Chapter 69 Already has 200,000, who is writing a book!
The predecessor of 21st Century Publishing House was a children's publishing house specializing in children's books. At that time, their main business was publishing comic books.
Different from other state-owned publishing houses, as early as the late 1980s, 21st Century Publishing House began to conduct independent accounting and take responsibility for its own profits and losses. Therefore, it began to experiment with commercialization models relatively early. In the past ten years, it has always been It is for the purpose of profit.
When dealing with such a for-profit publishing house, you can negotiate money directly, which is much easier than those publishing houses that are public institutions.
In addition to the commercial nature, what Zhang Wei values more is the publicity and channels of 21st Century Publishing House.
From 2000 to 2002, the best-selling book champion in the country was Han Han. Except for "Three Gates" in 2000, the best-selling champion "One Degree Below Zero" in 2001 and the best-selling champion "Like a Boy" in 2002 were both 21 Published by Century Press.
Han Han’s reputation is certainly important to win the annual best-selling title, but the publicity and channels of 21st Century Publishing House are also additional factors.
If it were replaced by a publishing house with average publicity and distribution channels, even with Han Han's reputation, he might not be able to win the number one bestseller in the country.
Don’t underestimate children’s publications. In the era of paper media, the publicity and distribution channels of children’s publications far exceed those of other types of books.
Were martial arts novels popular enough in the 1980s? Heroes like Jin Yong and Gu Long can't compete with the picture books of Calabash Baby and Black Cat Sheriff.
Romance novels were popular enough in the 1990s, right? Even though Grandma Qiongyao is all kinds of sensational, she can't do anything to her big-headed son and little-headed father.
As for the works of great writers such as Mo Yan and Yu Hua, they are basically published by specialized literary and art publishing houses and are specially prepared for young literary and artistic people.
Anything that involves the word "literature" is usually relatively niche. In the early days of reform and opening up, everyone was busy making money. Who would engage in literature and art if they were not idle and aching for real people?
So in that era, children’s books were the real gods in the publishing industry!
……
Zhang Wei found the phone number of 21st Century Publishing House and consulted first. He found that publishing a book could not be explained over the phone at all, so it had to be done in person.
The next day, Zhang Wei bought a plane ticket and flew directly to Hongcheng City, where 21st Century Publishing House is located.
There were quite a lot of people in the reception room of the publishing house. They were all holding manuscripts and looking for submissions to the publishing house.
The contributors are also of all kinds, and it seems that there are people from all walks of life.
There are people wearing glasses and neatly dressed who look like intellectuals;
Some people look sloppy and decadent, and you can tell at a glance that they are homebodies who live at home all day long;
Some people have dark and rough skin, with faint calluses visible on their hands. They are probably engaged in manual labor, but With a dream of being a writer;
There are also young people about the same age as Zhang Wei, with a confident expression, as if they feel that they have written a masterpiece, very similar to those of later generations who have not yet An author who thinks about becoming a god after writing tens of thousands of words.
Zhang Wei also saw a child younger than himself, about fifteen or sixteen years old, standing nervously in the corner.
"This child is probably influenced by George Han!" Zhang Wei thought to himself.
The myth created by Han Han dropping out of school to write novels did influence a generation at that time. Many middle school and high school students of that age tried to imitate Han Han in writing novels, hoping that they could become famous overnight.
Although everyone came to submit articles, Zhang Wei could feel that there was a certain amount of hostility and disdain in the eyes of these contributors. They looked around with critical eyes. .
Literaturemen look down upon each other! Everyone who writes novels has the same moral character. I think you are all scum, and I am the only one who writes the best.
The receptionist came in with a business card box and handed out business cards to everyone. At the same time, he continued: "If you want to submit an article, you don't have to come in person. I will give you an address and mail it directly. If our editor I'll contact you if I think it's appropriate."
"We are all here and have brought the manuscript, why are we being asked to mail it again!" one of them said dissatisfied.
The receptionist explained: "It's for your own good to let you mail it. And you must choose China Post for mailing. The postmark on the envelope can be used as evidence, and it can also avoid copyright disputes in the future."
< br>As the receptionist spoke, he walked up to Zhang Wei and handed over a business card.
Zhang Wei did not accept it, but said: "I am different from others."
"You are not here to submit a manuscript?"
"I wrote it A novel that I plan to publish at my own expense." Zhang Wei answered.
Zhang Wei now has money in his hands. Even though the quality of "Dead Ghost Blows Out the Lamp: The Ancient City" is definitely good, Zhang Wei has no intention of following the publishing house's normal submission process.
Why waste time and energy when you can throw money at it.
When I heard that Zhang Wei was going to publish at his own expense, everyone around him looked at me with envy, and of course there was jealousy and hatred!
“Do you want to self-publish?” The receptionist looked Zhang Wei up and down and felt that Zhang Wei was talkative and insecure, so he asked directly: “Do you know how much it costs to self-publish? ?”
“Is two hundred thousand enough?” Zhang Wei asked. "You have 200,000?" The receptionist showed a surprised expression, as if to say, what can you do with 200,000? Why write a novel!
