The Authors Guild…
This organization should change its name. In spite of all the nice platitudes on its website, it’s not a union for authors. It doesn’t represent the majority of authors at all. What it has become is a tool the Big Five publishing conglomerates and their authors use to rant against self-publishing and independent small presses, the former being those who feel threatened by the latter (they’ve got theirs, so they don’t want any competition). It’s a bit like those old range wars between farmers and cattle ranchers or sheep ranches and cattle ranches. I can’t come up with an appropriate name for this group. Maybe EPAC? Yeah, that’s it: Endangered Publishers and Authors Club. Well, EPAC doesn’t control this blog, and, as a mongrel (both self- and traditionally published), I’m certain I know what’s wrong with publishing today: We authors, the creators, are smacked around far too much, and EPAC does nothing whatsoever to protect us.
Sure, in their glib platitudes, the Guild professes to work to minimize that “smacking around.” Dunno. Maybe they do for those already established authors who want more power to push the Big Five and their agents around for better contracts, but their presence I’ve seen in entirely different. And I don’t know what their problem is. Big Five conglomerates and the old formulaic mares and stallions in their stables have successively trampled on small-press authors for a long time, with the addition of self-published authors to their hit list only occurring in the last twenty-five years or so, corresponding to the advent of digital publishing. They have attempted to propagate the myths that their enemies produce badly written and badly edited books that don’t have the quality of Big Five books. (I rarely read the latter!)
Many Big Five authors are generally vocal about that (for example, James Patterson, the inventor of the book-writing assembly line—ever wonder why he needs Bill Clinton?). Of course, they’re all wrong. Now most self-published and small press books are better quality than Big Five book, from the former’s snazzy covers (some Big Five covers look like PowerPoint slides, others just cheap) to everything inside. Moreover, the Big Five has a bevy of sycophants like Kirkus and the NY Times Book Review to propagate these myths. Why do they need the Guild?
Agents bow to the Guild too, because most of them are just gatekeepers for the Big Five (even though neither they nor the Big Five acquisition editors can tell what MS will become a successful book any more than anyone else!). I’m turned off when a literary agency responds to a reasonable question by referring me to the Guild. In their defense, literary agents, by their own choosing (maybe to continue their parasitic existence?) have become the ham slices in a sandwich—the Big Five are one slice of bread, the Guild the other, and it’s all about keeping the bread coming. (Yeah, I know: that’s a mangled metaphor. But it’s all about bread, i.e. greed. Promoting creativity is far down the list of motivators for the Big Five.)
The Guild still pretends to be something like a union for all authors. I wish! Authors have no representation. Period. Publishers depend on authors, but the standard 15 or 20% royalties are a joke, especially when most publishers do very little to earn that 80 to 85%! I suppose some starry-eyed newbie authors still think they’ll help in marketing. Forget about it! Those full-page NY Times ads and TV promos for books are only for the old, dependable, but formulaic mares and stallions in the publishers’ stables. New authors get zilch for help in marketing…assuming they can even manage to get a publishing contract. Most traditional publishers expect their authors to do all the marketing to earn those meager royalties. And authors shouldn’t think self-publishing is the answer either. Amazon and Smashwords really don’t care if you’re successful. They make plenty of money from your paying for your book formatting and your ads. Amazon, for the most part, has forgotten they got their start from selling books. They love to sell toilet bowl cleaners, though.
The Guild is always on the wrong side of these issues. They go against any author who tries to buck the system! They can’t help authors in general, because they have a long tradition of not doing so…and have forgotten that without authors, publishing is nothing. Most all the dinosaurs in the EPAC are heading for extinction, though. I hope I live long enough to see it.
***
Comments are always welcome!
“Esther Brookstone Art Detective.” In this series, the reader will meet Esther Brookstone, ex-MI6 spy and Scotland Yard inspector working out of the Art and Antiques Division, and Bastiann van Coevorden, Interpol agent, who are twenty-first versions of the famous sleuths Miss Marple and Hercule Poirot, except that Esther is a bit more nimble and sexy and Bastiann a bit less flamboyant. In Rembrandt’s Angel, Esther becomes obsessed with recovering a painting stolen by Nazis in WWII. In Son of Thunder, her obsession is to find St. John the Divine’s tomb. In both novels, Bastiann tries to keep her on an even keel. Available in print and .mobi (Kindle) ebook format at Amazon and the publisher, Penmore Press, and in all ebook formats at Smashwords and all its affiliated retailers (iBooks, B&N, Kobo, etc.) and lending and library services (Scribd, Overdrive, Baker & Thomas, Gardners, etc.). Novel #3 is in the works.
Around the world and to the stars! In libris libertas!
