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

[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.

There's always the Davinci Code

[(Anonymous)]

S&S had a couple of Dan Browns on their backlist, that sold nada on release, but is now generating significant revenue. The central point is that most books are crapshoots.

[jonquil.livejournal.com]

It's not actually a 100% chance, sadly; ask Jennifer Crusie's fans, who would dearly love copies of The Cinderella Deal. Unfortunately, Bantam is sitting on the rights; Crusie's comment is "The Cinderella Deal and Trust Me On This belong to Bantam, and they're waiting until I get famous to reissue them." And, yes, Crusie does make the NYT, Publishers Weekly, and USA Today bestseller lists.

[alg.livejournal.com]

Okay, sorry -- it's a 99% chance!

[jonquil.livejournal.com]

I shouldn't have nitpicked you; I'm sure you are completely correct. It's just frustrating to see certain paperbacks (Susan Kay's *Phantom* is another) priced at four times the cover price and higher, and yet remain unavailable in editions that would actually pay royalties to the writer.

[alg.livejournal.com]

I completely understand. I feel the same way about Suzanne Brockmann! (Although now her out of print stuff is being put back into print, finally.)

Part of the problem here is that publishers only have so many slots -- and unless an author is Nora Roberts, we just can't, most of the time, justify using a mass market paperback slot for a reprint. I am not saying this is the only reason -- but it's definitely one of them.

[jonquil.livejournal.com]

Let us not speak of how much I paid for The Admiral's Bride.