4 ms·
The Accidental Bestseller (2014)
- m3kw9 9y ago“Rinker sold Goodnight, Goodnight, Construction Site to Chronicle for a $4,000 advance. The title has been on the New York Times list for three years, with more than 850,000 copies in print and rights sold into 23 territories.” Seems like a lot of the writers got hosed
- greesil 9y agoI don't think you do writing to become wealthy, and I also think they get royalties.
- pinewurst 9y agoThe advance is just front money. There's definitely a standard royalty.
- hyperpallium 9y agoJust to elaborate on other comments: an "advance" is short for an "advance on royalties". So if the total royalties are less than the advance (pretty common BTW), they are said to have not "eaten out the advance" - and you don't get any more. If the royalties are greater, then you get them minus the advance (i.e. the royalties you already got). source: am writer
- billpollock 9y agoThere are undoubtedly royalties being paid as some (unknown) percentage of sales. The advance is essentially a loan against earned royalties. Publishers spread advances over numerous projects. The real money comes when a book sells well and the author earns royalties, unless that author is already a star and commands a very high advance like a former president, a sports star, movie star, and so on.
- jsperson 9y agoI always think about A Confederacy of Dunces. It's a great book that had a hard and somewhat tragic road to getting published. Then it won a Pulitzer Prize.
- leggomylibro 9y agoThat book is something else. Jones, Ms. Trixie, Gomez, Dorian... something about its cast of characters just perfectly captures the sheer absurdity of trying to make it through a day. And part of me wonders if Toole might not have written Ignatius out a hyperbole of the worst parts of how he saw himself. I mean, it sounds like the guy was probably depressed and disillusioned with the structure of the world he lived in.