Friday News: Harlequin makes HC money, why we shouldn’t DNF, streaming Shakespeare, and Celia Bullwinkel’s “Sidewalk”
Harlequin, Divergent Drive HarperCollins – So Harper Collins saw a 24% increase in the first quarter of the new fiscal year, which both Harlequin and Divergent are responsible for. The company reports that sales exclusive of Harlequin would have rise by only 6%. Now why did Torstar sell Harlequin again???
In a conference call discussing the results, executives from News Corp. gave strong support to HC, calling the book publisher one of the “core pillars” on which the corporation will build its future. The executives said they were pleased with the pace of integrating Harlequin into HC and told analysts that when the integration is completed they expected to get $20 million in savings, the same level of savings HC generated after it completed the integration of Thomas Nelson. On the revenue side, the executives said HC and Harlequin are looking at new ways to monetize Harlequin’s extensive backlist. –Publishers Weekly
Finish That Book! – Oh, boy. Armed with the lesson of Ruth Graham’s awful Slate article about how adults shouldn’t read YA, Juliet Lapidos gets into the ring with those of us who see no harm in DNFing a book. I could almost buy her “pleasure” article, and I even have some nostalgic affection for her “fortitude” argument. But by the time she gets to “respect,” it’s down for the count.
To drop a novel after a few chapters is, then, to disregard what makes it a formal work of art rather than a heap of papers that reside in a desk drawer. Today, books and authors need all the help they can get; if you care about literature as an artistic endeavor and the people who create it, then you should do so fully. If you consider yourself a literary person, you shouldn’t just embrace the intellectual cachet that starting books gives you. Starting, but not finishing, books is one step above saying, “Oh yeah, I’ve heard of that author.” –The Atlantic
Globe Player- Shakespeare’s Globe – A streaming channel on which you can watch a variety of Shakespeare content, from plays to documentaries to sonnet recitations. This is SO COOL. Free and paid content. –Globe Player
Meet The Animator Who Captured A Woman’s Entire Lifetime In A Four-Minute Short – Someone sent me the link to this video and the interview with its creator. Both are wonderful, and I basically want to quote every answer the filmmaker, Celia Bullwinkle (and isn’t that the greatest name ever??) gives to every question. She’s so thoughtful and the way she tries to honor the honesty of how women so often see themselves in a really negative way while not replicating that negativity is really lovely. A nice way to end a Friday.
I remember talking to my mother on the phone about it, I was complaining to her, I was in my twenties, it had reached that critical mass. And she said, “enjoy it now, because when you get older, it goes away, and you might just miss it.” And you have to remember, this is a generation gap . My first impression was, absolutely not, that’s terrible. But I also kind of realized that when you grow up in a culture like this, you come to expect validation in negative ways. It becomes acceptable. And so I wanted to tell this like a parable. It’s a story about a woman who kind of buys into it. I know it’s not aspirational, as a lot of people who viewed the film wanted it to be. But I wanted it to be honest, I wanted to reach the people who, maybe they’re not conscious of it, but they kind of do rely on [catcalling] as a way of telling you that you’re okay. That yes, you are valuable. I thought about a lot of things. I did a lot of research on Nora Ephron. –Think Progress
That easy: I consider myself a reader, not a literary person, and I’ll read what I like. If a book can’t hold my interest, then I am probably not the right reader for that book.
I know Slate has gone the way of click baiting (with that horrid re-design, they need all the help they can get), but didn’t realize The Atlantic was moving in that direction as well.
I almost never drop a book once I’ve passed the quarter mark. In my younger years, when I didn’t have a lot of use for my time (which I’ve now come to call “being a responsible adult”), I never did. The “pleasure” I could agree with, but only when I speak for my own person. And if a book stops being entertaining for me, then that’s my potential loss. I’d build up enough “fortitude” in school to endure anything…or at least things that I need for my job (read: it’s not “editor”).
Respect? Sure. I have that. For my time, energy, sanity, and other more worthwhile reads. Just because I did not finish a book doesn’t mean I disrespected the work or the author. I’m a casual reader, not exactly a literary connoisseur. We all have personal priorities—those are the ones that “should be” respected.
Sheesh. Where are all these ideas coming from?
