Replacement Dust Jackets Are Here!

Stephen King, Dean Koontz, William Peter Blatty, Ray Bradbury, Robert Bloch, Frank Darabont, Brian Keene, Ronald Kelly, Jack Ketchum, Joe R. Lansdale, Richard Laymon, Edward Lee, Richard Matheson, Kirby McCauley, William F. Nolan, Michael Slade, Peter Straub, Thomas Tessier, Chet Williamson, F. Paul Wilson, Douglas E. Winter, and many others!

Hi Folks!

Today we’re pleased to announce we’ve finally cataloged all of our replacement dust jackets from every book we’ve ever published (plus a few from other presses!) and we’re now selling them on our site! This is something people have been asking us for years, so be sure to place your order sooner than later because most supplies are VERY limited!

Why might you want a replacement dust jacket? Easy! Sometimes a collector needs to replace the DJ that came with their book (which will improve the value!) and sometimes customers ask about purchasing just the DJ so they can hang it on the wall because they like the artwork so much!  (Some collectors have even been known to matte and frame the DJ as a true work of art!)

These DJs are from books by a “Who’s Who” in the genre: Stephen King, Dean Koontz, William Peter Blatty, Ray Bradbury, Robert Bloch, Jay Bonansinga, Gary Brandner, Gary A. Braunbeck, Kealan Patrick Burke, Dominick Cancilla, Hugh B. Cave, Richard Chizmar, Simon Clark, Douglas Glegg, Nancy A. Collins, Geoff Cooper, Justin Cronin, Peter Crowter, Frank Darabont, Terry Dowling, Dennis Etchison, Brian James Freeman, Robin Furth, Mick Garris, Ray Garton, Christopher Golden, Ed Gorman, Beth Gwinn, Rick Hautala, Brian Hodge, Stephen Jones, Brian Keene, Ronald Kelly, Jack Ketchum, Joe R. Lansdale, Richard Laymon, Tim Lebbon, Edward Lee, Michael Marano, Graham Masterton, Richard Matheson, Kirby McCauley, Thomas F. Monteleone, James A. Moore, David Morrell, Robert Morrish, William F. Nolan, Norman Partridge, John Pelan, Tom Piccirilli, Gary Raisor, Al Sarrantonio, John Shirley, John Skipp, Michael Slade, Peter Straub, Thomas Tessier, Chet Williamson, F. Paul Wilson, Douglas E. Winter, and many others!

These dust jackets are sold First Come, First Served while supplies last and some of these are extremely limited!

Read more or place your order while our supplies last!

The Cemetery Dance “Will Tweet For Books” Promotional Offer: We Gave Away $1000 In FREE Books!

The Cemetery Dance “Will Tweet For Books” contest is now over!  Thanks to everyone who participated!  Here are the names of the 10 winners, who were contacted today about redeeming their prize:

1) Richard T.
2) Julie S.
3) Adrian T.
4) Michael F.
5) George J.
6) Michael P.
7) Laura
8 ) Gregg K.
9) Larry F.
10) Rebecca D.

Congrats to all of the winners and thanks again to everyone who took part!

 

New Signed Limited Edition Announced and Selling Very Quickly!

Vacation by Matthew J. Costello
A New Novel Inspired By The Classic Cemetery Dance Short Story!

“Costello is a master at lean, swift pacing. I read this book in three big gulps.”
— Jack Ketchum

Hi Folks!

Today we’re pleased to announce Vacation by Matthew J. Costello, which we’ll be publishing as a signed Limited Edition hardcover with a print run of just 550 copies and a Deluxe Lettered Edition of just 26 copies! Both of these editions are already well past the 50% sold out point, so we expect this title to be hard to find on the secondary market down the road!

About the Book:
In the near future after a global crisis causes crops to fail and species to disappear . . . something even more deadly happens. Groups of humans around the world suddenly become predators, feeding off their own kind. These “Can Heads” grow to such a threat that fences, gated compounds, and SWAT-style police protection become absolutely necessary in order to live.

