'Splain it to me, Lucy (Niffenegger gets $5 mill for second novel)

Next time I hear an agent or editor tell me how the faltering economy means authors have to accept smaller advances, I'm going to whip out a copy of yesterday's New York Times. Word has it, Audrey Niffenegger, author of The Time Traveler's Wife, has signed a "close to $5 million" deal for her second novel.

So they say:

After a fiercely contested auction, Scribner, a unit of Simon & Schuster, bought the rights to publish the new novel, "Her Fearful Symmetry," in the United States this fall. The book is a supernatural story about twins who inherit an apartment near a London cemetery and become embroiled in the lives of the building’s other residents and the ghost of their aunt, who left them the flat.

The auction for Ms. Niffenegger’s second novel involved several large New York publishing houses, as well as the original hardcover publisher of “The Time Traveler’s Wife,” MacAdam/Cage, the San Francisco-based independent, and the publisher that holds paperback rights to the first novel, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt.

Read the article in full here.

I can't decide if I envy Niffenegger or not. She's an amazing writer who completely deserves her great success, and five million bucks is great, of course, but that's a lot of barge to pull. I'm reminded of the vociferous attacks on Alice Seybold's breathlessly anticipated second novel. And the resounding thud of Charles Frazier's. Even Audrey's agent Joe Regal had to acknowledge, “There are going to be people coming to the book with claws out. That’s just reality."

On the other hand...five million samoleans. Sheesh.

What we the unanointed must remember is that every one of the publishers in that conversation must have been prepared to fork over millions, which means, my darlings, they have it. I'm not listening to one more bullshit claim that this money doesn't exist. For the right project, the money will materialize. Hold fast, me hearties.

More About Money

Yesterday, Joni brought up the nearly-taboo topic of filthy lucre. Writers often pretend not to care much about the subject, but it's hard to create good art without food in the belly and a roof overhead, so sure we care. There's just not a lot of information out there to help us understand the financial side of the business.

First of all, a primer. When a editor wishes to buy the rights to publish a book, she typically offers an advance, otherwise known as an advance against royalties. Royalties are usually (but not always) a percentage of the book's cover price. In the world of genre mass market paperback originals, it's usually between 4% (ouch) and 10%, with 6% and 8% being fairly typical. To come up with an advance, the editor fills out a profit and loss statement (P&L) to try to figure out, conservatively, since it's a crap shoot, how much the book will make. For a great description of the process, read this post by Agent Kristin Nelson or buy this one (well worth the $3.50) on profits and loss by former TOR editor Anna Louise Genoese.

After figuring out the expected author's share based on the estimated number sold, book's price point, and the royalty percentage, the editor will shoot a low-ball (or conservative, depending on your point of view) offer to the author's agent. If the offer has no agent, it will be generally be quite a bit more conservative.) In the everyday world of the romance paperback, this can be anywhere from a low of about $1,500 to a high of around $20,000, depending on how excited the publisher is about the project, how deep are its pockets, and about a zillion other factors. For a completely unscientific but still helpful list of advances and percentages broken down by romance publisher and line, visit Brenda Hiatt's labor of love here. More beginning writers report than veterans, so these figures, IMO, are more indicative of what early-career writers can expect to make.

So what about those giant advances we see reported in Publisher's Lunch? They certainly happen, even in genre fiction, but they're pretty unusual, especially for beginning authors. And believe it or not, there may actually be advantages in a slow build rather than a blazing start, which sets up very high expectations in pretty tough financial times.

When/if the book earns back its advance with royalties (called "earning out"), the author begins getting the additional royalties twice annually. One can't count on this money, and it's slow in coming, but it can build to a significant level, especially when a book's become a surprise hit.

I want to add that in the ten years I've been doing this, I've noticed that advances and royalty percentages for beginning writers haven't budged a bit. In fact, they've dropped in some cases. As writers grow more popular, their earnings increase, but many struggle to stay in the game, much less make progress.

So the financial reality of writing is often a harsh one, but sure enough, there are still writers out there (albeit a minority) make a good to damned good to spectacular living. Who's to say that you or I won't be one of them?

I hope some of you have found this helpful. More info on the money questions can be found in the pages of Donald Maass's The Career Novelist (outstanding resource!) and Richard Curtis's How to be Your Own Literary Agent, which you should have on your shelf even if you already have an agent. Does anyone else have any good, up-to-date resources on money and the writer?