Word: paperbacks
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...surplus is remaindered-sent back to the publisher, who is lucky to get 300 a copy from the remainder bookstores, which deal in such wrong guesses. Multiplied many times over, this is the true picture of the adult book business which, except for the appearance of the paperback, has not changed its ways appreciably in 50 years...
...printing plants, like Kingsport Press in Tennessee, one of the largest in the U.S. The sheer bulk of books retards their progress; jobbers have only so much storage, and can be poky about emptying their warehouses to make room for new consignments. To meet some topical demand, however, a paperback...
...unprecedented affluence for writers. A sale of 5,000 hard-cover copies at $5.95 will net the author only $2,975, at the royalty rate of 10% ; the percentage rises with book sales. This is not a great deal for a year or two of work. But paperback income-of which the author's share is 50% or more-can often amount to $20,000 even for a modest seller. And with successful books and name authors, five and six figures are common. Author James Jones got $800,000 against the paperback sales of three of his novels-none...
...that all that lettuce is not good for writers-besides being a lot of trouble for publishers. "Novelists are subsidized," says President Edward E. Booher of McGraw-Hill. "My trade editors have to run around constantly just to keep up with the big writers-getting big movie deals, big paperback deals. We pay them big money, and then we don't know whether their books are going to sell...
...choice of titles that Random House buys and in their dealings with authors. Cerf takes charge of important advertising campaigns-he even writes a few ads himself-and usually directs all important financial negotiations for his top authors. "In one month," he said recently, "I sold the paperback rights on three books for $1.7 million-Michen-er's The Source for $700,000, Capote's In Cold Blood for $500,000, and Kathleen Winsor's Wanderers East, Wanderers West for $500,000. Then a month later I sold O'Hara's The Lockwood Concern...