we were obviously meant to work together

My assistant is taking the interns out for karaoke after work.

Happy Tanabata!

Thanks, Jenny-chan, for reminding me that it's Tanabata, one of my favorite Japanese holidays.

Today's the day to go to your local bamboo grove and write your wish for the upcoming year (or any wish in general) on a slip of paper, which you then tie to the bamboo.

Since the closest bamboo grove is a bit of a trek for me, I might celebrate with sushi, instead.

Why do British novels often have different titles in the US (and vice versa)?

Christa brought up this good point. Stuart Neville's brand-new debut is called THE TWELVE in the UK, and GHOSTS OF BELFAST in its forthcoming US pub. The first Harry Potter was THE PHILOSOPHER'S STONE in the UK and THE SORCERER'S STONE in the US. On the flip side, Diana Gabaldon's OUTLANDER, the first book in her bestselling series, is called CROSS STITCH in the UK and Commonwealth. Why do these darn publishers meddle with a good thing?

The reasons are various, and perhaps not always good. But we publishers usually try to make things better, not worse. (Sometimes we're wrong.)

Let's look at these three:

Stuart Neville originally titled his own debut GHOSTS OF BELFAST. From what I understand, and Stuart, feel free to step in here, for him that's what the book was about, so he titled it accordingly. When it got to his UK publisher, it was decided that keeping "Belfast" in the title might have negative connotations in the UK, since books about Belfast in the past have been either dour books about the political strife or downmarket commercial thrillers--so associations his publisher didn't want to make. So the title THE TWELVE, which is more neutral, was decided on. Meanwhile, the US market has none of those concerns with connotations, and Americans love to read about Ireland (what can I say? We do.). "Belfast" helps evoke the place and culture of the novel, which is a major selling point for the American market.

Harry Potter, meanwhile, is a different story. In that case, the American publication was undertaken before anyone knew the phenomenal selling power of Harry Potter, and the US publisher was afraid "Philosopher" would turn off kid readers. Since when is philosophy cool? I've heard that JK Rowling has since wished she'd stuck it out and insisted on her original title. But hey, who can guess these things in advance?

Diana Gabaldon, meanwhile, wrote herself a bestselling series that starts with a book that was called OUTLANDER in the States. When she found out people in England knew her book as CROSS STITCH, she was totally confused. The timbre is certainly pretty different, at least on American ears! (I heard her tell the story of her absolute stupification over the British title at a book signing once.) But it turns out in England, the Commonwealth definition of the word "Outlander" prevails--and outlander is some kind of slang in Australia for something that didn't apply to her book (back me up here, global friends? I can't remember or find online what the exact definition is). So in her case, it was a linguistic gap kind of thing.

Any other amusing/confusing renaming examples you guys have come across?

I would 100% say no

if a guy tried to propose to me like this.

FYI, in case anyone out there was thinking about it.

Saturday morning British one-hit wonder pop moment!

Happy 4th of July, my American friends!

To my British friends--don't feel too bad. You may have lost America, but you still have Chesney Hawkes!

new (to me) publishing blog!

Do you guys read Bibliophile Stalker? He's another EdAss blogger, and he literally has links to everything published on publishing, everyday. I've definitely started surfing all his linkage posts to see if there's anything I'm missing.

when did cats become so funny to me?

Can't help it. Think I've fallen into the LOLcats world (but just a little bit!).

This one via Heather, who has other funnies.

THE TWELVE hits stores!!!!

Oh happiest day! Our long-time mischief buddy Stuart Neville's debut novel, The Twelve, is officially on sale today!!!

(In the UK, at least. US folks have to wait for the US release in October--the US edition will be called Ghosts of Belfast. But it's ok--we get Stuart himself, too, since he's coming over for a tour!)

Congrats, Stuart! May this be the beginning of a long and celebrated literary career!!

what's an online book launch party like?

Check out Grace Lin's launch party (today!) for her new middle grade novel, WHERE THE MOUNTAINS MEET THE MOON. She has some great ideas for you--contests, giveaways, recipes, you name it.

By the way, Ello's giving away a copy of the book on her blog. She (and her kids) loved the book, if anyone's looking for a good middle grade read!

(via Mitali)

to all my Interns out there

Breaking Onion news! "Summer Intern Already Forgotten"

I'd like to dedicate this post to all my summer interns, and also to The Intern.

This very special article comes to me via Inara.

my assistant believes

this will improve your Tuesday.

yikes.

Be nice on the internet, writer friends, lest you actually dismantle your own platform. Cautionary tale here.

Pre-Editing (Or, My Thoughts on Hiring Freelance Developmental Editors Pre-Submission)

I got this note the other day:

Hi there,

I am a first time writer and I just finished my first novel. In your opinion, should I try and get an editor before I query an agent? I haven't been able to find any advice on that and I read your blog all the time so I figured I would ask. If you have time to respond, please let me know whenever you can!

XXX

Dearest XXX, thank you for asking. I've been wanting to write about this for a long time. I'm afraid I have a TON of thoughts about it.

Let me start with an anecdote.

About six months ago, I got to meet an editor hero of mine, who is a big important head of an imprint at a big important company. We got to chatting, and she asked me about some of my favorite projects.

Being my humble modest self (ahem), I started bragging about all my most splendid projects (all of them, naturally). I took some special time on a book I was particularly proud of--one you've heard a bit about here--which I'd acquired after every other house in basically the entire world had passed. I'd seen potential there, and after working carefully with the author on editorial back-and-forth and thoughtful development, we published to mind-blowing awesome reviews. In my prideful, sinning mind, this was an ultimate victory, because I felt like I could see my own personal hand in the book's success in a special way.

My esteemed interlocutor, however, did not *realize* I was bragging! Instead, she said something that shook me from buttons to boots: "Oh wow, you guys edit over there? That's nice--I always used to enjoy editing. We don't have time, so we can only really buy books that are pretty much ready for production."

I was, as I said, pretty shaken. My very smart, wise, and experienced new friend had opened my eyes to an industry trend I'd kinda been ignoring--houses are increasingly not insentivizing their editors to EDIT. Instead, they are supposed to focus on ACQUIRING. I love editing, and realizing that it may not be a crucial or celebrated skill for an acquisition editor to have made me wonder what the future holds for me.

Enough about me and my ego. How does this tie into YOUR life as a writer?
I am not saying the system doesn't suck. I'm just trying to address this very specific question of whether or not you should hire a freelance editor.

Basically, you want your submission to be as clean as possible, at every stage.

"Clean" means both in terms of copy issues (grammar, punctuation, sentence structure) and in terms of content--your structure, composition, ideas, and for fiction plot, characters, and pacing should all be tight as a drum--it's not enough to want to sell your manuscript anymore. You have to imagine that, in a worst case scenario, you might get published without another hand tinkering with anything you've written. (Hopefully this won't be the case--but you should treat your manuscript as if it is.)

Don't let yourself cut any corners at any stage. You should be as clean as possible before submitting to agents, because while some agents are fantastic editors, some of the best agents are very poor editors (different although frequently overlapping skill sets--but don't count on an agent to edit your manuscript). You should also talk seriously to your agent about how clean the manuscript is before the agent submits to editors.

Some pros and cons (all mixed together) of hiring a freelance editor to work on cleaning up your project:

*The expense--they charge a ton. We're looking at hundreds or even thousands of dollars, depending on the person and what kind of editing your book requires. And I know a lot of us aren't exactly rolling in it. You have to figure out on your own the risk/reward scenario fiscally--it's important to remember that working with an outside editor doesn't mean that your project will sell.

*You gotta have the right person working with you, and that's often hard to ascertain in advance. While you, personally, may not be an expert at grammar, or may feel you need a second opinion about pacing or the commercial viability of elements in your story, it's important to remember that you ARE the author, and that ultimately your idea and presence are sacred to what makes your book your book. I mean, I'm NOT one to tell anyone to ignore editorial suggestions (of course I'm not going to tell you that!). But I will tell you that it's important that you work with editors--whether in houses or on a freelance basis--who understand you and who agree with what is fundamental about your book. Yes, you want a clean and commercially viable book--but working with someone who loves to read (and ONLY loves to read) Sophia Kinsella may not be a perfect idea when your writing is designed to appeal to readers of Maeve Binchy.

*An outside set of eyes never, ever hurts. Every person who reads your manuscript will offer you a different kind of reaction, and those reactions (good, bad, ugly) should be both important and interesting to you as an author. Plus, a paid freelance editor will (hopefully) have a lot more to bring to the table in terms of concise, helpful advice than your neighbor Sue Ellen might have.

*The level of cleanliness required in a manuscript these days might be higher than what you're humanly capable of achieving on your own (as I discussed above). Are you up to it on your own? Be honest with yourself about your own abilities. But also don't be scared of your abilities--you may need less help than other people.

*Then again, don't trust yourself at all. Writers are notoriously bad about judging themselves--bad writers tend to think they're awesome, and terrific writers tend to think they're terrible. So get a second opinion about whether your manuscript needs outside help from someone who will give it to you straight.

*Now, a great way to get around an expensive professional edit is to work with a crit group. Not every crit group works out perfectly, but in the best case scenarios, writers can find another very kindred soul or two with whom to slap the silly out of their respective works before things go to an agent for submission. Just because someone isn't a publishing professional doesn't mean they can't help you awesomely. Just remember they need reciprocal incentive--you have to offer to take their project as seriously as they do yours.

