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Into the Light snippet #12

Aliens? Invading aliens? What will Earth do? Well...we may have a few more resources than we first thought. Come join a friendly discussion about David Weber's newest Tor series - "Out of the Dark."
Re: Into the Light snippet #12
Post by Theemile   » Fri Jul 26, 2019 9:57 am

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PeterZ wrote:Hold the phone. If Fallsfromtrees has a copy of the book, why is TOR taking so long to publish it? They could schedule a release within 8-9 months of submission.


He probably bought one of the first copy subscriptions. David gave a handful away to help support several cons.
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Re: Into the Light snippet #12
Post by fallsfromtrees   » Fri Jul 26, 2019 12:52 pm

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Theemile wrote:
PeterZ wrote:Hold the phone. If Fallsfromtrees has a copy of the book, why is TOR taking so long to publish it? They could schedule a release within 8-9 months of submission.


He probably bought one of the first copy subscriptions. David gave a handful away to help support several cons.

I am indeed on the first readers list, which means I have to be extraordinarily careful about spoilers.
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Re: Into the Light snippet #12
Post by PeterZ   » Fri Jul 26, 2019 4:22 pm

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My point is that the book is finished. Why is publishing the completed book taking so long?
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Re: Into the Light snippet #12
Post by Theemile   » Fri Jul 26, 2019 4:45 pm

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PeterZ wrote:My point is that the book is finished. Why is publishing the completed book taking so long?


It's Tor - they have a 18 month cycle for publication. It's partially due to their internal processes, it also partially due to their agreements with their book printers.

I believe Baen has a ~9 month cycle, and I believe I was told they have a set # of printed book slots each month with their printers.
******
RFC said "refitting a Beowulfan SD to Manticoran standards would be just as difficult as refitting a standard SLN SD to those standards. In other words, it would be cheaper and faster to build new ships."
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Re: Into the Light snippet #12
Post by PeterZ   » Fri Jul 26, 2019 5:00 pm

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Theemile wrote:
PeterZ wrote:My point is that the book is finished. Why is publishing the completed book taking so long?


It's Tor - they have a 18 month cycle for publication. It's partially due to their internal processes, it also partially due to their agreements with their book printers.

I believe Baen has a ~9 month cycle, and I believe I was told they have a set # of printed book slots each month with their printers.

The idiots should sell e-books in some form leading to the HC release.
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Re: Into the Light snippet #12
Post by Randomiser   » Sat Jul 27, 2019 6:51 am

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PeterZ wrote:
Theemile wrote:It's Tor - they have a 18 month cycle for publication. It's partially due to their internal processes, it also partially due to their agreements with their book printers.

I believe Baen has a ~9 month cycle, and I believe I was told they have a set # of printed book slots each month with their printers.

The idiots should sell e-books in some form leading to the HC release.


I'm pretty sure that the 'idiots' reckon that if they publish the e-book first it will damage sales of the HC. Due to retailer's sentiment if not reader's. Also when do you then do the advertising push?
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Re: Into the Light snippet #12
Post by PeterZ   » Sat Jul 27, 2019 9:44 am

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Theemile wrote:It's Tor - they have a 18 month cycle for publication. It's partially due to their internal processes, it also partially due to their agreements with their book printers.

I believe Baen has a ~9 month cycle, and I believe I was told they have a set # of printed book slots each month with their printers.
PeterZ wrote:The idiots should sell e-books in some form leading to the HC release.
Randomiser wrote:
I'm pretty sure that the 'idiots' reckon that if they publish the e-book first it will damage sales of the HC. Due to retailer's sentiment if not reader's. Also when do you then do the advertising push?

Does Baen's e-arc sales harm their HC & e-book sales? I don't think so. I am pretty sure the opposite is true. TOR's 18 month cycle is just too cumbersome in the current market environment.
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Re: Into the Light snippet #12
Post by drothgery   » Sat Jul 27, 2019 11:58 am

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PeterZ wrote:My point is that the book is finished. Why is publishing the completed book taking so long?

