The article appears in the Guardian which isn't doing so well either. Any time you visit their website, you get a pop-up telling you to turn off adblock and think about supporting them by buying a subscription.
Of book authors they write:
"Book sales income was up 5% on the previous year, according to annual figures released by the Publishers Association. In sharp contrast, a recent survey of authors’ earnings revealed a 42% drop over the last decade, with the median annual income now below £10,500.
Powering the record year for the UK industry was a 31% rise in hardback book sales income, as well as a 25% increase of income from audiobooks and an 8% uplift from exports. Income from fiction and non-fiction also rose, by 3% and 4% respectively, which the Publishers Association’s chief executive, Stephen Lotinga, said proved that people’s love of books showed no sign of waning.
“The figures did not include publishers’ profits, although the latest results from the two biggest publishers in the UK – Penguin Random House and Hachette Group – suggest increases in sales have not been matched by higher profits. Publishers are paying writers a pittance, say bestselling authors.
However, authors contrasted the figures with a long-term decline in pay and investment in writers, particularly those yet to have a breakout bestseller. The author of Girl With a Pearl Earring, Tracy Chevalier, said: “Authors have seen their earnings chipped away at while publishers thrive.
“Most writers cobble together a living from several sources: teaching, journalism, and odd jobs. Writing is just one shrinking source of income. Shrink it enough and people will stop writing altogether. It literally won’t be worth it.”
Chevalier, who is also the president of the Royal Literary Fund, which supports writers in financial difficulty, said that the charity had noted an increase in applications for hardship grants from younger writers. She said it reflected publishers’ hesitancy to take a risk and support an author for more than one or two books at a time.
“I think writers starting out are getting less support from publishers – not just financial, but a commitment to develop them and see them through several books to build up a readership and steady sales,” she said.
One difference between England and America, seems to be in the demographics. Lady Chevalier grouses that in England, all the publishers want are OLD WHITE MEN. Ha ha ha. Not in AMERICA they don't.
Interesting view from Lady Chevalier, since the black British female Zadie Smith gets a lot of hype here. What, George R.R. Martin sits on her face in terms of sales? It wouldn't be for lack of hype.
"Authors are being sacrificed for ‘wish-upon-a-star celebrity’ publishing..." she says. That's the same the whole world over, and it's a shame, a bloody shame. Back in the day when I could get most any silly lark published ("The Stooge Fans' I.Q. Test") the warning signs were around. The publisher of the Stooge book, Contemporary, won a bidding war for a female romance writer's FIRST book. The company was determined to diversify and grab a hunk of the "women sit on their ass with a box of chocolate and read crap all day" market. The book tanked. The publisher had to close the New York office and retreat back to Chicago.
Long ago, my agent advised me to hitch my paychecks to a star. "Celebrity books ALWAYS sell," he said. Unfortunately, not every celebrity book hits the best seller list, and I recall seeing relatively new books by Roger Moore, Robert Wagner and Tony Curtis sitting in the bargain remainder table...while I was standing around talking to Robert Vaughn who was signing his new book. Yes, even though celebs are forced to sign 500 or 1000 copies at a few bookstore signings, that often isn't enough to cover their advance. And not everybody will buy a celeb book of bland anecdotes if it isn't autographed to them personally.
In England, a big star is David Walliams, a phony (real last name Williams) who has made a big name for himself by pretending to be queer as a judge on "Britain's Got Tail Lint" or whatever it's called. David's increasingly stale act is to deliberately vote through any campy no-talent act (ooh, two men dancing together) and to constantly try to embarrass simmering Simon Cowell. He's also the author of kiddie books. This guy is making a fortune WITHOUT needing huge advances and book publishers pushing him and spending all their publicist time on him. So says the Guardian:
The celeb phenomenon is a problem in many other fields. For example, cartoons USED to be a place where talented but unknown voice actors thrived...the Paul Frees and June Foray types. Now, celebrity voices MUST be behind every big budget cartoon. Their names, even if their voices are bland, help put the little asses in the seats, along with the big asses of the parents, and the bigger obese asses of fanboy adults with no kids or wives but a big fetish for some actress or other.
One thing NOT mentioned by the Guardian is piracy. In forums and on torrents, it's very easy to download any best seller. Demonoid and the others routinely offer the ENTIRE New York Times best seller list. EBAY sellers routinely sneak download books and know that inept and crapathetic book companies such as Penguin/Doubleday won't bother to send a DMCA. Yes, publishers ARE making a good profit, and part of the way they do it is to give all but the top best selling authors the worst advance and the puniest royalty arrangement. I once asked some twat at Penguin/Doubleday (last name Sheridan) if she'd allow me to send in DMCA's on the virulent EBAY sellers. She told me the company employed a firm to handle piracy. Yeah? The firm was only pulling a few BEST SELLER AUTHOR items off the torrents and forums, and NOT even bothering with EBAY. I sent this company some eBay links. In other words: here, YOU make the money, just stop this piracy on behalf of ALL authors, because piracy hurts ALL authors. Guess what. The bitch (last name Sheridan) sent me a caustic email telling me to cease and desist contacting their piracy experts. The ones who weren't stopping the piracy.
The fact about piracy is simple: the more stole'd the less sold. If somebody gets the entire R.L. Stine collection, the entire George R.R. Martin, the entire Stephen King, the entire collection of some "cozy mystery" idiot or romance moron like Nora Roberts, the LESS reason there is to buy anything. As in, "I have more than enough Stephen King to plow through...no need for me to even buy Clive Barker...but maybe I'll ask "anyone want to SHARE it" in a FORUM. You know, one of the ones protected because the UK and USA won't pass laws to allow the blocking of obvious piracy sites doing their dirty work from Putinville.
Authors have never had an easy time of it. Even Philip Roth and Allen Ginsberg ended up teaching in colleges. Authors indeed are encouraged to always keep that DAY JOB. Scott Turow is a lawyer and so are several others. Joseph Wambaugh was a cop first, an author second. Several professors are scabs...they make a good living, are tenured, but they write books for virtually no advance just as a hobby. One of them contacted me asking for advice, phone numbers, and the chance to "pick your brain" because he was writing a book on comedians. He wanted photos, too. I suggested he at least pay me an "honorarium" of a hundred bucks for my time and postage in mailing him two dozen. He complained, "I'm not getting an advance. There's no photo budget." But for the glory of publishing, and the fun of talking to comedians, he was being a scab.
Nobody is renting a bus or a taxi and offering to give free rides just for the FUN of it, or the experience. You can't set up an office and pretend to be a doctor. But an author is scabbed by everybody on the planet. You can be SHITTY like pudgy E.L. James, and be a hit. Publishers know the average reader is not discriminating and will read E.L. James before Anais Nin, Erica Jong or Henry Miller. The publishers also know that some professor will happily spend five or ten years meticulously researching a book on a favorite horror actor and will accept a $500 advance, because he's not making a living he's just having himself a hobby. So, publishers WILL take as much of the profits as they can.
It's a surprise that books are selling at all (probably the British market is better than the American market). What is NOT a surprise is that publishers are making the money and not authors.
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