Let’s try this once more, shall we? Earlier today this appeared, only the text was entirely made-up of quotes from roles played by Samuel L. Jackson in various movies, courtesy of the web-site SAMUEL L. IPSUM (Mother*cking Placeholder Text, Motherf*cker!), which generates far more interesting text than the classic “Lorem ipsum” material used by most layout people.
So… erm… Basically I created the post, put some text in to hold some space where the actual content would go, put a in image in, then some relevant links at the bottom, and then… walked away and forgot about it. More fool me. :: ahem ::
Amazon [he says, rapidly changing the subject from the previous one of “just how daft is Ian getting in his middle-age?” to a more news-worthy one] has recently been getting a fair bit of flack from all sides for their decision to become ‘a real publisher, just like Atomic Fez’, although the last part of the phrase isn’t one that’s commonly a point made by anyone. Not only are they to be the original publisher of works, they will be publishing these works in electronic and printed formats, as well as selling the books through a distributor so that the books will be on shelves of bookshops the world over. In theory, anyway.
WWI War Financing Poster (by Haskell Coffin, 1918)
The problem with the plan is quite simple: the same businesses that Amazon is in direct competition with are now to be their retail partners. One minute they’re crushing Barnes & Noble, Borders, or everyone’s favourite local independent book shop; the next minute they’re saying ‘look, just before you go completely bankrupt, could you do a big display in the window with our new titles?’, and wondering why they’re getting the stink-eye from everyone in the place including the university kids on holiday fill-in duty.
If you’re thinking “no no, Jeff Bezos and his crew surely wouldn’t be that insane, would they?” let me assure you they are either filled with so much chutzpah they don’t think they can lose, or they’re really oblivious to anything other than that which is the nano-second of existence of “now”.
Or, possibly, they’re on so much cocaine their irises are white as snow. After all, they do seem to be far more focused, energetic, and enthusiastic about everything than just about anyone else in the entire world, short of seven-year-old boys on a sugar high let loose in a LEGO Warehouse.
The enabler in this little affair is Houghton Mifflin Harcourt’s “New Harvest” imprint, which will be exclusively dedicated to the release of Amazon.com’s titles, including upcoming titles by James Franco and Deepak Chopra. Clearly these are not merely Poems About My Cat (A Collection) we’re talking about here, but potential ‘hot titles’ by people the common reader will be interested in, or at least be aware of (which is far more than could be said of about 98% of any books released in a given period of time).
Amazon are the same people who released a smartphone ‘app’ prior to Christmas which permitted the user to scan the barcodes of up to three books in a store, thus providing the user with a guaranteed discount on the price of that book (up to a maximum of $5 per item, I think) as long as that same book was ordered through Amazon instead of buying the ‘over-priced’ book in the store they had in their hands at that very second. ALLHAIL duplication of effort! Not only do you choose a book by going to the bookshop and are reminded they still exist, you then guarantee you contribute nothing to its existence by literally going out of your way not to give it your custom! Hurrah! Let us all go to Cloud Cuckoo Land where books are cheap and plentiful, and no one needs to look further afield than Amazon for all ones worldly needs!
Now, given the above, you would think that Amazon would pooh-pooh the notion that getting copies of their own publishing house onto shelves in real bricks-and-mortar shops, wouldn’t you? “Stores?” you might be forgiven to presume they would respond, “do they still exist? Why would you want to go to one of those? Just sit in your chair, move the mouse around a bit, click a few times, and we’ll bring the world to you!” Oddly, this is not what they’re doing. No no.
Through Houghton Mifflin Harcourt’s distribution network, they are attempting to get their books into the very same shops they recently sent people into with their smartphone apps, possibly in an effort to get every single dime available in the book industry chain. The only thing they haven’t got – in addition to the eBook hardware, eBook software, print-on-demand via Lightning Source and Create-Space, plus now the actual publishing house, and a host of other ventures under their vast umbrella – is actual retail outlets. According to the New York Times, that’s possibly next. If true, perhaps this is a test of how much they can use books to lure people in as a loss-leader for their other products like shoes (Amazon now own on-line shoe-retailer Zappos.com, by the way), BLU-RAYs, and iPad accessories. Who knows?
Personally, the thing I find most surprising is the sheer unmitigated gall and blatant effrontery of them expecting to get a piece of the action they’re attempting to reduce to rapidly diminishing returns. It’s a bit like acting as a real estate agent in the area in which you’re also enacting a policy of lebensraum, and you’re actually re-selling the land to the people who are already living there. Plus, you still get a commission on the sale, any the tax on the transaction itself, plus future property taxes for maintaining your now possessed territories. Win!
Honestly, what part of this whole thing made someone think “yeah, that’s a great idea; let’s do that!”…?
The cocaine suggestion doesn’t seem so ludicrous now, does it?