After a Can Head attack leaves NYPD cop Jack Murphy wounded, Jack takes his wife and kids on a much-needed vacation. Far up north, to a camp called Paterville where families can still swim and take boats out on a lake, and pretend that the world isn’t going to hell.

But the Can Heads are never far away, and nothing is quite what it seems in Paterville…

SPECIAL BONUS: This special edition includes the original short story that inspired the novel!

Read more or place your order while the signed editions last!

The Stephen King Covers That Might Have Been!

If you’ve read Full Dark, No Stars by Stephen King, you know this is a book with a really dark heart, which made deciding on a cover image and designing that cover a serious challenge.

A lot of collectors never get to see “behind the scenes” of the creation of a Limited Edition book, so Brian James Freeman has written an essay about the cover artwork and design for this Stephen King book fcame to be.

He’s also posted several dozen images including the several versions of the cover artwork and ALL of cover designs we tried, along with information about why we made the decisions we made at each stage.

Full Dark Alt Cover

Visit The Stephen King Book Covers That Might Have Been to read the rest!

Brand New Halloween Signed Limited Edition: Blood Harvest by James A. Moore!

Hi Folks!

Blood HarvestWe’re pleased to report that we’ll be getting a limited supply of Blood Harvest by long-time Cemetery Dance favorite James A. Moore, which will be published this Halloween by Earthling Press!

About the Book:

Five years ago, Jason Soulis experimented on the town of Black Stone Bay, creating an army of vampires for the sole purpose of seeing which ones would survive and if the creatures could evolve. Five years later, his experiments are bearing dark, bloody fruit. A new breed of monster has come from the ashes of the old, a deadlier predator with a far greater ability to kill and destroy whatever it touches. Black Stone Bay was wounded before, but the infection left behind has festered and the darkness is spreading faster than anyone has noticed, because this time the evil is better at hiding.

Maggie Preston was one of Soulis’s victims, a college-aged girl who has become something far darker. She’s fed her urges and kept her secrets with the aid of her lover and protector, but that relationship is fraying, and the hungers she’s suppressed are growing stronger and the family she has protected in the past has fallen victim to the new evil that Soulis unwittingly unleashed.

Five years have passed, and the town of BlackStone Bay has recovered from the horrors of the past, just in time to get caught in the crossfire of the undead and a new, virulent darkness.

Sometimes the devil you know is your only hope of salvation.

Read more or place your order while our limited supplies last!

New Signature Series Book Announced Today: At the Printer and Shipping Next Month!

Four Legs in the Morning

Four Legs in the Morning
by Norman Prentiss

Hi Folks!

Today we’re very pleased to announce Four Legs in the Morning by Norman Prentiss, a brand new signed Limited Edition in our acclaimed Cemetery Dance Signature Series line! This book is already rolling at the printer and will be published next month, so don’t wait around to place your order! Many of our Signature Series titles sell out before publication and given Norman’s growing following, this tiny print run of just 550 copies for the Limited Edition won’t last long!

PLEASE NOTE: Both editions are now more than 50% sold out due to strong demand from collectors.

Four Legs in the Morning (Cemetery Dance Signature Series #9)
by Norman Prentiss

Featured Artist: Steven C. Gilberts

About the Book:
Dr. Sibley, long-standing Chair of the English and Classical Literature Department at Graysonville University, has outlasted many of his detractors. In this collection of three linked stories, mysterious consequences await those who defy or disappoint him:

• a new colleague, whose avant-guard theories offend Sibley’s traditional critical sensibilities, uncovers a new answer to an ancient riddle (“Four Legs in the Morning”)

• a student plagiarist learns to regret his dishonesty (“Flannel Board”)

• a young administrator attempts to curtail some of Sibley’s power, until he discovers the fate of his predecessor (“The Mask of Tragedies”)

All of these characters eventually learn — sometimes too late — that Dr. Sibley may be far more powerful than he seems.

