My teenage son blinks. His eye’s roll. Before his gaze slides back to mine, I see him judging the distance between where we’re standing at the stove and the french door leading outside to the deck.

He’s about to cut and run. And he’s blushing, this kid whose olive complexion should make that impossible, only he’s my son and a few of my fair skin’s more embarrassing traits managed to infuse his DNA no matter how much the rest of him takes after his dad.

“Pawn stars,” he enunciates with the precision of a special ed. speech teacher humoring a challenging student. “It’s a reality show on the History Channel about a pawn dealer in Vegas. It’s cool.”

“The History Channel is doing reality TV?”I wait for the irony of the phenomenon to speak for itself. Another blink’s all I get back. “Reality TV, by definition,” I explain, ”is watching something that’s actually happening while it’s taped. So, naturally, a cable channel devoted to learning from civilizations past would be a huge player in the medium…”

That gets me a sigh. I’m a writer. Not necessarily the most fun person to be around when I can’t hold in my altered (or in this case, sarcastically literal) take on the world around me.

“It’s like Antiques Road Show,” he throws at me unfairly, because I’m a geeky ARS fan who’s gotten my son hooked more than once on watching episodes of people dragging their family’s treasures (or fakes and reproductions) before experts and millions of PBS viewers, hoping a piece of their heritage will be something truly spectacular someone else will love as much as they do. “Excepts it’s not for old folks. It’s actually cool.”

Ouch.

I stir my Marsala instead of wincing. Add some more chicken stock, turn the simmer down lower, and slide back in the chicken I pounded, breaded with flour and pan seared a few minutes ago.

“So.” I smile. “History’s cool now?”

My teenager’s a math and science kid. His passion is numbers and technology and what he can do with them, but I’ve known forever that he’s fascinated with history, too. Except the teachers of this less-exciting subject who can actually bring a piece of the past to life for him have been few and far between. To be fair, getting him watching ARS with me actually begin as a ploy to get him talking to his grandparents about the lives and worlds they’ve lived.

“People bring stuff in and they have experts talk about the older things,” he says, “and there’s always a lot of guns and swards and military stuff.”

Ah–the cool stuff.

“And the guys who run the pawn shop are funny. There’s this old, cranky guy and his son and grandson and a guy they all make fun of. They’re always fighting.”

“So.” My smile’s wider. “They’re telling a story about this family and all the stuff they see come in and out of their shop?”

My teenager hesitates. He’s sensing a trap. He always does every time I mention storytellers, because I’ve told him he’s one and he’s resisting, kick and screaming. Like my author juice might somehow infect the analytical, engineering plans he already has for his life.

“It’s on tonight?” I ask.

“At ten.”

“Can’t wait,” I say. He didn’t exactly ask if I’d watch it with him, but I’m a mother. Being pushy’s a hardwired reflex. “Drain the capellini, will ya’?”

It’s the best part of my day, most days, the times my teen helps me get dinner finished. Like his Italian dad, he loves to cook. And like his father and his grandfather, he opens up and talks more while he’s doing it. And tonight, he’s telling me that he’s found a way to like something new. Or that the History Channel’s found a way to reach him and other young people and tempt them to learn while they’re watching something entertaining.

I’ll learn later that one of the channel’s tag lines is “History happens every day,” and that there are a lot more shows my teenager turns away from other kid programming to watch: Ice Road Truckers and Deadliest Catch,to name a few. But for now, what I see is him growing into his ideas about the world and his own tastes and his own sense of play, which includes a heavy dose of studying the past his own way and watching people live their lives (some of the strongest traits every storyteller must have).

I’m waiting for him to tell me he wants to watch the show by himself. I’ll back off if he does. I’m pushy, not stupid. Picking your battles with your teenager–I could write a book.

“There’s a marathon of past shows on now,” he says instead. “We could watch it while we eat.”

He dumps the pasta, and I wonder who’s pushing whom. My son likes to eat at the kitchen’s center island with the TV on. I like the dining room and the conversation and recap of the day that happens there. This is an ongoing war.

