for Unagented Writers. This thing stinks to high hell.

I suppose there's a real dearth of unagented writers out there submitting manuscripts to agents and publishers such that we need a $100,000 contest to inspire more submissions. What a crock of shit!

Here's the story from Sobol:

The Sobol Award for Fiction

The Sobol Award is designed to discover new fiction writers. Sobol is open to all unpublished authors with a $100,000 award to the winner. The award screens a large number of manuscripts. Each one is evaluated by multiple
readers and the top-ranking entries are passed on to a panel of distinguished judges, who select the winning manuscripts.
Sobol provides all contestants with a reader's report on the main strengths and weaknesses of their manuscripts. In addition, the Sobol Literary Agency is committed to helping the top-ranking writers find publishers.
The award is designed to be a unique nation-wide talent screener to discover and introduce new writers to the
publishing industry.

The award "is designed to discover new fiction writers." Wait a minute. Isn't that the basic function of a literary agency? Isn't an agent supposed to be a talent screener that discovers and introduces new writers to the publishing industry? And aren't agents already inundated with unsolicited manuscripts from unpublished and unrepresented writers, so much so that the industry refers to the large quantities of these submissions as "the slush pile."

What is speciously absent from Sobol's description of the contest here is that it will cost you $85 to submit your manuscript. With the cost of admission you will get a "reader's report on the main strengths and weaknesses" of your work, but this will certainly be small consolation for the thousands of writers who are looking to be published, not critiqued (or worse, humored).

Some simple math tells us that it will only require a few thousand submissions to fund the monetary awards, though Sobol says it is prepared to handle 50,000. What a windfall! It seems the industry has just identified a new revenue source: exploit the people most desperate to get in. Perhaps the next time I need to hire an assistant, I can charge prospects $30 to send me their resumes. I'll send them back with notes on my impressions.

POST SCRIPT: I just ran a spell-check on this piece and the suggested replacement for "unagented" was "unashamed" -- how appropriate.

P&L Statements and the Book Publishing Industry

2006-04-25T10:29:00.000-04:00

Via BoingBoing, I read this piece by Anna Louise at Tor about how a P&L statement works and the publishing decisions that go into the making of a book. It's not entirely universal, but for all intents and purposes it's spot on.

What I find most interesting about it was not the article itself, but the comments section, namely the number of authors who wrote comments saying they had no idea this was how it worked. Does that strike anyone else as being a little strange? Not that I think it's untrue. I think many authors probably don't understand the business model under which they do their business. I think this is a fundamental flaw of the opacity of our industry. It's far too secretive for no good reason.

Not surprisingly, I didn't see any comments of shock or surprise from agents. Agents, I suspect, do understand the business, but possibly don't share that information with the authors they represent. Perhaps it's in their best interest not to discourage their authors, or perhaps, not to stop their authors from feeling outraged when they don't get all the advertising they want.

Regardless, Anna Louise has started an important dialogue about a topic that seems to have been taboo previously, and I heartily commend her for it. Everyone who has ever published a book, is thinking about publishing, or has even a passing interest in the industry and how books are made should read her piece.

Comments on Branding

2006-04-07T16:41:00.000-04:00

So, part of the idea here is to get people involved in a dialogue about book publishing, and to that end, I wanted to share a very thoughtful note that was sent to me by a publishing insider (who will remain anonymous) in response to my posts about branding. I am publishing this almost in its entirety, removing only the things that might identify this person.

Without further ado, "A Response":

I get what you are saying, and have been thinking about it for years. And it's interesting that someone fromV/A is asking the questions, because they are really one of the few that do have a brand that is somewhat recognizable to the consumer -- or a small segment of consumers. V/A is probably only surpassed by Harlequin and Penguin. Harlequin has, for all intents and purposes, become a generic word to describe one category of books -- I'm not sure that
consumers actually purchase books because they are published by Harlequin anymore. But at one time, they did. Penguin - or specifically, Penguin Classics -- well, a lot is in the packaging, and the fact that all of those books are merchandised in the same section in the bookstore. And I think that might be the key -- merchandising. Because you can try and try to build your brand, but if your books are spread out all over the store, there's not a cohesive message being carried through to the end consumer. If you look in a supermarket, all of the cereals are merchandised by brand. Does this help with brand loyalty? Perhaps not -- but if you are standing in front of the Kellogg's section and the store is out of Raisin Bran, you might reach for Rice Krispies - or Special K - they are all right at
hand. And after trying 2 or 3 or 10 cereals from that same section and liking them, you might discover that Kellogg's is a brand you can trust. Ballantine (now Random/Ballantine) has tried to reach the consumer (members of book groups) through its Readers Circle program. The logo on the spine, the spinner rack, and Book Group information speaks to the brand as a whole. But what I don't see are back ads or excerpts for other Readers Circle books that are not by the same author. That's a major opportunity to brand that is totally missed. Does Vintage/Anchor cross-sell other authors? Other consumer products are test marketed to the end consumer ... books
really are not. I would imagine that part of the test marketing process analyzes whether or not the new product fits within the brand, as judged by the target demographic of the consumer. Because books are so subjective, you and I might see a natural match between Richard Ford and Brett Easton Ellis, but
if the end consumer does not see the relationship, there goes the credibility of the brand. But because books are signed long in advance of any final product to test market, the decision about whether or not a book fits into the brand is made by only a few people, and often based on nothing but a vague sense of what the final product will be. The structure that Richard Nash describes
sounds a lot like the way the various publishers at Random House operate. Do you think that V/A would be more successful in building the brand if they were spun off from Knopf? What about Pantheon and its graphic novels program? Should it be its own entity? I'm not really sure how it would help the branding exercise.

I think this raises some important points that I had not addressed, though none more significant than merchandising. How stores decide to merchandise our product is of the utmost importance, because for all intents and purposes that is how most consumers experience us (the publisher).

There are publishers who have successful brands and I think that is largely due to the fact that they keep a narrow focus on what they do, such that you are likely to find there books in only one section (or only a few sections) of a bookstore. This makes the merchandising aspect easy. Workman might be a good example.

In private conversations, Richard Nash has said to me that his personal interests have led him to publish a broader range of books that venture outside his initial focus, and he wonders if he is diluting his brand. I don't think he is because I still know what kind of book a Soft Skull book is going to be whether it's poetry, a graphic novel, current affairs, or LGBT lit. Regardless, it's a damn good question to ask because I think the branding problem for publishers also has some origin in the broad range of publishing each imprint does.

These days it seems like every group and imprint seems to publish the same kinds of books, which is to say, any kind of book. Literary, commercial, academic, trade, mass market, hardcover -- everyone does it all. Vintage and Anchor have a tradition of literary trade fiction and non-fiction, yet now we do mass market books, too. This certainly blurs the lines a bit, and I think takes us further away from a discernible brand. It makes sense from a business aspect, but you can't have everything, and in this case I think it dilutes the sense of how Vintage is different from, say, Bantam. But that's just my opinion and I'm sure I have colleagues who would disagree.

As for the questions raised by this anonymous reader, I think there is a small amount of cross-promotion that goes on in the "back ads" (i.e. the extra pages at the end of the book), but it is done almost exclusively in books that are promoted as reading group favorites, which makes sense because these groups are often looking for the next pick. It's a harder thing to do with every book because of the way the authors feel about it (i.e. not happy that their book is a selling tool for someone else's book).

Other questions: Would Vintage and Anchor be better off (for branding purposes) if they were spun off from the Knopf Group? Or Pantheon for that matter? No, I don't think so. While there are differences, Vintage wouldn't be what it is today without Knopf, and really the group as a whole is pretty closely tied. Now I might entertain the possibility that the Knopf Group would do well to be spun off from Random House, Inc., but that's another thing all-together. For one thing, Anchor would loose it's influx of Doubleday titles and authors, and the group would lose it's sales force and all the other amenities that come with the big corporation. But I think it's a pretty amazing group of people that would make for a rather successful independent. It'll never happen, but it's a fun thought.

A Dubious Approach to Podcasting

2006-03-29T17:56:00.000-05:00

Stop me when this starts to sound familiar. A hot new trend emerges, and while only a small percentage of the population participates in the activities surrounding this new technology, companies rush to spend a lot of money to be part of "this new thing" so not to be left behind. They give it a year, maybe less, to start showing some results and when it doesn't they turn around and say, "This new technology doesn't work," and they abandon it.

Obviously I'm talking about podcasting, but I could just as easily have been describing how the book publishing industry approached e-books and online advertising in the 90s. They over-reacted, wasted a bunch of money (or thought they had), and then dropped these two tech developments like a crashing stock to cut their loses. As it turns out, online advertising does make sense (always has) and publishers now recognize it. And e-books will eventually find their market, even if it doesn't mean the printed word will disappear (as was the popular rumor to incite panic a decade ago).

Now I see podcasting on that inevitable horizon of publishing mania. Chronicle has just announced it will offer a podcast twice a month to be produced by a company called Hear Now Productions. Chronicle joins Holtzbrinck, and probably others, in the move to providing additional audio content online (that is, additional to simply offering an audio book).

An article from Publishers Weekly today says, "The key in podcasting, according to both Chronicle and Hear Now, is to create original, compelling and consistent content.... Chronicle doesn't expect immediate results from its podcasting venture and is giving the program six-months to a year to build."

You know, I hope I'm wrong about this and Chronicle goes on to great success with its podcasting initiative, but this scenario sounds awfully familiar to me and seems to fit the pattern I mentioned earlier. Chronicle is investing some money and giving an untested, small user-base format six months to a year to work. I can't imagine it's cheap either. PW reports, "Chronicle solicited the expertise of audio producers with NPR backgrounds to help develop a program that goes beyond reusing audio book excerpts, but will feature an emcee, a theme song and produced segments that include interviews with the authors of various books." That's no small change, I promise.

My guess is that if they make it through a whole year, they will probably drop it for lack of consumer participation. I think this is terribly unfortunate because podcasting is a great new medium with exciting possibilities for book publishing, but it's stupid to throw a lot of money at it right now when there just aren't enough users.

I think it's instructive to compare blogging with this phenomenon of binging & over-dosing on new technology. Why hasn't blogging fit into the pattern that e-books and podcasts have? I could certainly name a number of publishers and publishing professionals who have taken up blogs, and probably even name a few who have already quit. But why isn't anyone saying that blogging doesn't work? That it's just a fad?

There's a pretty simple answer and it has everything to do with why I think Chronicle's approach to podcasting is dubious. You can't throw money at blogging. Think about it. You can't pay a firm an exorbitant amount of money to write a blog for your company. Why? Well, blogging technology is sufficiently user-friendly such that a person with a modest understanding of word-processing can publish a blog. Unless you want to hire someone for their writing skills, you might as well just write the damn thing yourself. And there are two important qualities of writing the blog yourself: 1. it becomes personal, has character, and is therefore more attractive to people than something "produced" and 2. it's free!

When it's free to produce, a blog can't fail because it has a financial cost to overcome. Maybe it fails because it's boring and no one cares, but it's not going to be weighted with the expectations that come with significant financial investment, those same expectations that make new technology so easy to drop when the returns don't show immediately.

I fear that Chronicle's approach is doomed because it is "produced" and professional, and costly. And it's disappointing to imagine that Chronicle probably employs a number of smart, talented young people who would have been eager to try a low-budget podcasting program. Kids all over the country are podcasting and vlogging (video blogging) -- it's not impossible, even if you don't know what you're doing at first.

With anything new and untested, it's always better to start small, minimize expectations, and let it grow into something bigger organically. The top-down approach of forcing new mediums to work is akin to telling people how much they will love New Coke.

