101 Ways To Shoot Yourself In Your Own Foot...
I’ve often waxed lyrical on how much I admire author bloggers who are up-front and to the point, but never in a month of Sundays would I expect an author to go to these lengths.
Sandra Scoppetone, is a mystery writer who’s editor has decided to quit the business. Sandra is devastated by this fact, and wonders who her new editor will be, and whether or not, she’ll be offered a new contract. This is what she writes:
“This doesn’t put paid to my earlier anxieties as everything I worried about still applies and in fact adds to my worries. Who will my new editor be, if I’m going to have one?
Not to insult anyone, but this editor is the last of a certain breed…a gentleman and a man of experience. I don’t know for sure, but I’d say he’s in his early fifties. He mentioned the possibility of one editor and I asked how old the person was. Twenty-nine.
I know any editor is probably going to be younger than I, but twenty-nine? He/she could be even younger, not only at this publishing house but almost everywhere. I’m not saying an editor of that age has to be horrible, in fact I know that someone so young could be the best editor I’ve ever had. Still, it gives me pause.”
She’s just basically announced to the world that she hopes that her new editor wont be a young know-it-all twenty something.
Now what would happen if her future twenty-something editor should read this entry?
An anonymous commentator lets her know exactly what she/he thinks about her honesty.
“Sandra, I'm a first-time reader of your blog--arrived through a link of an old favorite, GalleyCat--and I have been looking through your archives with interest.
I thoroughly sympathize with your anxiety about whether or not your publishers will offer you a new contract. However, I wonder whether you realize how far you've gone in making sure that they do NOT do so. In one post or another, you've insulted the art department, the copyeditor, your own editor, and the company itself. You haven't restrained yourself to making specific substantive complaints, either, but have gone on to imply nasty things about intelligence, general competence, and so on.
In other words, you've gone some distance towards making yourself look like what editors call a nightmare author, the kind of person who makes coming into work every day a burden rather than a pleasure.
Of course, if you're John Grisham or Dan Brown, you can be as nightmarish as you like, and it won't affect your contract. But if your numbers are only mediocre, then you've put yourself in a bit of a fix: you're now in a position where your publishers are looking for an excuse to drop you, rather than fighting for the chance to keep you on. In other words, if your sales aren't strong enough to overcome all the other negatives involved in dealing with you, then you may indeed be looking for a new publisher soon.”
Pow, take that beeotch!
This was the start of a bitchfest of sorts, go and have a look for yourself, it makes for interesting reading anyway.
That’s enough procrastinating for me, I’m working late tonight, and I want to go home sometime tonight. Anybody know any nice non-hotel meeting venues in Downtown/midtown New York?
Sandra Scoppetone, is a mystery writer who’s editor has decided to quit the business. Sandra is devastated by this fact, and wonders who her new editor will be, and whether or not, she’ll be offered a new contract. This is what she writes:
“This doesn’t put paid to my earlier anxieties as everything I worried about still applies and in fact adds to my worries. Who will my new editor be, if I’m going to have one?
Not to insult anyone, but this editor is the last of a certain breed…a gentleman and a man of experience. I don’t know for sure, but I’d say he’s in his early fifties. He mentioned the possibility of one editor and I asked how old the person was. Twenty-nine.
I know any editor is probably going to be younger than I, but twenty-nine? He/she could be even younger, not only at this publishing house but almost everywhere. I’m not saying an editor of that age has to be horrible, in fact I know that someone so young could be the best editor I’ve ever had. Still, it gives me pause.”
She’s just basically announced to the world that she hopes that her new editor wont be a young know-it-all twenty something.
Now what would happen if her future twenty-something editor should read this entry?
An anonymous commentator lets her know exactly what she/he thinks about her honesty.
“Sandra, I'm a first-time reader of your blog--arrived through a link of an old favorite, GalleyCat--and I have been looking through your archives with interest.
I thoroughly sympathize with your anxiety about whether or not your publishers will offer you a new contract. However, I wonder whether you realize how far you've gone in making sure that they do NOT do so. In one post or another, you've insulted the art department, the copyeditor, your own editor, and the company itself. You haven't restrained yourself to making specific substantive complaints, either, but have gone on to imply nasty things about intelligence, general competence, and so on.
In other words, you've gone some distance towards making yourself look like what editors call a nightmare author, the kind of person who makes coming into work every day a burden rather than a pleasure.
Of course, if you're John Grisham or Dan Brown, you can be as nightmarish as you like, and it won't affect your contract. But if your numbers are only mediocre, then you've put yourself in a bit of a fix: you're now in a position where your publishers are looking for an excuse to drop you, rather than fighting for the chance to keep you on. In other words, if your sales aren't strong enough to overcome all the other negatives involved in dealing with you, then you may indeed be looking for a new publisher soon.”
Pow, take that beeotch!
This was the start of a bitchfest of sorts, go and have a look for yourself, it makes for interesting reading anyway.
That’s enough procrastinating for me, I’m working late tonight, and I want to go home sometime tonight. Anybody know any nice non-hotel meeting venues in Downtown/midtown New York?
posted by Karen Scott at
7:52 pm
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