*Don't be ashamed of hiring an outside editor. This is no longer a pride issue--it's not about your fitness as an author. It's more about the woefully understaffed and underfunded state of the union as it is at this moment in time. So if you are considering hiring an outside set of eyes, don't get hung up on all that.

*Remember that in most cases, you can't submit to the same editor (or, before that, agent) twice. That means that, again, you MUST be honest with yourself. If you are the kind of author who needs outside professional help, try to figure that out BEFORE your agent submits your manuscript to every editor in history. Many agents start out with small, exclusive submissions so that if the general editorial feeling is that the manuscript needs more work, the author and agent can go back and try again before using up all their submissions options. So in many cases, you'll have time to consider and reconsider.

You probably want a more concrete answer--yes or no? Honestly, I want to say that it depends on you. Some people are simply more able to self-edit, or have more friends who are able to give more (free) incisive criticism. Some people have more time for self-development. If you have some cash to burn, are in a rush, and are pretty sure you need outside help, a professional editor may be the easiest way to go.

I believe most people who are ready to publish books do not require a professional editor before they submit to agents. An agent should be won over by your ideas, your platform, and your voice. The agent needs to see the potential, not a perfectly polished sparkling diamond (although see above re: getting the manuscript as clean as within your own powers). So unless you're positive you need professional outside help, I would postpone the discussion until you have secured representation--since then, in theory, at least you'll have an industry insider to give you an honest and viable opinion about your personal needs.

I hope this helped--let me know if there's anything I can flesh out for you.

I come back to one point--I am not claiming the system doesn't suck. It sucks in lots of ways. But together let's try to pass around proactive advice/strategies.

Robert the Publisher's Gem of the Day

RtP: Sometimes you just have to say no. You can't go around appeasing agents all the time. That's what happened at Munich, and look what that got us. You can't suck up to Hitler, you can't suck up to agents. Neville Chamberlain would have been a terrible publisher.

[Because you know Robert loves him some Hitler analogies.]

low publishing salaries ==> literature suffers?

GalleyCat posted this story about the stupid state of publishing salaries. I couldn't resist commenting.

I think everyone knows that publishing professionals (especially people in the early years of their careers) make salaries so low they're almost silly--it's kind of a truism, or maybe a joke.

But thanks to this guy for drawing attention to it again. Here's why, as he spells it out:

-In order to work in publishing, you have to be able to spend years (often lots of years) toiling at the bottom of the pyramid. Some of these years (in almost all cases, at least one of these years) are unpaid entirely.

-The only people who can afford to spend years toiling at the bottom of the pyramid are the (often elite) college grads with no loans and, frequently, outside help to subsidize their rents in some of the most expensive cities in the world.

-By hiring only the people who can afford to work for free or little money, publishers are essentially keeping the entire industry locked into a tiny socioeconomic bubble.

-The homogeneity of publishing professionals (see above) means a homogeneity of the literature they choose to publish--surely slots get filled based on (at the very least) interests or preoccupations that might not be as diverse or widely interesting as if human resources were drawn from wider demographics.

-The lack of perspective aside, think of all the talent that's getting arbitrarily shut out of the whole process.

Anyway.

Why does this matter to you, the aspiring author? Well, briefly:

-The first person in the industry to ever read your manuscript will probably be an unpaid intern at a literary agency. His/her opinion will make or break you.

-The first person to read your book at a publishing company will probably be a grossly underpaid editorial assistant. See above re: making/breaking.

You also remember Richard Nash's article (I posted a couple months ago) about the commodification of editors, and how underpayment and lack of job security essentially forces editors to not take their acquired projects too seriously.

Do I know how to fix this? Sadly, no. The truth is our profit margins are so slender I don't really know where in the process you'd squeeze out more for salaries.

But this is one of those gross problems in the industry, and one of the reasons I have a feeling there's going to be some major overhaul in the next couple of years.

Sorry for the rant. Missed you guys.

rehab

Ok, I haven't checked my Google Reader since MONDAY. Who's proud of me?

Of course, I'm blogging about it. But this is different. This is more of a... forum with friends than a mind-zap.

Phew. Brain detox... Although my fingers are itching to click that "Reader" tab...

whee antique Japanese book covers!

Mid-week link of delightfulness, via the fearsome, intrepid, and indefatigable Janet Reid:

Extraordinary Japanese Book Covers from the Early 20th Century

I love all the bright colors. Hmm, I wonder if any of my books could take on some of this style...

Happy Wednesday, folks!

eek deadlines

Dear Mischief,

I have three (3) pretty daunting deadlines this week and next. I suspect this means three things:

1) I will not post long meaty things, and may not post at all unless my assistant sends me an amusing baby animal to share

2) I'm going to be less present on Twitter (I know, you didn't think it possible)

3) I'm not going to have time to keep up with my Google reader, so probably won't be visiting blogs again until the weekend.

Wanted to apologize in advance. Normally I try to keep all the balls in the air, but this week at least one has to come down.

Love,

Moonrat

love stinks, literally

[warning--this story is PG13 and not appropriate for children or very impressionable monkeys.]

[Rally Monkey emits loud, obnoxious fart.]

YT: Ewww!! That's disgusting. You should go do that in the bathroom.

RM: [Stands up to wave his butt in YT's face.] That's what you get!

YT: There's a hole in the back of your underpants.

RM: What?! No there's not.

YT: There is! You clearly blew a hole in your underpants with your inappropriate fart.

RM: That's impossible! It must have been there before.

YT: No, it's perfectly round!

RM: YOU'RE perfectly r-- [Abruptly cuts himself off and goes running into the kitchen.]

YT: WHAT?

RM: [silence and cowering in the kitchen]

YT: DID YOU SAY I'M PERFECTLY ROUND?!

RM: [further cowering]

YT: That's right. You better hide.

Happy Sunday!

email of the day

[from my assistant]

To: Moonrat
From: XXX

Subject: I found this picture.


It reminded me of the interns.

just finished reading

The Stone Diaries, by Carol Shields. My review here. Anyone else read it? Any thoughts?

I'm moving to WA

So I can have this cake.

(please cf my FAQ re: whether I'd rather have a chocolate layer cake or a tray of sushi... I NO LONGER HAVE TO CHOOSE.)

is there a word count cap for a debut novel?

I got this note the other day:

Hi Moonie,

Could you tell me - are there big word count issues for a first novel? Mine is accessible literary fiction. The thing is. it's edited down to 135,000 words from approximately 150,000 words. I'm wondering if I've gotten it down to an acceptable size. My novel is a period piece, and it has required a good number of words to capture the characters as well as the place, period, and action. Does this sound all right to you? Am I in a reasonable ball park?

Thanks,

XXX

Sorry, this is harder to hear than it is for me to say. Honestly, no, you're not in the ballpark, regardless of your topic--you'll get blanket rejections before people even look.

I would say that the absolute upper limit of OK is 100,000 for a debut novel, but you'll find some people turned off to it if it's anything above 80,000.

I'm not making these numbers up from my experience--I've read identical stats on a lot of agent blogs. It's pretty much an industry standard. But (with only a very few exceptions) I think you'll find in a survey of successful literary debut novels, the average page count is between 250 and 400. Often, authors get really famous for longer opuses--but those aren't their debuts. Those are their second or third books.

There are practical reasons for this rule! It's not (entirely) that editors are close-minded pigs. The reason is 100,000 words casts off at about 480 typeset pages. That would make your book...well, a lot of pages--astronomically expensive to produce. Since literary fiction (particularly debuts) sell in smaller numbers than genre fiction, the potential profit margin on your book would be even lower than on another debut. Publishers would be very, very wary of the financial risk they were undertaking.

Furthermore, think of your audience--you're an unknown writer at the onset. But readers are probably going to be more willing to take a chance on you if the commitment is relatively small.

This is really hard for you, the author, in terms of your story, but what I would do is try to whittle it down for your submission. If an agent or later an editor is like, "awesome story, but why didn't you develop the romance between Billy and Matilda [or Craig or Alice or Pete] more?" then you can stick stuff back in.

Also, ask yourself if maybe you've written two books--can you strike out one element of this book and spin a whole other plot out of it? Might as well make all your hard work work for you.

One last word for the wise--I wish that all publishing was based on beautiful writing and wonderful ideas, not on marketability and production costs. I wish literature as the pure art and publishing as the industry had a little bit larger of an overlap. BUT. More content does not always mean better content. So please, revisers who read this and want to accuse me of being mercenary, please believe me when I say there are craft and readability issues central to this as well as production/money ones.

I don't mean this to apply to anyone in particular--and indeed, it may not apply to you--but try to keep in mind as you're revising that probably the most universal flaw in early-career writing is overwriting or over-inclusion of material.

I find that I, personally, feel less regretful about taking a knife to a manuscript (my own or someone else's) when I keep a separate document where I deposit everything I've parted with. There's no reason you can't use good material in something else later, and there's no reason you need it now (unless you NEED it now--and be honest with yourself about the difference between "need" and "really really want").

Hope this helps. Any thoughts out there in the blogosphere?

things the rally monkey says

Rally Monkey: Just ask your dad about how marriage works. The only time the man gets his way is when he proposes.

Sometimes, to get what you want, you just gotta go out and take it.

Happy Monday.

(back to the editorial bat cave now)

Tiananmen, the "Gate of Heavenly Peace"

Today's the twentieth anniversary of the Tiananmen Square protest/massacre in Beijing, when unarmed student protesters were gunned down by the Chinese military in the historical Beijing landmark.

