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Forget Macmillan
Nov. 23rd, 2019 08:53 am| Time to talk business. If you aren't aware, and most people aren't, Macmillan is blocking local libraries from purchasing the necessary numbers of new books to satisfy demand. Why? They're basically greedy fuckers. Here's the deal. New books get published and those first few weeks are the ones where business is booming. Everyone makes the most money off of those sales, then it dwindles as everyone moves on. Kah-ching! Libraries purchase multiple copies of these books for patrons. Yes, the patrons read for free, but the cost to the library is sometimes four or five times the amount that you'd pay as a regular consumer. My own local library purchases each Macmillan ebook at just under four times the cost of the general public. This means that they are basically paying for four people to read a single book. Now we don't have a huge facility like they would in New York city, but our city's library serves 59,862 citizens. On top of this, I have access to the county's library system, which serves... a number that I'm not counting up right now. The point is that my library alone is being allowed one copy of a title of a book on high demand. Can you imagine the waitlist for a bestselling author in a town of nearly 60,000 inhabitants? No, not everyone uses the library, but in my hometown, the library is actually a central part of the lives of most people. It has a huge community presence for a small town. How do I know this? I go there. I participate in events and meetings there. I see the place packed to the brim with patrons. And I am frequently number ten or more on the waitlist for an ebook or audio book that we have 3 or more copies of and is ten or more years old. Yeah. We read here. A lot. So let's put this embargo into perspective by looking at a book that I recently read and enjoyed: Call Me By Your Name by André Aciman is a romance story about a boy who falls in love with a guest who is staying in his his parents' mansion on the Italian Riviera. It was published in 2007. That's twelve years ago. Twelve. It was made into a movie. It is also a gay romance, something that not everyone is willing to dive into. The only version of it currently available at our library is the DVD. The eAudiobook has three holds on two copies. The eBook has one hold on seven copies. The single print copy is checked out as well. This means that now, right fucking now, there are currently ten people reading the book and four who are waiting to read it. And it's twelve years old. Twelve. Imagine if it were an eagerly awaited new release. Aciman is one of their top selling authors. The waitlist would be insane if we had just one copy of the new release. People would be number thirty seven on the list and waiting for months, not weeks, to get their hands on a copy! Right now, the kindle version is selling for $9.99, so let's round that up to $10 just for the sake of being able to conveniently say that my library would have paid $40 for a single copy. We have seven copies. In a theoretical scenario of this purchase happening right now, the cost to the library would be $280. That's twenty bucks shy of $300 spent for copies of ebooks that would never have been paid for anyway. Why? People who use libraries are doing that because it is free to them. For whatever their personal reason, they are making the choice not to purchase a book. So instead of the publisher making $280 that it wouldn't have made off of these readers anyway, they make $40. Sure, I can see the dent that libraries put in the cash flow to publishers and authors. I write. Of course I want people to buy my stuff. That's my paycheck. But I also want people who don't purchase something I've written to have the opportunity to read it. Reading is fundamental. I know we've all heard that before. Reading is a huge part of our lives and a necessary and welcome escape that every human being with a written language should have a right to experience. You know what else? People who read TALK about what they read. Don't tell me you have never heard any of the following sentences in your lifetime: "This book is amazing!" "What are you reading? Is it good?" "I absolutely love this book." "Can anyone recommend a book to me that..." And don't you dare tell me that you haven't heard of book clubs either. Because I will ban you from my writing forever for that ignorance. Maybe. The point is, people who talk about a book share it with others in such a way that occasionally makes them want to read it. And you might be surprised to hear this, but people who want to read a book sometimes purchase them so that they can enjoy them! What a concept, right? So yes, I want that paycheck, but if you tell me that my books aren't getting to the library, I think I'll go Begbie on you. There's a petition here that readers can sign to tell Macmillan that you aren't having any of their shit. I'm keeping a close eye on it since this whole thing got started. They're up to 211,308 signatures. Throw your name on there. If you don't, we can't be friends. And if you don't believe that the issue is a thing, maybe you'll believe NPR. A three minute listen. |
Yes, scum of the earth that I am, I have neglected this page for days.
In The Shadows is now a completed work sitting in the hands of the publisher for acceptance or rejection.
I am seriously considering dropping livejournal as one of my blogging locations, which would mean losing these extra icons that were gifted to me by a friend of a friend.
Sometimes I spend a whole day wondering what my purpose is. I go through the routines and when I finally get the chance to sit down I think to my self, "Why the hell did I do all that? What's the point?" I have yet to figure out why this mood comes on, but it just happens. I wouldn't say it was depression, but it certainly isn't overflowing joy either.
The deadline is drawing near. I'm usually the person who has everything in a week ahead of time, but with this latest project I am far behind because I only found out about it at the end of a month. 
I'd love to say that I have been away because I was hard at work getting things written, but I've been away to give my mind a little bit of a rest from the pressure of the impending date for this specific publication. Of all of my test readers, one completed the read and returned useful feedback. I've been waiting to hear from the rest, but I think I will just have to go on without them.
You know, I think I did a Saturday question yesterday instead of a Friday one. Not that it makes much difference, because other things happened.
I began my love for mysteries as a young child of the 80's, watching Murder, She Wrote every Sunday night before bed. I watched it for the acting, for the writing, for the guest stars that would later become actors I knew or loved, or knew and loved. Yes, even at a young age I was taught about acting and all the other work that went on to make these shows possible. 
Last night was a night of not being able to breathe. You really don't get any sleep when that happens. In six hours I managed to sleep just long enough to dream that I was living in a house where I was supposed to take care of someone's kids, but I couldn't do it. I don't mean that I was having a hard time, I mean the kids weren't anywhere. Then I realized I was supposed to get them from someplace, only I couldn't get out of the house.
Whoever invented plastic eggs should be shot. Better yet, let's force the inventor to stuff them full of crap and then hide them so they can experience the eggs opening every time you put them down and spend 30 minutes bent over like a field worker handpicking strawberries, making the task that should take 10 minutes last for at least 25. You want an egg to crack open and reveal a surprise? Great. Make it do that with a little more effort than simply looking at the goddamned thing.
There is something very sad about seeing a building with such grand history, something that is so iconic, find it's last moments in tragic accident or purposeful betrayal. Notre Dame Cathedral had survived so much. I have no care one way or the other about the religion or the country and I don't know the people, but I feel the loss of something with that importance and I understand the grief that others can feel as well. 
With the novel on hold so that I can meet the deadlines for the three short stories that have jumped into my life, I've basically abandoned Camp. It might be for good, it might be just for the next week or so.