Re-Visiting "Branding Re-visited"

2006-03-28T17:56:00.000-05:00

Richard Nash at Soft Skull took up the gauntlet of my call for some opinions on books and branding and wrote a very thoughtful piece on his blog. I highly recommend reading the post in its entirety, but this is specifically what Richard had to say about branding and corporate publishing:

My instinct is that it can be done, but it would really require a complete reinvention of the structure of the corporate publisher. You'd need to create small imprints within the company, consisting of a group of maybe 4 to 8 people functioning as an entire editorial and marketing and publicity operation, availing of the corporation to provide infrastructure, sales, distribution. They would have considerable autonomy, so long as they met their financial targets.
Everyone in that unit would be encouraged to think like a publisher, considering the entirety of how a book gets from the writer to the reader. And the sales, rights and contracts, production and manufacturing groups would be structuring themselves as service providers.

In effect the Random Houses and Penguins would be holding companies of a stable of imprints and the primary difference between them, and a company like Soft Skull working with a distributor like PGW, is that they would have stable cash flow and great economies of scale on everything from FedEx to printing.
(Operations like Perseus and Avalon are existing examples, albeit on a smaller scale, of this hypothetical structure).

But, absent that level of autonomy it would be very difficult to build
a brand, since all a brand is, really, is a small group of people creating something they think is lovely, and a larger group of people (readers) agreeing it is lovely, and a bond developing between them. That connection can't be faked, not in books...

I agree with Richard's analysis here, which is part of why I continue to think about this question, especially in regards to Vintage and Anchor books. V/A is a small imprint in a larger group which is then part of a huge corporation, yet V/A enjoys quite a bit of autonomy (or at least that is my perception) and has a small enough staff to work closely together, share ideas, and work on all aspects of the publishing process. This is, roughly, the essence of my job -- cover several areas of expertise and bring together comprehensive and cohesive marketing strategies. But the situation Richard proposes is not really happening at Vintage and Anchor. We are still structured like other corporate imprints -- the traditions that separate departments are still intact and the potential for cross-pollination and "team" development are still largely unrealized. This is not a criticism of Vintage and Anchor in any way, but more so of this aging model on which all of publishing is set.

Sadly, it seems like everyday I read in Publishers Lunch about some new imprint being founded. Aside from being vanity projects for successful editors and publishers, I wonder what's the point when we all pretty much do the same thing anyway. It would be great to see a large corporate publisher, like Random or Penguin, gamble on a small "indie" imprint that aimed to become a culturally identifiable source of specific types of books. I mean hell, it would be worth it just to see something different for a change.

In Spiegel & Grau's mission statement, they say, "The books published under the banner of Spiegel & Grau aim to be on the frontline. As publishers, we want to be responsive to the issues that touch people's lives but also to provide a forum for thinkers and writers who break new ground, pose new questions, provoke and challenge us to remain alert and live to change, even as they entertain us." Well that certainly differentiates them from everyone else. Seems like the only ones not breaking new ground, posing new questions, or provoking any change are the publishers themselves.

I have often wondered if people working in book publishing actually read the books they work on and apply the wisdom therein to their own lives and jobs. We published James Surowiecki's THE WISDOM OF CROWDS and I found the irony striking that we would promote this book as a work of such value to business people and yet not take any of its principles into consideration in examining the nature of our own workplace. I invite you to read the book to understand the reasons why, and then maybe examine how your business operates.

I'm getting off topic here, but I think it speaks to questions of, "What are we (as publishers) doing here? Why aren't we asking more questions? Really challenging ourselves as professionals to do it better?" Everyday we work with some of the most brilliant, innovative writers, who are constantly reinventing themselves and their craft to push their art forward. We seem rather dull by comparison.

I think quite often of something Laurence Kirshbaum said in the New York Times last December. He said, "The demands of publishing and marketing a book today have grown to exceed the ability of a publisher to cope. I felt very keenly that we were leaving so many good marketing ideas unexplored because there were too many authors and too little time."

I think he's right to say that part of the problem is in sheer numbers -- too many books are being published for any reasonable degree of marketing effort (and dollars) to be spent on every book. However that's not the only reason good ideas are being left unexplored. Part of the reason is that we are still beholden to a set of practices and perceived notions about "how to publish a book" that keep us so preoccupied we can't begin to think outside of our traditions. And in the context of branding, and with respect to Richard Nash's comments, we are still beholden to the sense of "how a an imprint is organized" to fully appreciate the value of trying it differently.

Why aren't there a hundred blogs out there asking these questions? And why is Richard Nash the only person giving thoughtful answers? Again, as my thoughts are not complete on this subject, and potentially out-and-out wrong, I welcome any comments you may have, or email me a link to your blog post if you write something.

Branding Revisited

2006-03-21T18:46:00.000-05:00

When I started Sepulculture, one of my first posts was about branding and the book industry. Some of my comments were noted by Michael Cader in Publishers Lunch. He pointed out that Vintage Books was one of the most recognizable brands in publishing, despite my claim that Vintage seemed a little schizophrenic with all of its sub-imprints. I still stand by what I said. While Vintage is widely recognized within the publishing industry, among few consumers is it a known "brand" in the way other products are. I think in publishing we sometimes forget that the book buyers at Barnes and Noble and Borders aren't the end consumer. But the question I find useful from Cader's remark is whether or not it matters for a publisher to have brand identity among consumers? Certainly it matters with our retailers -- I want B+N to think of Vintage as the publisher of great literary fiction and non-fiction, but how much effort should Vintage put into conveying that impression to consumers? Typically in the industry we don't invest much (if any) capital in marketing ourselves. We invest the overwhelming majority of our resources in branding our individual authors, building awareness of their names and titles among consumers. But is there a point to also developing a consumer sense of what "types" of books we as a specific publisher produce? I feel there are.

In working to promote some of our recent trade paperback originals to young readers, it has frequently occurred to me that I could really save a lot of effort in trying to explain to these kids that our books are smart and cool and interesting to them. If they understood that Vintage frequently publishes these type of books that they enjoy, I wouldn't have to reinvent the wheel every time out. I think about the way that independent record labels have successfully managed to this with this very same demographic -- kids know what to expect from a Vagrant or Saddle Creek band, Side One Dummy or Drive-Thru Records band. Why shouldn't publishers enjoy a similar recognition? I guess there's no reason why they shouldn't, only a question of whether or not it's possible. If anyone out there is still reading, I would to hear your thoughts. Is branding only effective for small labels, or in the book business small publishers? One of my favorite publishers is Soft Skull Press. I think they could make Soft Skull a really strong identifiable source among young people. I would assume their marketing budgets are slim (or non-existent), but I think a lot of this work (especially when you're talking about grass-roots efforts anyway) could be done very inexpensively. A topic for further consideration.

Back in the (proverbial) saddle

2006-03-08T17:00:00.000-05:00

Does anyone still read this blog anymore? Perhaps you are one of the many people who have asked why I'm not writing anymore. You'll have to accept my apologies for my silence over the last 6 months. I was (as they so lamely say) busy. But the time was not wasted I assure you.

Over the past 6 months, when people would ask me why I wasn't blogging anymore, I would respond, "I'm too busy doing my job to write about it." While this held some truth, it wasn't the full story. What I was really doing was thinking, questioning myself, my beliefs, my blogging style, and numerous other things. Was I effectively doing what I set out to do when I started this blog? Was that even possible? Was there an audience for my thoughts on publishing and marketing? Was my writing style and choice of subject matter alienating any real dialogue that might exist around the issues I chose to tackle? How could I facilitate enough dialogue to actually change the publishing environment? Was all of this, in the end, worth it?

I didn't find answers to all of those questions, however I do find myself once again at the beginning, the place where all of this started (for me). This weekend I head off once again to Austin for the SXSW Interactive Conference, which is the event that inspired me to start this blog a year ago. And again my mind is on blogging, particularly my blogging. I suppose if I drew any answer from the all of the questions I posed to myself over the past 6 months it would be this: THE QUESTIONS ARE JUST AS IMPORTANT AS THE ANSWERS.

Maybe I don't know the answers to every question I face in my job and in my life, but this blog is as good a place to ask them as any, and in doing so, perhaps to give them the serious thought they deserve, and hopefully spark something in you. I think this requires a slightly different methodology than what you have encountered here in the past, when my writing aimed to be more argumentative. I think you will see less of that from now on, and more of my inquisitive nature. Either way, here's to seeing more from Sepulculture than you have in the past 6 months.

Marketing Books on the Internet

2005-08-12T19:30:00.000-04:00

Being a supposed internet-marketing "expert" at a publishing house, I often get (what is now a classic) web-weary look of desperation from colleagues wanting to know the basics: Can you save my books? Is there hope? What can we do? I'm beginning to feel an affinity with the crew of the Titanic.

The web is a fickle tool. It's so seemingly easy, and yet so utterly frustrating in its rates of success. Why does it work for some and not for others? And in this age of new media, where does really old media (i.e. a book) fit in? Recently, I've seen two different websites/authors/books answer these questions in strikingly different ways, which when compared offer some valuable insight into all of this mess.

The first is a rather obvious choice, and also one the begets a question of whether it was the chicken or the egg. Clearly Freakonomics has become a phreakomenon (oooh, sorry about that!) by several means other than it's website (which should be taken as a point that the internet cannot be your only answer), but part of its continued success - and more importantly RELEVANCE - has come from it's dynamic website.

Yes, it has all the usual features we've come to expect from a website for a book: the reviews, the links, where you can buy it (go figure!), and of course the obligatory excerpt, but this website also has something that's entirely vital to the whole concept of the book: a blog.

Freakonomics is a book of ideas, and the book itself is simply the starting point for a long conversation the authors have begun with the world. The book is, in a sense, our ticket for admission to the conversation. What the authors started with the book, continues every day through their blog and through the comments left by readers. What they started was a community, a conversation that makes its participants feel connected and important. How does your book make it's readers feel connected and important?

Now granted, Freakonomics is an easy choice - it was probably destined to be a bestseller whether it had a website or not - but this is no reason to dismiss what the website does so successfully. For one, the website and the books authors understand their audience. It's an information audience, they gravitate to current information sources (like the internet), they want the Freakonomic perspective on issues that go beyond the book, and they want to participate at their leisure and anonymously if possible. A blog is the perfect solution to that set of criteria and so it fits the audience well. People can access it and participate as often or as infrequently as they like, there's a regular stream of new information directly from the source of interest (i.e. the authors), and the medium is as fresh and current as the ideas in the book. It just makes sense.

This is not the case for every book. Authors of histories and memoirs may find that they're wasting their time with a blog. The same might be said for novelists, though I think that depends on personality as well. So what if you haven't written the next Freakonomics, or you are writing in different genre, for a different audience, on another planet? Well, who's your audience?

The second author website I noticed recently that seemed to be doing all the right things was Chris Bohjalian's website. Chris's audience skews more towards the middle-aged mother from middle-America. He writes novels about families and the difficult social and moral dilemmas they face by virtue of being human. It's not my personal preference, but it doesn't have to be to see that Chris Bohjalian has done an awesome job with his website, one that really connects with his audience.

Again, Chris has all of the essentials: info about all of his books, his bio, an extensive list of his events and speaking engagements. He even has a guestbook, which is a personal touch his audience might appreciate - it's Chris's way of saying "welcome to the site," and "I'd be delighted to know you stopped by."