MediaBistro.com’s eBookNewser, “Author’s Guild Argues That Amazon’s Dominance Comes From Antitrust Laws”; Wednesday, February 1st ~ READTHISPOST
MobyLives, which is the blog of Melville House, “Amazon finds a beard to sell books from its publishing unit”; January 25th ~ READTHISPOST
Globe & Mail, “Indigo joins growing boycott of books published by Amazon.com”; Friday, February 3rd (and correction on the following Monday) ~READTHISPOST
Publishers Weekly, “End of the Line for Dorchester?”; Friday, February 3rd ~ READTHISPOST
The New York Times, ‘Bits’, “Amazon Has Tried Everything to Make Shopping Easier. Except This.”; Friday, February 3rd ~ READTHISARTICLE
Publishers Weekly, ‘PW Tip Sheet’, “This Has All Happened Before”; Friday, February 3rd ~ READTHISPOST
“This Week’s Fish Wrap” is an on-going series of posts summing up the news of the previous seven days in the publishing industry, and/or announce the latest news Atomic Fez has about the publishing house, and appears here each Monday. It’s also quite possible that the posts merely serve as a dumping ground of links so that Atomic Fez Proprietor Ian Alexander Martin can find articles later to include in his occasional rants about how ‘EVERYONEELSEISENTIRELYWRONG’ about various things.
Now that we’re well and truly into the new year (and thus we’ve no reason to keep accidentally putting “2011” on things anymore), it’s time to let you all know what’s coming in the next twelve months! Things have been quietly plotted in secret until now, so they’re being let out into the yard to run about in the fresh air for a little bit. Have a look at them before they get dragged back into the basement for some more advanced adjustments.
Atomic Fez World Headquarters Building
All of the titles are novels, and in the case of the first and last ones, they are the author’s first ‘long-form narrative’. Hooray!
There’s absolutely no artwork available, and isn’t that a pity? Try to be patient.
Likewise, pre-orders will begin once we’re closer to the date, with each title’s eBook edition being made available just as soon as the text is finalized and the files are back from the hard-working slave labour.
Autumn 2012
In conjunction with the British Fantasy Society’s FantasyCon 2012 in Brighton (September 27 – 30):
John Llewellyn Probert: The House of a Thousand Screams (title not final)
John Travis: The Designated Coconut (Benji Spriteman #2)
In conjunction with… um… because it’s nearly Spring Equinox, St. David’s Day / Dydd Gŵyl Dewi Sant (March 1st):
Mark H. Williams: Sleepless Knights
In order to whet your appetite, here’s some text about the individual titles. You’ll also notice that the second and fourth in the lists below are very-much Wales-oriented, thus in keeping with my never-ending accidental association with the country and its people. I swear this is not by design; but it just keeps happening, so why try to fight it?
As the first in the series was an homage to the noire thrillers, so we have the second Benji Spriteman tale similar to the classic English Mystery of roughly the same era.
During the visit of the two famous mystery-writing sisters, a death occurs, leading to a complicated series of events. How did the safe in the locked room get stolen? Who was behind the poisoning? Is someone at the resort’s hotel involved, and is it the beer-guzzling band-leader? What do the mole-men have to do with it?
The House of a Thousand Screams (working title), by John Llewellyn Probert, author of Wicked Delights; Autumn 2012
The very first novel from John Llewellyn Probert provides a mystery of ghosties, ghoulies, long‑legged beasties, and thing that go ‘bump’ in the night, starring Mr Massene Henderson and Miss Samantha Jephcott; the most un‑likely team of paranormal investigators you’ve somehow lived your life without… until now!
Henderson and Jephcott head to the wilderness of Northern Wales to investigate a house constructed from the bits of haunted buildings and filled with devices of death, all constructed on a foundation of a ‘stone circle’. Designed to be the most haunted house in Britain, the original owner hasn’t been heard from since the mid-1950s, and the new one wants to know if he’s got the real thing or not. What lies in wait for the two detectives and the four people who are there to help in the research, and will anyone survive to claim the fees for their labours?
I, Death, by Mark Leslie Lefebvre; Winter 2012
The terrifying story of a young man coming to terms with a death curse.
By writing an on-line journal, Peter O’Mallick hopes to deal with his emotional turmoil at being dumped by his former girlfriend. While the blog helps, it also attracts cyber stalker Bryan Brecht, who coerces Peter into doing things which should never be done…
Hilarity ensues.
Publisher (left) and Author (right) sign contracts for “Sleepless Knights” prior to RCMP Musical Ride performance in Maple Tree Square (out of shot, to right) {photo: Laura Cotton}
Sleepless Knights, by Mark H. Williams; Spring 2013
It’s not easy being the man behind the myth.
Sir Lucas is butler to King Arthur and the Knights of the Round Table; the person who managed every epic legend behind the scenes. He’s the one who made sure each quest happened in the right place at the right time, and that everyone involved had comfortable accommodation for the weekend. The man whose average working day involved fighting dragons, defeating witches, banishing demons, and ensuring the Royal pot of tea never crossed the thin line separating ‘brewed’ from ‘stewed’. What’s more, 1,500 years after that golden age, he’s still doing it: here in modern Britain, right under our noses…
Through ten working days in the life of Sir Lucas the Butler, discover what really went on at Camelot. The story behind Lancelot’s affair with Guinevere. The truth about the quest for the Grail. And find out what happens one fateful day in June, when King Arthur and six of his knights are revealed as living among us. A revelation that brings about the return of Merlin and the end of the World, uncovering secrets from the past which King Arthur would rather stay buried, and forcing Lucas to confront the truth about his own unique and peculiar destiny. A destiny he will do anything to avoid, even if it means sacrificing the love of his life in the service of his master.
