Pub Rants

Category: client books

Going Public

by Kristin Nelson

Status: Most of today I felt like I still had BEA brain. And the Brenda Novak Auction is ending tonight!


What’s Playing on the XM or iPod right now? ROSEALIA by Better Than Ezra


Many weeks before several authors started making headlines about their choice to self-publish, my author Courtney Milan, with my blessing and support (not that she needed it!), had already made that decision. She walked away from an offer on the table from her publisher Harlequin. There were several reasons for this decision but it will come as no surprise that it mainly hinged on the electronic royalty rate that had been offered. It’s no industry secret that Harlequin is well below what has become the “industry standard.” And it’s also not a secret what I think about Publishers’ current industry standard of 25% of net.


What was secret is that Courtney didn’t announce it—until now. Today she launched this new publishing direction with a novella entitled UNLOCKED in her Turner Brothers series that began with Unveiled & Unclaimed which will release in September.


In four short days, I can already tell you two important things about this digital revolution.


1. Pricing is everything. Pricing a title appropriately will move a great number of books in a short period of time.


2. Publishers are under-reporting electronic book sales in any given period on the royalty statements we are seeing.

That’s a fact.

BEA Week

by Kristin Nelson

Status: It’s pouring rain in New York too. Is there anywhere where it’s not raining?


What’s Playing on the XM or iPod right now? WHATAYA WANT FROM ME by Adam Lambert


Dashing off in the next hour to head to Javits Center. It’s going to be a crazy week but I’ll try and report from the floor. I’m armed with my camera.


And some great news to kick it off. Kirkus lists the Top 26 Galleys to grab at the Fair and guess who is on it?


Heck yes!


In a totally unscientific sampling, I gave an ARC of this title to my 17 year old niece who loved it. She cajoled my 14 year old reluctant reader nephew to read it. He spent an entire day, while on spring break, away from playing his favorite video game because he couldn’t stop reading it.


There have only been two other books that did the same for him. ENDER’S GAME and the HUNGER GAMES trilogy.


This is how I know Marie and I might be on to something with this LEGEND trilogy so if you are at BEA, you might want to hit Marie’s signing on Wed. May 25 at 3 pm at Penguin’s booth #3252.


The last NLA book to be chosen as a top galley at BEA was SOULLESS by Gail Carriger.


This bodes well for us!


The Power Of Story

by Kristin Nelson

STATUS: Heading to Seattle today.

What’s playing on the XM or iPod right now? PERRY’S PLACE by Richard Underhill

When I was in St. Louis two weeks ago visiting family, my mom asked me if I wanted to go and catch a matinee movie. If you know my mom, you’ll know that she loves shoot ‘em up action films, mysteries, and thrillers. The more blood and guts, the better.

In general, not my cup of tea. But the point was to hang with Mom so I said, sure, and let her pick the film. For a matinee price, I can live with just about anything.

So off we went but she had gotten the movie start time wrong so as we sat down, the movie had already begun by a few minutes.

About 10 minutes later, I had a rather puzzled expression on my face and Mom asked what was up. The theater was almost empty so I leaned over and whispered, “I recognize this. This movie is based off of a short story.”

She shrugged as she didn’t know.

But I was right. It WAS based off of a short story—and one I hadn’t read in probably over 20 years.

The movie was The Adjustment Bureau starring Matt Damon and Emily Blunt–based on the short story by Philip K. Dick.

And that, folks, is the power of story. That after 20+ years, I still recognized it even though I hadn’t thought about it in years.

That’s what you want to achieve with your own writing. And speaking of Philip K. Dick, my author Sara Creasy has been nominated for the Philip K Dick Award for her debut SF novel SONG OF SCARABAEUS.

Why not check out the list and if you haven’t picked up one of these titles to read, why not? Editors are reluctant to acquire new SF authors because the sales numbers can’t compare to fantasy, so selling a debut SF writer is a tough biz (but I’m happy to report I just sold another debut SF author 3 months ago and gasp, a guy to boot!).

So if you love SF, do your part. Pick up one of these nominees.

Because It’s Cool!

by Kristin Nelson

STATUS: Enjoyed a quiet day because of the Passover holiday. I caught up on a lot of emails.

What’s playing on the XM or iPod right now? CUTS LIKE A KNIFE by Bryan Adams

If you have read HOTEL ON THE CORNER OF BITTER AND SWEET, you’ll know that in the front matter of the book, there is a picture of a Japanese girl circa 1942. She’s wearing a tag on her jacket and it’s implied that she is leaving for the internment camps.

It’s a powerful picture.

