A dollar, two dollars? How many books of his have been sold? Just curious. Mike, Va.
Not enough IMHO
I’ll take a wild-assed guess, as a publishing professional.
The first book net twenty thousand copies.
The second book net eighteen thousand copies. There’s always a “sophomore slump” in publishing, but the second book was such a big fat rotund hunka knowledge that it actually had a good sell-through. (“Sell-through” is the relation of net to gross. If 100,000 books ship out from the publisher and 80,000 are actually sold, only 20,000 returned, the book has an 80% sell-through).
Book 3 net 15,000 copies.
Book 4 net 8,000 copies.
Book 5 net 5,000 copies…but it’s still considered the “new book,” so copies are still sitting on the shelves in bookshops.
Are all five books still in print and readily available? Given the current bookselling climate, I’d be inclined to doubt it.
The above conjectures are not emblematic of a disrespect for Cecil’s Word. They’re just my usual pessimistic outlook on book-publishing/selling.
If Cece’s numbers actually went UP…Zotti should phone me up to discuss a move and a new contract.
Standard author’s royalties are usually around 12-15% of the cover price for a hardcover and 6-8% for a paperback. You get a higher rate if the book sells more (say, 60,000 paperbacks jumps you to the higher rate for all copies after the 60,000th is sold).
Since Cecil has a track record, and probably is smart enough to get a good agent, his royalty rate may be higher. He’s probably given a pretty solid advance, too – money paid up front when the book is accepted. He gets no royalties until he sells enough copy to cover the advance (and, no, if he doesn’t cover the advance, he doesn’t have to give the money back).
{hides his grin beind his martini glass}
The standard industry royalty rate for trade paperbacks is 7.5% straight. It usually doesn’t go up.
But now that the mass market field is in the toilet and lots more hardcover titles (including genre fiction titles…mystery, SF, etc.) are being reprinted as trade paperbacks, that may change.
The first book sold close to 300,000 copies, the second book around 110,000. Subsequent books have sold progressively fewer copies. All the books except More of the Straight Dope are still in print.
Cecil makes money doing this?
You mean he isn’t doing it out of a desire to fight ignorance and make the world a better place for future generations?
That damn capitalist pig.
Ok, so I looked around at online sellers of his books, and I found on average, you’ll pay about $7 for one of Cece’s books. And at the 7.5% aforementioned rate he’d get about 50 cents a book.
So, I think a good guesstimate for the net # of Cecil’s books that have sold is around 500,000-600,000 books. So his net profit off the Sd book series is in the ball park of $250,000-$300,000. Not that much really, but then again I’m sure cecil’s primary bacon has come from the weekly newspaper columns. (Considering he’s been doing them for 25+ years.)
Well, I make $2.75 for every copy sold of “Anna Held.” So if you don’t feel like going out and BUYING it, you can just send me the cash . . .
By the way, Ed (getting on her High Horse), MY book has sold TENS of copies!
I guess you cheap and heartless bastards need to purchase more books, don’t you? We can’t have the World’s Smartest Human die a pauper, can we? It just wouldn’t be right.
Go here to finish your Christmas shopping now.