The official Chinese number of casualties was 7,000. You can imagine the unofficial number is much, much higher.

This anniversary doesn't only matter to me because I'm interested in China and Chinese history. The event itself, in 1989, is the first international political event I remember hearing about (I was 5 at the time, and still have a vivid memory of the NPR coverage, and talking about what happened with my parents at the dinner table).

But most importantly, we should remember not only those who died and how they were killed, we should stop to think about what they stood for, and the sad irony of how this anniversary is being treated in China. According to my AM New York (p 6), China has banned foreign journalists from the Square itself, shut down Twitter, Flickr, blogs, and other social networking sites, and treated the whole story with radio silence.

This is an important statement about how the world's largest, most populous, and possibly most powerful country thrives--or thinks it thrives--on the suppression of information and on depriving its citizens of their own history. We should remember not only the event but the anniversary.

Our resident China blogger Froog offers his take on why this anniversary matters (and I'm inclined to agree with him).

Here's the video of the famous single man who stood in front of the tanks (short, Chinese language).

The 1989 BBC coverage (I'll warn you, I found this clip particularly upsetting).

I'm wearing white today for memory and free speech.

BEA wrap-up

I promised a full report on BEA. Alas, I had 4 different authors in town (!) (don't ask--none of it was my fault, I promise) and while I LOVE hanging out with my authors and would rather do that than anything else, it meant that I didn't attend many panels or meetings worth blogging about.

For that kind of coverage, you might try PW, which has culled a number of reports.

Also, because of my general unavailability, I didn't get A SINGLE GALLEY. Boo. However, I did make my slave assistant get in line at 8 in the morning on Friday to wait in line for a Catching Fire galley. She managed to get like 40 pounds of "swag" so I don't feel bad. She did better than I did.

However, I did eat a number of delicious things (in chronological order):

-goat cheese omelete
-the rest of my agent friend's granola and yogurt
-some fresh fruit
-four (4) cups of coffee
-a poached pear and arugala salad (did I spell that right?)
-four (4) assorted pieces of delicious bread from the bread basket
-1/3 a bottle of olive oil (smeared all over above-mentioned bread)
-fried calamari with Thai chilli sauce
-spring rolls
-two (2) blueberry mojitos
-an almond croissant
-six (6) slices of ham
-two (2) cups of coffee
-a yogurt parfait
-another cup of coffee
-a huge handful of sunflower seeds
-edamame dumplings
-deep fried rock shrimp
-bok choi (yum)
-some kind of flat brown noodle
-some kind of gin cocktail with elderflower in it
-a martini with three olives
-frozen peanut butter mousse in a chocolate shell
-one (1) pot of coffee
-a cup of green tea
-one (1) bread basket
-a bowl of raspberries
-a cup of hot chocolate
-a bowl of olives (this time I did NOT eat the pits)

Now, unfortunately, I am saddled with hideous deadlines. So until I think of something awesome to blog about that's worth blowing off deadlines for, I think I'll go do some "work."

happy Monday

I need a day off. So does this guy.

not here

Cuz I'm GETTING TONS OF FREE BOOKS AT BEA!!!

Phew. I'm a little wound up. I'll try to work up a full report on Sunday. In the meantime, happy reading and writing, everyone!

editing your daily life

Magickeepers: Lit Blog with Your Kids!

Merry Monteleone has an interview with the beloved children's writer Erica Kirov over on her blog today. Erica is talking about her new middle grade novel, Magickeepers: The Eternal Hourglass.

It's interactive, meaning Erica is there to answer further questions, and best yet, Merry has set the interview up to be kid-friendly. Since Erica writes for middle grade readers, she and Merry hope to blog for them, too.

Readers, writers, middle grade parents, and teachers are all welcome, too!

back to work!

Happy Tuesday, everybody! A celebration of links.

"Le Wrath di Khan," or Star Trek as a stop-action action figure opera, complete with Italian and subtitles. Via a dear editor friend.

Over on Bookninja, a video--made in 1969--about what the internet would have to offer. 2 minutes of giggles.

Haven't had a chance to see Wolverine yet? No need--here's the whole thing in 30 seconds (watched this video for a second time this morning with the rally monkey, and we actually cried laughing).

Help bring everlasting bliss (and an awesome wedding) to Brian and his fiance, who are among three finalists for Lavender Magazine's dream wedding contest. Anyone can vote; just go here and select Brian and Benji. You can read Brian's story here.

Another one from Bookninja--have you ever had a man cold? It looks serious.

I linked to this earlier on Twitter, but for those of you who have wisely avoided Twitter: JES found a blog with the funniest fake Twitter stream ever--Pride & Prejudice & Twitter.

Via Nathan Bransford: the funniest item review on Amazon. Scroll down for the customer reviews.

Now everyone off for a productive pre-BEA week!

email of the day

[again from my assistant, who has infallible taste]

editors are scary

We had a new intern start on Tuesday; he was supposed to work Tuesdays and Fridays all summer. He arrived at the intern arrival hour on Tuesday, and left for lunch at 11:30. He never came back from lunch.

My assistant (the intern supervisor) only just noticed today, since he hasn't come in again. "I think we scared him off!" she cried. "It only took 2 hours!"

If anyone's seen an intern named Thomas wandering the streets of New York, tell him it's ok, not everyone's cut out for publishing.

And You Thought a Royalty Involved a Crown

My mother has read and loved a particular book I edited. Last week, she asked, out of curiosity, how much money that favorite author of hers might make off the book. Well, I said, there's an advance, I said, but really what matters is royalties, but you can't just assume those are rolling in every six months, since there's a reserve against returns, but then there's rights sales that are straight pocket change, but there's a fee for the...

Her eyebrows came down into her nose and her mouth pursed fretfully as she tried to follow me. Watching these changes come over her face, I started listening to myself and the malarkey I spoke. I realized that royalty accounting must be SO mysterious to anyone unpublished. Or published. Or anyone. I realized even I didn't really know what I was talking about.

So here is my imperfect attempt to describe to you an author's possibilities for making money with her/his books. I don't claim the final word, and I welcome amendments. But I think everyone deserves to know how they might profit from their work, because it might help them make good decisions about their writing and publication processes.

Let's try to go in rough chronological order.

The Advance
What does "advance" mean: It's money "advanced" to you against royalties, meaning it's a loan the publisher gives you in a lump sum under the assumption that your book will make enough money for said publisher that the advance will be recouped. This means that you will start earning royalties when and only if your book makes enough money that your publisher's advance to you it paid back, using your negotiated royalty percentage as a marker. If your advance is $10,000, your royalty is 10%, and your cover price is $25.00, you will need to sell 4,000 copies of your book before you start making additional royalties. This is called earnout.

How the advance is divided: Either in half of thirds--usually. If it's a smaller advance (or your agent manages to force them to agree to this), your publisher might agree to pay it in two lumps, often half on signing, half on delivery and acceptance of your final manuscript. If it's larger advance, you'll probably get a third on signing, a third on delivery and acceptance (or d&a), a third on publication.

The Royalties:
What are typical royalty percentages: Standard royalties for new books are as follows: 10% for hardcover, 7% (or sometimes 7.5%) for trade paperback, and 5% for mass market. Often, publishers will agree to incentive escalators (usually only on hardcovers). Here's a very typical hardcover example:

10% on the first 5,000 copies sold
12.5% on the next 5,000 copies sold
15% thereafter

When royalties are paid: As we mentioned above, you'll only start earning additional royalties when your advance has earned out. Supposing your book has earned out, royalties are (at most companies) paid every 6 months, in statements that go directly to agents.

Reserve against returns: This is the reason you won't have gotten every royalty dollar you were due during a period. Your publisher has a right to retain up to a certain percentage of your royalties--the actual percentage varies on your contract and on the situation--against future returns from booksellers. Returns are pretty complicated; we've talked about them before, but they're always hard to wrap our heads around. These are big, corporate returns, not the kind of customer-by-customer returns ("My Aunt Wanda bought this cookbook for me but I don't like Russian casseroles" etc). Basically, there are scenarios wherein a publisher may print and sell 10,000 requested copies of a book to book sellers, and, if expectation was wrong, receive all 10,000 copies back, for which they'd have to relinquish the entire dollar amount they originally earned for those books. Alas for returnable industries. The reserve against returns clause gives publishers some measure of protection against total bankrupcy (since, after all, we still have to pay for printing).

This means that especially the first royalty period you have will have a dent taken out of it--the publisher's reserved cash, since in many cases it takes a lot longer than 6 months for all returns to be processed. So there will be a chunk missing, but if your book is selling through well, that money will come to you the period after. Some delayed gratification there (I never claimed it was a living wage, recall).

Rights sales:
How they get diced: You'll earn different percentages of dollar figures depending on who retained the rights and who made the deal. I've listed some more complicated scenarios below, but basically your agent, your publisher, and a foreign co-agent may all be taking chunks out of your rights advances (which, by the way, earn out just like a regular advance). Generally, you earn the most money off of rights yur agent retained for you and then sold herself, because none of the middlepeople took a cut. That said, before you decide in an overhead contract whether to sell or retain rights, you and your agent must take an honest inventory of her outreach and labor hours, and evaluate whether you'll realistically make more money by selling rights via the corporate machine that is your originating publisher (varies on the size of the agency, usually).

When rights deal advances are paid: The good news is, rights sales wrap into your advance, so in some cases (this has happened with many of my authors) an advance can earn out on rights sales alone before the book even hits shelves.