He’s the one who’s smiling now, because he knows he has me. He’s won this battle.

“Turn it on,” I sigh, because his dad’s working late and it’s just the two of us, and because whenever my teenager invites me into his world, I’m there.

That doesn’t mean he’s off the hook.

“I can’t wait to tell your grandmother I let you talk me into watching Pawn over dinner,” I say as I grab bowls  from the cabinet.

He just about snorts milk out of his nose, trying to pretend he’s not laughing.

Reality TV dinner with my son–I realize I’d do it every night, if the easy feeling of this moment is my reward. We’re making our own history. Every day…

Questions all authors immersed in this situation are facing, and non-Dorchester authors considering the growth of publishing’s interest and investment in the digital format(BTW, you’ll see these are market questions, not publisher-specific questions–as I said in earlier posts, my business with Dorchester, a publisher I respect full of editors I love to work with, has to stay my business until I’ve worked my way through the transition):

1) How long will it take mass market readers to shift to digital, the way LP and CD buyers have moved to digital music to the point that music producers by and large no longer cut albums?

2) How will mass market readers eventually be able browse digital content,the way they currently browse the disappearing book stores and the shrinking shelves in discount stores? I suspect innovative approaches like the publishing version of iTunes will be the answer (Again, I’m lusting after my own iPad for many reasons, not the least of which that Apple’s poised to make massive inroads into digital publishing sales and distribution).

3) How will publishers’ marketing and sales departments target and promote to the new digital showplaces for their books? Because you know they will. Give them time. And digital authors need to be on top of the trends and prepared to partner in the process.

4) How will authors continue the advances we’ve already made in promoting on our own, in cooperation with what our publishers are doing? Social media’s an obvious answer. Viral marketing. But how much is affective? How much of that effort reaches an audience that doesn’t already own a digital reader (something estimated currently to be only 15% or so of the market place)? Because that’s who we need to reach if this is going to work–readers who aren’t already e-book true believers. How do we convince a world that currently sees books as tangible things that the digital format is a quality product, too?

Achieving this is the only way for a digital-first approach to have any chance of propelling an author’s career forward. And, frankly, we’re just not there yet.

5) And once again, most importantly to authors in my shoes, how long is all this going to take? Is investing time and money and sweat and tears now into the digital transition of our industry going to pay off any time soon? When’s the right time to throw your hat into the ring and commit to being part of the surge? To being a leader in the change that’s going to consume you eventually anyway. To figuring it out and making it work and not backing away?

We’re all going to have to take risks in this. The question is, how much risk can an author absorb?

IMHO, until we make our digital books the very best books available, until readers see that the very best is coming to them digitally (because the industry’s committed to the technology above all other forms), I’m not sure the sales are going to follow the way current mass market authors want. But at some point, we have to put the work out there, so those readers that buy our books can begin to adjust.

At least that’s the reasoning swirling through my mind one-week out.

This surprise Secret Legacy review came my way yesterday , adding to the swirling.

Writing Examiner Secret Legacy Review

It’s wonderful. Amazing, actually. I’m a bit stunned and humbled. And I’m thinking… About the future, and when I’m going to get on the train that’s taking us all there.

1) Is print publishing dead, and is digital going to rule the world?

This guy (the self-appointed “king” of digital book sales) thinks so:

http://www.jimchines.com/2010/08/death-of-print/

Read the comments on this one to see a great discussion from both sides of the issue.

For me, I’m buying my first reader later this year after watching them fight each other for market position (and I’ll be buying the iPad once they work the kinks out and get the second generation going, because it offers so much more than just a reader for the same price). But I won’t be giving up my “keeper” shelves of books. Ever. We’re looking at merging markets, folks.

We’re looking at a world where both forms (and future forms) of reading will become more readily availabe to everyone (when as it stands, something like 75% of us still don’t use a reader and mass market paperbacks increasingly can’t find a home for us to find them in, in bookstores and discount stores).

