Word: paperbacks
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Mario Puzo is indeed "The Godfather of the Paperback Boom" [Aug. 28]. Who else but the expert novelist could write so much yet so little about something he's never personally experienced? If I could do as much, I too would be a millionaire. Hats...
...show-biz approach was inevitable as the paperback business grew: some of the largest paperback houses belong to conglomerates with movie and television interests. In addition, inflation has pushed the cost of paperbacks higher than the average for most commodities, demanding more aggressive salesmanship. In the past six years the cover price of a rack-size book has jumped 77%, from an average of 930 to $1.65. The consumer price index for the same period rose 44.8%. Where will it end? Inflation is not likely to vanish and neither is the desire of publishers to secure bigger blockbusters. This...
Last year Bantam Books President Oscar Dystel spread a little gloom among his colleagues when he cautioned that net unit sales?the actual number of. paperback books sold?have remained fairly static since 1973, William R. Grose, editor in chief of Dell, takes a grimmer view. "I used to think there was a ceiling on paperback rights. Now I don't know. The consumer is the one who pays for all this nonsense, and the consumer doesn't seem to have balked. Everyone you talk to will say it's an unhealthy situation, but no one knows what...
...even though costs are spiraling, a paperback remains an exceptional entertainment value. As one reviewer once put it, "Shogun is a summer vacation." So are most other bestsellers. The trick is to book readers into the right vacation. N.A.L. hopes to sell more than 10 million copies of Fools Die and their edition of The Godfather. There are already 13 million paperback copies of the Mafia classic in print...
...million, minus legal expenses, for Earthquake, and $350,000 plus 5% of the gross on Superman I and II, the forthcoming spectaculars about The Man of Steel. On top of this, Puzo will earn $250,000 in increments and a gross percentage for his treatment for Godfather III. The paperback millionaire estimates that in the past ten years he has made at least $6 million from his books and movies. Before Godfather, his combined income from two previous novels amounted...