E.L. James's
Fifty Shades of Grey started out as
Master of the Universe, an adults-only
Twilight fanfiction posted under the pseudonym
Snowqueens Icedragon. The erotica re-imagining of Bella Swan as a 21-year-old college student and Edward Cullen as a 27-year-old billionaire -- with BDSM tastes -- was published by Australia's Writer's Coffee Shop Publishing in May 2011; names and details linking it to Stephenie Meyer's bestselling trilogy were changed (
...for the most part). In recent months,
the book has gone viral, selling more than 250,000 copies (over 90% in ebook format) and landing the #1 spot on the New York Times Bestseller List. Last week, E.L. James sold republishing rights for the
Fifty Shades trilogy to Vintage Books in a seven-figure deal.
[more inside]
posted by changeling
on Mar 15, 2012 -
97 comments
If Nicholas Carr is right, and consuming words on a screen is a "more primitive way of reading," then the iPad is a little bit Neanderthal and a little bit Prometheus. Its potential for creative ways to interact with literature makes it more than just an e-reader. And while it took more than a year and a half since the iPad's launch, some publishers are beginning to experiment with that potential. Last year saw several forays into innovative literature apps, most notably T.S. Elliot's
The Waste Land;
Atlas Shrugged and
On The Road also received the "enhanced" app treatment.
Laura Miller (Salon.com co-founder, NY Times Book Review columnist, author) and
Maud Newton (writer and critic for The NY Times Book Review, Granta, The Awl) have both written extensively about digital reading and publishing and they've launched
The Chimerist, tagline:
Two iPad lovers at the intersection of art, stories, and technology. Newton
writes:
[more inside]
posted by not_the_water
on Feb 7, 2012 -
20 comments
‘We feel that the stories in this book are such that if your nerves are not of the strongest, then it is wise to read them in daylight.' For a certain time, in every second-hand bookshop in the UK you would always be able to find a musty and dog-eared copy of one or more of the
Pan Books Of Horror Stories edited by the splendidly named Herbert Van Thal. Now the first is
being re-printed.
[more inside]
posted by fearfulsymmetry
on Sep 8, 2010 -
21 comments
"This post touched me in places I've never been touched" Over at Salon, Laura Miller talks about those little belches of beatification --
Book Blurbs. The Guardian is running a
contest where you (Yes, YOU!) can try to out praise all comers by blurbing The DaVinci Code.
[more inside]
posted by Trochanter
on Jul 9, 2010 -
48 comments
In
Publishing: The Revolutionary Future, Jason Epstein posits "The resistance today by publishers to the onrushing digital future does not arise from fear of disruptive literacy, but from the understandable fear of their own obsolescence and the complexity of the digital transformation that awaits them... The unprecedented ability of this technology to offer a vast new multilingual marketplace a practically limitless choice of titles will displace the Gutenberg system with or without the cooperation of its current executives."
[more inside]
posted by netbros
on Mar 3, 2010 -
19 comments
The announcement of the
iPad earlier this week has prompted a lot of discussion about ebook prices among publishers and their sales partners. That discussion took a major turn yesterday when
Amazon pulled the buy buttons for Macmillan's books off their site. Many of Macmillan's titles are still available through Amazon, but only through third parties. Right now, one of the largest publishers in America is no longer available from Amazon because they can not agree on ebook prices.
[more inside]
posted by Toekneesan
on Jan 30, 2010 -
306 comments
Ursula Nordstrom—the "
Maxwell Perkins of the Tot Department"—was, from 1940 to 1973, head of the Department of Books for Boys and Girls at the New York publisher Harper & Row, and until 1979 had her own imprint there, Ursula Nordstrom Books. A
legendary editor known to her authors as UN, she published the books of Laura Ingalls Wilder, Margaret Wise Brown, Shel Silverstein, Maurice Sendak (whom she is credited with discovering) and,
to not a little controversy, E. B. White (
previously). One of "the last generation of devoted letter writers," she wrote
nearly 100,000 during her five decade career at Harper, of which 300 of the most amusing, acerbic, and illuminating are collected in
Dear Genius by Leonard S. Marcus, the first hundred pages of which
can be read at the Harper website.
[more inside]
posted by ocherdraco
on Jan 6, 2010 -
8 comments
This one's for all the editors out there! Remember when index cards were actually used to create...
indexes?
posted by scody
on Dec 20, 2007 -
21 comments
More and more authors are turning to podcasting to find their audiences after being rejected by traditional book publishers,
it seems. Interested in hearing some of their stories for free (or if you're feeling generous, a suggested donation of $9.99)? Check out
PodioBooks, where there's a tonne of free literature just waiting to be downloaded to your iPod.
posted by Effigy2000
on Mar 8, 2007 -
9 comments
As he read, Mr Sterling became convinced he had to publish the book. Jed Rubenfeld's "The Interpretation of Murder" had an intriguing cast of characters, an engaging plot and a dash of kinky sex. It was a historical thriller, one of publishing's hottest recent categories. It had the potential, he thought, to be the next "Da Vinci Code."