A couple of complicated scenarios designed to illustrate some of the math
(Please note: all dollar values below are designed to make math easy, not to reflect typical advances for these kinds of sales)

Scenario 1: Your US publisher sells UK/Commonwealth rights to a British publisher for $10,000 at a 10% hardcover royalty and sell 1,000 copies, so the book only just earns out.
To note: a usual Commonwealth sale split is 60/40, meaning the author gets 60% of the sale, the publisher, who made the sale, keeps 40%

Your cash: $10,000 x .6 [your chunk after US publisher's cut] = $6,000; $6,000 x .85 [your chunk after your agent's cut] = $5,100

Scenario 2: Your US publisher retains Commonwealth rights and distributes their own edition. They sell 1,000 hardcover copies at 10 pounds a copy.
To note: Publishers usually distribute their editions to foreign countries on export terms, which involve a reduced royalty (probably 10% of net billing, or billing less expenses, on a hardcover instead of 10% of gross, or total, billing--it works out to about half).

Your cash: 1000 copies x 10 pounds per book = 10,000 GBP gross billing; 10,000 GBP x .5 [approximate net proceeds] = 5,000 GBP; 5,000 GBP at a 1.5 exchange rate (or so) = $7,500 in royalties that go straight to your advance; $7,500 x .85 [your chunk less after your agent's cut] = $6,375

[mini-lesson: the more copies you get out, the better the rights sale works for you than the distribution would have; the inverse is usually also true, unless someone way overpays an advance.]

Scenario 3: Your agent retained your Commonwealth rights, and sells them directly to a British publisher for $10,000. The book goes on to sell 1000 copies at 10 GBP and 10% royalty.

Your cash: $10,000 upfront, minus your agent's commission, so $8,500.

Scenario 4: Your agent retained your Commonwealth rights, but then your US publication didn't perform well enough that a Commonwealth publisher could afford to do their own printrun. They would have run off with a US publisher, but now it's too late for that. So no Commonwealth sale.

Your cash: $0

I hope this has been helpful. Please hit me up with questions. I'm a font of occasionally correct if generally irrelevant information.

Now that you've finished this Royalties seminar, I award you this tiara:

publishing light bulb jokes

Andrew Wheeler has posted a whole list of publishing light bulb jokes over on his very excellent publishing blog. You'll have to visit him for the full list, but I've plagiarized some of my favorites:

Q: How many art directors does it take to screw in a light bulb?
A. Does it HAVE to be a lightbulb?

Q. How many editors does it take to screw in a lightbulb?
A. Only one; but first they have to rewire the entire building.

Q. How many managing editors does it take to change a lightbulb?
A. You were supposed to have changed that lightbulb last week!

Q. How many copyeditors does it take to change a lightbulb?
A. The last time this question was asked, it involved managing editors. Is the difference intentional? Should one or the other instance be changed? It seems inconsistent.

Q. How many marketing directors does it take to change a lightbulb?
A. It isn't too late to make this neon instead, is it?

Q. How many writers does it take to change a lightbulb?
A. But why do we have to CHANGE it?

bad parenting

funny picture of the day, stolen right from Ello

your recommendations please--mysteries set in NYC

I got a note the other day:

Dear Moonrat,

My retired father loves mystery novels set in New York City. Can you recommend any?

Thanks,

XXX

Ooo. Ouch. You got me. I don't read very much mystery.

However, I open the floor to my beloved internet friends, who read everything. Please, folks, chime in!

I will say I was *very* interested to see Soho Press's Chinatown detective series, by Henry Chang. Check out Detective Jack Yu in Chinatown Beat and Year of the Dog. I haven't read them, but they seem to have very good editorial reviews.

Others? I'll update the body (teehee) of this post with links.

**edited to add the following**

Brooklyn Noir anthology (Akashic)--19 stories (rec by Donn Linn)

The Alienist, by Caleb Carr, set in 1896 rec by Miss Liberty)

Also The Angel of Darkness, by Caleb Carr (rec by Memory)


Gone Tomorrow, by Lee Child (rec by Scribe and seconded by many others)

One of whom is Janet Reid, who also recommends:
Even, by Andrew Grant (debut author)
Reed Feral Coleman's Moe Praeger books
East of A, by Russell Atwood
SJ Rozan's Bill and Lydia series

Motherless Brooklyn, by Jonathan Lethem (rec by Nathan Bransford)

Bust, by Ken Bruen and Jason Starr (rec by Stuart Neville)

Lawrence Block's Matthew Scudder series, including 8 Million Ways to Die, A Walk Among the Tombstones, and When the Sacred Ginmill Closes (rec by Eric Berlin)

baka-kit recommends Lawrence Block's Bernie Rhodenbarr series, which are more witty than noir

Lethal Legacy, by Linda Fairstein, which is based around the New York Public Library (rec by Colleen)

JES recommends Doug Preston and Lincoln Child's series, which features lots of NYC ties, including to the Museum of Natural History. He also recommends F. Paul Wilson's Repairman Jack series.

Iasa recommends these authors: Richard Barth, Rex Stout, Hugh Pentecost, Carol O'Conner, Jed Rubenefield, Ed McBain, Amanda Matetsky, and Donald Westlake. (Iasa--do you have favorite exemplary titles?)

Kristan recommends Mary Higgins Clark--Kristan, any specific titles?

you gotta have friends

[on phone to typesetter]

YT: I'm sending you corrections for BOOK TITLE today. It's super important we turn these around as quickly as possible.

Typesetter: Well, I'm currently up to my ears on HUGE PROJECT for your colleague. That was due at the printer last week

YT: Well... Maybe you could, you know, find a couple hours for me.

Typesetter: [huuuuge sigh] I'll sneak you in.

YT: You're my best friend.

Typesetter: You're my b**** goddess.

YT: I'll have you know I'm choosing to take that as a compliment.

Typesetter: What else would it have been, my dear?

Spontaneous Self-Organization, or the History of American Chinese Food

This clip of Jennifer 8 Lee talking about the history of American Chinese food is awesome. The rally monkey turned off a reality TV show to come watch it with me (and then we, um, ordered some General Tso).

Thanks for the link, Paca.

just finished reading

The Book of Night Women, by Marlon James. My review here. Anyone else read it? Any thoughts?

Write Your @$$ Off Day reflections

Well, guys, here's my progress report from yesterday's Write Your Ass Off Day.

I woke up at 8 and headed out at 9. Got to the New York Public Library at around 10, where I made my poor assistant meet me to keep me in line. (Poor thing. But she's very agreeable, and got to write her ass off, too.) My goal was to try to take a 36-page document of very disorganized notes I took almost three years ago and turn them into a usable outline (which would involve some idea of narrative strategy). This seemed more reasonable to me than it sounds to you because I *have* been thinking about this for three years. I decided it was time to bite the bullet.

We took a (rather long) Chinese lunch at 2:30, and I left her at 5:45 because I'd finished my outline and felt like my brain was burnt out. I was very pleased. No sooner had I packed up my case and headed toward the train, though, I realized that I didn't like any of the work I'd done at all. And that I still don't know who I want to narrate my stupid project. So I wept quietly and ate a large piece of chocolate peanut butter cake.

As JES tried to make very clear to me, the goal was to devote the DAY to your writing, even if not to the act of writing itself. Writing involves cogitation, decision-making, and mental mulching. I definitely did that.

How did everyone else do?

unwanted residents

The rally monkey just squashed a 6-inch* long cockroach, which exploded into purple juicy bits all over the wall.

Times like this I just LOVE living in New York. Where did it come from?! What did we do wrong?!

Someone's having nightmares tonight. (Read: me. And now you. Since misery loves company.)

*The RM says the cockroach was two inches, maybe an inch and a half. I think he needs his vision checked.

Write Your @$$ Off Day--Commencing!

See you at 6:30 (no sooner! No email/blogging!).

BEA

It's nearly my favorite time of year again! The biggest American book conference is Book Expo America, BEA, which is held once a year (usually in May). The location rotates. Last year it was somewhere ridiculous like LA (ridiculous only in the sense that I couldn't go because it was too far, sob); in 2007 it was in New York; in 2006, DC; in 2005, New York. Luckily, it's in New York again this year.

I love BEA. All the industry professionals go and book themselves chock-full of meetings with agents/editors/scouts/packagers/printers, trying to make business connections. That's... not my favorite part. But here are the things I LOVE about BEA:

1) Everyone comes to town with business excuses, so that means old book friends you don't get to see very often because they live far away are suddenly here for a short weekend of lunches/drinks/parties/coffee dates.

2) HUNDREDS AND HUNDREDS OF FREE BOOKS!

It was at BEA in 2007 that I picked up a lovely galley (picked it up largely because of the gold foil on the front) of The Spanish Bow, which went on to become my very favorite book of 2007 and one of my favorites ever. I blogged about it perhaps a little too much, because eventually the author, Andromeda Romano-Lax, started stopping by *here,* and now she has her own blog and has inspired the entire Fill-in-the-Gaps movement. The moral of this story is BEA offers you great books and helps you meet new friends, even ones who live in Alaska. And you might perhaps be inspired to start a club like Fill-in-the-Gaps, which now has 62 people in it. And other side benefits. All because I went to BEA!

I'm not prosletyzing here. There are reasons for everyone that BEA might be both wonderful and horrible and a waste of time and money. But I wanted to let people who might not have heard about it know about it, and give you a run-down of my cost-benefit interpretation.