What you won't find on his site is a blog. Nor will you find daily updates from Chris regarding his thoughts on current issues, or even weekly, monthly! And why should you? Chris's core audience is not surfing the web everyday, looking for new content from familiar sources. What you will find on his site though is something far more pertinent: Chris Bohjalian.

The essential thing that Chris provides through his website is access. He makes himself available. Whether it's in the "Discussion Board" section, where he seems to answer every question posted (usually right away and always with a very thoughtful, personal, and useful response), or in the area dedicated to "Reading Groups." And it's with the focus on reading groups that Chris truly differentiates himself from other authors. On his site, you can fill out a form to set up a 30-minute conference by speakerphone with Chris for your reading group. He explains why he does it on the site, saying:

Imagine: A small kinship of readers who celebrate the excitement of books, and the way that passion grows when it is shared. This is, in essence, what a reading group offers, and one of the reasons why more and more people are giving themselves license to revel, once again, in a book.

But the only reason necessary (in my book) is because that's where his audience is: gathered around a dinner table in Ohio, chatting among friends, gossiping, and eating food. Chris's point of entry to this crowd is simply like a phone call from a friend. And that's precisely why his website works - it formulates community in a different (yet appropriate) way. It's knows its audience and makes them feel connected and special by the means through which they understand.

And that is really the key thing these two very different websites have in common. They know their audience, they know how to connect to them, and they know how to reward them with what they are really seeking. So when I get those three questions: Can you save my book? Is there hope? What can we do? I have three questions of my own: Who's the audience? Where are they? And what do they want?

Seth Godin's Advice to Writers

2005-07-29T19:55:00.000-04:00

Anyone who reads Publisher's Lunch likely caught this bit about Seth Godin's advice to non-fiction writers. And for anyone who didn't, here's a brief summary:

1. Please understand that book publishing is an organized hobby, not a business.
2. The timeframe for the launch of books has gone from silly to unrealistic.
3. There is no such thing as effective book promotion by a book publisher.
4. Books cost money and require the user to read them for the idea to spread.
5. Publishing is like venture capital, not like printing.

I highly recommend reading the whole thing, as he provides greater detail for these points, which (more often than not) are spot on.

To begin, Godin points out that the return on equity (and more importantly the return on time) is awful for both writer and publisher. I can personally attest to that fact. Sadly, for a majority of published authors, writing books is not enough to make a living - not on the advances and book sales themselves. Many authors support themselves through other writing, lecturing, teaching, or consulting (and then there are a bunch who don't need a job anyway!). Something many people don't realize is that book publishing is a business run on very small margins. Some authors get huge advances and some executives take home huge paychecks, but the greater majority of writers and publishing employees are grossly under-paid (in comparison) and do what they do out of a passion for books, ideas, and ideals.

Godin's second piece of advice, that the time between the writing of a book and it's publication is painfully long (often a year or more), illustrates what I believe is a significant problem for the publishing industry. In this age of immediate, electronic access to information, the publishing industry still works according the Gutenberg model. The problem is that to change this, publishers will need to re-invent the way they do business and that promises to be quite painful, risky, and unfriendly. A book published today follows roughly the same procedures it would have 50 years ago. An editor buys a book from an agent and has to "sell" its virtues or "pitch it" to the marketing, advertising, and publicity staff at the publisher. The marketing staff then has to "sell" the book to the sales staff, who then has to "sell" the book to book buyers at the physical retail locations (bookstores, etc.). This is all before a single book has been purchased by a consumer. Additional "selling" of the book occurs through the publicity department who "pitches" the book to the media, who then provides coverage so that consumers know to go out and buy the book. It's a lot of convincing and hyping that needs to happen in order to ensure that enough copies of a book appear in bookstores across the country. And that's just to get it into stores - it doesn't even cover the marketing of the book to the consumer, the promotion of it, the advertising, etc. This model has been in place for decades and I don't see anyone (a major publisher) who is ready to change it. What I think publishers must realize though is that someone is going to figure out a feasible way to change the process. Someone is going to use the new technologies available now and develop a strategy for doing it better.

Godin's third point is clearly one with which I take considerable umbrage. To quote:

There is no such thing as effective book promotion by a book publisher. This isn't true, of course. Harry Potter gets promoted. So did Freakonomics. But out of the 75,000 titles published last year in the US alone, I figure 100 were effectively promoted by the publishers. This leaves a pretty big gap.

There are many things wrong with this statement. One, Harry Potter could have no promotion and still sell 10 million copies - it's hardly a fair example, and being a savvy marketer, Godin must know how improbable and unfair a comparison that is. Freakonomics is a better example, but even there you risk making a mistake by assuming that strong sales are necessarily the result of a great promotional campaign. Some books do exceptionally well without a great promotional plans behind them, some book with amazing promotional efforts completely flop. It's an art, not a science.

The larger issue at stake here is one of limited capacity. Godin says, "[O]f the 75,000 titles published last year in the US alone, I figure 100 were effectively promoted by the publishers." Frankly, there is not a market to support the promotion of 75,000 titles. The New York Times has a limited capacity to review books - they can't do all 75,000. The human brain has a limited capacity to process new information - we could possibly handle having 75,000 titles marketed and promoted to us in a year (which is equivalent to learning about 205 new books every day!). Blaming the publisher for a poor promotional plan is wrong, and doesn't go about addressing the problem accurately.

I know that as a publisher, we would love to be able to successfully promote everything we do (and believe me, we try very hard to do that), but it's simply a fact of life that there are limits out there that are imposed upon us (not from within). Every book we publish is sent to The New York Times for review, but as I said, they have a limited capacity to review books, so not every books gets the attention it deserves. And unfortunately, newspapers often review the same books, so one book may get lots of attention while others get none. This is not because the publisher didn't do everything it could to get all of their books reviewed. So what are we to do? Publish fewer books? That would mean you are less likely to have your book published at all. Is that what these kinds of stabs at the publishing industry are trying to achieve?

Godin's fourth point, which is not so much advice as an observation, is that people don't read. That's an over-statement, but it gets back to point 3 in that we have a limited capacity for information and in this day and age the average person seems to be over-whelmed with information to the point that it's hard to finish a book. As a writer, I wouldn't let this get you down. There are plenty of people who will find your book, devour it, and salivate for the next - you may just not hear from them. One also needs to recognized that the most important word in book publishing during the next century is going to be "niche."

The fifth point, that publishing is more venture capital than simply "printing a book," is one I like quite a bit, and I'm glad someone other than a publishing "insider" said it. An advance is an investment, not a gift, and while I'm reluctant to say publishers are looking for a "big" return (see point 1, there are no big returns), the money we put into a project is a joint venture for us, one we would expect you as the author to treat as a partnership with mutual goals and hopefully shared success. Basically, it becomes our baby, too! I recently had an experience with a potential author who wasn't able to accept this idea of partnership, and she eventually dropped out of a verbal agreement we had to publish her book. So working with a publisher is definitely not for everyone.

Seth Godin's final piece of advice is to build an asset (network) and then spread your idea(s) through the best means available (be it blog, pamphlet, street corner soapbox, etc.). He says, "Then, if your idea catches on, you can sell the souvenir edition. The book.... Books are wonderful ... but they're not necessarily the best vessel for spreading your idea." What is wonderful (in a not-at-all-wonderful kind of way) is that he calls the book "a souvenir edition." That, my friends, is exactly what book publishing is at risk of becoming: collectibles.

The Death of Information

2005-07-22T10:52:00.000-04:00

Good god, so many things to be alarmed about and so little time to blog about them all, though I suppose I could summarize these concerns in a single category one might call "The Death of Information," which seems sufficiently vague to encompass nearly anything. But I'm not talking about just anything. I'm specifically interested in the silencing of many voices here in the blogosphere because of "business."

Most disappointing of all the examples I will mention is that of Mad Max Perkins and the death of BookAngst 101. I didn't always agree with everything Max had to say about the industry and the state of book publishing, but that was precisely his value to me and to the book community at large - he offered a unique perspective. I'm certain he has good reasons for quitting his blog, and his leaving is unquestionably a loss to the community, but it would be a far greater affront to justice if his reasons are primarily related to job pressure, or a sense that his contributions to the industry will be better felt through concentrating on his work in the office rather than his work online. This simply is not true.

Every business in the world benefits from frank discussion abouts its ends and means, and book publishing is no different. And the more varied the perspectives that participate, the more valuable that discussion becomes (see THE WISDOM OF CROWDS by Jim Surowiecki - a brilliant exposition of the benefits of democratic thought). Bloggers like Max and myself (and others in the publishing profession) are not simply out here giving away information about the industry - we're taking something away from it too. Writing about my job and the issues we are all facing in trying to publish books makes me better at what I do everyday in the office. My mind, my work, and my company are all enriched by my participation in this process, and it's no different for Max. His absence is not simply a loss for all of us, but for him as well.

Another issue of some concern is the recent spat of bloggers being fired from their publishing jobs for writing about them, most recently with a beauty editor at a major magazine losing two jobs (almost simultaneously) after being exposed as a blogger. [NOTE: We will from now on simply refer to bloggers as "sinners" (blogger=sinner). It's easier, fewer letters, no problems with spell-checkers, etc.] As I've mentioned before, my concern is not personal, but ideological. Writing (and therefore thinking) about the problems an industry faces is in the final analysis beneficial to that industry - it encourages communication and the sharing of information, which is not to say that it is only information going out. Learning happens in both directions. Trying to silence this dialogue is not only harmful to a company's growth, it's also bad form and makes the world of corporate publishing look paranoid and fascist.

Not knowing the specifics of this young woman's employment, nor the details of her every post, I can't say anything too specific about her case, but it is still troubling to hear these stories of people being fired from corporate America on the basis of being bloggers (I mean, sinners) - a thing which, in the end, stands to benefit the company.

Now, I understand the counter-argument. Not all of these blogs-to-pinkslip stories involve people who are contributing much aside from bitching about the office, but I would argue that these blogs are likely the least dangerous to any business because they tend to say more about the individual than the company or industry. Ultimately, these blogs are about what type of person this particular blogger (sorry, sinner) is - they're vanity projects.

The more critical concern a business faces is the possiblility that private information could find its way (very easily) into a public forum, which is why a company should be more concerned about a blogger (damn, sinner) like me than some of these others who have actually been fired. I'm not writing about the aches and pains of office life. I'm writing about what's wrong (and right) with our business, how it works, why it fails, etc. It would be very easy for me to leak information that could be harmful to the company, our authors, or my colleagues, but I won't be doing that. My aim here is to be as honest as I can in my analysis and ultimately benefit everyone involved. Unless you actually wanted to be fired, you would never actually release sensitive information into a public forum. It's professional ethics. It's the same thing that would keep me from mentioning to my friend at the NY Post how much we paid a certain author for a book.

There is also the concern about giving away ideas, or what we might call "intellectual capital." Mad Max touched on this a bit in his farewell:

The business is so f***ing hard now, and there's so much pressure on those working inside it, that either they don't have the time for (shall we say) pro bono discourse about (say) how to do some of the little things better; or they feel that giving away what few secrets they possess will put them at the sort of competitive disadvantage that might, soon, cost them their jobs.

There was a time when I might have subscribed to this mentality, but I am well past it now for one primary reason: imitators don't have ideas. I keep no secrets about my "tricks of the trade" because I know that the real intellectual capital exists in my head. The techniques and tools (both new and old) have been around, are accessible to everyone, or are at least "known" to all. I haven't tapped some secret marketing resource that makes what I do successful. It's all about new ideas, figuring out how to make old mediums work better, and asking questions. The secret is that there is no secret - all of the vital information is out there for everyone to use, and success is determined by those who use this information most wisely.