In short, the kind of crisis only the ultimate butler can resolve.
It seems fairly often that Steve Jobs Apple brings out something that changes the face of the world – or at least what its face is pointed at – inexorably. They’re infrequently the first to do whatever it is that now has a lower-case letter “i” slapped on the front of the name, but they are typically the first ones to get it done the right way. For example: the tablet is finally done right with the iPad, after Microsoft tried to get manufacturers to figure out how to do it for most of the ’90s and ‘the noughties’; personal music players worked fine as cassette machines like the Walkman™, but it took the iPod to get the digital file format taking off; and the smartphone was clunky, awkward, and difficult to use for the acquisition of basic information until the introduction of the iPhone.
Beckman RIIC advert (“New Scientist and Science Journal”, Apr 1st1971)
Thus, the iBook 2 (not to be confused with the PowerBook, which is an old Apple laptop model) now presents textbooks in a far better, cheaper, and easier distribution model. HOORAY! say I. This is one of the best applications of the eBook format, as it drops the cost of the most expensive part of the production cycle for text-books: printing. Most text books have, at the very least, graphs and charts as illustrations. Anything used for science and artistic pursuits have colour illustrations or photographs required to properly explain matters of any complexity, be they medical matters of the body, or painted representations of the body. This need for acceptable colour reproduction – while both less expensive and less complicated than even two decades ago – still requires a hefty increase in costs than if there were nary a graphic included. The fact that a text book typically requires up-dating two years after its release only adds to the necessity of developing a way to reduce costs as much as is possible. Thankfully, the eBook is the answer.
No doubt the tales I could tell of the cost of my Geography text books in the mid-1980s would be enthusiastically laughed at by today’s students, and I don’t wish to consider what the cost of them are today. But, given the charges for typical education at any level are increasingly beggaring those who administer the provision of learning today, at any level, the method of providing texts at a fraction of the cost to the student is welcome indeed.
This is not without some valid considerations, however. Is the so-called “walled garden of Apple” too limiting for the freedom-loving world of academia? Will university and college lecturers and Deans of study find they are no longer able to regulate themselves or exercise their creativity within the technological constraints placed upon them by DRM and geographic distribution agreements? Will the publishers find increased revenue from their titles, rather than what trickles of cash they get from the photocopying licenses for ‘course packs’ used in a majority of higher learning institutions?
Do publishers even have the balls to make the sea-change of their entire business-model to this new platform? Are they just in time to make it, or are they merely trying to sort out how to rearrange the deck chairs on a rapidly sinking ship? Do we even care?
Lastly, what of the printed book – whether a textbook or simply a novel – being released with an electronic copy as a bonus? When buying a DVD or Blu-Ray disc, one often gets a “Free Digital Copy” for use on one’s smartphone or tablet, so why not extend this to books also?
Would Atomic Fez readers wish to receive an eBook copy of the book they just purchased in paper format? I’ve often seen it as an either/or situation, mostly because I’ve seen eBooks as mostly a new reader market. Perhaps I’m wrong, though, and you want the option of having increased access to the book, as this means you can start reading on your iPhone the novel you left at home this morning. Let me know! Atomic Fez is here to help you enjoy reading more, as well as helping you enjoy more reading!
“Pearson Made $3 Billion From Digital Content Last Year”, PaidContent.org | CLICKHERE
“Apple Move Will Spark Flurry off New Companies, Content in Education Market”, PaidContent.org | CLICKHERE
“New Stats: 2011 Libraries’ Digital Check-Outs Up 133% Over 2010″, PaidContent.org | CLICKHERE
“Do we want textbooks to live in Apple’s walled garden?”, GigaOM | CLICKHERE
Confessions of a Publisher: “We’re in Amazon’s Sights and They’re Going to Kill Us”, PandoDaily.com | CLICKHERE
“ECW Press Experiments with Free eBbooks for Print Customers”, Publishers Weekly | CLICKHERE
“This Week’s Fish Wrap” is an on-going series of posts summing up the news of the previous seven days in the publishing industry, and/or announce the latest news Atomic Fez has about the publishing house, and appears here each Monday. It’s also quite possible that the posts merely serve as a dumping ground of links so that Atomic Fez Proprietor Ian Alexander Martin can find articles later to include in his occasional rants about how ‘EVERYONEELSEISENTIRELYWRONG’ about various things.
For those of you who wish to fondle before you purchase, copies of Terribilis and Dirk Danger Loves Life are now on shelves of select locations of Chapters/Indigo/Cole’s Bookshops across the Dominion of Canada!
For those of you desiring photographic evidence, behold the images below!