2) Is Dorchester down for the count?

This article seems to be offering to order their tomb stone for them:

http://www.readwriteweb.com/archives/paperback_publisher_goes_all_e-book.php

It’s interesting when they say that Dorchester hasn’t weathered the recession well, since IT’S sales were down %25 last year (this number borrowed from the WSJ article I mentioned in my Day 1 post).

Let me just say, again from my experience as part of the industry, serving on the board of a large writing organization the first year of the recession, and working for several imprints and two different large publishers, that EVERY publisher has had significant trouble weathering the recession. That 25% statistic is mostly likely reflective of the industry as a whole (and helps us understand why Borders and now B&N are also struggling). Again, as I said on Day 1, everyone’s struggling and all of us are buying less of everything. Dorchester’s trying to find ways to cut costs and make money in an at-the-moment loss-leading industry sooner than other publishers, but by no means is this their problem alone.

Articles like this give me a pain. They’re asking questions like are e-books the mass market paperbacks of the future OR are they simply a cheaper means to deliver books to the largest audience. In no way is this an either or question. The form of the mass market paperback isn’t even the issue. The crux of the delima Dorchester and other publishers are dealing with is how to get print books created, warehoused and shipped to stores without a publisher losing their shirts to do it.

In my opinion, the parts of the industry that will be down for the count if the digital model prevails are the printers, wholesalers, distributors and book sellers. The publishers who figure out how to make the digital model work will continue to do business, without the excessive cost and overhead of having to deal with the rest.

The Print On Demand (POD) model Dorchester is exploring is the part of this shift getting the least attention at the moment, and I don’t understand it. There’s a way to make this work (printing smaller runs, warehouse next to nothing, getting stores books quickly without having to pay wholesalers to carry your assets, and eliminating the stripping of books solely at the publisher’s expense). It’s only a matter of time before someone figures it out. Dorchester’s just pushing up the timeline, rather laying on the mat, down for the count, while their time runs out. Good for them, I say.

3) Is the digital/POD publishing model a ploy to rob and pillage authors of their hard-earned money?

No links this time. As I said in my Day 3 post, not going to do the gossip thing here. If you want to indulge, the posts are easy enough to find.

Did authors get hit hard by this? Yes. Is this the last time a change made by a publisher will take its authors by surprise? No. Does that make the circumstances of this situation any easier for the authors involved to deal with? No.

As I said on Day 3, there are real people involved in this unfolding drama. Real lives and dreams and books we’ve worked damn hard on with editors we love. Real decisions to be made beyond the sensationalizing of the situation for the benefit of those who like to watch a house burn to see whether or not the flames can be put out. It’s amazing to me how few of the vehement posts and tweets flying around are actually in support of the authors themselves.

There’s a lot of raging and finger pointing going on out there. But not as far as I can see a lot of trying to understand where the authors are coming from now, how they’re dealing with this change, and what they’re take on all this is. And these are the people we can learn a lot from as we watch them grow and conquer this challenge. Let’s focus on the people a bit more, is all I’m saying.

The industry will shake itself out. Writers will keep writing, and we’ll find a way to make money at it or we’ll go back to writing for ourselves, because that’s what writers do–we write because we have to, even if no one else ever reads a word of it. This is an opportunity to watch our industry change around us and cheer each other on. The rush to lay blame and be the first to label the situation and the roles everyone’s playing in it with the strongest adjectives possible is lost on me.

Let’s keep our eye on the ball, folks. We all want publishing to figure this out, because we all love books and the people who write them for us.

Right?

You’re not going to hear me bash professionals or point fingers or rant and rave. There will be no rush to hypothesise, predict or leak juicy bits of gossip. I respect this business and my partners in it too much to sensationalize something that is already difficult enough for everyone. 

What you will see out here on Day 3 of Dorchester’s change, is me talking about an emotional dynamic that is very similar to what I’ve seen fellow authors go through for years–when unexpected decisions made by their publishers greatly affect their hard work and careful planning and leave them spinning in a place that feels uncomfortably like starting over.

