"Advances" in publishing…

An article in the New York Times made me think. It talked about book advances and how they’ve changed, how the amounts are influenced.

The article talks about how 7 out of 10 books don’t earn out their advance. That means the author never gets a royalty check, if I’m not mistaken. Also, that it takes so long to get a book to print that can really hurt an author financially because of the time involved. Not to mention you share part of that with an agent.

Wow. I mean, I know I don’t get advances currently from my houses, and I’m not exactly making Stephen King money, but I’m making average evil day job equivalent pay from my writing. Two of my houses pay monthly, one pays quarterly. I consider myself damn lucky, believe me, because I know a lot of writers aren’t making enough to quit their evil day jobs, and this is what I do full-time for a living now.

Convince me again why, exactly, traditional publishing is better than e-publishing? I mean, for a “new” writer without an established backlist, unless you’re extremely lucky, it’s difficult to get into a “regular” publisher. Yeah, it happens, but in the mean time, I’m not sitting there with my writing not making me money. So I’m still not sure why there are some writers who look down their noses at e-publishing when it’s a viable alternative if someone is serious about having a writing career. I’ve met some great people, I love the publishers I’ve signed with, and I’m developing a reader base who’ve really blessed me by reading what I write and buying more.

My writing makes me money. Period. It makes me money that allows me to work from home. It makes me money that pays my bills and I have fun doing it. No, “dead tree” books aren’t disappearing, but then again, neither are e-books.