I’ve been writing books full-time since 1986 and, believe me, I know that publishing books is a business. I also realize that publishers have to give the public what it wants. (Recently that has been love struck vampires and young English magicians.) I admire authors who can write books that reach so many millions.
But as authors and publishers do we have an obligation to go beyond the profit line and expose wrongs, introduce new ideas, challenge conventional thinking, and confront the afflicted and afflict the comfortable?
When I began writing proposals, all that I needed to explain was the story that I wanted to write. Now authors are expected to include in a proposal who potential buyers will be. We are supposed to provide publishers with a list of successful books that are similar and discuss the best ways a book can be marketed. I’m not lazy and I don’t mind taking a guess at such things, but I suspect that most authors are clueless about marketing and simply want to write what they consider to be a good story.
The truth is that despite surveys, focus groups, and predictions, no one really knows which books will be a big hit and which will flop – and that includes marketing departments who appear to cast the deciding vote when it comes to book projects.
Bantam Books didn’t know what to do with The Hot House when I finished it because there weren’t any other books like it on the market. The publisher wasn’t certain who would buy it. The publisher of Prophet of Death, however, was confident that it would be a big hit because it was about a cult, religion, murder, and sex. The Hot House remains my best selling book, having recently surpassed 400,000 in paperback sales. Prophet of Death is long out of print and remains my least selling book. So much for marketing predictions!
I’m frustrated because I wanted to write a follow up to CRAZY about the number of persons on death row who have severe mental illnesses and the U.S. Supreme Court’s ridiculously low threshold for executing people who are clearly “insane.” I feel passionate about this subject because we are killing people in this country whose only real crime is that they got sick.
But none of the publishers I approached was interested. I was told that a book about mental illness and the death penalty was not marketable.
And then John Grisham wrote The Innocent Man: Murder and Injustice in a Small Town, and it became a mega best seller. What’s it about? A mentally unstable man who is wrongly convicted and sent to death row.
I’m certain my publishing friends would tell me that Grisham is so popular that he can write about any subject and it will sell. But I prefer to believe that good stories will sell regardless of who writes them and I wish that editors at publishing houses had a bit more faith in their own judgments than fretting about marketing studies and what has sold in the past.
When I worked for the Washington Post, I corrected a friend when he asked me what it was like to work for Katherine Graham, the then powerful publisher of the newspaper. I arrogantly stated that I did notwork for Ms. Graham. I worked for the public. That might seem niave, but it was how I felt. I was a public watchdog. I believed newspapers had a responsibility to the public.
My statement might have been arrogant, but I wish more publishers felt that way today.
http://www.amazon.com/Innocent-Man-Murder-Injustice-Small/dp/0385517238
http://www.deathpenaltyinfo.org/mental-illness-and-death-penalty
About the author:
About the author: Pete Earley is the bestselling author of such books as The Hot House and Crazy. When he is not spending time with his family, he tours the globe advocating for mental health reform.