Max laments that the business is so hard now. The business is not any harder now than it was before, in fact, it's probably easier because there are more consumers, there's more disposable income, and there are more outlets for retail, merchandising, and marketing than ever before. The trouble arises from the fact that the business is so DIFFERENT than it has been. The world has changed, and thus far many in publishing have yet to accept or understand what these changes mean and what they require in order to survive.

You can hear some of what these changes require in the voices that comprise the literary blogosphere, which is precisely why every one of them is so essential to the industry. The very last thing we can afford is silence.

Blogging on the Job

2005-07-14T18:43:00.000-04:00

So several people have asked me what I think about this story of an employee at a major book publisher getting fired for blogging about her job and co-workers. The real question they mean to ask me is whether I'm afraid of getting fired for writing about my job, especially when I've made it explicitly clear where I work and I what I do. Well, the answer is NO. I am not afraid, which is not to say that I think they won't fire me - they very well could, and there seems to be very little legal footing for a person such as me to argue against it. I am not afraid of being fired because it would be a very stupid move on their part to fire me. I am good at what I do, and an essential part of that is how I think critically about my work and the industry as a whole. A blog is a wonderful way to put ideas out into a public forum where they can be considered, discussed, and torn apart if they're no good. Apparently this young woman's blog was less thoughtful and simply more bitchy, and that I guess is a shame. There's much to criticize about our industry. There's much to criticize about this company. I wish she had done it in a more thoughtful, provocative, and insightful way - something she could have argued was aiming to make our industry better. I stand by what I've said in these pages, and I would stand by them in the face of my employer, who is likely monitoring everything I do anyway. So here's an open invitation, Big Brother, throw me a pink slip for speaking my mind and we'll see who really loses.

The best book event, like... ever!

2005-06-22T13:14:00.000-04:00

Mr. Murray Hill poses for the camera

You know, I really hate to pat myself on the back (okay, I love to pat myself on the back), but recently Vintage Books held a book party for WHORES ON THE HILL and I have to say that it was the most fun I've had at any book event I've been to in the past 6 years.

The author and her hard-working publicist

Once again, I have to congratulate on of my colleagues for doing a brilliant job organizing the event. First of all, the event was held at the Slipper Room on the Lower East Side of Manhattan (a very cool venue that recently held the Lit Blog Co-Op's BEA party). The evening's entertainments included dramatic readings of WHORES ON THE HILL performed by three young actresses who dressed the part of Astrid, Thisbe, and Juli (the characters of the book). In addition to the dramatic readings, there were burlesque performances by the World Famous Pontani Sisters, who are some of the coolest, most punk-rock, bad-ass ladies I've ever seen perform burlesque (they give the Suicide Girls traveling burlesque show a run for their money). The Master of Ceremonies for the evening was none other than "Mr. Ton of Fun" Murray Hill, who is quite possibly the funniest performer I've ever seen. Seriously, Murray Hill is going to be very famous in the not too distant future - mark my words.

Murray Hill & the Pontani Sisters

Everyone in attendance was given a free copy of the book along with a goody bag that included a small bottle of Jagermeister, some candy, and Whores on the Hill stickers. There was a $5 cover to get in which paid for the talents of Murray Hill and the Pontani Sisters, but given the entertainment and the gift bag, it was certainly worth the price of admission.

Ultimately the event cost Vintage nothing. The venue was booked as a show, which meant that the bar made it's money from drink sales. The talent was paid for by the $5 cover. The Jagermeister was promotional donation from the distributor. And the guests were given lots of free stuff and a fun night. I think we paid for the candy and the brown paper bags, which was maybe $60.

And did I mention it was awesome? Did I mention how funny Murray Hill was? Did I mention how many people came up to me and said this was the coolest book event they'd ever attended? Not to say that any of this was easy to arrange, but it wasn't exactly rocket science either - just a little creative thought.

...

One of the assistants in the publicity department did an amazing job recruiting some of his friends that were actresses and fit the part. He took three chapters of the book and turned them into a script, which was a fantastic and highly original way to experience the book in a live setting. The performance was one of a kind.

The Whores on the Hill dramatic readers

Meanwhile, the author had it easy. Colleen sat at a table where she signed books and was able to simply enjoy the evening without any pressure to perform. Everyone there had ample opportunity to talk to her and socialize, which is far different than the typical book reading and signing.

...
Author Colleen Curran at her book party with friends

Lisa Selin Davis, author of Belly, was in attendance and here is her review of the party:

Au Curran, by Lisa Selin Davis

Colleen Curran’s Whores on the Hill may take place in Milwaukee, but the celebration of its release last night at the Lower East Side’s Slipper Room was a resolutely New York affair. The emcee for the evening — a drag comedian named Murray Hill (which is also the
name of an unhip east side of Manhattan neighborhood, which sits just below the U.N.) — kept posing for the camera, espousing hope that s/he’d find her/himself in the New York Post’s celebrity-ridden Page 6 the next day, but it wasn’t that kind of event. Instead, it was a very sweet tribute to a book about very naughty Catholic school girls — if it weren’t for the slight tinge of morality tale, the book might please Playboy readers as much as adolescent girls. Young girls in
plaid skirts and ripped fishnet stockings were recruited to read excerpts from the book, and the Pontani sisters (another New York institution —one of the sisters happened to be the author’s roommate in college) performed their delightful burlesque numbers.
With Carmen Miranda fruit hats towering above their heads, the three sisters forced strange smiles on their faces while they
shimmied and shook their hips. All the while, the author sat diffidently at her table, a smile sneaking from her lips. When Murray Hill offered her the chance to take over the microphone, she politely declined. Murray prodded her — 35,000 copies, he kept saying. They printed 35,000 copies, come on up here. But she continued to smile
and shake her head. The rest of the first novelists in the room -— none of them yet worthy of Page 6 coverage either — who had until
that point felt part of the joyous celebration, began to murmur among themselves. Thirty-five thousand copies? they asked, quietly comparing contracts by the bar. Luckily, the entertainment portion of the evening was over. Folks could speak loudly to one another, and, more importantly, speak loudly to the bartender, asking this time for a double.

This bit about the 35,000 copies of the book being published has me thinking about issues that have come up recently in my job here at Vintage (a topic for future posts). One of the issues at hand is choosing a publisher, assuming you are in a position to do so. Finding the right publisher is much like finding the right mate. I think a lot of writers are distracted by money and an uncontrollable urgency to publish.

The money part is probably due largely to their agents who want to find the highest advance so that they can reap the best return on their effort. The publisher who offers the most money is not always the best publisher for that particular book. Is the richest man you can find the best one to marry? I guess that depends on who you ask, but for the wise, the answer is no. Authors should ask their agents lots of questions about the different offers and not assume that the largest financially is the best.

The urgency-to-publish problem is equally dangerous and disturbing. Authors (especially those who haven't been published before) are so happy to finally have "a deal" that they don't pause to ask themselves whether it's a good deal, whether the publisher shares their goals and ideals, whether the publisher has a staff that's talented and knowledgeable in a way that's going to be effective in promoting and selling their book. These things are far more important to an author's success than the amount of money they get on their advance.

There are these myths out there that the size of the advance dictates a publisher's willingness to get behind and promote a book. This is not always true, and not even often true, especially if you're talking about a publisher that actually cares about and believes in the books they publish. The fact that money (as I've demonstrated above) doesn't even directly correspond to the effective promotion of a book, renders this myth utterly useless.

Creativity, hard work, enthusiasm, a willingness to experiment and take risks on new ideas - these are the traits of a publisher that knows how to publish and promote a book - and these authors lamenting that their books aren't printing 35,000 copies should ask themselves how much thought and research they put into selecting a publisher. Did their agents pursue the kinds of publishing houses that would do a great job or just the ones who paid the highest advances? Did they take the time to ask questions and meet the people who would be doing all the work to promote their book? Did they even ask how the publisher envisioned promoting the book, how many copies they thought they might print, whether or not there would be a tour, or whether that was even the best way to promote sales?

It's funny to hear authors complaining about their publishers, especially when they make it seem as though they are all the same. They're not. As the saying goes, you got to dance with them that brung you. On Thursday night, we danced with the Pontani Sisters and had a great time. Colleen Curran could not be happier with the effort Vintage has put into her book, and it's doing very well. Sales for WHORES ON THE HILL are among the best for any paperback original we've published.

Beatrice was there, and he seemed to have fun:

Last night, after birthday dim sum in Chinatown, Mrs. Beatrice and I walked to the Slipper Room where Vintage was throwing a book party for Colleen Curran's Whores on the Hill. I was glad to meet Colleen in person, since she'll be part of next week's Author2Author feature. And let me tell you, this was a party, emceed by Murray Hill with burlesque routines starring the Pontani Sisters. Plus three girls in tank tops and Catholic schoolgirl plaid skirts reading passages
from Whores that would no doubt send Colleen's Amazon hate squad--you should see some of those reviews--into a tizzy.

The Pontani Sisters in Action!

Answered: More Readers' Comments

2005-06-17T09:16:00.000-04:00

Over the past few months I've been inundated with questions and comments about the blog, book publishing, and other products and services related to the things I discuss here. I'd like to respond to everyone because that's part of what makes this "interactive" medium so useful, but unfortunately I can't address everything that comes my way. That said, here are a few things that have come up recently that are worth mentioning...

I received a nice note from Mitchell Silverman who wrote to tell me about a book-trading website he just launched called Bookins. He described it as such:

It is an automated system that finds good homes for members' used-books, while getting them titles they want in exchange. Membership is free, and it's easy to use. Like Netflix (the famous DVDD-by mail website) everything is automated, and postageis providedd. But instead of getting DVDs from a warehouse, members get books of equal value from other members. They receive a much greater return on their trade-in than at used bookstores, and we are connected to the US postal service, so mailer labels print with official postage from their own printers ($3.99 to receive a book, no charge to ship them).

I don't know if Mitchell realized it or not, but I work for a very large book publisher and the idea of organized book trading doesn't exactly please people who make their living by trying to sell NEW books! Well, I'm not the kind of person who values proprietary interests over common sense, and I firmly believe that good ideas should be recognized, rewarded, and given the chance to succeed. I'm sure my bosses would scream bloody murder to hear me say it, but I like Mitchell's idea and I hope it works out. The book publishing industry could use some creative thinkers as thoughtful and resourceful as Mitchell.

I also received a very kind note from Randall Williams, editor of NewSouth Books in Montgomery, Alabama, who offered me alcohol:

It's a good thing you're in Manhattan and I'm in Montgomery, or I'd have to come over and buy you a beer or three and I'm sure neither of us has time for it no matter how much we might enjoy it. You write well, and your comments are dead-on. I reached your web columns off a link on a newsletter I read, and I'm glad I did.

Let's just state for the record that I always have time for a drink (or three) especially if you're buying - this is publishing after all. Randall was additionally kind enough to send me an article he wrote on Print-On-Demand (POD), which is a topic I plan to address here soon.

The link in the newsletter Randall mentions is (probably) Publisher's Lunch, which seems to enjoy quoting my saucier moments. This focus on the most sensational things I say is a bit disappointing. Going to such lengths to push a thought into the ether, one certainly would appreciate some thoughtful contemplation from ones colleagues rather than being reduced to juicy soundbytes. But perhaps with our limited attention spans, there is no room for that dialogue.