Check out the website here for a basic FAQ. Also, Yodiwan, the excellent book publicity blogger, has put together a twitter feed for people with BEA questions, #nychelp. Check out her blog post about it here.

Assuming you're a writer:

Things you would gain from coming to BEA:
-Bajillions of galleys, for free, in stacks on the floor. At least, I hope. Everyone's talking about how they're cutting back on galleys this year, but I'm not sure anyone's actually doing it. (We, for example, are, um, not. We had a great plan to cut back, and ended up taking more books than ever. But that's because our books are so awesome.)

-Bajillions of authors will be there. Big, small, children, adult, fiction, nonfiction. I thought about posting the list here, but it turned out to be 40 pages. So I'm afraid you're going to have to download the PDF from the BEA site yourself (come on, BEA-organizing people! Have we learned nothing about how little people like downloading PDFs?!). But *three* of my authors will be there. That means you have a three in a bajillion chance of catching me at a signing!

-Every American publisher and a lot of not-American publishers will be there. You'll have a chance to see us at our ugliest--tired, cranky, and sweaty, with pasted smiles on our plastic faces and our eyes rolling and glazed. But you, bright-eyed and enthusiastic, will get to survey us, put faces to imprints, and learn a lot about our respective lists. (Please see caveat below.*)

-Some booths give out free food. And/or champers. I'm insanely good at sniffing them out.

-Lots of parties, some invite-only, some open, some impromptu.

-Lots and lots of bookish friends in town. I bet if we start making a list of attendees here it will turn out old [blog] friends from this particular blog circle are all going to be in town.

-New York in late May. 'Ain't no better time or place. In my humble opinion. I have suggestions for cheap and alcoholic Sunday brunch, btw.

Things you would lose by coming to BEA:
-$$$. Let's look at the cost. A day pass is $75, a weekend pass $130 (Thanks, Sara, for the update). No one really shows up on Sunday, so you're really only getting two days out of that $130. My suggestion would be, if you're saving money, pick either Friday or Saturday, depending on when your favorite authors are. You'll probably be able to get all your business done in one day. (You will also, frankly, be exhausted.)

-travel to New York

-lodging fees if you don't have a benevolent friend/relative with a couch. Luckily, Yodiwan has offered some cheap alternatives. Also, my cousin came to visit last week and managed to find a hotel in Long Island City for only $50. But maybe like 15 of us blog-friends can pile into a room earthworm-style.

Things you're tempted to think would happen at BEA that probably wouldn't:
-You'd woo an editor into a book deal. It's not going to happen. If you come with that as a goal, you'll be disappointed. Instead, come to learn and collect free goodies. And to meet people.

-Also, it will be really tempting to try to leave your card/proposal/manuscript with people at the booths of your favorite publishers, but I guarantee this will not work out well. Remember that everyone in the booths will be sales, marketing, and publicity people, most of whom have nothing to do with acquisitions/editorial, and whose passed-on materials will not be processed by editorial in prioritized or efficient ways. Also, remember there are many, many reasons you don't want to send your manuscript directly to a publisher without an agent. Schmoozing, however, is ok.

Hope this helps. Thoughts/questions? Shoot me an email if you're thinking of coming or have a specific question/concern.

Wings'n on Up!

Wow, ok, I haven't had a Mischief announcement of this size I think, umm, ever before. But Aprilynne Pike, who's been a blog friend two years now (I remember the first time you linked to me, Aprilynne--it was July of 2007, and you had to nicely explain to your mom why why my blog wasn't quite as profane as the title seemed!), wrote a YA book called Wings, which has JUST DEBUTED AT #6 ON THE NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER LIST!!!!

Um, yeah. I knew you when!!!!

a little late, but

On Mother's Day, I was extremely distracted watching every episode of FIREFLY consecutively with Dadrat while eating Razzleberry Pie.

But now that it's the Thursday after Mother's Day, I'd like to take this moment to appreciate all the ridiculous women I'm so lucky to have in my life. Especially because I believe they are amusing on a more general level.

I know everyone knows Momrat from her recent opinion of the internet, but it might have been awhile since you remembered Momrat's condition, Momrat's fateful adventure with the police, Momrat's surveillance by the CIA, or that time with the pie.

Or if you've had enough of Momrat for now, I offer you the other lady in my life, my Great Aunt, pictured here with her Sicilian zucchini (warning: image may be traumatizing). Or if you'd like, you can read about the Aunda's opinions of modern sexual mores.

Here's a shout out to all the ladies out there, whether you are mothers, have mothers, have lost mothers, or never got to be mothers, like the Aunda. I love the way we're all here for one another.

email of the day

[from my assistant]

To: Moonrat
From: XXX

In case you needed another baby animal today.

happy gender role day!

I'm coming late to the game, but have you guys seen this picture book, I'M GLAD I'M A BOY, I'M GLAD I'M A GIRL!?

Wow, is all I have to say. I can't decide if I'm amused, sickened, glad we've come so far, or horrified how recently it was published. Help me process my emotions.

(Someone shared this link with me on Facebook, and I accidentally deleted it--I'm sorry! If you're reading this, let me know and I'll give you credit.)

small annoyances

One of my authors emailed Robert the Publisher and asked if they could take him out for lunch.

I was copied on the email. So I shouldn't feel betrayed or annoyed. Right? Right?!

Write Your @$$ Off Day

JES has posted about Saturday, May 16--or Write Your A** Off Day. Check out his post here for more information. The point is to commit just one day--7.5 hours, from 10 to 6 with a break for lunch--to your OWN writing. You don't have to finish a novel or commit a whole month (like NaNoWriMo), just one day, to whatever you want. Maybe to give you the kick-start on that project you've been meaning to get going.

I have a brand spanking new laptop that's just PERFECT for setting up camp at a local cafe. I've also been meaning to put in some time on a project that REALLY needs a solid kick-start. So I'm in, JES.

Anyone else?

Momrat takes on the internet

[We're driving in a car. I'm explaining how we can watch the original Abba video for "Take a Chance on Me" on this thing called Youtube, if we like.]

Momrat: Here's the the thing. I just don't understand how it works.

YT: How what works?

Momrat: You know. The internet. Why is there all that information? What is Youtube, and why is it THERE?

YT: It's just like real addresses, Ma. You know, when the mail truck is looking for you, they need to get to Smith Street, then they find #4. Well, think of Youtube as Smith Street, and the Abba video as, like, #87,400. And Google is like the phone book, where you find all the addresses.

Momrat: ...

YT: Does that make sense?

Momrat: No.

YT: Why not?

Momrat: What is it all doing in my HOUSE? Why is it in a little BOX? Did it come in on a WIRE, or something? [Waves hand wildly at windshield.] Why is all the information floating out there? Is there just an Abba video floating out there in the air? Why does that stuff even exist? Where was it before the internet?!

YT: ...

Momrat: WELL?!

YT: I... don't... I don't know.

Momrat: Yeah.

YT: I... I guess I just take it all for granted.

Momrat: Yeah, see? *You* don't know, either. No one knows. It's just all... floating.

did you know that the closest phrase in Klingon to the English expression "hello" actually translates to "what do you want?"?

Excellent article on the history of Klingon.

Via TheAuthorPhotographer

hits the nail on the head

Today's GraphJam. Hurts so good.

The Ramen King and I

I was confused about how I ended up on Penguin's podcast blast list a couple months ago, but kind of wrote it off, until this morning, when I saw this podcast:

Andy Raskin talks about The Ramen King and I: How the Inventor of Instant Noodles Fixed My Love Life, a memoir of his odyssey through various Japanese cuisine and his homage to the inventor of instant noodles (about whom I once had to read a very difficult essay in Japanese, in which language all essays are difficult, and so I hold him in great personal esteem).

I don't know anything else about the book, but it's got a great cover.

So thanks, Penguin. You win this round.

at the intersection of revisions and karaoke

THE BEST video I've seen all week!!! "Editing Letter," by Lara Zielin.

Thanks, Janet, for making my day.

what's safe to syndicate online?

This is probably my most frequently-asked reader question, and I've never answered it well.

Dear Moonrat,

I was thinking about releasing my first chapter on my blog for critiquing, but then a friend told me I should be careful because it could interfere with getting a publishing contract. Is this true? What are the possible issues with this? If it can interfere with getting a contract then it defeats the purpose in posting it so I would not do it.

Thanks,
XXX

I'm going to take a stab at this, but the caveat is that my word should not be taken as final here. If anyone else in the industry or with concrete experience on this matter wants to chime in, please be my very welcomed guest.

So here's the central issue with internet syndication: electronic rights. Basically, when you syndicate your content online, you're "using up" the electronic rights. Sort of, in a small way.

For your book deal, electronic rights will be wrapped up in your contract under either the volume rights or the "other forms, current and future" clause, and are becoming a sticking point for publishers everywhere, who imagine a future in which they are more relevant than they are now (yes, ebooks are great, but don't let publishing people fool you into thinking we have ANY idea what we're doing with ebooks or how the fudge we're going to make money on them in the long term).

But what this means is there is some scaring and misunderstanding everywhere about whether or not it's ok for an author to release their content online before (or after) a book deal. Some publishers are afraid that all-important electronic clause will be forfeit if the book was already released on a blog. Others are worried about first serial (print publication before the book is available), which is silly of them, because first serial is nearly dead, anyway. There's no consensus on this, and reaction will vary from house to house, but there are ways to make the internet work for you, to proceed wisely, and to not upset anyone, even the ninnies who are afraid of free content and how it ruins everything.

My thoughts on this are as follows.

