Bad News: Another Series Bites the Dust.

[I. J. Parker]

Just got the news. It looks like I need a publisher again. I haven't quite absorbed the implications of this, and I'm sitting here looking rather foolishly at the notes for the nearly finished manuscript of novel number eight. Number seven is still unpublished, and I'm being told that I need to write a different series if I want to sell any more of my work. Pity poor Akitada, cut off before his prime.

Any publishers out there who'd like to continue the series???

[EDWARD C MORGAN]

What sad news. I'm disappointed as I really enjoyed the series. I'm sure my mother will be too! Hopefully, you'll find something.

I keep thinking about starting a publishing firm/small press. Might be able to pull it off with my contacts background - except that pesky distribution part.

Oh well.

[I. J. Parker]

Thank you, Clay.

[I. J. Parker]

Thank you, Naomi. I'm working on a number of titles and forms of publication.

[John Desjarlais]

That really stinks. It's all about the numbers, they say, and we all wish it wasn't so. Carry on. Work of your quality will find another home.

[I. J. Parker]

Thanks, John.

[Daniel Hatadi]

Sorry to hear about this, Ingrid. I completely second everything Steven Torres has to say on this. Best of luck!

[I. J. Parker]

Thank you, Daniel. This site is good to me and for me. So, thanks again.

[JackBludis]

I.J., I know what a bummer that is.

Been there, done that.

I suppose most of us will have to face the fact that the big publishers can't "afford" to make just a few bucks here and there when they can make gazillions by paying gamillions to the big fish who are always on the best seller lists, have a megahit now and then like Dan Brown or sell at a large and steady rate just below the NYTimes top thirty-five.

There are a growing number of very professional small companies who are doing a decent job selling books like ours.

Jack Bludis ...

(I don't mean to be a hack, it just comes out that way.)


The

[I. J. Parker]

Thanks, Jack. Actually, I've been there myself once before. Third time lucky or out? Yes, we're looking at small publishers.

[Karyn J. Powers]

Sorry to hear this, but it is their loss. You have the gift and will land with another publisher. Don't let the B@#$% get you down.

[I. J. Parker]

Right on! I tend to spell out "bastards." :) Penguin hasn't been too bad. I think they gave it a reasonable shot. I can't say that for my first publisher, though -- and that's where the trouble started.

Ultimately the problem is with the readers.

[JackBludis]

Woah, there I.J.. You say:

"Ultimately the problem is with the readers?"

I can't follow you there. If we write the best book we can and the reader can't find it through the advertising for the big guys and the tons of new writers who seem to be published every day, don't blame it on the reader.

I think the real culprit is modern marketing. Many of us are doing the same things from a marketing standpoint: getting on forums like cimespace and on lists like 4_MA and DorothyL to chat up books and writing in general, talking up our books and giving them to significant readers, going to conventions when we can afford them, etc. That all helps, but a reader can't buy and read everyone's book. Far more writers are doing that today than twenty years ago.

If some don't find our books or read them and don't like them, it may not be the kind of book for them. If some read them and love them, it may be just their kind of book they want. Between we writers and some publishers, there is enough blame to go around without blaming the readers ... Or maybe you'd like to explain that further?

Jack Bludis