Chapters, Robson Street, Vancouver (photo credit @604Heather)
Chapters, Robson Street, Vancouver (photo credit @604Heather)
Chapters, Robson Street, Vancouver (photo credit @604Heather)
Chapters, Robson Street, Vancouver (photo credit @604Heather)
Chapters, Metropolis at Metrotown, Burnaby (photo credit Atomic Fez Publishing)
Chapters, Metropolis at Metrotown, Burnaby (photo credit Atomic Fez Publishing)
This represents a personal first: never before – as far as I am aware – have books published by me been on offer in a bookstore anywhere in the world. Yes, they’ve been available on ‘virtual shelves’, as well as being available for order through ‘bricks and mortar’ locations of stores, but not actually sitting on shelves waiting for people to discover them for immediate purchase. This is a happy thing.
Also, for those of you who love all things old – both books in paper form and stop-motion animation without computer generated imaging, for example – here is a short animated film of such accomplishment I cannot begin to comprehend the amount of work involved in it.
Early last week, the Canadian Distributor of Atomic Fez titles – Author’s Choice – received an order from Chapters / Indigo / Coles for a substantial number of copies of Terribilis and Dirk Danger Loves Life. Huzzah! Exposure in shops at last!
Metrotown location of Chapters/Indigo
Well, actually, possibly not; plus it might not be the best time to break out the champagne and caviar and dispense with the beer and hot dog budget either. You see, this isn’t anything quite like a “guaranteed river of money” situation. In years past I’ve sometimes been surprised at the seniority and years of experience which authors and readers alike might possess, yet they’ve not much idea of the business specifics of the retail selling of books. So as to further the understanding of all, here’s how things come top play in this daft publishing life thing. Besides, it’s something that I have to remind myself of in order to keep in mind how insane this whole notion is to begin with.
Also, please note that all Atomic Fez books have been in the Chapters/Indigo/Cole’s catalogue since the agreement with Author’s Choice about a year ago (click here to see the titles). Due to the same agreement, you can also locate Atomic Fez books in the Amazon.ca (click here to see the titles) and Amazon.com catalogues (click here to see the titles). So, this isn’t a change, except for the actual quantity of copies ordered.
Here’s how these things work: Chapters calls the distributor in Ontario with orders for books they’d like in the warehouse, and then either the distributor tells me to ship them a big shed-load of boxes like last week, or – more frequently – the distributor parcels-up the four copies of some title and those get sent to Chapters’ warehouse. Typically Author’s Choice has no more than one box of anyone’s book in stock, as they are only a small distributor, and not a warehousing or storage firm. Once the books head to the warehouse of Chapters/Indigo/Cole’s for their inventory, anything can happen and I’ll not know a thing about it. Yes, copies could be sent to some of the 247 Indigo, Chapters and Cole’s stores across Canada, or they could merely hang-on to them in the warehouse to supply their on-line orders through Chapters.Indigo.com (the same as I do through this site’s ordering), or they could do a little of both. Again, I have no idea what they’re doing, and I won’t ever know until either someone stumbles across copies on a shelf and tells someone, or I stumble across an inventory entry on their web-site (and that would take a concerted effort of experimentation with searching through the item’s status using major population centres). So, basically, if someone sees some copies, they really ought to take a picture of them, then send me a copy.
This is the first time – as far as I know – that a shop has ordered copies ‘on spec’ of an Atomic Fez title. I’ve sent occasional copies to wholesalers and shops both in the UK and in North America, but as they’ve been very small amounts, they’ve probably been ordered by customers. I’ve never, never seen any book I’ve published on a store shelf, either in person or even in a photo, with both outfits I’ve worked with. So this is an excellent thing.
WH Smith Train Station shop (c. 1933)
But.
Here’s where things get stupid with this publishing industry thing.
All 268 books that were just sent to Ontario could very well be returned to me come April. Because all Atomic Fez books are “returnable” by retailers (as most publishers do), shops are more interested in carrying them, because their risk having them is eliminated. Likewise, their costs are further reduced by the fact that I pay for the shipping there and back, plus they get charged 40% or so less than the RRP so that they can sell at a profit (which is a business-like idea, obviously). Likewise, shops pay when they’ve actually sold the books; although not by design, but due to the delay in paying happening to fall outside the point at which they’ve returned the un-sold ones.
now keep in mind that I’ve not only paid for those books to be printed months ago, plus get them shipped from the printers to the house here, I’ve also just paid about $300 to ship a bunch of them to Ontario to the distributor. the distributor will now get those boxes to Chapters/Indigo’s Distribution Centre, at a cost which will be deducted from any sales earnings. Once the books are decided to be “too old” and the remaining amount is sent back, once again the cost of transport is borne by the Distributor and Publisher. Yes, I get to pay for shipping in both directions, and that’s an industry standard arrangement for a large chain. You should hear the sorts of things that Amazon.com fully expect to be done at a minimum for them by the bog houses like Random House, Simon & Shuster, and so on. It’s a wonder there’s not sacrificing of pets and virgins involved sometimes, given the lengths of demands.