The Wall Street Journal details
the fascinating mechanics of modern-day book marketing as Henry Holt & Co labors to birth this year's must-buy publishing phenomenon.
posted by Kraftmatic Adjustable Cheese
on Oct 16, 2006 -
14 comments
How much money do first-time novelists make? Author and upcoming first-time novelist
Justine Larbalestier is constantly asked by aspiring writers what first-time novelists should expect in advance payment for their beloved texts. So she asked some of her author friends what they got for their first novels. The responses ranged in time from 1962 to 2004. What didn't change in all that time was the basic amount: Not much. Quoth Larbalestier: "The life of a novelist is, financially speaking, a mug's game.
Enter at your own peril."
posted by jscalzi
on Dec 24, 2004 -
66 comments
Bush Junta: A Field Guide to Corruption in Government - A substantial visual document (200 pages of comics from Fantagraphics, fact-checked with an extensive bibliography; the link goes to a number of sample pages) on the Bush Dynasty, from its beginnings benefitting off of Hitler and WW2 (that entire piece, which is printed in english, is posted in its original dutch online
here), to the Bush's connection to Reagan's assassination, CIA and Iran-Contra, ending with the unsettling origins and profiles of the current administration. A great election primer, featuring comics and art by Steve Brodner, Ralph Steadman, Spain Rodriguez and many others. (
Amazon link provided for a better description)
posted by Peter H
on Oct 11, 2004 -
11 comments
Book publisher soliciting proposals on a high school marching band memoir. It could have an “American High” structure, in which a reporter follows a number of members of a band for a year, but the tone should be “Freaks & Geeks.” It could be something along the lines of “Drumline.” Or, and this is preferable, it could be a person’s wry memoir of his or her life as a band geek: weirdness on the bus, band sluts, the freshmen who steal your place, rivalries, loathing, the football team, what personality type goes with each instrument, etc. Knowledge of band camp and competitions would be a plus. BONUS:
Maud's post includes the email address of a senior editor at
Wiley to whom you may send your book proposals.
posted by _sirmissalot_
on Oct 8, 2004 -
9 comments
Forbidden Love: The Romance That Masqueraded as a Bio In early 2003, a Jordanian woman named Norma Khouri published a book entitled
Forbidden Love (or
Honor Lost in North America). This book was a memoir about how Norma Khouri's best friend, Dalia, was killed by her own father after she fell in love with a Christian military officer, and Norma's subsequent escape from Jordan.
Forbidden Love was a bio that read like a sensational romance, and it sold 250,000 copies around the world and made Norma Khouri a celebrity in her adoptive country of Australia. However, it turns out that the book really was just a romance. Dalia never existed. Norma Khouri left Jordan at the age of 3 and grew to adulthood living in Chicago. So, one
very disturbed woman has
exploited Western prejudices about Arab cultures,
fooled the general public, plunged her publisher into an enormous legal and financial embarrassment, and impugned the very real and serious problem of honour killings. And she got away with it for a full year and a half.
posted by orange swan
on Aug 5, 2004 -
14 comments
"Whadyawant, motherf*ck?" These are the first words
Charles Bukowski speaks in
John Dullaghan's
documentary about the
poet and
novelist,
famous for his writing and infamous for his
drinking and
brawling and
screwing. The audience member might respond, "To hear your story,
Hank, that's what I want."
The movie opens with friends (Sean Penn, Harry Dean Stanton, Bono) and colleagues and lovers and fans
recounting the myth; theirs are stories of blades pulled on the maitre d' of the swanky
Polo Lounge in Beverly Hills, of dangling dicks revealed in public, of
a drunk who'd just as soon crack his bottle over your head than share its contents.
(more inside)
posted by matteo
on May 28, 2004 -
26 comments
Anonymous midlist author tells horror story (Salon: viewing of annoying ad required, but it's well worth it) "In the 10 years since I signed my first book contract, the publishing industry has changed in ways that are devastating [...] to midlist authors like me. [...]
What once was about literature is now about return on investment. What once was hand-sold one by one by well-read, book-loving booksellers now moves by the pallet-load at Wal-Mart and Borders -- or doesn't move at all." (more inside)
posted by Prospero
on Mar 22, 2004 -
117 comments
Aspects of the Victorian Book is a Sunday morning kind of site, a relaxed but vivid tour of 19th century British publishing that explores production techniques such as lithography, binding and illustration, and looks at the printed works of the period (including forms such as the inexpensive "Yellowbacks" and their cousins, the usually lurid "Penny Dreadfuls").
posted by taz
on Nov 17, 2002 -
6 comments
Are you writing a novel? An article in the NY Times urging would-be authors to pack it in. Given the quoted stat (that 81% of Americans 'feel they have a book in them'), and extrapolating it for the rest of the world, that still means that there are roughly 12,887 unwritten books out there in me-fi land. Is this true? And has anyone actually written theirs down?
posted by jonathanbell
on Sep 30, 2002 -
59 comments