To paraphrase a line from “Blazing Saddles” – Oh, blow it out your ass, Juliet.
I guess there is only one respectful way to handle a piece line Juliet’s, and that is to never start it in the first place.
So is it disrespectful to buy the book and never get around to reading it? Because I’m sure all of us who do that could save a lot of money if that’s the case.
Finish every book!? Sorry, but that’s a big no. I didn’t even finish that article. No regrets on either point!
The DNF is a time honored and beautiful reading tradition. Or to put it another way: I second what Jayne said.
When I was younger, I always finished the books I started. And it is true there are some books I started off disliking or being bored by that did “turn around” in the second half and I ended up quite enjoying. But that is a very small percentage of the books I forced myself to finish.
Since I am not reading for school or work and don’t actually need to finish any particular book, I’ll DNF whenever I please now, thank you. Time is short and the TBR pile is very long.
I saw that several editors were laid off by Harlequin yesterday. I hope they find wonderful jobs soon. I also wonder how many lines HarperCollins is planning to close (if that is in fact what’s in the works which was my first fear when I heard about the sale).
What about the disregard shown to the reader by writing a terrible POS of a book?
Okay, most of my DNFs are books that just didn’t work for me. I avoid a lot of the truly terrible ones by, well, reading the first few chapters.
Life is too short for bad books.
If something bores me I end up falling asleep while reading and it takes me a great deal longer to finish it. Right now my small amount of reading time is precious and refuse to sacrifice them. Even if I had tons of time I read for enjoyment so if I am not enjoying it I am not going to finish reading it.
I’m fine with some random stranger thinking me disrespectful of books as art. My time is much more precious than her ‘good’ opinion.
I wonder what Juliet thinks about literature professors who allow you to drop one title from the semester’s book list and still be able to pass the final? Even they realize that taste is subjective and sometimes, no matter how hard you might try, finishing one book in particular is an impossibility.
Disrespect? I don’t finish plenty of books, but that doesn’t mean I don’t respect the author or the work that went into producing a book. Heck, I don’t finished my friends’ books… and I love them. Thing is, time is so valuable and if a book doesn’t hit the sweet spot for me, I’m not finishing it. That’s like saying you should finish a piece of cake you don’t like. It may be delicious to others, but if it doesn’t taste good to you, your time is better spent on, say, a Krispy Kreme donut. Now, I suppose if you’re a reviewer or a judge who has committed to read and remark on a book, that’s a bit different. But the casual reader has no obligations.
@Lostshadows: “Life is too short for bad books.”
That’s what my parents taught me — and I grew up in a household of readers. I have to slog through enough crap at work that I must finish, no matter how awful. If I am reading for my own pleasure, why shouldn’t I put down a book that either doesn’t hold my interest or makes me want to hurl expensive technology against the wall?
The Globe Player is very exciting and cool. I’ve been enjoying the NT Live series for a couple of years now when we’re able to get to the theatre for it. Because of it and the RSC and the Globe broadcasting performances, I’ve been able to enjoy some great plays — and a couple of “meh” ones — along the way. And they have the 2012 Shakespeare festival they did for the Olympics, which was one of those “if I had the money” things for me.
I was brought up to finish what was on my plate. It was an old-fashioned sentiment rooted in the desire to avoid waste and discourage greed, but flawed in some ways. Now, I eat until I’m full and stop.
No one ever told me I had to finish every page. When it comes to books, curiosity might compel me to skip to the end to see what happens if I’m bored with a story, but if I can’t be bothered to do even that, I feel no guilt.
Unlike my eating habits, that won’t change.
My then eight-year-old daughter taught me how to DNF. Even at eight she knew that reading time was precious.
But hey, if you think it is better for people to not DNF and then write a review filled with all the negatives, that’s your right. But rarely when I finish a book I wanted to walk away from have I ever been filled with the feeling I did the right thing.
Wow, thanks for including the link to Sidewalk. What an amazing short. Can’t wait to share with mini me later
When I drop a novel after a few chapters, it’s generally because I didn’t think it was a “work of art,” “literature,” or an “artistic endeavor.”
Books and authors may need all the help they can get, but making reading a miserable slog through a tedious, poorly-written, plotless wonder is not helping either books or authors.
