One of the publishers from crime fiction’s past, was a little name that tried to become a bigger power among heavy hitters. Not necessarily known for their quality, they did try hard. They signed up some known authors whose contracts perhaps expired with other publishers, and some names never heard of before or since. Collectors drool over finding a nice Phoenix in near fine jacket. And not because the jacket art was all that compelling either. ABE has a little group of them for our perusal. I think the reason these are sought after is their relative scarcity in jacket. For years, a well known writer, Bill Pronzini, another author on my Best 100, has collected them, striving for better and better copies. One of my
Brick and Mortar Archive
When did the powers that be decide that trade paperbacks were the right way to go? I understand why authors would welcome this format–I would gather that the more expensive the work, the more royalties paid. Mass market paperbacks give little return for the author. And maybe, maybe the print is larger, although, I’ve not seen much difference. Trade paperbacks, as I remember them from my ancient days of book-selling, were reserved for weighty novels, or works of nonfiction or biographies, and classics. Now, any romance, or teen vampire title is produced in this format. Begging the question why? Except, it’s a no brainer why. More money in the publishers’ coffers. The sum of money demanded for a mass market paperback is steep, but the
I didn’t join Goodreads. Mostly because until recently I didn’t know what it was or what I would want to join for. Many authors and friends had suggested via facebook I should join, and that only made me less likely to do so, because I assumed it was another facebook game or oddity. When I finally realized it consisted of normal people, well, as normal as any one who would join something called Goodreads–meaning lovers of the written word–are, the grassroots group sold out to the man, as the kids in my youth would say. They sold their original nice friendly swapping of what members enjoyed and didn’t like to the Robber Baron devil of Amazon. On the Goodreads home page, the list owners describe
Murphy’s Loft, Mullica Hill NJ. This was my third experience in this laid back book and ephemera store. I visited years ago, and then a few months back, right after the original owner retired, and her son (grandson?) took the reins. Unfortunately, his mother decided to rid herself of half the inventory, so he let it be known he was fine with trade ins, if I had them. Ha, is the pope catholic? (at least he was when the smoke cleared). It took me months to get myself in gear and bring the boxes piled up at my mother’s front door–yes there was still room to go in and out–barely. I had around 5 filled regular sized boxes, and a couple of bag pretty nice copies.
Denise Swanson is a character out of one of her books. A small town girl, intelligent, kind, and successful. Very successful. Her Scumble River soft boiled mystery series has been running for many years now, with appearances on the New York Time Bestseller‘s list and slews of award nominations, including a Best First Novel Agatha, from the Malice Domestic convention. Not too shabby. And with her second entry with protagonist Devereaux Sinclair she’s well on the way to having not one, but two hugely popular series. I met Ms. Swanson at one of those Malice conventions, and I remember standing in the back of an auction with her, marveling at all the other authors, and some of their rather high schooly ways. (schooly should also