P&Ls and how books make (or don't) money

[alg]

Profit & Loss/Profitability & Liability: How Books Make (or Don't Make!) Money

A basic outline of what happens when an editor buys a book and wants to publish it. This is very much a basic look at publishing and publishing finance, with some explanation of terms commonly used by the marketing and sales departments.

Comments

[kristine-smith.livejournal.com]

I memoried this. Thanks!

[forodwaith.livejournal.com]

Fascinating. I wish I'd learned more about publishing as a business in library school (though I suppose it made more sense for them to fill our heads with useful stuff like, y'know, research techniques).

A couple of years later, though, she starts writing Blaze novels under a pseud., hits a bunch of in-store bestseller lists, and revitalizes her career.

Phew! You had me worried about Aeryn for a while there.

[tharain.livejournal.com]

Crichton is an Idiot

I got no further, and snarfed Diet Coke up my nose.

[alg.livejournal.com]

Awww, no. I love Aeryn! She just needed to find the right niche to write in.

My sister is in library school right now. Her main complaint is that they aren't learning anything about the "real" world -- they're learning how to build websites and do basic things in Excel. Poor kid.

[alg.livejournal.com]

*wins*

[aberrantvirtue.livejournal.com]

Does the mass-market failure ever turn into a hit years later? IE- If Aeryn Sun started writing Blaze novels under the name Kara Thrace, is there any chance of Crichton is an Idiot being re-released with a thingy saying "Written by Aeryn Sun, aka Kara Thrace" (I know they don't really say that), or does this original P&L pretty much doom it to never coming back?

[forodwaith.livejournal.com]

Hee! Hope she gets to more interesting stuff soon. I loved cataloguing & collection development, but then I am a nerd.

[chickwriter.livejournal.com]

no one pays until they have to

As someone who's been in the biz as a bookseller (worked at an indy for a couple of years); as a book buyer and now as an author, I thought I knew a LOT about the business and knew what I was getting into. Finding out the above now that I am published was the thing that I didn't know. It was a shocker.

It's a weird, scary, fascinating business - for all sides of the equation.

Thanks for the scoop!

[casacorona.livejournal.com]

No. Crighton is an Idiot will go out of print within the year, and never be heard from again, except possibly as a POD book put out by a small press after the author becomes a big hit.

[alg.livejournal.com]

This is a complicated question.

The answer is basically NO. Not in the scenario you describe.

However, if the Kara Thrace name were to really take off, and KT started writing these great books that hit the NYT and USAT lists, and Aeryn went over to Pocket and started doing hardcovers under the name Kara Thrace, there is a 100% chance that either:

(1) her first company would rerelease Crichton is an Idiot and make some money off her ass

or

(2) her first company would realize that they'd reverted the rights to her years ago, and Aeryn would sell the rights to Pocket and they'd release it in whatever format they wanted, and put, BY NYT AND USAT BESTSELLING AUTHOR KARA THRACE writing as Aeryn Sun or whatever.

[alg.livejournal.com]

You're welcome!

[alg.livejournal.com]

Yeah, especially since "big hit" in category romance is pretty much a meaningless phrase.

[tharain.livejournal.com]

You so win.

However, I, for one, never want to write again. Or rather, never want to try to get published in the first place. Oh. My. God.

[alg.livejournal.com]

Hey, listen, my mantra is this:

Writing is an art. Publishing is a business.

It doesn't really work, because publishing is its own kind of art, but whatever. The point remains.

[pir8fancier.livejournal.com]

Fascinating. I write for a small mystery publisher, and I don't think they have the same woes, but I have heard the same woeful tales from other editors. Another key thing which no one realizes is distribution. The evil "d" word. Interesting that amazon actually orders its own books.

[alg.livejournal.com]

Small press works very differently!

[deza.livejournal.com]

I wish I'd learned more about publishing as a business in library school

Seconded. I'd say about a quarter of my patrons are frustrated novelists. Since I'm the one foolish creative enough to head the writers' group, they all get sent to me with their questions. This series of entries will hopefully help keep them calm, and it will certainly sound a lot better than saying "Face it, you just don't write worth a damn."

[tharain.livejournal.com]

No, no, no. I totally get that it's a business, and these posts are invaluable (as well as funny as all get out).

I'm just feelin' like my friends must have felt when they went to NYC in their twenties in order to become stars on Broadway (and their stories are the ones that kept me firmly in the facilities management job market).

I'm also feeling very "Wow. Real people who are real writers don't get published. Just go sit in a corner."

I guess I just identify myself as an Aeryn at the moment (pre-Kara Thrace, of course). A clever dilettante who amuses his friends, but had better stick to Lulu or other such PODs. It's all very intimidating.

[alg.livejournal.com]

tnh says:

It could be worse. You could want to be a rock star.

[tharain.livejournal.com]

This conversation sucks for my nasal passages.

That and I'm disturbing the people in the next office. Poor them.

[pir8fancier.livejournal.com]

They are determined to keep it small so that they don't lose control. I remember talking with an editor at Simon and Schuster about the process to okay a book. How 10 people have to love it. It's book by committee. If the 10th person doesn't love it, it doesn't get published. With my publisher, if the editor likes it (who also happens to be the owner), it gets published. They run it for love, not money. Lucky them.

Has the romance mid-list gone through the same hell as the mystery mid-list? I have a friend who was cut from Bantam because she sold through only 40,000 paperbacks. ONLY 40,000! Wow. I would be doing handsprings if my books did that well, but it wasn't good enough for her. They cut her.

[alg.livejournal.com]

Ahahahaha. I have no pity.

I do want to be a rock star. But I cannot play an instrument worth a damn, nor can I sing, and the grunge movement is over. So if you feel frustrated, just think of me -- I will never fulfill my dream career EVER.

[alg.livejournal.com]

ALL midlist has gone through the same cuts. ALL of it. Mystery, SF, fantasy, westerns, romance, etc. The difference is in the numbers.

(Frankly, the above doesn't sound very plausible. A 40,000 sell through is good -- unless you printed 200,000 copies of the book, which I doubt it did.

A 40,000 print run is what is not good.)

[tharain.livejournal.com]

Oh, noooooooooooooo. You, too can be a star! It's all about the Podcasts, woman. Get the mp3 files, a microphone, some software, and you too can be an online rockstar. I even have a DVD (live) and a studio recorded piece.

Tiffany made her one hit wonderdom workin' the mall circuit...

Wo. A very cute guy just walked by. Brain fuse.

...so you can do it online.

Or, as an alternative, American Idol, that insulting, agist darling of a television show.

[elvesforeyes.livejournal.com]

In Crichton is an Idiot, does the main character fall in love with a male/female dinosaur and make sweet, lizardy babies? I'd buy it. I'd read it. I'd sleep next to it.