It used to be that books could prove themselves on the shelvesas being “something that sells” through a three-month period or longer, which would permit reviews as well as ‘word-of-mouth’ to drive sales, plus the staff would get to know the book at least by reputation. Early this year Chapters/Indigo changed their period to only 46 days, which doesn’t even give books a chance to actually gather dust. Honestly, the notion that this is enough time for someone to read a review, decide they want a copy for their birthday/Christmas, tell a relative, the relative then gets time to go to the store, then remembers the name of the book… it can easily be out of stock in the store. This is another reason why the on-line reviews excellent people do works wonders, as the text on various web-sites – Amazon, Goodreads, LibraryThing, and many of the new Canadian public library sites – acts as further advertising and proof that ‘someone actually read this book’, thus encouraging others to try them out.
Bottomless pit of books
The reason Chapters/Indigo changed the length of the shelf-life for titles, in my opinion anyway, was due to reduced floor space for books when they switched to being a Home Design Shop as well as a book store. Thus, inventory they haven’t invested money in building themselves (as all the rugs, clocks, pillows, candles, etc. are designed and created by Indigo) needs to work harder to keep their space, or ‘earn their space’, if you will.
And therein lies the under-pinning problem of the whole thing that really needs a re-think in not just publishing, but just about any manufacturing industry. Publishers pay authors, artists, printers, distributors, shippers, eBook formatting people, and everyone else in advance of even taking a single order, never mind making a sale. The best comparison here is the lottery: you buy some quantity of tickets and hope that one will return more than the amount you spent, but there is no guarantee of any return. I publish books with the hope they will sell, but I front the cost of printing as many copies as I can spend money to get, and then do what I can to ensure people will part with their cash so that I can then publish some new titles, with exactly the same principle guiding the manifestation. That’s fine, really, and it’s the same as if you were paying the ante for a poker game, and that is another good comparison to this.
But, when the big retail stores get involved, it’s even more serious an ante, as the combination of shipping charges and wholesale discounts on large orders (which may not ever sell a single copy) mean that I not only pay for the production of the books that never sell, I get to pay for moving them all over the place because they didn’t sell, thus losing even more money than just the cost of manufacturing. Remember, once a massive order is placed by Bob’s Big Book Box, say 1,000 copies (which is insane compared to my situation), then those thousand are tied-up in the warehouse of the store, leaving me with whatever I got printed over and above the thousand I just sent to Bob’s. So, do I run another 250 or 500 copies of the books, and gamble the thousand at Bob’s won’t all return to me in a few months’ time so I then have 1,500 books filling the basement, or do I run the risk that a bunch of people will order copies from me direct and I’ll not have any more left because I didn’t order a new run of copies? Besides, those thousand copies Bob’s won’t pay me for any sooner than about four months from the day they take delivery, and even if they did pay me for the whole lot immediately, if they all get returned un-sold, then I have to return those funds as they were for “books sold” which didn’t happen in the end. See?
Books heading for the trimmer at MPG Biddles
The entire thing is a daft notion. Lord knows why anyone would want to even try this, never mind keep at it, which is obviously why I need to get a day-job. The ‘cost of doing business’ is always something that makes or breaks a business, but it really feels like the book trade has it staked against itself even more than others do.
This is another reason that the entire supply-chain of books needs a complete re-think, as well as who knows how many other manufacturing cycles for goods. As far as I’m concerned, the eBook is perfect to replace the obscenely wasteful production standards of the Mass-Market Paperback, for which many publishers pre-determine the amount of copies in a run which will be pulped at numbers typically around 33% and 45%. Yes, they actually budget throwing away nearly half the run, knowing that they’ll be damaged on shelves, and then not be bought, or they’ll get dinged in transport to and from various distribution centres and warehouses. the additional reason is that the price for running ten-thousand copies of a title can actually sometimes be less than printing 7,500 copies (or at least it’s often a good third or more per unit to run the larger figure), thus making the throwing away of part of the run actually cheaper than printing less of them in the first place.
There’s so much in this industry which works on the basis of the economics of supply and demand of the late-1800s, as well as the levels of available resources of that period, it’s a wonder that books are even still available in the same form as that time.
But, we continue. Onwards!
“This Week’s Fish Wrap” is an on-going series of posts summing up the news of the previous seven days in the publishing industry, and/or announce the latest news Atomic Fez has about the publishing house, and appears here each Monday. It’s also quite possible that the posts merely serve as a dumping ground of links so that Atomic Fez Proprietor Ian Alexander Martin can find articles later to include in his occasional rants about how ‘EVERYONEELSEISENTIRELYWRONG’ about various things.
Not so much of an ‘up-date’ as a “here’s something you’ll like” sort of post this week.
Lobby of Atomic Fez HQ (or JFK’s Terminal 6, it’s tough to tell the difference sometimes)
Carol Weekes, the author of Terribilis, has posted a couple of short stories on her blog. This gives you the chance to read some of her other work either after you’ve read her novel, or as an “enticer” for it.
The two tales are:
“Neurosis”, which first appeared in 69FLAVOURSOFPARANOIA, Issue #4; and
“Snowfall”, which first appeared in THEEDGE, Issue #7, edited by Greg Gifune
Also worth noting is that her novel is available on Kobo at the sale price of $499 as part of their “Great Reads for $4.99 or Less” category. HEADHERE to locate that on their site.