No one really talks in the amidst of these kinds of transitions. Not out in the open. These are confusing, uncertain times, and none of us like to appear as if we don’t have the answers to our own business problems.We like to wait until we’re sure of what we’re doing before we talk about it in public.

Except I’m getting emails and texts and phone calls and facebook messages and tweets about this every day. And even though I’m as confused and uncertain as the next writer, I don’t see me being sure of much of anything for a good while to come. This is all happening too publicly to stay on my island and watch from a distance. There are too many people in the same situation, too many folks commenting and speculating.

So, though I have no answers yet to share, I’m throwing out some more things to consider. Things that, unlike my last post, veer today toward emotions rather than business:

1) Remember that what’s happening to Dorchester authors now is happening to real people. They’ve happened to lots of other people before us (obviously not this particular change, but authors have been watching their publishing worlds shift and often shrink with alarming frequency over the last few years). And when you’re watching change happen on this large a scale, it’s easy to talk business (as I did in my Day 1 post), and say whatever comes to mind without stopping to consider that the news and updates you’re bandying about are affecting the lives of very real writers.

And when it’s happening to you, it may be easy to think of your personal situation as far more precarious than anyone else’s. I suspect it’s not. This isn’t my own unique circumstance, nor yours. My hope for all the authors struggling with this is that it helps just a little, knowing there are other kick-ass writers and families out there facing the exact same delima.

2)The first reaction to change this big is going to be emotional. I don’t care how good you are at staying focused on your business and staying positive and constructive, having your world shift so suddenly and having no control over the decision isn’t a happy place.What I try to remember when this happens (and, yes, this isn’t my first ride on the roller coaster) is that decisions made during heightened emotion are almost always the ones I’ve wished later that I could go back and change. In other words, I’m doing a lot of yoga right now. A lot of deep breathng and list making (already sent several long ones to my agent ;o) And studying. And I’m very privately discussing the situation with close friends in the business whose insight I value. All these things are helping neutralize the emotion, at least enough of it for reason to grab a greater hand.

3) When the unknown takes over everything you thought you knew, the second reaction (fast on emotion’s heels) is typically panic.  All hope is lost, you’re going to have to start over, and maybe it seems pointless to even try…That sort of thing. My experience in my own career and from watching the long-term success of others is that this is one of the most critical phases of dealing with the kind of surprising change Dorchester authors are facing.

This is the point where I need to decide to keep fighting, or to take my toys and go home. How much do I really want this? How creative am I willing to be about getting to the finish line? How deep am I willing to dig for the motivation and confidence and belief that this can be only a bump in the road, instead of a roadblock I’ll never get past?

4) Luckily, when the shock of the first waves of emotion and panic have passed, I’ve learned to gravitate toward a place where I can step back and respect the situation and options before me for what they are. In other words, I slowly begin to drag myself back from the ledge and remove my emotions from the questions I have to answer. I regroup and try to attack the decisions facing me with intelligence and optimism, rather than emotions and a sense of impending doom that could easily become a self-fulling prophecy.

For those authors facing this same crossroads, and for those readers and writers facing other difficulties that seem just as daunting, I encourage you to let yourself feel the emotions and let the panic have its first rush of power. Venting all that yuck is an important step toward getting your mind where it needs to be to think clearly about your situation and your options. And there are always options. There are always choices you can make to improve your situation and your chances for success. You just have to get yourself mind ready to do battle again.

And luckily, on Day 3, that’s where I’m finding myself. Calmer. More aware of the bigger picture. Ready to get back in the game…

I hope you are, too ;o)

So, as a Dorchester author with a degree in business and 5 years as a published author, writing organization board membership, writing craft teacher, mentor and romance publishing advocate behind me, here’s what I see on Day 1:

1) Anyone who thinks this latest shift is just about a small New York publisher named Dorchester needs to research, as I have, the changes in our industry over the last two years. The current mass market business model has been broken for some time (long before the shrinking economy played its hand). It’s never going to work again on any sustainable level. It’s only a matter of time before even the largest publishing house must face the decisions Dorchester has had to. The only variable in this evolution is how long each house has before they have no choice but to act in some significant way.