Zhang Weize continued: "If it's not enough, you can add more."
"Looking at this tone, he is a rich second generation!" The receptionist immediately put on a smile and continued: "If you really plan to self-publish, please wait a moment. I will hand out the business cards in a moment. Come with me and I will take you to see the editor!"
The receptionist continued to hand out business cards, and a middle-aged man next to him Brother Nian came up and said with a smile: "Little brother, I also write a novel. My novel is about a pair of young lovers. After experiencing a vigorous love, they found out that they were half-sisters. In the end, The story of two people dying for love.
The plot is exciting, and it is definitely comparable to "Thunderstorm"! If you think it is suitable, we can cooperate, you will pay, I will publish the novel, and we will publish it together. How about splitting the publishing money 50-50?”
"Do you think people nowadays will watch "Thunderstorm"?" Zhang Wei curled his lips.
Another spirited girl with hair dyed in three colors also came over and pretended to be coy and said: "You're right, no one is watching "Thunderstorm" now! All the popular ones are now Urban love stories, like the ones I wrote, brother, you should read my novels!”
The spirit girl handed the manuscript to Zhang Wei, and Zhang Wei lowered his head and read the title: "Red" Love of Life and Death"!
“Uh, how does the name look like a revolutionary story? Those who didn’t know thought it was a sequel to “The Red Detachment of Women”!”
“Brother is really good at joking, my name is an imitation. "Blue Life and Death Love", do you know "Blue Life and Death Love"? The Korean TV series is very popular! ”
"So, is there a car accident in your novel?"
"A car accident? What kind of car accident?" The energetic girl looked confused.
"What about cancer? Can it be cured? Isn't there any of these?"
The spirit girl looked ignorant and obviously didn't understand anything about it.
"Auntie, there are no car accidents, cancer, or incurable diseases, and you are still imitating Korean dramas!" Zhang Wei said.
At this time, the staff member also finished handing out business cards. Under the envious and jealous gazes of everyone around him, Zhang Wei followed the receptionist and walked to the editorial department.
......
In the editorial department, Zhang Wei met an editor named Wang.
“Young man, have you published any books before?” Editor Wang asked.
“No, this is the first time.”
Editor Wang nodded: "Then let me first introduce to you the process of self-publishing. First, you need to pay an ISBN fee. This is used to buy an ISBN. Without an ISBN, there is no way to publish.
The book number fee of our publishing house is relatively expensive. For novels, the book number fee is 20,000 yuan. This is mainly because our publishing house is relatively large and some small publishing houses are not so expensive. One book number costs 10,000 yuan. Take it down.”
“No problem!” Zhang Wei agreed happily.
“The second fee is the proofreading fee. This is based on the number of words. Our publishing house’s proofreading fee is five yuan per thousand words.
The third cost It is the cover design fee. The difference in this fee is relatively large. If the cover is a single color with pure text, the cover fee is almost negligible. If the requirements are higher and the cover needs to be designed separately, it ranges from a few hundred to several thousand yuan. , prices vary.
The fourth expense is the typesetting fee. This is not much, usually one thousand yuan is enough. Finally, there is the printing and binding fee. It depends on how many copies you plan to print. The more copies you print, the cheaper the unit price will be. The minimum printing is 1,000 copies.
Another point I have to explain separately is that if it is published by our publishing house at our own expense, it must be printed by our printing house. We need to charge an additional service fee. The specific amount is also calculated based on your printing volume. ”
“I plan to print 10,000 copies first! "Zhang Wei said.
"Ten thousand copies? The young man is very confident! Editor Wang said this, but the sarcasm in his eyes flashed away.
A rookie who writes a novel for the first time should break out the champagne to celebrate if he sells 100 copies, but he dares to print 10,000 copies Book! Do you really think you are Han Han?
Unexpectedly, this young man is not very old, but he is a good gifter of money!
Zhang Wei then asked: "Editor Wang, if you publish at your own expense, how are royalties calculated?"
"Royalty? You are a novice, you may not be able to sell many books. You still want royalties?”
Editor Wang despised Zhang Wei, but he still patiently explained: “In self-publishing, our publishing house is only responsible for distribution, and other costs are covered. The author is responsible. In this case, the royalty rate is often higher.”
“It’s 50% for self-publishing.” Zhang Wei! I thought to myself.
But after thinking about it again, these 10,000 copies were just a test of the waters anyway. If the sales were good, the contract could be renegotiated for subsequent reprints, and Zhang Wei was relieved.
"Okay, just do what you said!" Zhang Wei said, handing over "The Dead Ghost Blows Out the Lamp: The Ancient City".
This chapter has more than 3,000 words. I won’t say whether it is well written or not. At the very least, I have to measure enough! As for the price of self-publishing mentioned in this chapter, I don’t know what the price was at the time, so I wrote it based on the price when the physical book was published in 2010. Don’t mind if it’s not accurate. On the last day of the month, if you have extra monthly passes that are about to expire, you might as well give them to pass and add some fan points to me, thank you!
(End of this chapter)