When I struggle through an awful “literary” book for my book club and feel like I have to finish it, I’m much more likely to hate the book and announce my opinion on Goodreads, Amazon, and to all my bookish friends. If I pick up a book for pleasure and ditch it after a chapter or two, I’m far less likely to do anything other than make a note to never buy the author again.
@Rose: Well, she used to write for Slate, so maybe she learned the technique there. And it’s not as if the Atlantic isn’t publishing its share of stupid pieces these days.
I knew what genre of article we were dealing with when I hit this line:
I DNF genre books all the time, and many nonfiction books don’t need to be read cover to cover to get the main ideas, especially if the writing is no better than serviceable. I tend to pick lit fic books with more forethought, so I don’t DNF them as often.
But that’s an issue she overlooked (among many): if you give more books a chance, you’re bound to DNF some of them. But at least you’ve tried them. I’m not sure how reading and finishing two or three books a year is superior to starting ten and finishing five.
I’ll DNF a book all day long. If it doesn’t catch my attention, I don’t finish it. As Jayne said, she can blow it out her ass. In fact, I found her article to be tl;dr.
Respect is earned. When a book doesn’t earn it, DNFing seems like a logical and wise choice.
How about starting with making the books AVAILBLE? I wanted to try Maisey Yate’s IR Mills and Boon and guess what? No can do! The Highest Price to Pay is from 2011. There’s NO excuse for it to not be available as an eBook in all markets!
@Isobel Carr: It is available. We talked about this in another thread. It’s part of a 2-book bundle in the Corretti Dynasty series. Here’s the amazon link.
There’s a well-loved and critically claimed historical fiction series that, by every measure, I *should* love, but I hated. I hated the hero and I hated the heroine and I hated the world they inhabited and I hated myself every second I mentally spent there.
But I was of the “you must finish everything on your plate” reading school, so I doggedly plugged along, until a particular scene snapped my last nerve, and I stuck in a bookmark that I have yet to remove to this day.
It was an amazing, liberating moment. I have lugged that series with me through thirty years and six states, faded bookmark still poking out, just to remind myself that all books are artistic collaborations between the reader and the writer, and an unwilling reader produces bad art.
I wish I had time to finish all the books I start, but I am not gonna spend a week trying to read a bad book when I could read other books
All of those “reasons” to finish a book you don’t like were about externals, did anyone else notice? Showing respect for the author, for the literary profession, for the artistic endeavor inherent. Again, women are being told (by another woman!) that our own wishes don’t matter – it doesn’t matter whether we actually like the book or not, whether we enjoy something for ourselves. We should finish it anyway because the greater world needs us to show it respect.
Screw that. My wishes matter. My needs, wants and choices matter. I will make my choice. And no one will tell me I’m less than others, less deserving or less intelligent or less “good” for making a choice based on my personal taste and wishes.
I finish very, very few books. I long ago realized (and my mother sets an amazing example of a person who doesn’t finish many books) that reading is just about my opinion. I’m not reading for anyone else – I may be doing laundry, driving, cooking, working, cleaning, and all that stuff for everyone else, but reading is only for me. And NO ONE, absolutely no one, has the right to tell me I’m doing it wrong, or that I should do it “for” someone else or that doing it for just my personal enjoyment in my own way isn’t enough.
Did Lapidos ever actually do the reading in any women’s studies courses? I may read and write genre fiction instead of the much-more-valued-by-the-academy literary fiction, but I know that in the room of my own, I get to read and write what I want – that’s the point – and no one, not even another woman, can chide me about it.
Geez. Thanks for annoying me with my coffee! (they just sit around and look for trends to tick women off about, don’t they? Yes, click bait … glad our comments are here and not on the original article).
Crock. Of. Shit.
Life is too short to spend it reading books that don’t work for you, while there are tens of thousands you’ll never get a chance to read if you live 100 years.
Thanks for “Sidewalk”. Unlike so many books I’ve seen, worth finishing and rewatching.
@Anna Richland: SLOW CLAP.
