The book business as we know it will not be living happily ever after. With sales stagnating, CEO heads rolling, big-name authors playing musical chairs, and Amazon looming as the new boogeyman, publishing might have to look for its future outside the corporate world.
Ominous words coming from respected magazine, New York. With the publishing industry flailing, a writer has got to question her future. Let’s just forget for a moment, the challenges of finding let alone the right agent, but any agent at all. Then there is the query letter, and the waiting. All of that, considering you have your book written first. The challenges facing a struggling writer in the beginning of their career are steep, and that is under the best of conditions.
So, what does this mean for struggling writers and the publishing industry? It seems that there is a spike in celebrity book deals. I have no statistical data to support this, only my observations from my daily morning online meandering. James Franco has just signed with Simon & Schuster to release a collection of short stories. That’s just the beginning. In 2008, as the economic crisis that has challenged the publishing industry loomed, Miley Cyrus signed a seven figure book deal with Disney. At least James Franco is an MFA candidate studying creative writing at NYU and Columbia. Miley Cyrus is 15 and famous because her daddy had an achy-breaky-heart back in the 1980’s (although it must have got fixed sometime in the 1990’s). Is it possible to still take the craft seriously when there are thousands of talented writers out there who are sending short after short to literary magazines, searching for an agent, and hoping for any advance at all, while Miss Cyrus gets a million dollars for her memoirs?
Let’s not forget Britney Spears’ $20 Million book deal to spill all of the sordid details of her recent crazy years. Excuse me, but that is not literature, it’s voyeurism…and not very well cloaked. What about Kanye West? Or Paris Hilton? Or Kathy Griffin? Or even Sarah Palin? Musicians, actors, politicians…it seems anyone but a writer can get a book deal these days.
Is this really the way to save the publishing industry; by offering celebrities who already blog, Twitter, star in YouTube videos, films and television, appear on news and talk shows, and are the topic of paparazzi and media everywhere seven or eight figure book deals to write their memoirs?
Of course, I am biased considering that I am a “struggling writer” and not a celebrity. I understand why the publishing industry is increasing its affinity with celebrities. They come with a built in audience, just waiting to spend their allowances on the next unauthorized Lindsay Lohan tell-all.
But what of the struggling writer then? Where will the future of publishing take us? To the Internet? Vanity publishing and self-promotion? Is this just the right moment for writers to take reins away from powerhouse publishers by getting wise to the opportunities offered by services like Amazon (e.g. Kindle, CreateSpace), blogs, online lit mags, and a new generation of news media like the Huffington Post? No one knows for sure, not even the publishing industry. One thing is for certain; enough with the celebrity book deals.
Jennifer Astle 