Click here to read more or to place your order!

New Book Announced: Killing Ghost by Christopher Ransom

“Ransom’s style mimics that of the early Stephen King and Dan Simmons’s horror fiction.”
— Library Journal

Killing GhostToday we’re pleased to announce Killing Ghost by Christopher Ransom, which we’ll be publishing next year as a Trade Hardcover Edition, a signed Limited Edition hardcover with a print run of just 350 copies, and a Deluxe Lettered Edition of just 26 copies!

Killing Ghost
by Christopher Ransom

About the Book:
James Hastings once enjoyed a lucrative but hollow career pretending to be someone else. But when his wife Stacey dies tragically behind the Los Angeles mansion she so lovingly restored, James finds himself alone, spiraling into grief, and haunted by a familiar menace that is not ready for him to move on.

Free US ShippingSalvation comes in the form of Annette Copeland, a beautiful widow who moves into the house next door. James and Annette bond quickly over the spousal losses they have suffered, but as their unconventional romance escalates, Annette begins to exhibit uncanny manners and desires that belong to Stacey. Concerned friends and former lovers who try to come between them meet with increasingly diabolical fates, and James becomes convinced Annette’s cosmetic changes are only the beginning of a horrific yet alluring case of possession.

Driven to isolation far outside of Los Angeles, James and his unstable companion return to the deserted gated community of Sheltering Palms, where evidence of Annette’s family tragedy is waiting for him, and James’s investigations unwillingly draw the attentions of two dangerous personalities: Rick Butterfield, a delusional policeman who knows Annette’s history and still pines for her; and Aaron, a 10-year-old boy who wanders the desolate subdivision nightly, waiting for his parents to come home.

With every attempt to atone for his failings as a husband plunging James deeper into a nightmare struggle for survival, he must finally confront the ghost of the man he used to be, the origin of his resurrected other half, and the true face of the evil that has brought them together.

Killing Ghost is at once a descent into psychological terror, a midnight meditation of the addictive nature of love, and a novel that redefines the ghost story for a culture obsessed with dark entertainments.

Previously published in the UK as The Haunting of James Hastings, this Cemetery Dance hardcover edition brings the novel to the US for the first time.

Read more or place your order while the signed editions last!

Today’s Featured eBook! Invisible Fences by Norman Prentiss For Just $4.99!

Since we launched a lot of titles at the same time, we’d like to draw your attention to a few of them at a time when we have space. Today’s featured eBook is…

Invisible FencesInvisible Fences
by Norman Prentiss

About the eBook:
Do you see the point of the story, Nathan? We all cut parts of ourselves away, but we never lose them. Things stay with us—souvenirs with memories attached. We can’t always choose what to keep, what to throw away.

Nathan’s parents devised cautionary tales for him and his sister—gruesome stories about predatory cars racing along the “Big Street” at one end of their neighborhood, or dope fiends lurking in the woods behind their house and ready to plunge hypodermics into the skin of foolish young trespassers. These stories served their purpose during Nathan’s gullible childhood, essentially constructing an invisible fence around the yard and keeping the boy close to home where he’d be safe.

Such barriers are not so easy to discard in later life. As an adult, Nathan no longer believes his parents’ stories, and yet they still confine him. He lives cautiously, avoiding serious relationships, avoiding risk. But despite his efforts, something from his parents’ cautionary tales threatens to creep beneath that invisible border…and the enclosed yard might not be as safe and secure as it always seemed…

You can purchase from the Cemetery Dance website or:

Download from Amazon (US) Download for the Nook

 

Production Updates: IT by Stephen King, the IT Artwork Portfolio, Kin, Gideon’s Sword, and more!

Hi Folks!

Today we have a few production updates for anyone who hasn’t had a chance to swing by our Production Status page on the website:

It: The 25th Anniversary Special Limited Edition by Stephen King

The interior design is now set and the signature sheets are with Stephen King for signing. We hope to send everything to printer in September if all goes as planned. The Gift Edition is now more than 75% sold out.