Do you have a huge blog readership? Like, thousands of people? No? Then no worries. Put up what you want for critique--especially if you're planning on taking it down later. If you're not driving tons of traffic to your site, and especially if your site is mainly designed as a writing forum to exchange ideas, I don't see a problem with putting it up.

Do you care if you ever sell this work? Sometimes, people write for the internet and their internet-sepcific crowd. What you do with THIS book can't negatively impact a DIFFERENT book (at least, not in terms of electronic rights). I know some blog authors--lots of you, actually--who do special clever and fun online writing exercises that are never intended for future publication.

Remember online readership is a great fanbase. The internet is the easiest way to build platform while you sit at home. So offering people on the internet SOME window into your soul isn't a bad thing. I don't think it pays to be unnecessarily afraid.

A couple safety measures:
*Don't put the whole thing up at once. That way, it's less likely that a full, unfinished version of your ms is floating around anywhere in cyberspace. Also, that means that you'll almost certainly be able to say only "portions" have been released should the time come that that's relevant.

*Take down what you're done having read. This is to protect your reputation, too. You don't want unpolished versions of what you wrote floating around indefinitely on the internet.

*Use email if you can. If you critique with a very small e-circle--like 3 or 4 people--consider using email instead of your blog as a venue. That way, you'll never have to have this conversation again.

Re: worries about first serial: I had an author recently who had published a portion of her novel in an online journal (a mid-sized one). This ended up having literally zero effect on the book, except maybe extending readership (who knows?). But we sold first serial rights, and a beautiful piece came out of it.

Ultimately, whether or not to syndicate what you've written online is your choice. My personal feelings is that putting up free content creates fans for you. Obviously, it makes sense to exercise judgment--or, heck, you might end up LOSING fans--but I think a lot of the "ack don't put it up!" fear is going to dispel as publishers come to grips with the concept of free content (and how they can't fight it).

Does anyone out there have specific negative experience with publishing online? Any cautionary tales? Any industry professionals with wise words?

from books doth much useful knowledge issue

For Project Fill-in-the-Gaps, I'm (very, very slowly) reading a mammoth history of New York City--Gotham, by Edward Burroughs and Mike Wallace.

But this is why I love history books. Sometimes you stumble across things too much fun not to share.

In a possibly apocryphal story (related to a Philadelphia priest 150 years after the fact), members of the Lenape tribe described the story handed down to them about meeting Henry Hudson. According to the story, Hudson invited their ancestors onto his boat, where he offered them alcohol to drink. Thus was that particular spot named Mannahattanink, or "the island/place of general intoxication" (15).

All right, who's going to make the first smart comment?

Ten Writer Mistakes

Writtenwyrdd posted this great link to 10 universal (and avoidable!!) writer mistakes. SO TRUE. Take it from someone who's seen the work of MANY good authors--no one's immune! Everyone read it!

The ten are:

1) The crutch word (Have I told you about my author who used the word "gyrate" 16 times in a 300 page manuscript? Or my other author who used the word "emotional" 67 times in a 400 page manuscript? Has anyone seen my red pen? And my wet noodle?)

2) Flat writing (ugh, YUCK--usually, if you think about a boring sentence for a couple minutes, a more interesting way to say the same thing will pop into your head; the challenge is spotting your own boring sentences)

3) Empty adverbs (Actually, totally, absolutely, completely, continually, constantly, continuously, literally, really, unfortunately, ironically, incredibly, hopefully, finally--words that "promise emphasis but do the reverse"--clever way of putting it)

4) Phony dialogue

5) No-good suffixes (humm, I kind of like words like characterlessness; but maybe that's my general lack of good taste)

6) Am Is Are Was Were (who doesn't love a little unnecessary passive voice? not you? no? no takers?)

7) Lists

8) Telling instead of showing

9) Awkward phrasing

10) Commas (I love commas. But I love them in the right places.)

My one quibble--where is TERRIBLE DIALOGUE TAGS?!?!?!!? Because those are the WORST THINGS IN THE WORLD. Except spiders. Well, they're much worse than small spiders, or daddy longlegs.

the Rally Monkey on unexpected outcomes of colonialism

[RM is of Filipino descent]

Rally Monkey: Now look. The Spaniards violently conquered my people, oppressed, slaughtered, and tortured them for four hundred years. But when I see a Spaniard, do I go beat him up? No, no I don't. I just think to myself, why do you guys all wear such tight pants? I can't help but be ashamed that my ancestors were conquered by skinny people in tight pants.

who here lives in New York?

If you do, I assume you're going to be here at 7. Right? Because I can't think of EVEN ONE reason to miss it!

more swine flu humor

[via Ann Victor]

If there's such thing of karma, I'll totally die of swine flu this weekend. In the meantime, back to the bacon...

how swine flu started

[via one of my authors]

just finished reading

Middlesex, by Jeffrey Eugenides. My review here. Anyone else read it? Any thoughts?

i <3 nerds

My friend Kelly sent me this photoessay of MIT pranks throughout history.

Alas, it doesn't include my favorite stories (urban legends?), which are all related to crashing Harvard-Yale football games.

My favorite of all time was the summer the MIT kids came to the Harvard football field everyday dressed like jailers. Everyday, they scattered birdseed all over the field and blew whistles. (So you can imagine what happened at the beginning of the first home game when the refs ran out and blew THEIR whistles.)

Any good school prank stories?

weekend venn diagram

JES has helped me make my epiphany a visual reality.

Tuesday news

Happy Birthday, Harper Lee! You may have only published one book, but you made it count. To Kill a Mockingbird is one of the things I think most Americans have in common. Via Harper's fellow Alabaman Anna Claire.

Despite the fact that it's her own novel's release day, YA and fantasy author (and lovable blogger) Sherwood Smith devoted her post today to reviewing two other YA/fantasy debuts (one of them my friend Cindy's). Talk about paying it forward, Sherwood. That's so cool I went out and ordered several of your books. Any Sherwood fans in the house?

Do you read books in translation? Why, or why not? When you read a translation, would you rather it were perfectly faithful to the original in content and language reflection, or would you rather it were more English-ified so it's more readable, even at the cost of cultural elements? (I got in a well-mannered fight with someone about this just yesterday; I subscribe to one of those opinions, but I won't tell you which.) Do you like supporting international literature, but secretly find translations daunting? (For me: check, and check--and I'm not ashamed to admit it, because I want to fix the problem.) This is a longer conversation that requires a whole post, but in the meantime check out this blog post. The specific topic addressed is whether or not publishers should print a translator's name on the cover of a book in translation, but it touches on many of the central issues. As an editor, I want to support translation and international literature as much as I can; but from the marketing side of things, everything's so sticky.

Confused about when titles should be italicized and when they should be in quotation marks? The Blood-Red Pencil editors provide a cheat sheet.

Now back to *my* red pen.

joyous fantastic day!!!!!

I've just... I've just been waiting for this for so long, it's hard to even type!!! Finally!! Cindy Pon's ecstatically wonderful debut, a young adult historical fantasy, hits stores today!!

Silver Phoenix is more than just a great read--it's already revolutionizing the fantasy genre with its spunky and loveable Chinese heroine, Ai Ling.

This book is the real thing--check out the starred Booklist review (starred!!! you know how often they give out stars?!):

If the cover image of a fearless Chinese heroine reminds readers of such films as Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, that’s intentional; the story inside will, too. First-time novelist Pon has a screenwriter’s talent for producing a sweeping saga, and in this, the first of two books set in ancient China, 17-year-old Ai Ling faces demons, monsters, and gods as she tries to fulfill her destiny. Frightened after a local man tries to blackmail her into marriage, Ai Ling resolves to journey to the emperor’s palace where her missing father was last seen. Along the way, she meets the handsome Chen Yong, who is of mixed parentage and on a quest to find answers to questions about his family that have haunted him his whole life. (In the story’s prologue, readers get hints about his origins.) As in most martial-arts movies, the story sometimes takes a back seat to the action, but Pon doesn’t stint when it comes to her characters. Ai Ling is a clever and determined heroine, Chen’s younger brother is a witty teen whose girl-crazy ways transcend the centuries, and even the monsters have dimension. Pon’s writing, both fluid and exhilarating, shines whether she’s describing a dinner delicacy or what it feels like to stab an evil spirit in the gut. There’s a bit of sex here, including a near rape, but it’s all integral to a saga that spins and slashes as its heroine tries to find her way home.

or the blurb from Meg Cabot:

“I couldn't put it down. Your heart will be racing, and you'll be aching for more. An addictive gem.”
~Meg Cabot, author of The Princess Diaries and Airhead series

or the blurb from Alyson Noel:

“Beautifully written, lush, exotic, and romantic, with a gutsy heroine who defies convention to fulfill her destiny—Silver Phoenix has it all! Cindy Pon has penned a remarkable debut, and I can’t wait to see what she writes next!”
-Alyson Noel, New York Times bestselling author of Evermore

Ok. I need to go calm down; I'm overly excited. Congratulations, Cindy!!

venn diagram for weekend with family at Madison Square Garden

The intersection of "Deadheads" and "geeky dad" turns out to be "Israeli folk dancing."

were you wondering what an awesome book trailer looks like? (also, book giveaways)

So Cindy Pon has a really, really awesome--I'd go as far as to say exemplary--book trailer for her debut, SILVER PHOENIX. And apparently an 18-year-old made it. You can watch the book trailer here, at Ello's blog. Added incentive--note that Ello's having a book giveaway. One of the three contest entry options is to write a haiku, and I know how crazy everyone here is about haiku :)

Publicity Secrets

[during publicity meeting]

Publicist #1: Well, we have some awesome news. NEW BOOK is going to be in HUGE PUBLICATION.