Gah, is this anti-DNF thing an English major problem maybe? Because I am one (eons ago), and I used to have this attitude – but none of the overt judgey-ness on others’ reading habits, thankfully, only on my own. (I always assumed that not everyone was going to enjoy what I did.) It’s odd that she cited Pickwick, because I’m a Dickens fan and have read oodles, but have DNF that particular one tons of times. And I don’t think I’ve missed anything that I haven’t picked up in his other books. (Debtors prison comes up a lot in Dickens. And Pickwick is a really weird one to cite because even tho a serial, parts stand alone pretty well, and most of the continuing story stuff isn’t vital to understanding a later chapter. It’s meant to be that way.)
When I realized that I was treating every dull-book-trudge-through-read like an assignment and that I was miserable doing so, I figured out that I was only punishing myself, and for no reason. Especially when I wasn’t going to be talking about or reviewing the book. I was not having fun. It was just taking up time that I could have been reading something I liked. And yes, for every person that’s said “oh but it gets better” – some books do, but a lot more don’t, and often I’m still VERY irritated for that portion I had to slog through. (The word “editing” comes to mind.) The end result will be not liking the whole of the experience.
There are so many books out there, and excellent ones – I don’t have a problem setting something down anymore. I usually tell myself I’ll get around to it again, but sometimes that’s for years. And sometimes when I’ve picked up the book again, it was indeed what I was in the mood for. But pushing myself to read it when I wasn’t enjoying it? When it would make me like the book less? That would make no sense.
Short version: If your DNF lecture is all about the fortitude of finishing something and makes it sound like you’re running a marathon rather than pleasure – well, that doesn’t sound like any fun. And not everyone is reading for a class or a profession.
Also the bit:
“But if a novel starts well and descends into trash, then it seems to me that it’s worth continuing to see if it gets better, or to see where the writer went wrong. ”
Yeah, that’s English major thinking. I can still be interested in that. But not enough to finish a book that I find truly awful – by the time that I don’t care enough about the text and am only thinking “WTH is with this author?!” I really should DNF.
@Jayne: Well said!
@Anna Richland – this too! Why is it that the “literary” community expects us to show respect for everyone and everything but ourselves. Quite frankly, every time one of those articles telling me how I “must” read is published, I lose more respect for the “literary community.”
I don’t DNF a book often. If I’ve picked it up in the first place, I’ve already done my due diligence. I’ve read a review, and may also even have read sample chapters. Something about it has already made me think “okay this might be something that entertains me”.
And 999 times out of a thousand, I will in fact finish it. It’s extremely rare that I bail on a book once I make the effort to start reading it in the first place. The times when I do, it’s because something in it has actively pissed me off.
And I make no apologies for that! I do not see the point of continuing to read a book that’s pissed me off in the hopes that it’ll stop doing so. It’s pretty much tantamount to saying “man, hitting myself on the head with this hammer REALLY HURTS but if I keep at it maybe it’ll start feeling better!”
How’s this? I’ll finish your book. I’ll just start reading in the middle instead of at the beginning. Then if I like it enough, I’ll go back and start at the beginning until I catch up to the middle. If I *really* like your book, then I’ll end up re-reading the second half.
We all do lots of things for other people (highlight my hair? wear foundation? take out recycling in the rain b/c Mr. Richland took his shoes off first and I didn’t?) because “we should.” That’s being part of a family or a community or a work place. But read – NO – that’s not something we do for others, especially not for remote strangers, as the author suggested.
Thankfully we all get that – but I am left wondering about the critical analytical faculties of the lit fic world. Hmm.
Reading is an individual choice and how or what one reads should not be critiqued (short of criminal behavior or critiquing a lack of reading, IMO). In fact, in my January upcoming release, I specifically promised my kids in the dedication not to criticize what they read. A very public promise from me to let them read comics and sports pages without criticism that they should read “better” books.
I just don’t get why someone thinks it’s okay to tell readers that how or what they read is wrong. I understand giving someone a book rec – I do that all the time – but telling complete strangers, publicly, that they’re not good enough to be called readers if they DNF stuff? What arrogant, elitist crap. I always try to make a positive recommendation and be positive about reading – being negative about reading of anything in any fashion has no place in my world.
You all have the right to DNF my books and be guilt-free. If it didn’t work for you, that’s okay. Your right to quit, not my right to criticize a reader for not clicking with my story.