It: The 25th Anniversary Edition Limited Edition Artwork Portfolio

The signature sheets have been sent to the artists. The prototype for the portfolio itself has arrived and we’re making a few small production tweaks, but it looks incredible. One box of art prints was damaged during shipping from the printer, but they have been pulped and will be reprinted before the artists are done signing the signature sheets. This is now more than 80% sold out.

Kin by Kealan Patrick Burke:

At the printer and on schedule for a fall publication.

Gideon’s Sword by Douglas Preston and Lincoln Child:

This book has been sent to the printer and is on track for a fall publication date.

Four Ghosts (Cemetery Dance Book Club 3.0 Exclusive)

This title is being proofread one last time and then it will be ready for the printer.

Four Killers (Cemetery Dance Exclusive Collectors Set #2):

The reprints have been scanned, one of the originals has arrived, and the other original is in the works.

Prince of Stories: The Many Worlds of Neil Gaiman by Hank Wagner, Christopher Golden, and Stephen R. Bissette:

We’ve added the exclusive introduction by Bill Hader to our file, and Stephen R. Bissette is hard at work on the exclusive artwork he is providing for this edition (including the cover). After that artwork is added to the book, this one will be ready for the printer.

Smoke and Mirrors edited by Richard Chizmar:

The book is all set for the printer now and we’re just waiting on the last TWO authors to sign the signature sheets. We’re hoping they’ll be able to sign during the next few months as their schedules allow.

The Mailman by Bentley Little:

Undergoing one last proofread. The author has not had a chance to sign the signature sheets yet, but we are still hoping to have this published at the end of the year.

Cemetery Dance #65 (unannounced):

This is another of our “Special Author” issues and it is now being proofread so we can send it to the printer next month.

The Dropper by Ron McLarty

“This book is filled with rich pleasures and textures — it reminded me of Steinbeck’s Of Mice and Men. I highly recommend it.”
— Stephen King

New Book Announced Today!
The Dropper
by Ron McLarty

Hi Folks!

Today we’re pleased to announce The Dropper by Ron McLarty, a brand new signed Limited Edition hardcover with a print run of just 350 copies for the Limited Edition and just 52 copies for the Deluxe Lettered Edition! And because we were so blown away by this book, there will also be a trade hardcover edition for retailers and bookstores!

The DropperThe Dropper
by Ron McLarty

Featuring Cover Artwork by Les Edwards

Free US ShippingAbout the Book:

Some say it’s Death, Some say it’s darkness, I say it’s a game of light…

Gutsy 17-year-old Albert “Shoe” Horn is an apprentice plumber and part-time boxer in England in 1922, but when his mother dies, he finds himself responsible for an abusive, alcoholic father and a younger brother with special needs.

This marvelous novel follows the indomitable Shoe’s day-to-day survival with poetic grit, cynical genius, respect, and deep affection as he navigates a world full of very real characters: the gentle giant McAvy, his slave-driving boss, the Irish louts that resurrect his temper, the tempting ladies who seek him out, his hilarious plumbing clients, and the formidable “Dropper,” who Shoe fears will take away the most true thing in his life, his brother.

Find out for yourself why Stephen King proclaimed “The Dropper avoids sentimentality, but not sentiment; Shoe and his brother Bobby live and breathe” when this novel is published as a Cemetery Dance Publications exclusive next year.

Click here to read more or to place your order!

What do Stephen King, Dean Koontz, Michael Connelly, Scott Smith, Dennis Lehane, Joe R. Lansdale, Dan Simmons, and Stewart O’Nan all have in common?

Hi Folks!

The answer to the question in the headline is simple: they’re big fans of Michael Koryta, author of So Cold the River, The Cypress House, and The Ridge.

Because we’re also big fans of Michael’s work, we’ve made special arrangements for him to SIGN and even inscribe some copies of his most recent hardcovers for our customers!

