I wanted to call my novel ‘East of the Sun’. It was a good name! it was meaningful on so many levels. but they didn’t like it.

i groaned and moaned and came up with lots of others and then settled on ‘Scatterheart’, which is so. much. better. and now i hate ‘east of the sun’.

I loved your comments on what writers have no control over, it makes the hair on my neck quiver. After putting so much thought, so much time and effort. All the hours researching agents, publishing houses. All the months agonizing over characters, names, birthdates, conflicts, love interests, etc. The tast of picking out a title (falling in love with it) and calling your MS that title for years (six) only for it to be gutted by a stranger, sad really.

Just my thoughts.

Nicole

If you got another common royalty breakdown (i.e., 12.5% after 5k, 15% after 10k), then you STILL would not have earned out a 25k advance, and would only have “earned” about $16500 and change. I don’t think you’re anywhere near breakeven unless your book was much more expensive than the average hardcover, your publisher got a lot of pre-publication money back on foreign or subsidiary rights, or your royalty rate was about twice the average.

I’m sorry you had a bad experience. I wish I knew more about how the memoir industry works.

There’s the rub. The first title I submitted for the second book in my series was roundly rejected for being too obscure (it’s a popular Latin phrase that would make perfect sense not long into the book, and besides, it’s got the series title in it!) But who understood “Prisoner of Azkaban” before reading? Blah.

I got no say over my flap copy, but then again, many parts of it were lifted straight out of my original query letter and synopsis, so I had no complaints. I got minor input on my cover, but then they changed it anyway, and then all I haggled about was the size of my name (which they made larger upon request).

I think I’ve been gosmackingly lucky. I hope it holds!

Shut up and go write your book. I don’t want to see you on here again until your book is done.

Much love,

A fan who should take her own advice

I don’t want you to be blonde. Not even in jest. If you really want to be Glad, go for ringlets. Hee.

on the willingness of greg egan to change publishers back upthread: i don’t think it was his *choice*. i don’t think he was up for it, and it happened. i think his publisher opted not to persevere.

The only area so far where I’ve wanted and had NO voice has been release date.

It’s only my first novel though so I’m sure there will be other areas wherein I’ve absolutely no voice. . .

From my own limited experience it seems that publishers are certainly willing to listen to ideas and suggestions about many of these other things in your list. But they’re not going to drag the author into the process; you need to be assertive.

And even when they have no intention of following my suggestions, my editor has been happy to explain to me why not, and to point out that arcane piece of the publishing biz that I’m not taking into account.

~Whether a particular bookstore will stock the book. (Also: *publishers* have no control over that–despite what their authors often think!)

~Overseas sales and distribution: whether and where

~Whether there will be foreign-language editions and translations

~What part of the bookstore the book is in (e.g., “Fiction” vs. “Literature” vs. “Fantasy” section… publisher can sometimes but not always influence that; usually it is entirely up to the bookstore or distributor)

Things an author can influence but isn’t always able to insist on/veto:

~Whether there will be footnotes, pictures, captions

~Anything to do with marketing at all

definitely not all. publicity, book price, typeface, audio, film, and translation and most certainly not staying in print are some that of the ones that there’s very little that can be done about.

and laura anne g’s gnomes make me feel somewhat better about the complete lack of control over print runs. let alone understanding of, prediction of, or translation of the meaningfulness of such print runs!

I hate a lot of covers. I think I’d be a terribly cranky author, especially knowing I have no control over the process.

But, umm, Justine: are you honestly blond now???? I just can’t picture it. ;^)

I see preliminary sketches for my covers from most of my publishers, but have no illusions that anyone in the art department listens to a damn thing the editor says, much less the author. They’re too busy dealing with the mischegas of their own talent (ie the artist).

And Copy is a tricky thing — it’s been my experience sitting on both sides of the desk that authors often write the worst copy for their own material. In fact, Publisher A doesn’t like me to write my own copy — despite the fact that they pay me to write copy for other people in their list!

As to things we have no control over: catalog copy and presentation; catalog space; blurb usage (you can get ‘em but no guarantee they’ll be used); number of and distribution of ARCs; promotional widgets.

More to come, I’m sure…

The title thing has happened to me twice, so yeah. Apparently my titles only make sense AFTER you’ve read the book, and for some silly reason publishers seem to think they need to make sense beforehand. Go figure.

In the UK I have had input on cover art several times. One time I had input and they did what I wanted, and everybody hated it. After that I stopped commenting! Give people like me enough rope and we’ll hang ourselfs.

No control is not always a bad thing.