Finally! Someone Has a Pulse

2005-06-16T19:15:00.000-04:00

I've been sitting here on my bully pulpit, ranting about an industry of which I am actually a part, being completely inappropriate and probably wrong more often than not, and yet no one (or very few) have dared to put a thought into the wayside and challenge me. Until now!

I am most pleased to report that someone has FINALLY taken some offense to my comments! Hooray, the democracy of the blogosphere actually works!

In response to my last post about the infamous "weenie" promotion at BEA, a fellow by the name of John wrote:

This truly is a strange way to promote a book, but isn't this better than a publishing house not promoting a book? Granted, if I was the author in question I would likely be a bit put out that this was the way they chose to spread the word, but how many authors have seen their books sneak into stores with no publicity at all, authors who would kill for a wandering weenie pitching their wares? Handselling, word-of-mouth, a great review in the NYTBR... all are preferable, of course, but how realistic are any of those for the non-A list author competing against the other 30K books released in a given year?

The problem here is that John is asking the wrong kind of question. The problem isn't whether it's better to have bad promotion over none at all. The question we should be asking is whether this is really the best use of the time, energy, MONEY, and creative thought for the book itself?

One of the problems in our industry is that very few outside of the industry really understand anything about it. John asks how many authors see their books sneak into stores without any publicity. Not having publicity for a book is not solely the fault of the publisher, nor is it a sign that enough money and effort weren't spent. Sometimes the media simply isn't interested in covering certain books. Publishers have no control over that (despite what many conspiracists out there would have you believe). And what is a giant weenie going to do? In the history of publishing has a giant weenie ever convinced anyone to buy a book?

John also mentions hand-selling and word-of-mouth, which are things done in large part by booksellers, not publishers, who take a liking to particular books. The books that get hand-sold and that generate word-of-mouth are not always (or even mostly) A-list authors (whatever that means). More importantly, publicity and the money a publisher spends to promote a book have little (if not nothing) to do with hand-selling and word-of-mouth. These practices are based solely on the quality of the work and the discretion of the booksellers talking about these books.

A million variables go into making a book a success, but you can't simply wrap up a handful of them and blame the publisher when they don't happen for any one of the thousands of books that get published each year. An underlying myth in this discussion that is kind of the large elephant in the room that no one's talking about is the perception that the publishing industry is somehow an evil enterprise that wants to undermine and cheat its authors. This is the most ridiculous thing I've ever heard and demonstrates just how little people understand this business.

First and foremost, book publishing is one of the least profitable businesses in our economy. The people who choose to do it, do so largely out of a true passion for their work and the literature they are helping to bring to the world. We have very tight profit margins, and truthfully only 1 in 10 books published is likely to be a financially successful endeavor within it's first year, or even it's first 10 years (I once did an interesting study on this topic that I will one day discuss here).

The thing that authors and author-hopefuls need to realize is that WE ACTUALLY WANT TO SELL BOOKS! We succeed when you (as an author) succeed - our future profits are mutual. Why on earth would we want to publish your book and then ensure that it won't sell? That makes no logical sense. The reason some books fail is because they aren't good, people who read them don't like them and don't recommend them to others. Some don't find the right readership. Some have such a limited readership that stores aren't interested in taking lots of copies of their books. Some fail because they are packaged and marketed poorly. Some get horrible reviews (deserved or otherwise). Only a handful of these things can even remotely be controlled by a publisher, and regardless of that, we always do whatever we can (that makes sense) to sell books.

Now plenty of authors have complained that they didn't get enough publicity or advertising or bookstore support. They believe that if they had just gotten some ads in the NY Times they would have sold 50,000 copies rather than 500. The fact of the matter is that no amount of advertising would likely save this book. If it only sells 500 copies, there's something (probably many things) far more problematic about this book than a lack of advertising. A book that bad could probably be advertised in the NY Times everyday for a month and not sell 50,000 copies. Meanwhile the cost of that much advertising would probably eat up all of the profits of our entire business for that year (NEWS FLASH: Advertising is obscenely expensive. When will people start to criticize the NY Times for gouging money out of its advertisers? And don't think they are alone in this either!).

The point I'm trying to make is that one could easily blame the publisher for not spending enough money on advertising, but in truth no amount of advertising would have helped. The publisher isn't being cheap, but it's also not going to throw money away.

Recently we had a perfect example of this. A very wealthy author wrote a novel and the hardcover publisher put out around 5,000 copies, only 1,800 of which actually sold, which is a failure under any circumstances. The publisher didn't do much in the way of advertising because there were only 5,000 books out there to begin with, but the author did her own advertising and spent upwards of $75,000 on ads in places like The New Yorker, the NYTBR, and others. That's roughly $42 spent in advertising alone for every book that was actually purchased, but more to my point it's $15 spent on ads for every book that could possibly have been bought. All that money spent and no increase in book sales.

I don't even make $75,000 a year in salary, but for that much money I could have driven around the country for a year selling twice as many copies out of the trunk of my car! Inflatable weenies, obnoxious amounts of cash thrown into advertising - they're just not good ideas, and not nearly as successful as something creative that makes sense for the book.

I'm sure I have much more to complain about, but I need to move on to further complaints about my posts. LostBoyPN writes:

I agree, the weenie guy sucks. I wouldn't want to stoop that low to promote my book. But, I also agree with John that at least they were doing something... and it was somewhat memorable. Any publicity is good publicity, right? Then again, after writing that, I think I'd rather have nothing than have a walking weenie guy.

The idea that "at least they were doing something" is precisely the problem. Writers are so desperate for their publisher to promote their work that they're almost elated to see them do something as crazy as put a publicist in a weenie costume. It doesn't have to be this way. The options in this world don't have to be bad ideas or nothing. Every author should have the courage to say, "This doesn't make any sense. Wouldn't it be a better use of time and money to do x, y, or z?" or at least engage their publisher ina dialogue about why they feel this is the very best thing for them and the book. The point is, we don't have to settle for weenie promotional ideas. God, I'm glad that thing was a weenie.

And no, not all publicity is good publicity. If that weenie stunt caused me to disrespect the author or (especially in my case) the publisher, I'm not going to buy their products. I know that I will probably never work for that publisher if that's the type of thing they do. Creating a spectacle does establish recognition, but the associations one makes may not always be positive. Is all the publicity Michael Jackson's getting now going to help him sell millions of records again? I really don't think so. (Damn, I swore to myself that I wasn't going to mention anything MJ related in this blog.)

More comments, Anonymous writes:

Well, it's a children's book. The weenie is the title character of the book (INVASION OF THE ROAD WEENIES) so it seems much like having a giant Babar, Walter the Farting Dog or Curious George for kids to interact with. While there were less kids at BEA than, say, a traditional author booksigning...a lot of the adults seemed to love acting like kids again. And from what I've heard, if a kids/YA book doesn't have a message or any entertainment value for adults, it's
probably not worth reading.

Well, what a jerk am I? I neglected to notice that this was a children's book. I'm certain that all the many BEA-loving children that were in attendance simply adored the weenie and went right out to buy books.

The fact of the matter is that BEA (from a publisher's perspective) is largely a schmoozing event where they can get book buyers (i.e. accounts) to get excited about their books. The weenie wasn't there to entertain children - he was there to get the attention of booksellers by the most absurd means possible. Does the weenie in any way convince booksellers that they will be able to sell copies of the book? I don't see much of a connection. Now if the author was going to dress up in that weenie suit and tour the country to the delight of young readers, then I might buy into it. But as a BEA gimmick, it's just sad. And insulting given that a young professional had to walk around in that thing.

You went to school, studied hard, and did well precisely so that you wouldn't have to dress in a weenie costume and sell crap. Let's keep our eye on the ball here.

Book Exploitation Absurdities (BEA)

2005-06-08T20:33:00.000-04:00

Why do I feel like the only person (aside from GalleyCat) who was horrified by the this little snippet that ran at the end of The New York Times' coverage of BEA this week?

On Friday afternoon, four young publicists from Tor Books were spotted in a corner trying to get one of them, Melissa Broder, into an 8-foot-tall hot-dog costume; it did have an air pump so the wearer could breathe. They were promoting "Invasion of the Road Weenies" (Starscape/Tor Books) by David Lubar. Finally, they zipped Ms. Broder up. Fiona Lee took her hand, or paw, or whatever, and led her across the convention floor. "Would you like your photo taken with a giant weenie?" Ms. Lee asked, over and over again.

Book publishing has literally become a circus. I've been seeing a lot of this stuff lately (much of it from imprints here at Random House). I noticed a few weeks ago that a sister imprint here was having a $200 American Express "Vacation to Italy" contest to support some mystery novel set in Italy. Also I was recently alerted (by the ever-frisky GalleyCat) to a very disturbing gimmick being run (I guess corporately) at Random House to get content from young writers for essentially nothing.

The stunts, gimmicks, and questionable contests really bother me - not simply because they are stupid - but because they make it harder to do legitimate creative marketing as people grow suspicious after seeing so much crap.

A giant inflatable weenie, while curious to ponder, has nothing to do with a book. Doesn't tell you anything about the book, doesn't offer you anything tangible that will improve your connection to the book. It's purely a puerile spectacle - a shameless arms-race of sensationalism designed to steal your attention. I can't believe that a group of smart people thought a walking, inflatable weenie was a good idea.

Say hello, Mr. Weenie.

Why Can't I Get a Book Deal?

2005-06-06T16:49:00.000-04:00

I hear that question a lot, and frankly, the appropriate answer 12 times out of 10 is, "Because you're an idiot."

Several weeks ago (okay, months ago) I posted a piece about Whores on the Hill, which received a comment by a blog called Another Useless Fact directing others to his "review" of the book. As it turns out, the Useless review was simply a listing of titles released (by many different publishers) from Random House that could be construed as "chick lit" based solely on their titles and brief descriptions. Now, without getting into any discussion of chick lit, it should be said that Useless hadn't actually read any of the books he chose to disparage. Each book description was followed by several snide remarks, few of which were even remotely humorous.

But before treating us to any of his incisive commentary, Useless first took a moment to re-iterate that well-worn phrase, that battle cry of the untalented writer, "It's no wonder most of us can't get an agent let alone a book deal...." I suspect that if Useless employs the same sound judgment, reason, and good taste in his writing as he does in his reviews, he'll never get a book deal. Perhaps he will one day write the authoritative biography of Lincoln without actually having read any books about Lincoln. I'm sure it will incorporate Useless' uniquely "snarky" tone that we all love.

But hey, it's fair to blame the industry, right? After all, they are collectively responsible for all of the books that get published. Those nameless, faceless giants at Random House and thoughtless publishing mill they run - naturally they're all morons for not seeing the linguistic cunning of dear old Useless. Or maybe they're just too polite. There's a large elephant standing in the middle of our little book party here and it's dying to tell you, "If no one's interested in your book, it's because it isn't good."

And the Dead Shall Rise

2005-06-06T16:18:00.000-04:00

The rumors of my demise have been greatly exaggerated. The fact is that I have been too busy doing my job to actually write about it. In my silence, many events have passed that would have (I'm sure) enjoyed my commentary, but I'm not one to rehash the past, so I won't here.

One of the more interesting reasons that I haven't been blogging is that I acquired my first book for Vintage, so in addition to all of the marketing, advertising, and PR I've been doing, I'm knee-deep in the editorial process as well.

Now I can't give particulars about the book I bought (it's something of a "secret"), but I can tell you that it's something completely new for Vintage. It's based on a blog and might just be the first truly successful blog-to-book project thus far (seriously, for all the hype, no one gives a shit about the Washingtonienne). The book will likely go on-sale in February of 2006, but more details will be available this summer.