This is a very limited time offer and we’re selling these special copies for the original retail price — NO MARK-UP!

If you’d like your book(s) personally inscribed to you, please reply to your order confirmation and let Mindy know what you’d like for the inscription. Otherwise, your copy will be flat-signed by the author (which some collectors prefer anyway for collectibility reasons.)

Click on a cover to learn more about each book:

So Cold The River

The Cypress House

The Ridge

 

News from the Dead Zone #144

Hodder & Stoughton has produced a short promo video for 11/22/63.

Movie news:

Bag of Bones is currently filming in Nova Scotia, Canada. Mick Garris is directing from a script by Matt Venne. A&E network will air this four-hour minseries over two nights, perhaps later on this year. The cast includes Pierce Brosnan (Mike Noonan), Annabeth Gish (Jo Noonan), Melissa George (Mattie Devore) and Anika Noni Rose (Sara Tidwell). Kelly Rowland’s name has also been mentioned in association with the film, but not for a specific role.

Jonathan Demme (Silence of the Lambs) has optioned 11/22/63 and will write, produce and direct the film. Variety says that King will executive produce. There’s no distributor yet, but Demme hopes to start filming toward the end of 2012.

Warner Bros. is in the process of finalizing the deals for Harry Potter director David Yates and Steve Kloves, who scripted the final three Potter films, to re-team for a multi-movie version of The Stand.

Alexandre Aja may to direct the remake of Pet Sematary for Paramount.

Upcoming short fiction appearances:

  • “Little God of Agony” in A Book of Horrors, edited by Stephen Jones
  • “The Dune” in Granta magazine’s Fall/Winter horror-themed issue. You can pre-order the single issue at Amazon

Mark your calendars:

  • King will appear and sign books at the Fall for the Book Festival at George Mason University in Fairfax, VA on September 23, 2011. Tickets become available on Monday, August 15. Though admission is free, tickets are required and there is a limit of two tickets per request. See Center for the Arts Ticket Office.
  • On Monday, October 3, at 8 p.m. (Eastern), Turner Classic Movies will premiere A Night at the Movies: The Horrors of Stephen King, with in which King will discuss the classic horror films that influenced him the most. He takes viewers on a journey through many aspects of the horror genre, including vampires, zombies, demons and ghosts. He also examines the fundamental reasons behind moviegoers’ incessant craving for being frightened. Along the way, he discusses the movies that have had a real impact on his writing, including Freaks (1932), Cat People (1942), Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1956), Night of the Living Dead (1968), The Texas Chain Saw Massacre (1974), Jaws (1975), Halloween (1978) and The Changeling (1980).
  • King will be touring to support 11/22/63. The following dates have been announced: Boston (11/7), Dallas (11/10 & 11/11), New Orleans (11/12),  Sarasota (11/14), Atlanta (12/14)

An abridged version of King’s introduction to the new centenary edition of Lord of the Flies can be found in the London Telegraph.

It: The 25th Anniversary Edition Limited Edition Artwork Portfolio

IT: The 25th Anniversary Edition Limited Edition Artwork Portfolio
29 Pieces of Artwork, Printed on 11 inch X 14 inch Sheets of 100# Archival Cover Stock!
Signed By All Three Artists and Limited to Just 500 sets!

Hi Folks!

IT Artwork PortfolioIf you love artwork inspired by the works of Stephen King or you’re a huge fan of IT, then we have a deal you won’t be able to beat — but it isn’t going to last long due to already strong demand from collectors!

We’ve made special arrangements with Glen Orbik, Alan M. Clark, and Erin Wells to collect ALL of their artwork from our upcoming 25th Anniversary Edition of IT by Stephen King into one giant artwork portfolio, which will be SIGNED by all three artists and limited to a one-time printing of just 500 sets! These special artwork portfolios will never be reprinted or reissued.

