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

Re: Something that would be helpful

[alg.livejournal.com]

Okay, these are really good questions that, unfortunately, do not have static answers.

I'm looking for a formula, I guess, to assign importance to different factors, as opposed to other factors, with an eye toward plugging all of the useful information you provided into a workable "plan".

That sentence worries me. You cannot create a workable plan -- not really. The human factor is far too large and important a part. You need good luck, good timing, and a good book -- two out of three ain't bad, but all three make a book a success.

(And for "good book" read: commercial. No matter how beautiful your prose is, you can't be a bestseller if people don't want to read about your chosen subject(s).)

Re: Something that would be helpful

[deep-bluze.livejournal.com]

Okay....but what about the blurb question? In your scenario about the author of Crichton is an Idiot, you continually mention that said book has no blurbs as if this is meaningful...but how meaningful is it in the process? We are in a theoretical deal in your post where the book has already been bought by your theoretical editor, so in figuring the P&L what kind of weight to the blurbs carry?

D