The week before last, Jamie was doing a reading/signing at Woodland Reads. He discovered that the young girl in the photo is still alive and lived nearby. So he invited Mae Yanagi to come and be his special secret guest.

And she did! Okay, I got a shiver just looking at the pics so here they are.

She stuck around and signed books with Jamie for the whole evening. How cool is that?

Ebooks Gone Wild

by Kristin Nelson

STATUS: I don’t know what to do with myself! I’m literally caught up on all queries, all sample pages, and I’ve responded to every full we’ve requested. Maybe I should just revel in the moment….

What’s playing on the iPod right now? SEX ON FIRE by Kings Of Leon

We are getting our latest round of royalty statements. Our biggest months are Feb/Aug and April/Oct.

All I can say is whoa. Who turned on the ebook sales? In five years, I’ve never seen numbers like I’m seeing from the past 3 or 4 months. Ereaders were THE gift this holiday season is what I’m thinking. About 6 months ago I said the tipping point was near. I think it’s here.

Almost Famous?

by Kristin Nelson

STATUS: TGIF! I have to say that today’s news is a totally new experience for me.

What’s playing on the XM or iPod right now? FAITHFULLY by Journey

OMG! I’m speechless.

And to quote Marie, “Is that my head in Times Square?????”

Uh…yep.

January Happenings

by Kristin Nelson

STATUS: Okay, two days without sunshine is one day too many here in Colorado. *grin*

What’s playing on the XM or iPod right now? LET’S STAY TOGETHER by Nick Driver

I finally get to talk about the excitement unfolding here at NLA. What a way to kick off the year.

Huge Congrats, Marie, as the news hits Deadline Hollywood and Variety and of course, this blog! Since we don’t have cover art for the first book yet, you’ll just have to look at a picture of Marie Lu instead.

Notice the articles don’t mention the literary agent or film co-agent who actually brokered the deal. LOL. Hollywood. We are so unimportant.

Friday Funnies

by Kristin Nelson

STATUS: Even though it’s Friday, I’ll probably be a little late in getting out of here tonight.

What’s playing on the XM or iPod right now? THE GREEN ROOM by Wayne Gratz

Although this isn’t a “funny” per se, it’s more like a cool item. One of NLA’s Australian clients, Cheryl Hingley, had her novel LA CREOLE adapted into a musical.

Here are excerpts from the performance at the Comedy Theater, Melbourne, Australia.

We are also happy to report that Cheryl’s application for a grant from the New Musicals Australia was accepted. How cool is that? Now the musical will go through workshops and a 40-minute fully-funded performance in Sydney this March 2011.

If you live Down Under (and I know I have plenty of readers in that country), you might want to check it out.

Fun Facts On NLA Clients—Take 5

by Kristin Nelson

STATUS: I think my telephone’s handset is permanently glued to my left ear. Way too much phone time over the last few days.

What’s playing on the XM or iPod right now? THE LOVECATS by The Cure

Wrapping up the fun facts tonight!

Mari Mancusi—It took me over two years to convince her publisher to buy the fourth book in the Blood Coven Vampire series. Then they did, repackaged the back list with new covers and now the series is doing great and we are up to having recently sold book eight!

Lisa Shearin—who has well over 100,000 copies in print for her Raine Benares series had a ton of passes while on submission for MAGIC LOST, TROUBLE FOUND because the editors didn’t like the “fun voice.” It wasn’t the “norm” in fantasy.

Shanna Swendson—Gets regular royalty checks for her Enchanted Inc. series even though the first book published more than 5 years ago. Talk about evergreen!

And I have a ton of other facts that will probably never see the light of day but this has been fun to recap.

More The Cure music on iLike

Fun Facts On NLA Clients—Take 4

by Kristin Nelson

STATUS: I have an auction unfolding later this week so busy busy.

What’s playing on the XM or iPod right now? DOG DAYS ARE OVER by Florence and The Machine

Kristina Riggle—literally lives on the street one block over from where my husband grew up in Michigan. Talk about a small world…

Sherry Thomas—English is Sherry’s second language. She didn’t start learning English until she was thirteen years old. If you’ve read her, you’ll know she has a beautiful way with language that’s really stunning.

Linnea Sinclair—came to me via a referral from the amazing Deidre Knight. How cool is that for a fellow agent to recommend an author to then to have that author have such a great career? Deidre and I toast it every time we get together.

Helen Stringer—has a gorgeous British accent and a little known fact is that she has a background in film/tv. This doesn’t happen often but she auditioned for and landed the narrator job to read her own novel SPELLBINDER for the audio book version. She’ll be doing THE MIDNIGHT GATE as well. So if you’ve listened to the books, you are actually hearing her. If you haven’t picked up the audio version, I highly recommend it.