When we say GIANT, we mean it, too! Each piece of artwork — including the 6 interior color plates, the full-color cover artwork, all of the black & white interiors, plus Erin Wells’ TWO pieces of color signature sheet artwork — will be printed on 11 inch by 14 inch sheets of 100# GPA Uncoated, Heavy Duty archival quality cover stock. These will be HUGE pieces of artwork, perfect for matting and framing if you wanted!

The portfolio itself will be a spectacle to behold: it’s already in production at the same company that made the Blockade Billy Lettered Edition artwork portfolio, which was one of the most talked about features of that special edition! Not only will we be using a similar high-quality material for the folder itself, but there will be one-color hot foil stamping on the front cover, too! (You can see some photos of the Blockade Billy Lettered Edition artwork portfolio on the IT Artwork Portfolio product page.)

Remember: this is a ONE-TIME printing of this artwork portfolio and we will NOT be printing more! This set includes EVERY piece of artwork in the book, including the two color signature sheets that will only ever be seen by the collectors who were lucky enough to snag a copy of the Limited Edition or Lettered Edition before they sold out. Plus there’s a special, full-color signature sheet signed by all three artists!

The art prints are already finished at the printer and the signature sheets will be headed to the artists next week. The portfolio is ready to start rolling, too, as soon as the special order materials arrive, but don’t wait long to place your order because we don’t expect our very limited supplies to last long!

If you’re interested, place your order today! After they’ve all sold, we won’t offer more!

Thanks, as always, for your continuing support!


“A Foolscap and a Green Eye Shade: How to be an Editor” by Al Sarrantonio

A Foolscap and a Green Eye Shade: How to be an Editor
by Al Sarrantonio

Everyone thinks being an editor is easy.

It’s not.

In fact, it requires as much (though different) talent as being a writer.

Because you have to read writer’s minds, stroke their egos, collaborate without intruding — well, there are a hundred tricks to the trade.

In my case, I was lucky because I was already editing books at a major New York publisher when I started to write, and, later, was already a well-published writer when I started to edit books with my name on the cover.

But what about the nuts and bolts of editing — the day to day slog, the record-keeping, all the boring stuff that has nothing to do with the nicely-bound, shiny-covered book you finally hold in your hands when you get that first copy? (I will never forget the first “Back to the Future” film, when Marty McFly’s father gets his box of books at the end – I felt a palpable thrill so real it was eerie.)

But, back to the nuts and bolts (which is doubly relevant if you’re editing a robot anthology).

First off, you have to become an accountant.  It’s the lousiest part of the job, but it has to be done, mostly in fairness to your contributors.  If you don’t keep track of the money and disburse it correctly, you’re letting your writers down.

But being an accountant isn’t that bad if you’re reasonably organized. In the olden days, it meant piles of paper with numbers on them.  These days, it’s lines of numbers on a computer screen.  But it amounts to the same thing: keep records.

What kind of records?  I’ll try to make it as clear as possible.

It all begins with the sale, and your contract.

Let’s say you’re buying a story from Joe Schmo for an advance of 5 cents a word, at a length of 2,000 words.  That makes for an advance payment of $100.  Now you’ve got a number to keep track of.  So you record it somewhere, along with the writer’s name, physical address, and e-mail address.

Believe it or not, you’re already halfway home.

Because if your contract is a good one, it will already stipulate what the further terms of the sale are: i.e., what the contributor can expect to get above and beyond that $100.   Usually the advance will be paid out under the term “against royalties,” which means that the book has to earn out its own advance from the publisher before anyone (including the editor) sees any more money.  To make it even clearer, I’ll break it completely down:

Let’s say the editor was paid a $5,000 advance to put together an anthology titled NUTS AND BOLTS: A ROBOT ANTHOLOGY.  The normal (and fair) thing to do is for the editor to keep half of that advance ($2,500) for all of his trouble, work and expense, and use the other half ($2,500) to pay the contributors, usually by the word.  In this case, just to keep the math simple, let’s say the anthology is going to be 50,000 words long, so he can pay 5 cents a word to his contributors.