They have to do final editing of the book, create cover art, do some marketing so that people who aren't here even know the book exists, actually print books for those of you who stick with dead trees, and probably a bunch of stuff that I'm forgetting. And publishers have limited resources, so the people who do most of that have work on other books scheduled out for a while.
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Re: Into the Light snippet #12
Post by runsforcelery   » Sat Jul 27, 2019 6:32 pm

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PeterZ wrote:
Theemile wrote:It's Tor - they have a 18 month cycle for publication. It's partially due to their internal processes, it also partially due to their agreements with their book printers.

I believe Baen has a ~9 month cycle, and I believe I was told they have a set # of printed book slots each month with their printers.
PeterZ wrote:The idiots should sell e-books in some form leading to the HC release.
Randomiser wrote:
I'm pretty sure that the 'idiots' reckon that if they publish the e-book first it will damage sales of the HC. Due to retailer's sentiment if not reader's. Also when do you then do the advertising push?

Does Baen's e-arc sales harm their HC & e-book sales? I don't think so. I am pretty sure the opposite is true. TOR's 18 month cycle is just too cumbersome in the current market environment.


Part of the problem is how far ahead a publisher sets his schedule. Suppose I know I have 6 slots (just to pick a number) in each quarter. That's 24 new releases a year. I start plugging books into slots as they come in, probably holding one or two for the big book I really hope will come in, but the odds don't look real good. As I get closer to the release date, I fill in the ones I held back. Let's say that I try to solidify the schedule out for a full year --- that is, I close up those open slots as my production cycle gets to the go/no go point for each quarter.

So right this minute (start of 3rd quarter) I'm scheduled solid through 3rd quarter of next year --- that is, though end of October 2020 --- and I've got my PR scheduled and timed for that.

Now one of my writers (in this case, two of my writers) hand in a book I didn't expect to have for another three months. I look at my schedule, and there's no place to put it at all prior to November 2020. I have other books already in the production queue ahead of it, and I already have most of my slots for 4th quarter 2020 filled up. So I schedule this new one for 1st quarter of 2021.

Not saying that's exactly how it worked in this case, but that's sort of how the process goes in general. Tor is definitely slower in production than Baen, and that adds onto the time cycle, but it's really more about timing on receipt of the manuscript than dawdling.

As for early e-book releases, if you're talking about doing it on the scale of Baen's earcs, I agree it should be doable if Tor didn't have a policy against it. Releasing the e-book early would definitely poison hardcover sales, though.


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Re: Into the Light snippet #12
Post by dvdscar   » Mon Jul 29, 2019 10:04 pm

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runsforcelery wrote:Part of the problem is how far ahead a publisher sets his schedule. Suppose I know I have 6 slots (just to pick a number) in each quarter. That's 24 new releases a year. I start plugging books into slots as they come in, probably holding one or two for the big book I really hope will come in, but the odds don't look real good. As I get closer to the release date, I fill in the ones I held back. Let's say that I try to solidify the schedule out for a full year --- that is, I close up those open slots as my production cycle gets to the go/no go point for each quarter.

So right this minute (start of 3rd quarter) I'm scheduled solid through 3rd quarter of next year --- that is, though end of October 2020 --- and I've got my PR scheduled and timed for that.

Now one of my writers (in this case, two of my writers) hand in a book I didn't expect to have for another three months. I look at my schedule, and there's no place to put it at all prior to November 2020. I have other books already in the production queue ahead of it, and I already have most of my slots for 4th quarter 2020 filled up. So I schedule this new one for 1st quarter of 2021.

Not saying that's exactly how it worked in this case, but that's sort of how the process goes in general. Tor is definitely slower in production than Baen, and that adds onto the time cycle, but it's really more about timing on receipt of the manuscript than dawdling.

As for early e-book releases, if you're talking about doing it on the scale of Baen's earcs, I agree it should be doable if Tor didn't have a policy against it. Releasing the e-book early would definitely poison hardcover sales, though.


What he said. And even Baen's perceived nimbleness and flexibility is pretty limited. Eric Flint and I turned in the final manuscript for The Span of Empire at the end of September 2014. They originally told us it wouldn't get onto the schedule until mid-2017, but Eric convinced them to find an earlier slot. It still wasn't published until September 2016.
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