You Could Be Wearing this Hat

2005-04-22T17:12:00.000-04:00

Mr. Jonathan Ames

It looks like a fun party, doesn't it? 275 people mingling in a bar, B and C list literary celebs with a sprinkling of other media big mouths and bloggers. It actually was a fun party - plenty of free alcohol, transvestites, and even a cute gift bag for all in attendance that included a free copy of Jonathan Ames' Sexual Metamorphosis, Condomania condoms, Izze bottled juice, and cosmetic products from Blue Q and Sharps (I personally love these guys). I had a great time, met lots of new people, and all of those new friends seemed to enjoy themselves as well. What a great thing to build buzz around this new book. Guess how much of our marketing budget was spent in pulling this thing off? It's less than you think.

My colleague who arranged this party did a phenomenal job in organizing it and bringing in co-sponsors. First she found a venue willing to host it, and a media partner to get the word out. The venue was the very stylish Table 50 in lower Manhattan, who had the best martini glasses I've ever seen (not that I drank several martinis or anything of the sort!). And the co-sponsor was Nerve, who designed the invite and provided their party list of important media types. Once those two critical parts were in place, she then approached several liquor sponsors to provide alcohol for the event. She found a company called Triple 8 to supply vodka (which was excellent, again not that I drank a lot of it, I swear!) and Hendrick's to supply gin.

Venue, guests, and drinks secured, my colleague started organizing the gift bag. Obviously the book was to be the featured item in the gift bag, but it was important to leave guests with something more than just the book, while also keeping everything related to it and preferably nothing that competed with anything else. The condoms and the hygiene products were great. We also tried for some sex toys from Toys in Babeland, but they never got back to us (note: they're also not getting a link because they didn't earn one - booo!). The can of Izze, well, that was just to protect against hangovers I guess (not that I have any first-hand knowledge of that!).

The gift bag was a nice touch that made the event just a little more special and a little more memorable for the attendees. It was also a great opportunity for the companies that donated these products to get their name and brand out there. Yes, you heard me right. I said, "donated." In case you were curious, the final cost in terms of marketing dollars that this party cost us was $160. We had to pay the bartenders, and that was it. Everything else - the liquor, the venue, the guest list, the gift bags - was free.

I tell this story with such elaboration because it illustrates a very important point about marketing. The best marketing is not a function of the dollars you spend the effort and inventiveness that you expend in organizing it. You too could arrange an event like this at virtually no financial cost to you. It will take a ton of work, a lot of creative thinking, and some really persuasive pitches, but it can (and does) work.

In my short career in business, I've stumbled upon a very simple, yet practical equation: f(e) = 1/$. The 'e' here is effort, and for those of you without any mathematical inclinations, this equation means that the function of effort is such that as it increases, the amount of money ($) decreases or in marketing terms, spending money becomes less necessary.

I've said this before, and I'll likely say it over and over again until someone slaps me: so many times we choose to throw money at a problem rather than put the effort into solving it (almost always at a much lower cost). This is more than bad marketing - it's a lousy work ethic. Often we do this in the interest of saving time, which I think can have its justification, but those instances should be fewer and further between.

My colleague pulled off a huge party, virtually for free. Creative thinking, organization, and phone calls (and emails). There, that's the secret. Now run with it. And for the record, I only had 3 martinis, I swear.

Geeta Thee To A Nunnery

2005-04-12T11:03:00.000-04:00

Geeta Sharma Jensen wrote a piece in yesterday's Milwaukee Journal Sentinel about the controversy surrounding the book Whores on the Hill by Colleen Curran. Apparently, the school Colleen attended (Divine Savior Holy Angels) has taken a disliking to the book, which follows the lives of three teenaged girls known as "the whores on the hill" at the fictional Sacred Heart Holy Angels school in Milwaukee. Administrators at DSHA have warned parents and students about the book, assuring the parents especially that the sex, drugs, and bad behavior that the narrator describes in the book (NOTE: I said "narrator"), has no basis in fact. Yeah, right! I guess the school believes that sex, drugs, and bad behavior don't happen at the school now, and didn't happen there 20 years ago either. I feel relieved, don't you?

WHORES ON THE HILL

by Colleen Curran

From what I can tell by talking to women who have gone to catholic school, behavior among these students is far more racy and risky than anything happening at public school. It seems that the more these students are repressed socially and sexually, the more they act out secretly. And for a school to presume this doesn't happen (not now, and not ever) just demonstrates what a willingly-blinded, out-of-touch institution it is. [Such institutions and administrations seem to be quite popular these days]

From the article:

"Although the author stresses this is a work of fiction, its first-person style and its familiar sounding references to Milwaukee may lead some to wonder if it has any basis in fact," wrote school President Ellen Bartel in the letter dated April 6. "I can tell you that the author has stated clearly to us that the novel is not about DSHA nor is it autobiographical . . . . We are committed to the intellectual, spiritual and personal growth of young women in an environment that fosters faith formation, academic excellence and responsible decision-making."
The school, however, has not banned the book. Nor does it intend to, Bartel said Monday. "We have noted there is a similarity in names (and setting) . . . I imagine that some people might be tempted to conclude that it is about Divine Savior," she said. "So we're letting parents know. . . .
We're not going to tell the students not to read it." Bartel said she had read a copy she had received from "someone in the book business," and "it's not my particular taste in fiction."

One has to wonder what is her "particular taste in fiction," and whether such a thing could conceivably be characterized as taste. But snide insults aside, the word among students at the school presently is that the book absolutely has been banned whether it's been publicly stated or not. While this is obviously a rumor, one can imagine the reality of life at the school for the actual students - what do you think the sisters will do if they find a girl reading this book? I doubt such an instance will generate a warm reception.

Clearly the sexier story here is another catholic institution turning its traditional blind-eye to the scandalous events happening beneath its own vestments. But for us literary types, there's something more damaging at stake here: the freedom to write fiction that is informed by our experience.

The phrase that bothers me in the quotation above is the part about the novel not being about DSHA nor autobiographical. Put aside the fact that it's utterly impossible not to put something of yourself into your writing (everything you do is, in a way, autobiographical). What troubles me is that the attempt to protect the reputation of the school inherently seeks to negate the experience of the author, whether the events related in the book ever happened or not. The facts of their happening make no difference, but of vital importance is the feelings they inspire, which is the basis of our connection to a work of art. This act of protection wants to undercut the legitimacy of those feelings by proclaiming, "This never happened!"

This is very dangerous ground for artists and writers, not an inch of which should ever be surrendered to those who actively work to subvert the truth. I would encourage anyone who reads this to talk about it with people you know, and people you don't know. We can't let these ridiculous affronts to literature pass quietly.

And speaking of passingly quietly, I hope someone other than me noticed that little stab by Geeta Sharma Jensen in the article. In talking about the school wanting assurance from Colleen that the events in the book didn't happen, Geeta writes, "Why these assurances, this attention on a first-time author whose book is coming out only in paperback?"

ONLY IN PAPERBACK? How many books has Geeta published? Zero. So where does she derive the authority to judge the importance of a book based on its binding? Has it occurred to her that this book's publication in paperback is not a matter of legitimacy but one of fucking common sense? Can Geeta comprehend that the audience for this book might trend younger than most literary works of fiction, and that audience may not be willing to part with $26 for a hardcover, but perfectly happy to spend $12.95 for paperback? Does it take more than one minute of genuine thought or a reasonable understanding of 20th century literature to remember that books like Bright Lights, Big City and American Psycho were first published in ONLY paperback? Both of which proved to be pretty insignificant works of fiction, no doubt!

Clearly, I am outraged by this subtle slap in the face, but for good reason. Original paperback publishing makes a lot of sense for many reasons, but has yet to be highly successful. Much of the blame for that can be placed in exactly these kinds of preconceived notions of what is "only" a paperback. In the weeks to come, you will hear my sentiments about this and what I think can be done about, but until then you'll have to wait.

WYSIWYG

2005-04-11T21:32:00.000-04:00

Thank god for the clarity that wiki offers...

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.

WYSIWYG (pronounced "wizzy-wig" or "wuzzy-wig") is an acronym for What You See Is What You Get, and is used in computing to describe a seamlessness between the appearance of edited content and final product. Today this is expected for word processors but in other situations, like web (HTML) authoring, this is not always the case.

Related acronyms (in order of increasing obscurity)

WYSIWIS - What You See Is What I See (used in context of distant multi-users applications, e.g. CSCW)
WYSIWYAF - What You See Is What You Asked For (in reference to programs such as those used for manual typesetting such as TeX or troff, that what is retrieved from the system is what the user specified - in essence, a statement of GIGO)
WYSIAYG - What You See Is All You Get (used by computer programmers who point out that a style of "heading" that refers to a specification of "Helvetica 15 bold" provides more useful information than a style of "Helvetica 15 bold" every time a heading is used)
WYSIAWYG - What You See Is Almost What You Get (most text editing programs)
WYSIWYM - What You See Is What You Mean (You see what best conveys the message)
WYSIMOLWYG - What You See Is More Or Less What You Get (another way of stating WYSIAWYG)
WYGINS - What You Get Is No Surprise - Weaker version of WYSIAWYG and WYSIMOLWYG
WYTYSIWYTYG - What You Think You See Is What You Think You Get ("whit-iss-ee-whit-ig") (when a program claims to be WYSIWYG but isn't)
WYCIWYG - What You Cache is What You Get ("wyciwyg://" turns up occasionally in the address bar of Gecko-based Web
browsers like Mozilla Firefox when the browser is retrieving cached information)
-or - What You Create Is What You Get -or- What You Click Is What You Get
WYPIWYF - What You Print is What You Fax, briefly popular in the early days of fax modems, to distinguish software that presented the fax modem to the OS via a printer driver and thus fax-enabled any program capable of printing
WYGIWYG - What You Get Is What You Get (an alternative approach to document formatting using markup languages, e.g. HTML, to define content and trusting the layout software to make it pretty enough)
WYGIWYGAINUC - What You Get Is What You're Given And It's No Use Complaining

To that list I humbly suggest, WTFDWBWAAFTS - Why The Fuck Did We Bother With An Acronym For This Shit, or maybe WYSIRFUBBHASTE - What You See Is Really Fucked Up Because Blogger Has A Shitty Text Editor. I like that one because it rolls off the tongue so easily, Why, Sir Fubb Haste! And here I thought we were retarded for refering to A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius as AHWOSG.

PS - I apologize if there are spelling errors in this post, but there was no way in hell I was going to use a spell-checker and have to skip half the words!

Call Me Martin Luther

2005-04-08T13:40:00.000-04:00

Apparently some of my opinions have hit the publishing world like ripe shit. Now while it still falls short of nailing a treatise to the castle door, I am quite pleased that my blog has bound the britches of a few industry people. After being mentioned in Media Bistro's book publishing blog, Galley Cat, word of our little coup quickly spread to Publisher's Lunch:

BlogWatch

Among recent blogs launched is one from a guy whose "job at Vintage and Anchor Books is to research and develop new ways of marketing and publishing books, to identify new channels for promotion and sales, and to organize alternative marketing campaigns - and by 'alternative' the book publishing world often means 'online.'" He notes, "in the current state of publishing, there's little (if any) infrastructure to reach outlets that are not mainstream media and traditional book retail."
One post relates to his realization that Vintage--arguably one of the best-known names in trade paperbacks--"has found itself in something of a schizophrenic nightmare due in large part to the fact that it has no universal image or logo that consumers can identify when browsing in a book store." He counts nine different imprint logos "and only a few of them look even remotely similar" and that doesn't even count the logoless sci-fi line.
One of his first posts relates to being one of the few publishing people to appear at the SXSW Interactive conference. Among the things he heard: "Tom Anderson of MySpace said, in short, that MySpace has more money than it knows what to do with because companies are spending so much to advertise on his site. Why? MySpace is the #7 most trafficked site on the internet behind Google at #6. Tom went on to advise audience members NOT to advertise on MySpace, but to actually use the site, open a FREE account and use it - he promised the return would be hundreds of times more valuable. The problem is that takes work, time, and some creative thought as to how MySpace can work for you. It's easier to throw money into an ad than try to understand this new, 'cool' medium."

