Richard McGowan's Blog: Smashed-Rat-On-Press - Posts Tagged "lampshade"
More Zombification of Recently Deceased Authors
(Yes, Virginia, this is just another rant you can skip...)
The author was dead: to begin with. Dead. Dead. Dead...
She passed beyond mortal ken in 1973, which is more than forty years ago, so that isn't really very recent. In other words, she has no longer any demonstrable need to pay rent, eat, keep a roof over her head, raise her children, entertain herself by reading, or take part in any of the other myriad activities in which living people engage.
That is why I was so disappointed when, having just read that Miss Buncle's Book was one of someone's comfort books for cozy re-reading, I jumped up right away and went out to look for a copy.
Formerly, of course, the book was published in the dark ages--the 1930s, that is--in England, in hard cover, and if you could find one, the blogger assured me, it would cost you hundreds of dollars.
(I'm sorry to disappoint any authors out there, but if I'm going to spend hundreds of dollars for a single book, it had better be a limited edition and have the author's signature and thumb-print on the title page, in blood. Luckily these days even first editions of Miss Buncle's Book are going for merely $10 to $20, possibly because it's been re-published.)
Even if the book is as comfy as the blogger assures me it is, I have to wonder at the mentality of the publisher, who apparently must have inherited and thus own the copyright to the book, in putting it up for sale at $9.25 for the Kindle edition. Others in the series are similarly priced.
That's a lot for a pile of electrons, the mere ghost of the physical objects of decades past. I suppose it's true that someone had to (probably) scan a printed copy of the thing and produce the e-book edition, and I'm willing to pay for all that, of course. But for goodness sake, they didn't have to edit it. It was already published and went through that mill in the '30s. They did obviously pay a swanky cover designer, but they don't have to stock inventory, or deal with shipping, market heavily, or do any of the other publisher-like activities that are required for new books.
Maybe I'm a cheapskate, but: why on Earth would I pay $9.25 for the e-book edition of a book by a dead person when I could get a used paperback copy of the book for only $1.99?
The author, who is Dead you'll recall, will be just as well-served in her grave by me buying a used copy as she will if I buy a new e-book for $9.25.
That's why, if I were going out to buy a comfortable e-book for $9.25, I would probably just buy two e-books by a living author who could still use the cash. (Like L.B. Hathaway, as a random example.) Or I might pick up a couple of Lyn Hamilton titles; she's dead, too. (And I know someone scanned, not typed, at least the first of the Lara McClintoch mysteries because I've seen first-hand evidence of uncorrected OCR failures.)
Or I could buy a couple of cappucinos, pour one of those on the ground in honor of Seshat, then read something from Project Gutenberg. Or I could snag one of the gazillion free Kindle books by living authors who are so desperate to sell anything at all that they're giving away free samples on street corners, and then pour two cappucinos on the ground (because Saraswati likes coffee, too).
Nine or ten dollars for the electronic edition of a book published in 1936 by an author now dead? I don't think so. It just feels like somebody is trying to make out like a bandit by riding on her (now skeletal) coat-tails. One thing I will say for it: the cover of the new edition is rather beautiful and makes Miss Buncle look a lot more chic than one of the original covers did, so I hope the artist is being fairly compensated.
Rising from a mist within the door knocker, I can almost hear Marley's eerie voice wailing: "At least it's cheaper than an epipen!"
The author was dead: to begin with. Dead. Dead. Dead...She passed beyond mortal ken in 1973, which is more than forty years ago, so that isn't really very recent. In other words, she has no longer any demonstrable need to pay rent, eat, keep a roof over her head, raise her children, entertain herself by reading, or take part in any of the other myriad activities in which living people engage.
That is why I was so disappointed when, having just read that Miss Buncle's Book was one of someone's comfort books for cozy re-reading, I jumped up right away and went out to look for a copy.
Formerly, of course, the book was published in the dark ages--the 1930s, that is--in England, in hard cover, and if you could find one, the blogger assured me, it would cost you hundreds of dollars.
(I'm sorry to disappoint any authors out there, but if I'm going to spend hundreds of dollars for a single book, it had better be a limited edition and have the author's signature and thumb-print on the title page, in blood. Luckily these days even first editions of Miss Buncle's Book are going for merely $10 to $20, possibly because it's been re-published.)
Even if the book is as comfy as the blogger assures me it is, I have to wonder at the mentality of the publisher, who apparently must have inherited and thus own the copyright to the book, in putting it up for sale at $9.25 for the Kindle edition. Others in the series are similarly priced.
That's a lot for a pile of electrons, the mere ghost of the physical objects of decades past. I suppose it's true that someone had to (probably) scan a printed copy of the thing and produce the e-book edition, and I'm willing to pay for all that, of course. But for goodness sake, they didn't have to edit it. It was already published and went through that mill in the '30s. They did obviously pay a swanky cover designer, but they don't have to stock inventory, or deal with shipping, market heavily, or do any of the other publisher-like activities that are required for new books.
Maybe I'm a cheapskate, but: why on Earth would I pay $9.25 for the e-book edition of a book by a dead person when I could get a used paperback copy of the book for only $1.99?
The author, who is Dead you'll recall, will be just as well-served in her grave by me buying a used copy as she will if I buy a new e-book for $9.25.
That's why, if I were going out to buy a comfortable e-book for $9.25, I would probably just buy two e-books by a living author who could still use the cash. (Like L.B. Hathaway, as a random example.) Or I might pick up a couple of Lyn Hamilton titles; she's dead, too. (And I know someone scanned, not typed, at least the first of the Lara McClintoch mysteries because I've seen first-hand evidence of uncorrected OCR failures.)
