An abundance of Roman novels!

[Nathan Ross]

You are too generous to traditional publishers.

I know I am! But for all the annoyances of the wonky world that publishers have created to suit themselves, there are still benefits to traditional print houses.

(This is a digression from the point of the thread, I know, but I'll apologise in advance and keep it brief!):

While ebook publishing offers a tempting route for those tired of being rejected by the fickle print houses, for every genuinely great novel turned down for reasons of ignorance, lack of imagination or the vagaries of fashion, several more do actually get through (several of those I mentioned above, for example). With an ebook, the only earnings an author can make will be on royalties for direct sales, and even with the generous terms offered by ebook publishers, unless they sell a very large number they're unlikely to make much more than pocket money. Considering that they'll probably have had to pay a professional independent editor, and do all their own marketing and publicity, this isn't much of an incentive to write and continue writing good books.

Trad publishers, on the other hand, offer free editorial and proofreading (albeit of varying quality), marketing (likewise) and distribution. Most of them make their money on a very small number of titles, usually popular bestsellers, celebrity biographies or whatever. But the majority them use some of these earnings to pay advances to new writers - often not very big advances, admittedly (although I know a couple of novelists who got quite eyebrowraising amounts!), but with an industry support structure to help sell their books it enables them, potentially at least, to begin working as professionals, write more books and in time make a living from what they do.

Without this support, and quality control, writing novels could turn into an activity for amateurs, a weekend hobby. Good books would still be written, but all but a lucky few would be lost in the torrents of garbage poured out by online publishers, who would be the only ones making any real money out of the arrangement. I know this sounds harsh, but I do believe that a system that treats writers as professionals and books as (at least theoretically) quality items rather than ephemera must surely be of benefit to the reading public and culture alike.

Anyway, enough of that :wink:

Is Iggulden writing Roman again? Good to hear!

I don't know, I'm afraid. I only mentioned him as perhaps one of the founders of the current wave of Roman adventure story writers!