My favorite part is clearly about Vintage arguably being one of the best-known names in trade paperback publishing. If you only talk to people who work in publishing, or a related industry, then yes, Vintage is among the most well-known and highly esteemed, but I try to avoid talking to industry people too much because it warps ones perspective. It's like a priest getting feedback from the choir (ah, I have pope-on-the-brain today).

I take my job with me when I leave the office and I talk to people about books and authors and their perceptions of both and the publishing industry at large. It's easy to get this information from people through casual conversation if you simply listen. I would say that easily 90-95% of the people I talk to have NO IDEA what Vintage is (and these are just the ones who read books). I always have to tell people that Vintage is part of Random House, a name which nearly everyone recognizes. That's not good branding.

Would I have to mention General Motors or even Pontiac for you to know what a Firebird or a Trans Am is? [I hope someone out there gets the irony here] Or even closer to home, would I have to mention Bertelsmann or BMG for you to recognize labels like Arista, Columbia, RCA, or Epic Records? I doubt it.

My suspicion, and this spans all of major publishing, is that very few consumers have ANY concept of or identification with brand when it comes to books, AND, most disconcertingly, I also suspect that we're one of the ONLY media industries without significantly recognizable and distinguishable brand identities.

Now I'm certain there are exceptions, and I have met plenty of people who do recognize imprints, but the fact that so few notice book branding only illustrates the point that much work in the publishing industry remains to be done, or (possibly) we need to rethink our branding strategies.

And thanks to Buzz, Balls & Hype for the bump - I'm glad someone appreciates a frank discussion of these issues.

Watch Me Pull a Rabbit Out of My Ass!

2005-04-07T15:44:00.000-04:00

In recent weeks I've been informed by at least three different colleagues that a particular author of ours has found out about me and my new position and is interested in having me develop his web presence. That's all, really, just develop his web presence. Right. When asked where he'd like to be more prominent, the answer has been, "you know, like online reading groups." Oh? Which ones? "I don't know. There have to be some out there, right?"

Now I'm all about doing the impossible, but no where in my job description does it say I will pull rabbits out of hats or perform other feats of magic. I suppose this is the result of having a new job that my colleagues (and authors) don't yet understand, but I think it's also indicative of a more wide-spread phenomenon: authors want something to happen for their books, but haven't a clue as to how to go about it.

How many times as a book publisher do we hear an author say, "I think my story would be great for Oprah. Can you make that happen?" If some authors sold a book for every minute they pined over the Oprah Winfrey Show, they would probably be national bestsellers. Getting on Oprah is about as easy as hitting the lottery - and about as equally fair, too, which is a credit to Oprah. Just because you've booked an author on her show before (or even twenty authors), doesn't mean you have any kind of inside track on booking other guests.

While the Oprah show deservedly has a good reputation for selling books, ...wait, here comes the shocking revelation: there are OTHER media outlets that help influence book buyers as well! It's hard to fathom, but for years now literate people have actually been getting quality information from sources other than Oprah. In fact, there's a whole tradition (which supposedly pre-dates Oprah) called "print" media that seems to have some effect on consumers, and then there's something called the "interweb" which the kids keep yammering about, going to "revolutionize" something or other.

All joking aside, this is really to say that there are thousands of ways in which we communicate information to one another in our modern (I should say post-modern) lives, and different groups of people gravitate towards different mediums and modes of communication. I don't watch Oprah, but I could probably tell you everything that was on Nerve and Gawker yesterday and, this may surprise you, I love reading about medieval British history. My grandfather wouldn't know a URL from a UFO, but he loves using email and reading detective novels. Mainstream media might not reach either of us effectively. We're both avid readers, though not always conventional readers in the way demographic marketing might think of us.

In fact, the best way of ensuring that we get a marketing message is through an integration of several mediums (big and small, complicated and simple). Parts of that web might include an interesting online presence, possibly one that supports a poignant, viral (read e-mail) marketing component, and recommendations from credible sources (be it traditional reviews, bloggers, word-of-mouth, gift-giving, etc.). Credible sources come in a thousand different varieties, and their credibility varies among different audiences, but it's the primordial "grass roots" technique that is still the most powerful form of marketing there is.

There’s no universal answer or formula for success, no magic hats. There’s not even a simple solution, and this brings me back to my original point about expectations. In the history of the world, no meal has ever been prepared simply by wishing for dinner. Not only does it require someone who knows how to cook, but the right ingredients as well. I suppose it’s possible I could improve the web presence of an author, but what’s the point of that when his readership isn’t online? Hell, I might be able to get a book about the history of post-industrial capitalism on Oprah, but it probably won’t sell any copies (that’s actually an experiment I’d really like to test). Simply put, the fact that the internet or Oprah exist and probably influence people to buy books doesn’t mean that it’s the right thing for every book and author, and if we as publishers we willing to be a little more honest with our authors, maybe I wouldn’t have so many requests for the ridiculously impossible.

Postcard Secrets

2005-04-07T11:45:00.000-04:00

My friend, who shall here-to-fore be known as Link-Master Mike, sent me this link to PostSecret, a blog that accepts handmade postcards that reveal a deep, dark, often funny secret about its maker. The best cards are posted on the site, while the rest are (presumably) returned with uniform rejection letters that say something to the effect of, "Sorry, your postcard isn't right for us at this time. Good luck publishing it elsewhere. - The Editors"

The timing of this discovery, as is often the case with the timing of the Link-Master's notes, is perfect because just last night, over a $20-sandwich-and-glass-of-wine dinner ($20 eff'n dollars!), I was talking with a friend about "dis"honesty in the workplace and whether omission was actually a form of lying. The conversation began with a comment about knowing that you are close to a person (or real friends) because you occasionally fight with them. The fact that you fight with them means that you care enough to tell them what you honestly think even if you know it will make them unhappy or angry.

The conversation moved on to the fact that generally people don't speak their minds out some sense of "civility" and "politeness." The old saying goes, "If you don't have anything nice to say, don't say anything at all." What a fucking myth! What horseshit advice! We might as well tell each other, "Just repress your feelings." I guess that's not so nice, but it's basically the same thing.

Then I went on one of my characteristic diatribes about office culture. This rant was about how a lot of people I know are basically scared to say what they really think, afraid of confrontation or direct disagreements with someone even if their opinion has merit, and occasionally downright dishonest in acquiescing to ideas with which they don't agree. It's madness! Sometimes people are so busy being civil to one another that much of what they say and many of their interactions are simply fabrications. This will probably get me in trouble, but in keeping with speaking my mind...

It's infinitely worse when dealing with authors, who must be appeased, flattered, and generally satiated at a wretched cost to honesty. In the end, the ego-stroking and appeasement doesn't really help sell books (which is everyone's basic objective here). Personally, I have taken the position of full-disclosure. When I talk to authors I answer their questions and concerns honestly and (perhaps) crudely. I'll tell an author openly that they have a small ad budget because we're only printing 15,000 copies of their book, and the reason we're only printing 15,000 is because our retail outlets have only ordered 12,000 copies. Would we rather sell 100,000 copies of your book and spend tens of thousands of dollars advertising it? Sure, but the market won't support that. This is a business, and we try to make it work the best we can. There's always a good reason for the decisions we make, and if an author thinks we're skimping on ads for a book, it's probably because we haven't been honest enough in explaining to him or her why we haven't advertised more. We want to sell books as much as anyone (the author included) - there's no reason to hide from the truths behind that.

So yeah, this honesty thing - look into it, folks. It's one investment that's actually worth the risk. Otherwise you can keep sending your postcards to PostSecret. Look for one that says, "One of our author's book sales suck because she writes about characters with whom people can't identify and generally dislike. I've never shared this info with her because I'm afraid she'll leave for another publishing house." [If you thought I was going to link that statement to a particular author's book on Amazon, you're f*cking crazy!]

We Were April's Fools

2005-04-01T12:37:00.000-05:00

So this morning I was reading the blog of Jason Calacanis, one of the co-founders of Weblogs, Inc. and one of the many very sharp, highly opinionated people I met at SXSW, and his web entry for today was a funny bit about selling Weblogs, Inc. to CNN. The thought of Lockhart, Krucoff, Dobkin, and Spiers hosting a LES version of "The View" in the backroom of the Magician makes you realize how absolutely intolerable a group of snarky bloggers would be to a national television audience. Let's face it, people don't turn on their televisions to do any serious thinking!

But this April Fool's gag had me thinking about why the hell we accept this as a kind of national day of acceptable lying, so of course, I googled it. One of the first sites I found that tried to explain the origin of the day didn't exactly inspire a lot of confidence in it's accuracy. Here's an excerpt:

Ancient cultures, including those as varied as the Romans and the Hindus, celebrated New Year's Day on April 1. It closely follows the vernal equinox (March 20th or March 21st).... In 1582, Pope Gregory XIII ordered a new calendar (the Gregorian Calendar) to replace the old Julian Calendar. The new calendar called for New Year's Day to be celebrated Jan. 1. Many countries, however, resisted the change.... In 1564 France adopted the reformed calendar and shifted New Year's day to Jan. 1. However, many people either refused to accept the new date, or did not learn about it, and continued to celebrate New Year's Day April 1. Other people began to make fun of these traditionalists, sending them on "fool's errands" or trying to trick them into believing something false.

Huh? France adopted the Gregorian Calendar 18 years before its existence? Why, if this isn't the straw that broke the Bush administration's back! With such a history of omniscience it's a pure wonder Bush & Co. didn't pay closer attention to France's resignations about Iraq. But wait! The last line says, they "began to make fun of these traditionalists, sending them on 'fool's errands' or trying to trick them into believing something false." That sounds eerily familiar. Perhaps France fooled us into invading Iraq by saying we shouldn't! Aha! They are the dirty bastards we always knew them to be. Well, it's high-time we stop blaming our intelligence community for our failures and get back to our French-hating, redblooded American roots.

Fiction's Top 20 villains (and Anti-Heroes)

2005-03-31T17:08:00.000-05:00

A week ago my friend Mike alerted me to an article that ran in the Guardian (UK) about how Waterstone's (a book retail chain in the UK) had generated a list of Literature's Top 20 villains and Anti-Heroes. Now anytime you attempt to order the top 20 of anything as subjective as this, your most likely achievement is, first and foremost, to make an ass of yourself. That's all well and fine for me as long as you stick to the fundamental criteria of your ranking system.

My problem with the Waterstone list is not so much in the titles they chose, but in the basic criteria they used to construct their list. Now keep in mind that this list was generated by a bookseller, one who presumably has read A LOT of books. Am I to assume that this body of book knowledge couldn't come up with a list of ONLY 20 villains or ONLY 20 anti-heroes? Is the literary world so full of likeable protagonists that we have to lump villains and anti-heroes together into a single "bad" category?

Sure, I can hear the arguments arising already - it could be difficult to draw a clear distinction between a real villain and an anti-hero in some instances - but when you look at the Waterstone's list, it's hardly a fine line to walk.