Editor: Dang! How did you make that happen?!

Publicist #1: Psychotic pestering.

Publicist #2: No dignity.

Further Excellent Links (Truth about Royalties, New Guinean Lawsuits, Middlemay, and Where Not to Sit on a Hot Day)

Wanna know what royalties on a NYT bestseller really break down to? Good, honest post with a real live royalty statement posted here.

Also, Travis Erwin found this painfully excellent story about a guy who got trapped by his beach balls. I don't mean the plastic ones.

Remember that bestseller GUNS, GERMS, STEEL? Yeah, well, now the author, Jared Diamond, is being sued by the New Guinea tribe he wrote about so "lovingly." Well, actually, his publisher The New Yorker is. Heehee. I find this very funny. Although I bet The New Yorker doesn't. Via Gawker.

And finally for today, I'll bet I can guess three things about you:

1) You've never read George Eliot's Middlemarch
2) You always thought you should have read it and felt vaguely guilty that you know you'll never get around to it
3) You really, really want to join Middlemay!! Middlemay is an 8-week online book club in which at least 6 of us are going to read Middlemarch in enstallments over the months of May and June. Check out the breakdown here, and join us! Brought to you by the Fill-in-the-Gaps Project, which now has more than 30 participants!.

this will absolutely make your day, 100% satisfaction guaranteed

Who doesn't love a little Ray Charles?!

Just maybe don't watch it at work, lest you accidentally start dancing along.

email of the day

[from my assistant]

To: Moonrat
From: XXX

Subject: In case you need an editing break...

congrats, Briane and Lynne!

I love having awesome news on Tuesdays :) And I have a double whammy today.

Mischief maker Briane Pagel's short story "Don't Eat My Face" has been selected for inclusion in Graveside Tales' Harvest Hill anthology, due out Fall 2009.

Also, Lynne Griffin's debut novel, Life Without Summer, published by St. Martin's Press, is finally in bookstores!

Congratulations!!

Now who else hasn't been sending me awesome news lately? I know a bunch of you people are holding out! I love good news, so please loop me in.

do you believe in ghosts?

Periodically, I think of my childhood violin teacher, from whom I took lessons from the time I was seven through my sophomore year in high school, when she died at age 88 of breast cancer. Hers was the first funeral I ever went to.

I've had a number of dreams about her, especially in the last two years. The most vivid recurring one, which I always remember when I wake up, is me walking through her suburban neighborhood among piles of bright yellow fall leaves, knocking on swinging white New England plastic doors and asking if there is a Ms. Pleasant there. At last, I find a door behind which the alleged Ms. Pleasant appears, and it turns out to be my violin teacher, who opens the door and smiles and gives me a hug. (My violin teacher's name was not Ms. Pleasant, although it did begin with a P.)

These kinds of things happen every four or five months, I'd say. Sitting here editing this morning, I had a very powerful thought about her, which quite stopped me in my tracks. I couldn't remember the chain of thought that brought me to her, even right after the thought occurred, so I kind of listlessly Googled. There, in a note on her memorial scholarship fund, I saw that she died ten years ago today.

I do believe in the power of the subconscious to resurrect the relevant in eerie ways--for example, how is it that you always wake up exactly three minutes before your early alarm on the day you have a job interview?--but on some level I also wonder if she's out there, somewhere, in the miasma. If she is, I hope she knows how often I think about her, and how affectionately.

just finished reading

The Little Stranger, by Sarah Waters. My review here. Any other Sarah Waters fans out there?

some fun links for you

Inside Michael Jackson's crazy mind! Or at least his would-be auction house. Via Sarah Weinman.

NYT article on literacy in Roman times, back when you'd have to "rewind" a scroll for the next user.

Did anyone else, like me, not hear of thisiswhyyourefat.com until yesterday? It was advertised to me as "the most disgusting fattening food you'll ever see" but flicking through the pictures I'm just, well, appetized. Pictured here: the deep fried Cadbury Creme Egg, and the Hamburger Cake.


Also, GraphJam. Thanks to a very fruitful birthday party I went to last night, I have a whole new list of blog subscriptions. GraphJam is an uneven but often fabulous daily graph site. Scroll down for the Disney Kids venn diagram or the Horse flowchart.

All right, back to my reading list! Happy Sunday.

make your own thin mints

Oh my gosh. It's actually true. Recipe here.

Thanks, Jena.

Saturday Morning Indie Rock Moment

I haven't posted about Wormburner in ages! Now they have a new video. Aren't they adorable?

Happy Saturday!

things the rally monkey says

RM: Last night, I dreamed I had two girlfriends.

YT: Oh yeah? Was it a sexy dream?

RM: No, it was a terrible nightmare.

YT: Why? What happened?

RM: Well, in my dream, I came home from the grocery store with *two* heavy bags of groceries. And when I opened the door, you were both sitting there on the couch in your nightgowns blogging.

unholy bacon Friday

Apparently Friday has become Random Food Posting day, and Writtenwyrdd wins the prize today for these bacon-related links.

First, did you know that John Scalzi put bacon on his cat? Ya, he did. It's right here. Also, now he's the world authority on bacon, so if you have any bacon stories you should send them all to John Scalzi, right now.

Second, are you throwing a cocktail party and simultaneously really, really bored and ambitious? Because then you can make these awesome bacon cup appetizers!! And since I'm a pagan without any religion, I can eat them any day, even Friday. (Sorry to all observant Jews, Muslims, Catholics, and vegetarians, none of whom can eat bacon today.)

things the rally monkey says

[on my having gone drinking with the publicity department]

RM: We talked about this *last* time this happened. You can't roll with those people. They're the major leagues. You're seventh grade girls' intermural.

Why Don't We Throw Some Money at It! Like, 5 Bucks! (or, Book Marketing)

Last week, I got some very interesting responses to my post about the New York Times article on author advances. The point that seemed to stick out to people the most was this one:

I wish more agents pressed for marketing commitments than high advances.

You can follow the correspondence to see people have come down with valid arguments on either side of the issue. But I want to go ahead and point out some things we haven't talked about here yet.

I've done some soul-searching about practicing (as an author) what I preach (as an editor). Say, hypothetically, I were in the future to write a book and get a book deal. Honestly, if I were suddenly to be offered a huge book advance for my debut novel, would I turn it down? Umm. Turn down money? [Frantically checks credit card bills, etc, searches soul further, etc.] Probably not. I wouldn't turn it down. Ok. But let's revise the scenario a little. Say I get two offers, one of which is for a larger advance, the other of which is for a smaller advance but includes a marketing commitment. Now here I would think very, very seriously. After all, I don't want this to be the last book I write--I want it published well, to lay the groundwork for a brilliant future career.

So let's talk about this very sticky area of book marketing, and how you as an author can strategize with your agent to try to capitalize both on your publisher's abilities to come through and on your own (ostensibly limited) resources. There are ways! By "marketing," I mean specifically where money can be spent on your book to make it go as far as possible. I don't mean publicity, which is a different thing; publicity is free, but marketing often leads to publicity.

(Caveat: I'm assuming, going into this, that you are a dynamic and dedicated author, meaning you're willing to commit time and energy to marketing yourself. I don't mean you have to quit your job to do this or anything, but I do mean you have to throw yourself in. Please be one of those authors; they're my favorite.)

First, nothing, no amount of money or luck, guarantees publicity. Remember that Jesus, despite his professed connections to The Big Guy, didn't really get publicized until he was hundred of years dead. However, money and luck both make it much more likely that publicity will happen.

To cover their bases, publishers allocate a marketing budget for each title. In order not to go bankrupt, this budget is usually 5% of billing, meaning the company plans to spend 5% of the dollar value of what they anticipate shipping of that particular book. (The net worth is more than 5%, often much more, depending on the percentage of returns on a book, but that's a whole other story.)

Now it's generally agreed that the one thing that is far, far more important than anything else in the world in selling a book is that said book be present and available in bookstores. Bookstores cleverly figured this out awhile back, and now charge for the privilege of increased bookstore presence. This is called co-op. See the stacks of books on the "new fiction" table? Or the pretty Mother's Day endcap display on your local bookstore's aisle? All that placement is paid for by the publisher, and we compete for the honor of paying for those slots. There are so many books that want to be co-oped that vendors get to pick and choose.

Co-op costs an arm and a leg--on average, a dollar a copy. If you do some quick math, you'll see that co-op basically eats up the entire marketing budget for any given book. Yeah, unfortunate.

What publishers tend to do is "borrow" marketing budget from the books that aren't anticipated to "need" it, meaning books that won't score co-op. What YOU want is for your book to be one of the borrowers, not the borrowed from.

What this also means is the belt has already been tightened for marketing, and we haven't even started yet (although phew! at least we're available in bookstores). What is traditionally thought of as marketing--that is, ads, etc--are just way, way too expensive for book publishers. There are some exceptions, but generally, in the real world, ads are not even worth talking about. So let's think creatively.

I hope people don't get angry when I say an author advance helps the willing author commit to publicity on their own. Of course, you worked hard on your book and deserve to get paid for it. But a little investment back into the book on your part might make it have longer legs and make you more money in the long run. Nora Roberts, who one might say has a knack for making money in publishing, recommends authors recommit 1/10 their advance to their own marketing efforts. I like her number, although I'll say it varies on your specific scenario and the amount of your advance. But that's a good starting place.