ONE FINAL NOTE ABOUT 'THAT HOLIDAY'
Deadlines for ordering of printed books from the North American Shipping Depot in time for the 25th of December are as follows:
INSIDECANADA: December 10th
TOTHEUSA: December 6th
UK&OTHERS: November 29th (although much of this last category is covered from the UK Centre; those dates to come soon)
Thank you all for your continued support and interest.
“This Week’s Fish Wrap” is an on-going series of posts summing up the news of the previous seven days in the publishing industry, and/or announce the latest news Atomic Fez has about the publishing house, and appears here each Monday. It’s also quite possible that the posts merely serve as a dumping ground of links so that Atomic Fez Proprietor Ian Alexander Martin can find articles later to include in his occasional rants about how ‘EVERYONEELSEISENTIRELYWRONG’ about various things.
Oddly enough, this hasn’t been the expected result of being born in British Columbia of two parents who were both also born in the province, and two of whose parents in turn were born in Canada (one of the other two being born in Newfoundland, which at the time was a British Colony; the other in Northern Ireland), and as far as I can tell there’s more English and Irish than anything else about me, but what can I do when the facts of the matter are clearly delineated?
Atomic Fez Publishing, apparently, is a Welsh outfit, and is part of a cabal bent on promulgating the Welsh agenda of dominating the world with the literature of the country “where the land meets the sky”: Cymru. From Bro Morgannwg to Ynys Môn, from Sir Benfro to Wrecsam, around here it’s all about the “land of my fathers”, even if it doesn’t happen to have anything to do with any of my fore-fathers or mothers (see above).
Baner Cymru
Some of you might be wondering what I’m blethering about, and the rest no doubt are merely reading this far in order to discover if there’s a new sale price on something or a contest, or whatever.
I’ve occasionally joked about being secretly Welsh, or that I only have dealings with Welsh people. This was usually after someone had pointed out the number of Welsh authors Atomic Fez has published. Given that the books Wicked Delights and Twisthorn Bellow by John Llewellyn Probert and Rhys Hughes (and with names like that, what else could their Country of Origin be?) formed 50% of the initial catalogue, who could blame people for the confusion?
The thing is, it doesn’t stop there, you see. The covers of Twisthorn Bellow, Ponthe Oldenguine, and The Terror and the Tortoiseshell were all done by Steve Upham, who runs Screaming Dreams and was both born and raised in South Wales, where he continues to be quite Welsh. The cover for Dirk Danger Loves Life was done by Terry Cooper, who lives in Cardiff Bay (the area; he doesn’t actually live in the bay itself). This brings the number of book covers being designed in Wales to four out of the seven total titles.
Carrying on, any order placed by people in the United Kingdom (which is comprised of Wales and the bits on the other side of the Severn River [England, Scotland, Northern Ireland and various tiny islands around it]) or Europe receive their book(s) thanks to the continuing packaging and posting efforts of one Christopher Teague, who runs Pendragon Press from a teeny-tiny post office box located in Maesteg at the northernmost end of the Llynfi Valley, close to the border with Neath Port Talbot; and its name, plus the names of the other locations – plus their singular shortage of vowels – ought to tip you off about the country it’s in.
Now, with all of that, you’d think we were done. But no.
It turns out that the winner of the signed copy of Dirk Danger Loves Life happens to live in Newport (or Casnewydd), a city and unitary authority area in Wales, which stands on the banks of the River Usk, is located about 12 miles (19 km) east of Cardiff, and is the largest urban area within the historic county boundaries of Monmouthshire and the preserved county of Gwent. Plus, as if that’s not enough, they are a distant relative of the author of the book, Chris Rothe, and that side of the family has substantial roots in Wales. Thus, three of the books in the catalogue of sent titles are written by Welshmen.
Later this week I’ll be meeting and signing a publishing agreement with an author whose book will not likely be released until the spring of 2013. Their novel is based in and around the country of Wales. He lives in Wales, and a few months ago lived in a part of the country which was so very Welsh that one couldn’t get any further from other countries without the need of a dory. His girlfriend is not only Welsh, she speaksCymraeg and is fluent, fer Pete’s sake!
Thus, I give-up. Yes, there’s Terribilis by Carol Weekes, the story set in and around the Ottawa region where she is born and bred; certainly there’s The Beautiful Red by James Cooper, who lives in Nottinghamshire; absolutely there’s The Terror and the Tortoiseshell by Wakefield’s finest John Travis; without a doubt Andrew Hook, author of Ponthe Oldenguine, lives and set his book in the area of Norwich… these are nothing but an artifice covering the truth of the matter: in actual fact Atomic Fez is run specifically for the betterment of those who know that while it’s true mae na orsaf petrol yn Yr Orseddond mae does dim byd yna i weld yno (there is a petrol station in Rossett, but there’s nothing to see there).
If you wish to experience the Welsh tongue [pauses for someone near back to chortle with filthy intent] there are a number of places on the web to gain some language skills. You would be wise to be careful about the matter, however, because one site providing a list of phrases in the native language disturbingly provides something akin to a run-down of dialogue during an encounter with a particularly unsatisfactory result:
Croeso I Gymru!!
