Well, he’s not helping my bottom line … but Merry Christmas to all!
Rosenstern and Gildencrantz
I’ve been working with Laura on the second novel in the Drakis series — tentatively titled ‘Citadels of the Lost.’ Occasionally, I’ve felt a little lost myself as there were three characters who had come along for the ride from the previous novel. They were members of Urulani’s crew — sea raiders from the southern coast of Thetis Bay whom Drakis had convinced to take him north across the ocean in order to disprove his destiny.
Well, now we’re journeying through this second book and it’s absolutely fabulous — except for these three characters. Their names are Djono the Giant, Lucrasae and Kendai, the sailing master. Now don’t get me wrong, they are perfectly nice characters — but I had begun to think of them collectively as Rosencrantz and Gildenstern or, worse, Rosenstern and Gildencrantz.
The reason behind my bizarre thoughts concerning these otherwise respectable characters is that while they had some nice things to do and say in the first novel and even though their presence in the second novel makes a certain kind of logic — they had become ‘baggage’ — characters who you drag through the book even though they serve no dramatic or story function, represent no particular necessary viewpoint and are, for the lack of a better phrase, dead weight.
The immediate impulse it so turn dead weight into dead meat: just kill them off and be done with them, but that hardly seems fair. I mean, it isn’t their fault that the plot doesn’t concern them all that much and that the author is trying to shoehorn dialogue into their mouths just to justify their existence.
So, this means a rewrite — going through ALL the chapters to date and figuring out how to expunge them from the tale. Interestingly, the moment I wrote their now exit rather than inclusion near the front of the book … EVERYTHING IMPROVED. The plot got tighter, the motivations got clearer, the dialogue was snappier and everything made more sense. So, now I only have to go through the remaining chapters and, using the same crowbar I used to place them INTO the story, forcibly remove them so that the story is solid throughout, moving and strong.
Goodbye Rosenstern and Gildencrantz — and that third guy — whoever you were. Take comfort that I didn’t kill you outright but let you live an unheralded life off the stage of our story.
THE WORLDS THAT OUTGREW THEIR STORIES
Two Roads to Intellectual Property Success
Phil Athans, former Wizards of the Coast editor of both Dragonlance and Forgotten Realms, has just published an article on ‘Intellectual Properties’ (IPs) and how they related to the creators original vision called ‘The Worlds that Outgrew their Stories’ for the online ‘Grasping for the Wind: Science Fiction and Fantasy Book News and Reviews’. It includes commentary by Ed Greenwood and myself on the subjects of Forgotten Realms and Dragonlance.
Embrace Life
My father just sent me this video from the UK … and I just could not wait to share it with you.
Babies for Mother’s Day
As a special thanks on this upcoming Mother’s Day here in the United States, I wanted to share this with you…
This is from the movie ‘Babies’ being released this weekend. I’m looking forward to it!
The McMillan – Amazon War
There is an important battle being waged right now in the intellectual properties arena over ebooks. There’s a lot at stake here and while it revolves around money, it also deeply may affect the quality of the book you read … or may not get to read at all.
It all started when a quiet, private little battel erupted into a public one this weekend, as reported in the Huffington Post:
Amazon.com Pulls Macmillan Books From Site In E-Book Price Dispute
NEW YORK — New copies of Hilary Mantel’s “Wolf Hall,” Andrew Young’s “The Politician” and other books published by Macmillan were unavailable Saturday on Amazon.com, a drastic step in the ongoing dispute over e-book prices.
Macmillan CEO John Sargent said he was told Friday that its books would be removed from Amazon.com, as would e-books for Amazon’s Kindle e-reader. Books will be available on Amazon.com through private sellers and other third parties, Sargent said.
Sargent met with Amazon officials Thursday to discuss the publisher’s new pricing model for e-books. He wrote in a letter to Macmillan authors and literary agents Saturday that the plan would allow Amazon to make more money selling Macmillan books and that Macmillan would make less. He characterized the dispute as a disagreement over “the long-term viability and stability of the digital book market.”
Macmillan and other publishers have criticized Amazon for charging just $9.99 for best-selling e-books on its Kindle e-reader, a price publishers say is too low and could hurt hardcover sales, which generally carry a list price of more than $24.
Macmillan is one of the world’s largest English-language publishers. Its divisions include St. Martin’s Press, itself one of the largest publishers in the U.S.; Henry Holt & Co., one of the oldest publishers in America; Farrar, Straus & Giroux; and Tor, the leading science-fiction publisher.
Sargent credited Amazon in his letter, calling the company a “valuable customer” and a “great innovator in our industry.”
