The No News is No News Purgatory Thread, Volume 8

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mayqueen

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ebooks are great. So many people are reading because of their ereaders.
Sorry I haven't been following this discussion as closely as I should be, but I agree with this. I don't understand why it seems so many in publishing are sitting on their hands lamenting the death of the book when they should get on the ebook bandwagon. I read so much more now that I have a Kindle. I'm a busy gal and the only library I go to regularly is an academic one. And now my public library does ebook checkouts!! It's amazing. Part of the whole reason I bought a Kindle was to checkout library books on it. Love it.


Also, I've been meaning to ask (as I prepare to do my taxes) - what kind of write-offs can I take? I've got a craft room I converted into my office and I plan to put 25% into a SEP IRA, but what else should I be thinking about? Or do you know of a website that's got a good summary of what I can write off last year and what I should be tracking going forward?
My accountant wants all of my renovation receipts for my home office (furniture, paint, flooring, etc). Did you do any of that to convert? All of your supplies, computers, etc. Internet, utilities. Then there's more, but that's for my side business which isn't writing. (I didn't make enough money writing this year. Maybe someday!) I love my accountant. Best money I spend all year.
 

CalebJMalcom

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bad bad day...
I decided to try to go in. I need the money. I stayed an hour before I left work. Got stuck in the snow.... Was stuck for 3 hrs and 45 minutes. I was working hard to get myself out and working hard and working hard but was getting no where... When it is falling 3" an hour it's a losing battle.... Plus wind. Plus plow trucks blocking me in with snow. At the 3 hr 25 minute mark I fucking lost it. I've never in my life broke down like that but I just got back in my car and started screaming and sobbing for a good ten minutes. Finally got home and couldn't even get into my own driveway due to all the snow.... My car is parked somewhere between the street and the driveway at the moment. I just don't have the will to continue to try to get it all the way in my drive. I'm going to go lay down now. Sorry for this I just need to put this somewhere where with people that are important. I'll be fine in a little bit.
 

mayqueen

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((((((((((Caleb))))))))))) I'm so sorry. That sounds so, so frustrating.
 

xiaotien

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caleb. =( *gives treat*
so sorry you are going through
such a rough time.

QUESTION: if i'm describing from
hero's pov and i say "She was four years old,
the youngest sister among five siblings"
would the hero be included as part
of the five?

i don't know why this confuses me
but IT DOES. i want him to be from
a family of five brothers and sisters.
[FONT=&quot][/FONT]
 

Rick

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(((Caleb))) Get some rest and deal with everything after some shut eye.
 

Amarie

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Caleb, what Rick said. Being tired and cold makes everything seem worse.

QUESTION: if i'm describing from
hero's pov and i say "She was four years old,
the youngest sister among five siblings"
would the hero be included as part
of the five?

i don't know why this confuses me
but IT DOES. i want him to be from
a family of five brothers and sisters.

Could you just add in a "the"?
"She was four years old,
the youngest sister among the five siblings"
 

Rick

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Digital sales are up significantly, but I still sell the vast majority in hardcover.
That's surprising. I would have thought eBook sales would be much higher than HC due to the price. Was there a big difference in price between your HC and eBook or roughly the same?

Rick, I'm not sure authors can even find out preorder numbers. Anyone else know?
I was thinking of whatever you could gleam from Amazon's Author Central. (I don't have an account and I suspect I won't be able to get one until my book is available for pre-order? Or has an ISBN-thingy assigned?)

I figure most pre-orders would be through Amazon and B&N, and I'm okay at being able to monitor what Amazon's tracking. (I thought they also track all Bookscan sales, in addition to theirs.) Also, someone told me you can't even see eBook sales on Amazon, just paperback. That's bizarre.

you could try asking your agent
to ask your publisher, rick. and i have
no idea what is considered good, alas.
if you mean from BN?
Both Amazon and B&N if I can do that. I figure that would give me a decent idea of how things are going. Also, I've read that pre-orders count as 1st week sales, but I've read conflicting discussions on whether you can see pre-orders as they come in or just when they hit the first week. Also that pre-orders get counted when they ship, so if Amazon ships early, they don't count in the first week sales. (I'm just trying to figure all this crap out to determine at what point I make a major push for sales. If I bug people 3 months before the book goes on order, I figure some of them will punt, being so far out, and then forget to buy it. Right now I'm thinking to start pushing hard and take some time off from work 1 month prior to Release. But I've also heard that pre-sales can affect the size of the print run, if you don't have enough or do really well, so starting late would be a bad thing. Aaaaargh!)