I can’t speak Welsh [well]. Alla i ddim siarad Cymraeg [yn dda]. (Alh’a ee thim SHARad kym-RYE-g [uhn tha])
Do you speak English? Ydych chi’n siarad Saesneg? (UD-ich ch’een SHARad SAYES-neg?)
Is there someone here who speaks English? Oes rhywun yma sy’n siarad Saesneg? (Oyss RHEEW-in UMma seen SHARad SAYES-neg?)
Help! Help! (Help)
Look out! Hendiwch! (HEN-dyoo’ch!)
I’ve not changed a thing with that order, nor left anything out. HEADHERE to confirm this (scroll down a teensy bit to locate its start).
I can only conclude in the obvious way: Cymru am byth!!!
“This Week’s Fish Wrap” is an on-going series of posts summing up the news of the previous seven days in the publishing industry, and/or announce the latest news Atomic Fez has about the publishing house, and appears here each Monday. It’s also quite possible that the posts merely serve as a dumping ground of links so that Atomic Fez Proprietor Ian Alexander Martin can find articles later to include in his occasional rants about how ‘EVERYONEELSEISENTIRELYWRONG’ about various things.
Back a ways, we announced two contests for copies of the two September titles below. Two copies of each book are to be signed and personalised to the winners, one copy of each for “North America” and “UK and Others”. In the case of Terribilis, both winners receive a copy of the book in the ‘hardback binding’ (which is not available in North America).
[owing to a shortage of valid UK entries, North American entries were included in the drawing for this title]
Congratulations to those three people (and extra congratulations to Ms. Johnston for her win which defies normal rules about ‘standard variations governing probabilities of occurrence’), as well as sincere thanks to everyone who ordered copies of these titles and others as well.
The combined excitement of The September Sell-A-Bration and the two contests for signed copies of Terribilis and Dirk Danger Loves Life among those ordered all comes to an end on Sunday.
Now, now, stop sobbing like that… you still have a little time.
In the meantime, let’s all give Uncle Warren a big hug for the encouragement he extended to Atomic Fez. Have a look on either side of the screen for two versions of the same thing: him tweeting a copy of the original one – the kids call it “Re-Tweeting” or “RT-ing” I’m told – to his crowd of followers numbering 418,978 souls.
Twitter Page showing Ellis’ RT
Sometimes it’s the littlest thing which can too easily be over-looked that can be so very affecting.
For about a couple of weeks now, I have been predicting my own demise. Not too surprising, the usual estimate for each human being’s chance of death is 100%, after all. However, I’m speaking of ‘me’ as a publisher.
Scribner’s submissions readers deciding what to do with latest arrivals (Parker Brothers Ouija Board advert, Dec. 1969)
No, no; I’m not making some heavy-handed statement of portentous variety regarding lack of sales, quality of submissions, or the economy in general. I’m thinking in realistic terms about the likelihood and viability of publishers as ‘literary gate keepers’ or ‘curators of quality books’. I don’t foresee this as being something which either the reading public or the creative authors considering as tenable in the years to come.
Ever since someone said to Homer (no, not the yellow guy, the ancient Greek poet) “that’s great writing, but I don’t think we’ll be making copies of that story for people… try Demonites down the road, maybe he’s got room in his catalogue”, the Publisher has had control over what the public can read. Yes, there have been some notable exceptions to this power – DH Lawrence’s Lady Chatterly’s Lover, TE Lawrence’s (no relation) Seven Pillars of Wisdom: A Triumph, and James Joyce’s Ulysses–but mostly due to either “unprintable words” or the fact that publishers thought no one would like to read a book about people living in Arabia. Publisher’s aren’t alone in making foolish oversights: the man at Capital Records, UK must still bemoan his note stating “people no longer are interested in Rock & Roll bands” after listening to the audition tapes for The Beatles, to the great gain of EMI.
As a side note, the nasty aspect of this attitude of “only we can declare what is ‘worthy’ of your reading time” manifests itself in murmurings such as the recent decrying of “readability” as something the Mann Booker Prize Jury considered as part of their deliberations. Apparently when deciding what is good fiction one isn’t supposed to ask questions like “is it fun to read?” and one should limit oneself to “is it good for you?” Poppycock, say I, and so does Graham Joyce, the currently Acting Chairman of the British Fantasy Society (but then, he would, wouldn’t he?) in his piece titled “Don’t Confuse ‘Readability’ with ‘Dumbing Down’ ”. As much as I’d like to take a piece out of the attitude that “fun” is akin to “low brow” or even “sinful”, the real problem here is that it’s thought to be ‘of reduced quality’. I’d be hard-pressed to locate a musician who can play much of the music of King Crimson, Queen, or Steely Dan, but it sure is fun! Complicated, complex, intricate, and brilliant, absolutely! But don’t confuse it’s “fun quality” with it being ‘easy’, or ‘popular’ with being ‘sub-par’!