But, he wrote, the digital book industry needs to create a business model that provides equal opportunities for retailers. Under Macmillan’s model, to be put in place in March, e-books will be priced from $12.99 to $14.99 when first released and prices will change over time.
For its part, Amazon wants to keep a lid on prices as competitors line up to challenge its dominant position in a rapidly expanding market. The company did not immediately return messages seeking comment Saturday.
Then the Huffington Post reported that Amazon.com had just posted a notice saying that they, rather gruppily, were waving the white flag;
Dear Customers:
Macmillan, one of the “big six” publishers, has clearly communicated to us that, regardless of our viewpoint, they are committed to switching to an agency model and charging $12.99 to $14.99 for e-book versions of bestsellers and most hardcover releases.
We have expressed our strong disagreement and the seriousness of our disagreement by temporarily ceasing the sale of all Macmillan titles. We want you to know that ultimately, however, we will have to capitulate and accept Macmillan’s terms because Macmillan has a monopoly over their own titles, and we will want to offer them to you even at prices we believe are needlessly high for e-books. Amazon customers will at that point decide for themselves whether they believe it’s reasonable to pay $14.99 for a bestselling e-book. We don’t believe that all of the major publishers will take the same route as Macmillan. And we know for sure that many independent presses and self-published authors will see this as an opportunity to provide attractively priced e-books as an alternative.
Kindle is a business for Amazon, and it is also a mission. We never expected it to be easy!
Thank you for being a customer.
And so round one goes to McMillan — and every Kindle-user on the planet should be grateful that McMillan won.
I know that sounds crazy on the face of it but the truth is that ebook pricing was threatening primarily the livelyhoods of authors like me. Since ebooks do not require warehousing or physical shipping (they’re just a file, how much space or maintainance does that take per title?) you would think that they should be less expensive to distribute. True enough.
But the value in a book doesn’t lie in whether it is made of leather, paper, glue or just digital code: the real value in the book is in the story, the ideas, the journey and the meaning that those words elicite from the reader. It doesn’t matter whether you’re drawn into those words through ink on a page or digits on a screen — the value is in the meaning of the message not the medium.
Ebooks are cheaper to warehouse and distribute but by cheapening the costs to recieve that experience the PERCEPTION has been that books across the board have been devalued as well.
Amazon wants to establish the Kindle as their own market monopoly … I can understand that. They want to make their ebooks sell at bargain prices. I can understand that, too. But when their zeal to sell their Kindle product makes it impossible for my publisher — and by extention me — to make a living off our words and stories … then story itself suffers.
Like my local pizza chain says in their advertising: “You can buy a cheaper pizza … but then you have to eat it.”
Giant Leap Sideways for the iPad
The media is all abuzz this morning about Apple’s announcement of the iPad. This latest example of chrome-laden technology is being touted as a ‘magical and revolutionary device at an unbelievable price.’ Cue trumpets.
While I, too, was initially drawn like a moth to the pretty, pretty lights and shiny, moving pictures I quickly began to reflect on the actual usefulness of this device compared to things we already have … like netbooks, laptops, Apple’s own iPhone or iPod or for that matter … that established technology of books.
My conclusion was that with our economy such as it is and everyone trying to find new ways of cutting back, the iPad feels odd. It’s wi-fi capable but to get the full impact of the device I’m going to need to subscribe to AT&T’s G-3 network — and can I really afford another subscription right now? On top of that, I’m still going to have to pay for the book once I have the device. It will delivered directly to my device and instantly in my hands — but do I really want to pay the $500+subscription rates just because I can’t wait a day or two for the actual book?
Everyone in the publishing industry has been holding their breath waiting for this announcement by Apple — it has yet to be seen whether consumers who already have these same capabilities in notebooks, netbooks and smartphones will flock to the ‘dream’ that is iPad. Apple wants you to believe that the iPad is THE way to get your news and information … man, I can certainly understand why they want you to believe that … but I just think it’s blinding chrome and hype. Having just painfully awakened to the hangover given us from the age of ‘I want ergo I get’ … do we really NEED this?
Not only that, but in an effort to slice the pie into the smallest of proprietary pieces, I understand that the browser on the iPad is NOT flash compatible. This means that the browser will not play well with others on the internet. Think you’ll be watching television programming from such places on the internet as Hulu or Youtube? Think again. Apparently you can play in Apples back yard only with toys you buy at Apple.
As for me, the entire thing feels like a giant leap sideways for mankind — new technology that adds more expense and complication to our lives without significantly improving the experience itself. I am a big believer in new media and I’m exploring the realms of e-books as a paradigm for future publishing. I’m sure my books will be available soon on the iPad … but I just don’t see it as a threat to all other means of reading that it is being heralded to be.
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