I should just buckle down and ask Agent and Editor, but it's still really far out and I don't want to bug them. Ever since Dream Agent kicked me to the curb without an explanation, I've been worried it was because I came across as too high maintenance. (I kept bugging her about the R&R.) So I've decided to be ultra-low maintenance for Agent and Editor. I've only emailed Editor once, and that was to reply to his welcome aboard email, and I think I emailed Agent maybe 5 times last year. I'm just skittish about being high maintenance with lots of questions. I'm sure they'll be answered in time, but I'd feel better if I had a rough idea earlier rather than later.

I deduct all my home office expenses and my cell phone. Some writers deduct all the books they buy in any genre but I've never been that brave. I just deduct the ones in the genres I write.
Books in my genre - great!

I can deduct cell phone? What portion? (I have several lines and a 10GB share plan.)

My accountant wants all of my renovation receipts for my home office (furniture, paint, flooring, etc). Did you do any of that to convert? All of your supplies, computers, etc. Internet, utilities.
I did the conversion several years ago (Brett's therapy room into a Craft Room after we stopped), so I don't know if I can claim expenses from another year.

I think the "home office" deduction deducts a portion of my utilities (relative to home office / house square footage). I hadn't thought about Internet and phone.
 

Amarie

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I can't answer the whole preorder thing. I think Blond is a resident expert on what to do when.

I deduct my entire cell phone, because I really only use it to connect to the internet and check my emails. (I refuse to learn to text and I I don't chat on the phone with anyone.)
 

xiaotien

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rick, i've not heard of any authors
getting preorders from amazon and
bn online. only bn ordered into stores.
also, it is WAY too early for you to ask
about buy in.

and you have to remember, both blondie
and i write YA. (or i did, ha!) majority of
kids still take cash into a book store to
browse shelves and buy.

my ebook sales figure for less than 3% of
total sales. little change between 2009 and
2011 release. (tho the latter sold a lot less.)

in YA, you do begin to sell more ebooks
if you are successful--garnering more adult
attention as well as linkage on the sites.
 

dawinsor

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I thought some significant percentage of YA sales were to schools and libraries, which is why they came out in hardcover. Not true?
 

K. Taylor

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Rick, you can create an Author Central account at any time - it just won't have anything to list if a book isn't out. You can link Twitter and blog feeds to the AC, though, so there would be some content.

As for taxes, I deduct all my office supplies of pens and paper and stuff, and in the past I deducted the cost of my netbook and my desk bought new. I also deduct all my covers and stock images bought. Here's one article on taxes. This one, too. And this. You want to make sure you only take deductions for things you use in your career to avoid the risk of being audited. Keep all receipts, because you not only enter the amount spent but the date purchased on some items. I log everything in a notebook. I've also seen recommended that married writers dedicate a credit card to writing expenses only, as a "business" card, to make it easier for you to keep track and keep it separate from your household expenses.

For 2013, you'll be able to make deductions for your job hunt.
 
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Amarie

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I thought some significant percentage of YA sales were to schools and libraries, which is why they came out in hardcover. Not true?

true, but some publishers split their books into what they want to push for the school and library market and what they want to push to the general public. I could tell you a rant story about that, but not in public. PM me if you want to hear...
 

Roly

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and you have to remember, both blondie
and i write YA. (or i did, ha!) majority of
kids still take cash into a book store to
browse shelves and buy.

I believe that digital sales are more important for NA and possibly adult. I agree that YA still probably makes the bulk of its sales in the physical format, particularly for debuts, except perhaps if its more on the mature side (approaching NA).

(((Caleb))) That sounds awful. But maybe it's good that you 'lost it'? Sometimes you just need to have a good cry and get it out of your system. I agree with Rick, I'd just R&R for now.

Oh and re: YA HC Paperback, I know the S3lection and Sh@tt3r M3 came out as paperbacks originally. Both HC (specifically HT) titles.
 

xiaotien

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HI ROLY!

well, i definitely am upper YA and
it didn't make a dent as far as my ebook
sales. people say i'm crossover all the
time--but the truth of the matter is NO ONE
crosses over unless you are like g4iman.
you're stocked on multiple shelves.
listed on ebooks in multiple categories.

other authors don't get that luxury.
esp midlist ones like myself.

daw, true and not true. not all
YA books get picked up by libraries.
esp given budgets and how many
are published each year. and i don't
think i'm carried in many schools at all.

not sure about blondie or other YA authors.

it really does depend.

and yes, they often see you as Library OR Commercial.
you can't be both.
 