They start off the list very well with The Master and Margarita, Perfume (one of my favorite books), and Lord of the Flies. Coming in at #4 is a shocker: Fight Club! Some might argue that Tyler Durden is an anti-hero, but in fact he fits the very definition of antagonist even if he happens to physically be the protagonist as well. What should really be the cause of argument here is how the hell did Fight Club make it to #4? I love Chuck Palahniuk as much as anyone, but #4? Above Lolita? Above American Psycho? No way!

A Clockwork Orange ranks at #5, and I have no problem with that, but at #6 is Schindler's List. Who's the villain? Hitler? No, he's not a main character in this one. I realize Oskar Schindler had some character flaws, but #6 on the top 20 novels featuring the best villains? What an insult to great villains!

Okay, so I won't bore you with my analysis of the whole list, but I should note that Lolita at #10 and American Psycho at #14 are ridiculous, as they should both be in the top 5. Additionally, The Great Gatsby at #15 ("he gives Patrick Bateman a run for his money" - WHAT?) and The Catcher in the Rye at #17 are just absurd in the context of villainy! But the worst (well, maybe along with Catcher in the Rye as the worst) has to be #19: On the Road. Waterstone's explanation for this choice, "Two anti-heroes for the price of one in this classic of the Beat generation." And to think they passed over Crime and Punishment for that. Those wacky Brits! How degenerate to be unemployed and go on a roadtrip!

Business People Are Extra-Terrestrial

2005-03-28T19:21:00.000-05:00

I've recently developed a new marketing principle: Human beings are lazy... business people are extra-terrestrial.

If you didn't figure it out from my new maxim alone, let it explain it briefly. The first part, human beings are lazy, is not too difficult to grasp. Not that I want to make snap judgments about all people, I don't, but our species, especially the American variety, procrastinates with aplomb. We put off doing all kinds of important tasks, everything from the very simple (cleaning our homes, taking out the trash, and paying bills) to the slightly more complicated (filing our taxes, talking to our kids about sex and drugs, and telling others we love them). If it's something we don't feel like doing, there's a good chance we won't.

The second part plays off of the first - if human beings are lazy, then business people are something beyond lazy, hence "extra-terrestrials." That may sound downright un-American to your ears, but the fact of the matter is that it's true. The American workplace is full, not only of procrastination, but of personal inefficiency and distraction as well. Who works in an office and doesn't spend at least a small part of the day surfing the internet for personal reasons?

This premise was confirmed over the past five years after the dot-com bubble burst and nearly every company in America starting down-sizing its workforce. In the months and years that followed the cut-back, the most amazing thing happened: productivity increased in nearly every industry and companies were able to improve their balance sheets with lower overhead. Some companies were increasing capacity while decreasing personnel. Those who still had jobs were ready to work their asses off in order to keep them and companies across the country benefited greatly from it. Now if that doesn't indicate that there's some slack in the rope, then I don't know what does.

No business in it's right mind would expect that level of efficiency to be sustained over a long period of time, and as business seemed to be growing steadily again, most sensible outfits began to hire as well. But, of course, once the crisis is averted, human nature can return to form. Now don't get me wrong, Americans love a paycheck, and they'll work really hard when they feel it's in jeopardy, but as soon as business picks up and their jobs are more secure, the work-ethic is the first thing to go.

So what does all of this mean and why does it matter? Well, once you realize how supremely lazy the average American worker can be, you can begin to develop strategies to make your hard work MORE productive by tailoring your efforts to appeal to the lazy. This is especially true in marketing - the more work you do to make selling a product to someone as easy as it can possibly be, the better you will sell that product.

In my experience at Vintage Books, there have been some very fine examples of this principle - everything to doing all the legwork in creating a story idea that is then handed over to the media to setting up huge events with great publicity at no cost just by making enough phone calls and bringing in sponsors.

I think businesses are often guilty of making lazy mistakes - falling into the trap of spending money rather than expending effort, energy, brain-power, and resourcefulness. Frankly, I believe that anything you dream up can be accomplished (and probably at no cost to you) if you are smart and work hard enough to achieve it.

A Branding Nightmare

2005-03-23T17:29:00.000-05:00

Branding was one of those buzzwords that circulated through 1990s marketing-speak with greater virulence than a cab driver's body odor in a NYC taxi. The effects of both were often equally offensive. The fact of the matter is that brand identity has been around since Caveman A knew to go to Caveman B for extra sticks and stones because he knew the other cavemen had lousy wares. Since then, anyone deft in the art of business has tried to associate their brand with being trustworthy and reliable in order to maximize repeat-patronage and word-of-mouth endorsements from faithful consumers.

Skip forward several (thousand) years, and you see that branding has become something closer to iconography than reputation-building. These days so much value has been placed on slick logos and easily identifiable, repeat marketing campaigns that it's almost an after-thought to build brand identity from the ground up by establishing a product with a core group of consumers that will advocate on behalf of the company and/or product by virtue of its quality. The later of these two approaches requires more persistence, patience, and hard work, which is, I suppose, why the former has become so popular - you only need to spend money in order to get an eye-catching logo and a snappy advertising campaign.

That said, my company (Vintage Books) has done a pretty good job at building its reputation on the quality of the books we publish. Without getting into specifics, the list of titles and authors we published is unparalleled (proof of which can be found by browsing the Vintage catalog). However when it comes to branding, Vintage has found itself in something of a schizophrenic nightmare due in large part to the fact that it has no universal image or logo that consumers can identify when browsing in a book store.

We have the Vintage Sun logo, which is the basic Vintage brand; the Vintage International logo, which is does not mean "foreign" as much as it means "world-renown;" the Vintage Contemporaries logo, which tends to means next to nothing as plenty of contemporaries are published under the Sun logo and the International logo; the Vintage Classics logo, which is ostensibly more "vintage" than Vintage; the Vintage Crime/Black Lizard logo, which is the mystery & crime group obviously; the Vintage Espanol logo for Spanish-language books; followed by a few less common logos, such as the Vintage Departures logo for travel books, the Vintage Civil War logo, and the Vintage Spiritual Classics logo. Ironically, we publish a whole line of Sci-Fi books, too, but they don't have a unique logo.

By my count that's nines logos and only a few of them look even remotely similar. Now, short of completely over-turning the apple cart and starting afresh with one universal logo, how does one go about branding such a multi-faced product?

It's an interesting dilemma because the Vintage brand is actually a very meaningful one. According to our website:

Vintage Books was founded in 1954 by Alfred A. Knopf as a trade paperback home
for its authors. Its publishing list includes a wide range, from the most influential works of world literature to cutting edge contemporary fiction and distinguished non-fiction. With a list that includes such important writers as William Faulkner, Vladimir Nabokov, Albert Camus, Ralph Ellison, Raymond Chandler, William Styron, A.S. Byatt, Philip Roth, Richard Ford, Cormac McCarthy, Alice Munro, V. S. Naipaul, Haruki Murakami, David Guterson, and Richard Russo, it is today's foremost trade paperback publisher.

In addition to that list, Vintage is home to James Baldwin, John Cheever, Gabriel Garcia Marquez, Langston Huges, Toni Morrison, Joan Didion, Willa Cather, Truman Capote, and W. Somerset Maugham. We certainly stand to benefit from brand identification when it comes to these writers, which is also to say something quite remarkable about the living authors we are publishing today. The name itself, Vintage, implies something of lasting quality in the books we publish, and I think the sun (at least) is symbolic of a lasting, reliable source of renewal and life - but what about the other eight logos?

It's as if we've done all of the excruciatingly long and hard work of building an impressively reputable product line, but then shot ourselves in the foot with what should be the most simple finishing touch, the universal thing that ties it all in together for the consumer: the recognizable image!

SXSW and Non-Traditional Marketing

2005-03-18T12:43:00.000-05:00

Having just returned from the Interactive portion of SXSW, I am convinced of two things: SXSW Interactive is a gathering of amazing people and I need to start writing my own blog. I went to the conference hoping to seed the book WHORES ON THE HILL with bloggers and other "influencers" who might enjoy the novel and talk about it online. I also wanted to meet as many people as I could and develop some productive relationships. It's hard to know at this point how successful the trip was, but regardless of the outcome (and my execution of the plan) it was a good idea.

My job at Vintage and Anchor Books is to research and develop new ways of marketing and publishing books, to identify new channels for promotion and sales, and to organize alternative marketing campaigns - and by "alternative" the book publishing world often means "online." Examples of what I do are organizing and launching a fan club for Alexander McCall Smith, offering a "waiting room copy" of OVERCOMING DYSLEXIA to pediatricians so that parents would see the book while waiting for the doctor, and arranging book give-aways with popular bloggers. My job is to take non-traditional ideas, buzzword = outside-the-box, and turn them into feasible plans. More often than not these ideas are just common sense - pediatricians and parents have a vested interest in the reading development of children! - but in the current state of publishing, there's little (if any) infrastructure to reach outlets that are not mainstream media and traditional book retail.

My job is the first of its kind that I've ever heard of, but I can't imagine it will be the last. Given the changes in the marketplace (in nearly all forms of media), most large companies could probably benefit from having someone to fill in gaps left by the traditional means of business - especially since those gaps are growing as the industry changes. But I sense that many who've worked in the media business are a little confused, if not intimidated, by the changes happening. Most of the change has developed from the ground up by a younger, more tech-savvy generation that has a greater interest in creating new means of communication rather than explaining what it has already done. And for good reason - their peers get it, and the older business people who don't are often happy to throw money at them so they can feel assured they are keeping pace with new technology.

Take for example something Tom Anderson of MySpace said at SXSW. In short, he said that MySpace has more money than it knows what to do with because companies are spending so much to advertise on his site. Why? MySpace is the #7 most trafficked site on the internet behind Google at #6. Tom went on to advise audience members NOT to advertise on MySpace, but to actually use the site, open a FREE account and use it - he promised the return would be hundreds of times more valuable. The problem is that takes work, time, and some creative thought as to how MySpace can work for you. It's easier to throw money into an ad than try to understand this new, "cool" medium.

You can call that laziness, but it's more than that - it's also a generalized fear that something new can't be understood. I'm not a very tech-savvy person (a point that was made painfully clear to me by speaking to people at SXSW), but I understood that if I didn't try to put myself and my company into the mix, we would either miss opportunities completely or have to spend a lot of money just to hang on in the periphery. The irony is that the people I work with think I'm very web-savvy. I'm only smart enough to know that I don't know very much, and that my company has a long way to go if it really wants to modernize itself.

That said, Vintage and Anchor can take some consolation in the fact that I seemed to be the only person there from a major book publisher, which is precisely what I expected and part of the reason for being there. SXSW is a music, film, and interactive conference - there's nothing about it that focuses on books, and therefore most publishers are completely ignorant to it. But here's where the utter common sense of non-traditional marketing comes into play - SXSW is not only vastly populated with people who like to read, it's a virtual epicenter of "influencers" - you know the people who talk about things they like and influence others to go out and buy those things. In my opinion, these people are more important in today's market because they survive on their credibility with people who communicate with them - something mainstream media has lost almost entirely in recent years. Being the only person there promoting books meant that I stood out to everyone I spoke to - people seemed almost relieved that I wasn't another person pushing a website, a service, or a band - and the fact that I probably handed them a free book to read made them all the happier.

This is non-traditional marketing. And who knows, I got a lot of business cards from people who said they had a writing project for which they were seeking a publisher. Perhaps this could also generate some non-traditional publishing as well.