So Joe Schmo sells the editor that story that’s 2,000 words long, and the editor pays him $100 against royalties.  That’s Joe’s share of the advance from the publisher.

But: nobody gets any more money until NUTS AND BOLTS: A ROBOT ANTHOLOGY earns out: meaning that that book makes back for the publisher, based on the royalty rate per book, the $5,000 it paid to the editor to produce it.

What does that mean?  In short, the editor and publisher have agreed on how much of the cover price of the book (the royalty rate) will count toward paying back the advance.  The numbers vary depending on what kind of book it is (hardcover, trade paperback, mass market paperback, e-book) but a nice round number for our purposes is 10 percent.

So, to keep the math simple again, let’s say the cover price of the book is $10.  That means that for every book sold, a buck goes into the kitty to pay back the advance to the publisher.

Do the math: when the book sells 5,000 copies, the debt to the publisher has been paid.

Now what?  Here’s where your accounting skills as an editor come in again.

At this point in a good, fair contract between the editor and contributor it will then say something along the lines of: “Any royalty payment received by the Editor over and above Publisher’s advance, and all other earnings of the Anthology received by the Editor, if any, shall be distributed as follows: fifty percent (50%) to be retained by the Editor, and fifty percent (50%) to be distributed among the Anthology’s contributors in equal shares.”

There we are, retaining that fair split between the editor and his contributors.

You may notice a difference now, though: any further money coming in (more on that in a moment) for the book will now be disbursed to the contributors “in equal shares,” where the advance payment was by the word.

Why?

This is, in my view, fair to all concerned.

There is another way to do this, which involves figuring out each share based on how long the story is.  But think about the math involved, concerning percentages or fractions, and your head might explode.  My own philosophy has always been that, up front (the advance, by the word) he who writes more gets more, but after the book is published every story is equal, regardless of length, and everyone should share equally in the spoils, because it’s the book as a whole that now determines how well it does.  A great short story might win all kinds of awards, spur all kinds of sales, while a novelette might just sit there, doing nothing, and share in that success.

This is, in my opinion, fair — and it avoids an accounting nightmare.  All you have to do now as an editor is split whatever other money comes in (again, more on that in a moment) using that equitable formula of 50 percent for you, and the other 50 percent split in equal shares among the contributors.

Again, for simple math’s sake:  if the book earns $1,000 (for the last time, more on that in a moment!) after the advance has earned out, the editor gets $500, and each contributor (let’s say there are ten) gets $50.

And here’s the moment, finally: how does an editor get more money over and above the advance from the publisher?

Easy.  First, there are sales of the original edition after the book has earned out its advance from the publisher.  Now the editor will receive 10% (in the case of our book, $1.00) for every copy sold.  Then there are foreign sales, other-edition sales, audio sales, all kinds of things that are stipulated in the contract between publisher and editor, or that the editor has free reign to pursue himself if those rights have been excluded from the publisher’s contract and retained by the editor.  The publisher most likely gets a cut of this further revenue, but the bottom line is that when the editor gets a check, from whatever source, for NUTS AND BOLTS: A ROBOT ANTHOLOGY, he cashes the check (after running to the bank) and becomes an accountant again, recording in his records the amount of the check, and that 50% needs to be sent to his contributors in equal shares.

And how often should he disburse that money?  That depends on the wording of the contract between editor and contributor – but even if there is no wording to that effect, at least once a year – again, out of fairness to the writers.

Then, at the end of the year, all you have to do is add up all the revenue the book brought in, subtract the amount you’ve paid out to your writers, and you know how much you’ve earned for NUTS AND BOLTS: A ROBOT ANTHOLOGY.

It’s a lot of fun to be an editor, but it’s also a lot of responsibility and work.  You have to wear your green eye shade as well as your editor’s hat (mine’s a foolscap).

But the bottom of bottom lines is: keep records.


Al Sarrantonio can be found on Facebook and his website, Alsarrantonio.com.