I looked back some of my Tuesday blog posts and thought I might be getting too serious, so I wanted to lighten it up a bit with some practical, helpful information that should help you navigate and understand the complicated world of publishing.
Here are words you might hear in relation to publishing or describing a particular book and its real meaning:
- “A must-read” – Acquisitions editor job is on the line
- “Latest release by the author” – marketing hasn’t read the manuscript.
- “Incredible Literary Feat” – passive aggressive statement from publisher aimed at an author who missed their deadline by three years.
- “Much anticipated release” – passive aggressive statement from marketing department of publisher aimed at the production department for messing up printer files causing a delay in delivery.
- “Great crossover title” – Christian bookstores won’t stock it.
- “Great for all ages” – Publisher has no idea who will read it.
- “A message for the ages” – Marketing thinks book will blow the lid off of something, but they don’t know what.
- “A message you need to hear” – the book is like drinking a big tall glass of Metamucil.
- “Ground-breaking” – book has borderline heresy in it, but maybe not, we’re not sure.
- “100,000 Books in Print” – publisher over-printed and has a lot of copies in the warehouse…a lot of copies.
- “Research-based findings” – publisher held a focus group and gave participants pizza and chocolate cake to say they liked the book.
- “Just like Purpose Driven Life, The Shack, Prayer of Jabez, Left Behind, and The Bible” – Ad copy written by someone who just returned from a seminar on Metadata Key Word Search and Internet Discoverability.
- “Revised and Updated Edition” – we corrected the mistakes we made in the original edition.
- “Best-selling author” – the author did all the marketing and bought 20,000 copies and sold them at their seminars. We just printed them! Woo-hoo!
Any words or phrases you would like to have explained? (I can be serious…really)
What a fun list.
Next time somebody tells me that I need to hear a message, I’ll think of Metamucil.
Have a great day!
Dan, you made me laugh. It’s nice to begin a day that way. 🙂 The very first one made me laugh out loud. Not sure why.
“Great for all ages” – Publisher has no idea who will read it.
“Research-based findings” – publisher held a focus group and gave participants pizza and chocolate cake to say they liked the book.
Thanks for this. 🙂
Great daffynitions. Thanks for enlightening me about the sacred world of publisher
My mother, for my entire life, has had a large glass of Metamucil every morning. Blech! What a great image, Dan! Thanks for the laugh this morning.
Great start to the day, Dan! Thanks for the smiles. Loved the “Best-Selling Author” explanation.
I so appreciated this today! Sometimes, it’s best to keep grinning while plowing ahead.
Dan, I drew stares from my colleagues at work because of the guffaw that escaped my mouth as I read this. Fantastic!
I suspected, but now I know- isn’t that the truth.
Okay, I’m ending my day with some giggles—thanks, Dan! 😉
Some of these really made me laugh out loud (especially the one about too many copies printed).
Thanks for the Tuesday humor. 🙂
“Pulitzer Prize nominee” = paid $50 to enter the Pulitzer but didn’t win and wasn’t a finalist.
I read a novel where the lead character was described as a Pulitzer Prize nominee and commented on it in my review. I’ve recently read the sequel, and now she’s a Pulitzer Prize finalist. So publishers do read reviews!