Now I must get OFF the internet and actually go write another story …
I rarely DNF a book because if it sucks the big one I wanna see how that train wreck is gonna crash. More importantly though, DNFing as an article topic? Really?
Just as a note, one thing that I think made an instant difference is this: HarperCollins gets 70% of cover from Amazon & better merchandising. Harlequin only got 50% of cover. Adding an additional 40% in digital income from the major vendor off the bat, not to mention any merchandising differences, is going to make a difference.
@Courtney Milan: I’m guessing that 40% isn’t being passed on to authors?
I paid for that book. I’ll DNF the damn thing, take it out in the yard and set it on fire, or use the pages for toilet paper if I want to. Let me repeat, I PAID FOR THE DAMN THING. That gives me the right to do whatever I want to do with my copy. I don’t think I owe the author, publisher, or the public anymore than my hard earned money.
Is the act of not DNF-ing a book going to be another rallying cry on par with if you don’t like a book just don’t review it and play nice with authors?
@Janet: Probably.
And if people heed this stupid call…I hope sales tank around the world. Cause we’ll all be too busy reading books we hate to go out and buy new books.
I had another comment that appears to have gone to filter?
I just DNF’d a book last night, by the way, that I really wanted to like based on the blurb. Two things happened in the first chapter that made me have to suspend disbelief, I was annoyed at the hero very quickly for thoughtlessly poor etiquette that could have seriously inconvenienced many strangers on public transportation, and the heroine came off like a brat … so I skipped around and dipped into 2 or 3 scenes in the middle, and they didn’t pull me in enough to get over the three initial humps and go back.
I did not owe anyone more of my time on that book. So it’s a DNF and back to the library. Someone else will not be bothered by the things that bugged the spit out of me – I know that the action I considered to be very poor etiquette will be viewed as an expression of concern for a friend by many people, and the heroine’s insecurities will be more important than the display of brattiness to others – but despite knowing how others will see the book, I have no obligation to read it to see if I come around. I just don’t.
@Ros: At least some of the authors are getting a percent of net, so it might result in higher royalties, depending on how the deal is structured. But it’s the difference between being able to keep 37.5% and being able to keep 52.5%. It’s a significant difference for a publisher.
Life is too short and I am too old, to waste time on books that are not living up to either my expectations or their promises. It’s not like there aren’t 3 million other books that will better enrich my life out there!
I also wouldn’t finish a meal that I found repugnant. Is that disrespectful?
It’s odd, because I can’t really figure out if Lapidos is making an argument explicitly about “literary merit” or if she’s just using that to push for more reader promo of authors (and therefore really engaging the commercial aspects of writing even more).
This is part of what makes me wonder:
Today, books and authors need all the help they can get; if you care about literature as an artistic endeavor and the people who create it, then you should do so fully. If you consider yourself a literary person, you shouldn’t just embrace the intellectual cachet that starting books gives you. Starting, but not finishing, books is one step above saying, “Oh yeah, I’ve heard of that author.”
So you should do this if you consider yourself a “literary person” (whatever the hell that is) because “books and authors need all the help they can get.” So it’s not so much about excellence (because you’re supposed to finish any book that isn’t complete “trash”) as about boosting the signal of authors and their books? Hmm.
@Robin/Janet:
I can’t get past the “trash” comment because I am sick of the reader-shaming. If a book doesn’t work for me, it simply doesn’t work for me. It’s a DNF not because it sucks or is trash, but because it simply isn’t my kind of book.
Because trash, sucks, etc. is shaming those who like it. And fuck that shit.
@Patricia Burroughs [aka pooks]: And in this case it seems like both author and reader shaming, because the author who writes “trash” isn’t deserving of respect, so if you follow the logic, finishing a book by someone undeserving of respect would not be deserving of respect, either. Or something (I’ve had a long day and my brain is mush).
@Robin/Janet:
Exactly.
@Courtney Milan: Oh, sure, that’s huge for a publisher. It would be nice to think some authors are benefitting too.
I DNF most of the books I pick up. I just don’t have the time to stick with something that isn’t grabbing my interest. In fact, when I don’t DNF a book, I’m thrilled.