Just after the start of the millennium, there was a big resurgence in the “why can’t we just print copies ourselves?” school of thinking, and three things resulted directly from this:
small press formed in the vein of the Bloomsbury Generation style where everyone ran their own house and acted as launderers of literary works by their friends, or published works they truly believed in and nurtured them to perfection
people truly self-published (sometimes using an editor but frequently not, more’s the pity)
unscrupulous bastards started “author’s fulfilment houses’ which basically sucked every single cent out of the authors who innocently handed over all their worldly assets in order to see their name on the front cover of a book
I don’t see this as a bad thing (with the exception of the third, which is all bad plus a bag of chips). Some suggest that “it’s good for people to release crap that ought to have been edited, never mind proofed, as then the readers will understand just how valuable the publisher is!” This is the argument of the grumpy, self-important, and bitter. The reading of low-quality writing isn’t anything but harmful to everyone who writes, for this can only lead in the long term to people being ‘turned off’ to the joys of reading. I decry this situation and those who see it as good even in the short-term. Self-publishers should be encouraged to use editors and proof-readers for the simple reason it makes their work better in the same way it improved the works of Dickens, Joyce, Christie, Atwood, and every other writer you can think of.
The principle that I see being served is that of “providing an increased choice of material”. There are only so many books I can publish, no matter my desire. There are only so many books Simon & Shuster or Random House can put out each week. The more books which are made available, the greater the selection available.
Around the same time as the above three points came to pass, there was a common view that a narrower and narrower variety of books were being released; especially in the UK bookshops. There were oodles of new books coming out, have no doubt! But they were all of a piece: homogeneous in style, length, story, and often even in their cover art. The notion that “fantastical fiction” (SF, Fantasy, Horror, or amalgam of all three plus some other things as well) might see the surface of a shelf in a store was anathema to the large-house publishers, as the Big Boys® were of the opinion that ‘people aren’t buying those sorts of books any more’ and then they’d chuckle in that superior way of someone who had all of the answers.
However, obviously the large houses’ eschewing of SF&F titles was correct in one simple way. People such as Orion, Spectra, and Del-Ray were keeping things going as well as they could, but if you don’t release lots of SF&F titles, then it’s quite difficult for anyone to buy lots of lots of SF&F titles. QED.
So, a large number of people who loved ‘those sorts of books’ decided to do something about it and started small presses in the UK and North America so as to release either their own work, the work of others whose writing was in many instances excellent, as well as long out-of-print titles which couldn’t be found in anything but the rarest editions. Things were furthered by word-of-mouth and the development of superior “digital printing techniques” which made the printing of books in quantities as small as 200 the same wholesale cost per unit as doing a run of eight hundred or a thousand using traditional lithographic / offset techniques. Hooray!
Fast forward to today, and the matter gets a great deal easier for the author or “hobby” publisher to release works, as well as those such as myself who make this a full-time concern.
The main benefit to the author or “hobby” publisher is Amazon for various reasons, but they all come down to being a single source of solutions to every imaginable problem: electronic books (Kindle Direct Publishing, née “Digital Text Platform”), as well as paperback and hardback books (Create Space) can be had easily as well as providing a place to sell them to the world (Amazon.com, Amazon.ca, Amazon.co.uk, Amazon.fr, Amazon.de, Amazon.jp) and the author/publisher can keep a piece of the retail action if they set-up their links correctly (Amazon Associates Programme).
The side-effect of this is that Amazon has essentially destroyed the necessity of the “bricks and mortars” store, especially the independent book shop. There is no conceivable way for even a ‘big box’ book retailer to have close to the selection of titles that Amazon has on its sites. Even Chapters.Indigo.ca has a far larger selection than the biggest location you can walk into. The average small– or one-location bookstore owner has to compete in the only way they can: by specialisation in a particular content type.
There are other ways, obviously, as WH Smith has started to do recently, as their deal with Kobo looks far more to the future than simply making space in their stores for the hardware and their site for the eBooks by connecting with the largest eBook catalogue in the world. Again, the approach here is the re-gain the customers both through their stores as well as individual homes or offices (or wherever they’re using their computers).
In addition to adding eBooks to the shop, the other way a ‘high street’ operation can compete with the vast selection of titles offered on line is to install the Espresso Book Machine, something which has been around for a number of years now, and seems to arrived at an iteration which offers both decent-enough quality and reasonably good value for reader, store-owner, publisher and author alike. Next week I’ll babble about that here.
Next week will also see the announcement of winners in the two “get your book signed to you by the author!” contests, so head over to order your copies of Dirk Danger Loves Life and Terribilis today! This week is also your final opportunity to get both printed editions and eBooks on sale, so head to the Book Catalogue to fill your basket.
“This Week’s Fish Wrap” is an on-going series of posts summing up the news of the previous seven days in the publishing industry, and/or announce the latest news Atomic Fez has about the publishing house, and appears here each Monday. It’s also quite possible that the posts merely serve as a dumping ground of links so that Atomic Fez Proprietor Ian Alexander Martin can find articles later to include in his occasional rants about how ‘EVERYONEELSEISENTIRELYWRONG’ about various things.
(also available in 
) as being quite mad and highly entertaining, but you can pretty much find 
is damned good (even if he’s not published by Atomic Fez… yet).
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