Or I could buy a couple of cappucinos, pour one of those on the ground in honor of Seshat, then read something from Project Gutenberg. Or I could snag one of the gazillion free Kindle books by living authors who are so desperate to sell anything at all that they're giving away free samples on street corners, and then pour two cappucinos on the ground (because Saraswati likes coffee, too).
Nine or ten dollars for the electronic edition of a book published in 1936 by an author now dead? I don't think so. It just feels like somebody is trying to make out like a bandit by riding on her (now skeletal) coat-tails. One thing I will say for it: the cover of the new edition is rather beautiful and makes Miss Buncle look a lot more chic than one of the original covers did, so I hope the artist is being fairly compensated.
Rising from a mist within the door knocker, I can almost hear Marley's eerie voice wailing: "At least it's cheaper than an epipen!"
Speaking of Fonts, I mean Typefaces
Oooh, typeface wars! An amusing blog post over on Melville House books picked up the question: What typeface (or font) do you use for your own writing? (See also this article at The Guardian.)
Oh, that's a fun, surprisingly controversial question! Let's pause here and read for a minute, shall we? *
Because I always work with plain vanilla text while writing and editing, I end up using some "readable" fixed-width font at about 12 points on screen. Sometimes I change it up for later drafts. My personal habit is to never compose or edit text with a WYSIWYG page layout program. Save that folderol for the book design phase. (Why? Begin rant. Page layout programs often suck for high-speed text composition and real editing because that's not what they're designed for. A powerful editor like EMACS, or some variety of look-alike, is best for getting words into a file quickly. Authors should spend time learning to separate content-generation from page design. End rant.)
So, my work-a-day editing typeface used to be one of the Courier or Courier-New family, or similar. These days it's Consolas. But good gack, Virginia, I would never publish something using one of those typefaces! Eww.
When typesetting the resulting book or story for paper publication, the "designers" at SROP most often set body text in one of these very-readable workhorses: Warnock Pro, Constantia, or Georgia. (They all have fairly robust x-heights, by the way, and work well for digital display as well as on cheap paper in modern high-speed printing applications. I generally steer clear of fonts with anemic x-heights. Just so ya know.)
Titles on covers and opening pages of SROP books are often set in something more interesting as a display type, though we rodents eschew overy frilly typefaces for most work. (Mantissa's novella The Princess on the Rock is a notable exception.)
When I need to specify something other than default font in an e-book because the text contains too many unusual characters, I'll use one of the Gentium family or maybe the Brill family.
Neither Times New Roman nor Arial nor Helvetica ever rear their heads in the SROP shop.
Hey! Now that I've revealed all... What typefaces do you prefer for your work?
________
P.S. Here are some examples from the SROP catalog...
Warnock Pro: A Harlot of Venus
Constantia: How the Feather Sisters Came to Rule the Night
Georgia: On the Klickitat
Gentium: The Aerian Weaver
________
* Hmm. Times New Roman may "win" in the mainstream world, but to this rodent the typeface looks like a row of escapees from a sardine can. Also, btw, if you're a social media junky you won't want to miss the original tweet-storm over on Twitter. Also, just btw, we never submit except in-house, so we don't care what other publishers require for manuscripts.
Oh, that's a fun, surprisingly controversial question! Let's pause here and read for a minute, shall we? *
Because I always work with plain vanilla text while writing and editing, I end up using some "readable" fixed-width font at about 12 points on screen. Sometimes I change it up for later drafts. My personal habit is to never compose or edit text with a WYSIWYG page layout program. Save that folderol for the book design phase. (Why? Begin rant. Page layout programs often suck for high-speed text composition and real editing because that's not what they're designed for. A powerful editor like EMACS, or some variety of look-alike, is best for getting words into a file quickly. Authors should spend time learning to separate content-generation from page design. End rant.)
So, my work-a-day editing typeface used to be one of the Courier or Courier-New family, or similar. These days it's Consolas. But good gack, Virginia, I would never publish something using one of those typefaces! Eww.
When typesetting the resulting book or story for paper publication, the "designers" at SROP most often set body text in one of these very-readable workhorses: Warnock Pro, Constantia, or Georgia. (They all have fairly robust x-heights, by the way, and work well for digital display as well as on cheap paper in modern high-speed printing applications. I generally steer clear of fonts with anemic x-heights. Just so ya know.)
Titles on covers and opening pages of SROP books are often set in something more interesting as a display type, though we rodents eschew overy frilly typefaces for most work. (Mantissa's novella The Princess on the Rock is a notable exception.)
When I need to specify something other than default font in an e-book because the text contains too many unusual characters, I'll use one of the Gentium family or maybe the Brill family.
Neither Times New Roman nor Arial nor Helvetica ever rear their heads in the SROP shop.
Hey! Now that I've revealed all... What typefaces do you prefer for your work?
________
P.S. Here are some examples from the SROP catalog...
Warnock Pro: A Harlot of Venus
Constantia: How the Feather Sisters Came to Rule the Night
Georgia: On the Klickitat
Gentium: The Aerian Weaver
________
* Hmm. Times New Roman may "win" in the mainstream world, but to this rodent the typeface looks like a row of escapees from a sardine can. Also, btw, if you're a social media junky you won't want to miss the original tweet-storm over on Twitter. Also, just btw, we never submit except in-house, so we don't care what other publishers require for manuscripts.
Smashed-Rat-On-Press
The main purpose of this blog is to announce occasional additions and changes to the SROP catalog or the site. And it doubles as a soap-box from which to gesticulate and babble...
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