2) Every publisher, printer, wholesaler, distributor, bookseller, and author has taken a significant financial and sales hit in an economy where everyone was carrying sizable debt when the credit market crashed, then proceeded to shrink even further from there.

When the accessibility of available funds to do business dries up, businesses do what businesses have to do to protect the bottom line–they cut back. Starting with stores ordering fewer books and returning more (putting less titles on the shelves and ordering fewer and fewer copies of all but the lead titles), shutting the doors to low-performing outlets, and banking on the guaranteed success of branded names instead of continuing to risk precious retail space on newer, un-proven authors.

Track the dwindling numbers back down the chain to the publisher, and orders/print runs have dropped to levels no one could have predicted. Tack on the ridiculous losses publishers absorb when books are stripped and returned, often in warehouses, then re-ordered (and reprinted at the publisher’s expense) to replace inventory that eventually does sell, and the proposition of making money in mass market publishing keeps becoming less and less viable.

3) Smaller publishers without the assets to fall back on of their bigger counterparts will of course feel the pinch sooner. They’ll be the first to show visible cracks. But don’t for a minute believe that the bigger publishers that might seem safer places to do business or pitch books aren’t in the same precarious place.

I currently write for another publisher that’s closed and restructured numerous lines in the last few years, adjusting to the shrinking market as needed to protect/grow their business, at times leaving authors and readers scrambling to find new places to write or read what they love. I know many a talented mid-list author in various houses who’s had his or her contract option dropped, has been asked to end a current series prematurely and begin a new one (possibly under a pseudonym, to capitalize on potential sales interest in a “new” author), or has been told that a new proposal is AMAZING, but it just isn’t viable in the current market.

4) Larger publishers may have the option to sit back and watch as others try alternative business models. Maybe they’ll even have the chance to see which trends will work in their favor before they, too, are compelled by their bottom lines to act. But I suspect the lag in their hand being forced is shrinking even as I type.

5) The reality of Borders having financial difficulty for years (and closing countless retail outlets), Barnes & Noble possibly being up for sale, and the prospect of places like WalMart and  their ever-shrinking book sections choosing fewer and fewer titles to make available to the traditional mass market book reader makes you wonder if taking a strong position in the digital and POD publishing model sooner rather than later isn’t inevitable for anyone.

As I said above, this is just one author’s business take, from the perspective of watching and learning and talking to peers and my own mentors in this business over the last few years (some of whom remain professionals I admire greatly at Dorchester). What’s the best response as an author? I can’t say.  Because, honestly, I don’t know what I think about any of it yet. And the first thing I learned in business school is that when you don’t know what to do, do nothing until you have more information.

But I’m hoping to know more on Monday. I’m sure there will be even more to learn on Tuesday. Just like everyone else, I’m a student in this quickly-changing classroom. Figuring out for myself how all this affects me is my job. In addition to writing the books I hope readers will love for a long time to come, my job as a commercial fiction writer is to partner with my publishers in their business, which means I can never stop being a student of the business models that make my career possible. Those authors out there that this particular dynamic hasn’t affected yet, my advice is to show up at class every day, too, and pay attention to your own situation. Now more than ever, you can’t afford not to. Change is coming for us all.

Listen, learn, analyze, process. These are the things we can all do as this plays out. You know, when we’re not listening to the WSJ telling us that the reason romance readers are a strong market for digital reading devices is that we need to hide our pornographic covers and we’re so old that we need the increased font size capability of the reader to be able to see our smutty stories.

Really, WSJ? I’m embarrassed to know you.

Still, other than that indulgent aside, I’m keeping it positive around here as always. And Day 1 for me is all about business. If you have any thoughts along those lines, feel free to chime in. I’d love the company in my thinking spot!