What this means is that there are ways you, the author, can allocate money of your own to help the book as much as possible. But there are also ways that a little money spent by your publisher can go a long way. So do have your agent get on the phone with the publisher and ask for a marketing and publicity call with the entire team. Be forthright about what you're willing to put in, and also, be ballsy about asking for some reciprocal commitments. Squeaky wheel, etc. Knock, and the door shall, etc. You'd be surprised.

A couple specific ideas for opening up the conversation.

The Internets!! Does it sell books? It's hard to say. It certainly makes or breaks your presence as an author, although as of yet only about 5% of book sales happen online. In the meantime, it's still crucial to be accessible on the internet so people (and reviewers) can find information about you, follow your news, look up events if you have them, etc. (Preaching to the choir here--is there anyone reading this, ahem, blog who thinks the internet doesn't matter?!)

A little dinero down to make sure your web presence is accessible, pleasant, and fresh is worthwhile. This does not have to be much dinero at all, but probably even the cheapest routes are going to involve a couple hundred bucks changing hands (unless you're an HTML wizkid yourself). Alas, this one's on you. Your publisher is probably not going to offer to pay for your website, and if they do, they're going to want to put it under their own domain name so they can control content, which frankly isn't as much fun for you or your fans.

But for marketing online, your publisher also has a number of options for complementing your presense, ranging from very cheap to rather costly. For amounts of around a grand a piece, there are book club servers like bookreporter.com, which helps target book clubs around the country by providing newsletters, reviews, and reader guides to make books more accessible. There are also industry-targeted newsletters that essentially act as internet coop, and author write-ups that are distributed to indie booksellers around the country. These are internet options that might contribute to mainstream store placement.

The book tour! So about that old adage that the author tour is basically useless--it's totally, perfectly true. It's also totally, perfectly untrue. You just have to do it right.

First, as an author, you hopefully have a community (you've joined facebook already, right? that will really help you figure out where, geographically, your friends are). You should "tour" the places that would automatically love to have you no matter what--your local bookstore, library, and/or school, or the place where you grew up and where your parents/aunts/neighbors have 15 zillion friends who want to come pinch your cheek cuz you've done such a good job and gone and gotten your book published, wooja wooja. Don't underestimate the power of proud relatives/neighbors. They should be mobilized. Should your publisher pay to fly you there? No. That's a waste of money that would be better spent elsewhere. But they sure as heck can help you coordinate your next family visit, or your next vacation to wherever, to see if they can't hook you up with an event that's relevant or will sell books. You can't always score an event, but if your publisher realizes you're not asking them to shell out to take you somewhere, you'll be surprised at how many strings they can suddenly pull.

To be noted about events: you must (must must must must must must) be prepared for the possibility that not a single person will show up. That's why it's best to plan events in places where you have at least a modest fan base, or some kind of occasion at which to speak on whatever your topic is. If you accept that going in, any actual book sales will be gravy. Also, reinforcing community participation makes you beloved, and don't underestimate how powerful grassrootsism and communityism can be. So converse with your publist about this.

Also, it's nice to remember that book tours need not involve your entire corporeal self. You may also astroproject your spirit! Or just your voice, for example. Your publisher can choose to cough up for a radio satellite tour--which doesn't involve travel and silly hotel and air expenses, but there is a small chunk of change--usually about three thousand dollars--associated with booking these events. Radio is rather a big expenditure, especially since it may lead to zero book sales, but this is often a commitment worth fighting for. The reason? Tape. Tape of a teensy radio show--you in an awesome interview--might inspire bigger radio shows to pick you up, and heck, maybe that will lead to TV or other media commitments. And not that it necessarily makes sense, but... TV sells books. Yes it does.

I suppose I've written enough for today. But I wanted to get the conversation started. May we all journey together toward better and more cooperative publishing.

email of the day

[From my assistant]

To: Moonrat
From: XXX

Attached: A reader's report on that novel, and a special image from me to you.

When the Flock Changed

In most excellent news, Maud Newton's short story/novel excerpt was chosen as Narrative Magazine's Story of the Week, which means we can all read it for free here!!

Alas, she devilishly keeps us waiting for the rest. WHERE IS IT, MAUD?!?! Pleeease write it so we can read it. Thanks.

Amazonfail

makes me sad; doesn't really matter if it was an accident or not. There's a problem when too much of our media availability is controlled by one source.

(I know, I should talk, right? You kettles are all black, all of you!! But maybe this will be what breaks me.)

New York Times' take on author advances

I know you guys know it all already, but this article is still a little fun.

Duly noted:

-7 out of 10 books don't earn out their advances

-S&S is "watching every penny" in the recession, which they announce the same week they pay $4.8 mil for Audry Niffeneggar's second novel

-publishers are so dumb they can't seem to throw off the very advance system that's bankrupting them, because they still compete with one another for "the best books"

I do think it's a little interesting that one of the authors interviewed thinks that his six-figure advance "allowed [him] to work for less than minimum wage for three years." I wonder when the last time he looked at minimum wage was? That attitude frustrates me a little; there are a lot of people (frankly, a lot of us right here at this blog) who manage to work a job to support us and who find time to write even though no one is paying us a penny. What makes an advanced author worth so much more?

And of course, on certain levels I have to take the publishing company's side--a six-figure advance is actually a fairly huge risk. Our profit margins are SO SLIM that most six-figures will fall into those 7 out of 10 books that never earn out. (If you want proof, go look at the hardcover price of the first edition of Gabriel Garcia Marquez's LOVE IN THE TIME OF CHOLERA, which came out exactly 20 years ago, and then calculate for inflation--you'll see book prices are not keeping up, not even close.)

The system frustrates me. I wish more agents pressed for marketing commitments than high advances. I wish (usually already published) authors didn't feel entitled to large lump sums unless they knew they would earn out. I wish publishers would stop being jackasses about competing with one another and instead put their money and attention into publishing well.

Ok, enough ranting out of me for today.

happy salad Friday

Look what my Secret Source found on Vegan Lunchbox.








Personally I like the sheep :) Apparently, you can buy these full-sized posters.

just finished reading

Anyone else read Jane Austen's Northanger Abbey? My review here.

feel persecuted much?

This video ad against gay marriage is so ridiculous it's almost funny. Almost.

Thanks, secret source (you know who you are).

editor's sad lament

Dear Publishing Gods,

Hi, yeah, it's me again. We really gotta talk.

So you know which book this is about (since you're the Publishing Gods, I'm assuming you're omniscient, probably omniscient third). But let's refer to it as Very Nice Book. My question to you is, why are you not making "it" happen for Very Nice Book?

Right. You're going to shout at me for looking a gift horse in the mouth, right? You're going to say, "Now, Moonrat, we gave you Very Nice Reviews for Very Nice Book. We also gave you Very Nice Media Highlights, and Very Nice Coop Placement in Major Chain Stores. We gave you Very Nice First Printing, and Very Nice Rights Sales. What more could you possibly want?"

This is the thing, Publishing Gods. How could I have all those Very Nice Things, but no Very Nice Book Sales? What went wrong? We have, by all accounts, a lovely appealing cover, a stellar title, an afforable price, and an enchanting topic. We got great blurbs, tons of buzz, and, as You mention, tons of store presense. So why is no one buying it?

I'm very sad, Publishing Gods. I feel like I followed all the rules, and I thought I was at the conjunction of "hard work" and "everything going my way." But I can't MAKE people buy books (that is, except for my mother; I've made her buy three).

Maybe You could give me some kind of hint. If there's a hoop, You know I'd be happy to jump through it. Even if it's on fire and there's a rabid bear on the other side.

Your baffled and mystified servant,

Moonrat

happy wednesday video

Take a minute or two for this one. It's worth it.

This is SO the kind of thing I would end up getting involved in.

things the rally monkey says

RM: I hate this grocery store. It's ALWAYS packed! I HATE it here. I want to move to a different neighborhood where you can go shopping after 5 pm or on weekends.

YT: I have an idea. How about I quit my job and become a housewife? Then I'll have time during the day to go shopping when it's not crowded.

RM: Let me tell you how that would work out. You wouldn't make it to the store. You would blog, watch Netflix, and not wear any pants. That's what would happen.

Asian fantasy

Sci Fi/Fantasy readers--my buddy Ello is hosting a discussion over at The Enchanted Inkpot about fantasy themes in Asian literature: which ones are common in American fantasy novels, and which ones should be more common, because they're so awesome.

I threw in my readerly experience--Laurence Yep's YA fantasy books, and Jeanne Larsen's (now unfortunately out of print) fantasies set in different Chinese dynasties. Any others?

desperate times. i need me a hookup.

I only got my sticky fingers on one box of Thin Mints this year, and the effin' rally monkey ATE THEM ALL. I am LIVID.

Does anyone know any Girl Scouts who want to do a little business?

just finished reading

The Book Borrower, by Alice Mattison. My review here. Anyone else read? Any thoughts?

oh hey, we found us that resident masochist.

Emily Cross has been the masochist--I mean, volunteer--to put together a blog community where Fill-in-the-Gaps people can all come and commiserate--I mean, read and log their reading--together!

Here's the baby new group blog:

Project Fill-in-the-Gaps

We can share lists, see what other readers have our books in common, and celebrate our successes. Also, cross things off! That's my favorite thing to do with a list by far.

Obviously, Emily, count me in.

too much editing.

poopy.