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Welcome to TED's six-part series on The Economics of Publishing, which is based on research and interviews done by Adriann Ranta in 2007, who worked for TED at the time and is now an agent with Anderson Grinberg Literary Management. You'll find the main feature piece listed first below, Book Advances, Royalty Checks, and Making a Living as a Writer, and then a collection of support interviews with various agents, writers and publishers.
TED's sincere thanks go out to everyone who participated in our exploration of this shadowy but important topic. We hope to return to this topic in summer of 2009 to look at how the recent economic downturn has affected book deals and contracts this year.
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by Adriann Ranta
Few writers know what kind of payment to expect once a novel has gone under contract at a publishing house. Money is a frustratingly taboo subject and the sources for authors trying to get educated on book advances and royalties are scant. Though for many writers the whole issue of money is secondary to the satisfaction of having a book actually published (bestselling author Matt Richtel joked that he would have sold his novel for a six-pack of beer), compensation is nonetheless a topic worthy of exploration.
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 with Adriann Ranta
Rick Horgan is Vice President and executive editor of Crown, an imprint of Random House. Crown's hardcover imprint publishes some of today's best original popular fiction and nonfiction. Recent bestsellers under the Crown imprint include The Audacity of Hope and Dreams from My Father by Barack Obama, World War Z by Max Brooks, and Thunderstruck by Erik Larson.
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 with Adriann Ranta
A veteran of publishing, Jessica began her career in 1994 as an acquisitions editor at Berkley Publishing and Macmillan, where she had the unique opportunity to acquire and edit both fiction and nonfiction. Just some of the many titles she worked on include a number of books in The Complete Idiot's Guide series and the Edgar-nominated mass-market fiction series Gaslight Mysteries by Victoria Thompson. Jessica takes her editing experience to the Bookends literary agency, where she works closely with her authors to create the best possible proposal submissions. A native of Minnesota, Jessica now lives in New Jersey with her family and their very spoiled dog, Sadie.
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with Adriann Ranta
Kelly L. Mortimer founded Mortimer Literary Agency in the spirit of getting the unpublished published. She believes in treating each of her clients as if he were her only one, diligently line editing each of her manuscripts herself. Mortimer has a degree in contract law and a background in business.
AR: What do you tell new clients to expect when you take on a project for representation?
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with Adriann Ranta
Brent Ghelfi has served as a clerk on the U.S. Court of Appeals, been a partner in a Phoenix-headquartered law firm, and now owns and operates several businesses. He has traveled extensively throughout Russia, and lives in Phoenix with his wife, a former prosecutor, and their two sons. He is currently working on the sequel to Volk’s Game.
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 with Adriann Ranta
Michael Lloyd Gray earned a MFA in English from Western Michigan University, a bachelor's from the University of Illinois, and has taught English full-time in upstate New York, Michigan, Wisconsin, and Texas, and recently accepted a position at Illinois Central College in East Peoria, Illinois. His work has appeared in Arkansas Review, Flash!Point (2nd prize in their fiction contest), Potomac Review, Viet Nam Generation, Black River Syllabary, and 1812. His story "Little Man" won the 2005 Alligator Juniper Fiction Prize. Gray has written two novels: Confederate Nation and December's Children.
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