K. Taylor

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Yeah, different genres have a higher percentage of e-book readers. Romance was the first to adopt e-books in volume, so those sales are important for us.

(((Caleb)))
 

Parametric

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Ms Coffee is staying over for the first time on Saturday night. *afeared*
 

xiaotien

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para, wheeeeeeeeeee!!!!!!!

have a wonderful romangical time! <3

have you had The Talk yet? are you a couple?????

cindy, always nosy =D
 

Blondchen

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true, but some publishers split their books into what they want to push for the school and library market and what they want to push to the general public. I could tell you a rant story about that, but not in public. PM me if you want to hear...

If you can get on an ALA or YALSA list, it'll boost your library sales. When I made the Top Ten BFYA List, my library orders doubled in just a few weeks (you can obsessively perv over that via worldcat.org). Otherwise, just as with everything else in YA, the publishers push only certain titles at the ALA conventions, and despite making that list I've been told, yet again, that I will not be signing there this year.

As for pre-orders, I honestly think that's out of your control. B&N, Azn and the big box stores order based on (a) how their buyers feel your book will do, (b) what your publisher's sales and marketing department tells them how they think your book will do, and (c) the general sales in your market/genre. Services like Baker & Taylor can give you an idea what those pre-orders are, but it's not all-inclusive.

Besides, those aren't actual book sales. If B&N orders, say, 10k copies of your book, you might sell out or you might have 6k in returns that go back to your publisher six months later (thus royalty statements with negative balances). Not only that, but if you do sell out at B&N, it doesn't necessarily mean they will reorder your book the second the warehouse is empty. Certain books are coded for automatic reorder (so there is literally always a copy in every store at any time) while the vast majority of books will only be reordered if a customer asks for it. And since more often than not, when someone can't find a book on a shelf in a B&N they'll order it from Azn instead, the point is practically moot.

Book sales are not like movie box offices where you MUST make the majority of your money opening weekend because sales will fall off dramatically after that. You want your book to have legs: a spike sales the first month followed by steady sales in the next 6-9. Big reviews, award nominations and general word-of-mouth all help.

I think I got side-tracked. Not even sure I actually answered your question, Rick! HAHAHAHAHA.
 

JoNightshade

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Rick, I've got my amazon author central thing set up. I have ONE PREORDER! Possibly TWO! And neither one is from my mom, either! :)

I am finally biting the bullet and hiring someone to clean my house once a week. I did this after Sharkbite was born and... well, from the state of the house recently it seems like something that has become necessary again. Doing this is so weird - in the space of a few hours today I got like twenty applicants, everything from people with college degrees to students to people who clearly don't speak English. I ended up just going with the first one to respond, since she lives in town. Here's my favorite one, though:

Hello saw ur add and i would love the chance of sum extra cash give me a call if u steel need a person to clean

I'm definitely willing to overlook creative spelling, but "Hey gimme that job cuz I need some cash" just, uh... yeah, that doesn't work for me. :)
 

Blondchen

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Oh and re: YA HC Paperback, I know the S3lection and Sh@tt3r M3 came out as paperbacks originally. Both HC (specifically HT) titles.

I'm not sure. The cover redesign on Sh@tter Me was for the paperback, but I know the original release in November 2011 was in HC.
 

Tasmin21

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Spent about an hour and a half total, shoveling the first 10 inches of snow, and finished just in time for it to start snowing again. *sigh*
 

Rick

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Para - fingers crossed for you! Have a great time!

(((Tas)))
Snow-shovel-shovel-frozen-freeze-smiley-emoticon-000799-large_zps73308e66.gif


it is WAY too early for you to ask about buy in.
What do you mean by "buy in"?

As for pre-orders, I honestly think that's out of your control. B&N, Azn and the big box stores order based on...
I meant to refer to pre-orders by customers, not book stores. I heard that if there are a lot of pre-orders (or not enough), the publisher may adjust the print run. If that's true, what's the latest time before Release that the publisher will take a look and reassess print run (either up or down)? This is probably a question for Agent and Editor, but some of you might know.

ETA: Or was the article referring to pre-orders by the big book chains, and I misunderstood?

Rick, I've got my amazon author central thing set up. I have ONE PREORDER! Possibly TWO! And neither one is from my mom, either! :)
WOOT! for sales.
 
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