Paying The Piper

(Extracted from The Reader’s Roadmap)

As a dedicated reader, I just know you adore your local secondhand bookstore. You can buy dozens of books for peanuts and it’s a fabulous way of trying out new (to you) and different authors. I know, because I’ve done it myself.

But I stopped doing it when I became a published author, because I suddenly realized that none of the money I spend on those books goes back to the author. Nothing. Only the secondhand bookstore is reaping any profit.

I’m a great believer in paying the piper. Or to put it another way; rewarding the artist’s effort to please you, the audience. There’s a line in the movie Out of Africa, where Denys Finch Hatten tells Karen Blixen; “We pay our story tellers here.”

Right on.

But only if the artist has pleased you should they be rewarded. In this way, natural selection gets the last laugh; those artists (writers) who fail to please their audience die a nasty death through lack of food/money/valuta. Which is just as it should be. The traditional New York business model of book-buying and selling means that many artists that should be well-fed aren’t, because the audience has no say in what gets published.

On-line and elsewhere, fiction reaches its intended audience easily, cheaply and in a vast range of different styles, giving the reader lots to chose from. If you, the reader, continue to chose only those books that please you and reward the artist for pleasing you, then you’re helping to keep the industry alive and producing good books.

Now, I’m not nearly as naïve as the lovely theory above would seem to indicate. One of the flaws of e-books is that they’re so easily replicated. You can slip a copy of that fabulous book you just read to your best friend, and still have a copy for yourself. You can send it to a dozen friends. In fact, if the book is good, it’s difficult not to send it to everyone you know, with the exhortation to read it as soon as possible. With all the peer-to-peer file swapping programs and sites out there, the trade in “free” e-books is a tidal surge. It’s possible you’ve already got several, if not many, e-books on your hard drive that you didn’t pay for.

I’m not saying “don’t do it!” Yes, it’s illegal. No, I don’t think my saying “don’t!” is going to stem the tide. What I’m saying is; if you’d like that author to keep writing books like the one you just had to share with all your friends; if you’d like to keep reading more from that author, then you need to reward her for her good efforts.

If the book came to you without valuta changing hands, then there are some alternative ways you can reward the author directly, instead:

1)            Put up a glowing review of the book on its Amazon.com page, and copy that review on any other page where the book is officially for sale; try the publisher’s website, the author’s website; websites devoted to reviews of fiction. Do a search on the book’s title, and see what comes up.

2)            Post the same review or a casual “loved it!” note to any email discussion groups, notice boards or message centres you frequent.

3)            Tell all your non-computer/e-book oriented friends about the book.

4)            If you think the author has done a good job and deserves actual money, go buy the paper copy and put it on your keeper shelf.

5)            Send the author a note or email and tell him what a great job he did, and that he should keep doing more.

6)            Buy his next book.

I thought up all these with a mere 60 seconds of reflection. There are a lot of people out there a lot smarter than I, that could figure out a dozen more ways to pay the piper. You can probably come up with some on your own.

Remember, paying the piper doesn’t always have to involve cold cash. Cash is a means for the writer to feed himself and his family while he’s writing more stories, but there are other things a writer needs in order to continue writing stories. All the versions, above, encourage the writer by making sure more people hear about his work. If these others agree with you that he’s good, they will hopefully pay him for the work as you weren’t able to (this time around).

You can add and delete from this list of possible rewards as inspiration strikes you.

When you read a damned good book, do one or all of them as the book deserves. It’s up to you.

If you really did like the book that much, buying the author’s next book is a natural reaction. And bingo! You’ve just discovered a new favourite author!

If you make sure to always feed and encourage good work, then the system takes care of itself in a pleasant circle of reward for everyone involved. If you don’t feed back into the system one way or another, then authors doing good work fail to be “fed” and eventually, are forced to stop writing. Don’t want them to stop? Then pay the piper. It’s that simple.

The same system works for books you buy at secondhand stores, books you borrow from the public library or from friends. Any book or work of fiction, no matter what its form, should be rewarded if it pleases you. That’s all you have to remember. You can adjust the degree of reward depending on how strongly the book pleased you. But even if it was just a little, then there should be some small morsel given to the author.

The more readers feed and care for the authors that please them, the more the best authors will be rewarded and will thrive. Those that aren’t fed will eventually diminish. What you’re left with is authors writing books that please the greatest number of the most important people in the world; the readers. You.

And no editor can replace a perfectly natural selection system.

_________

_____________

Tracy Cooper-Posey © 2005. Cannot be copied or distributed without permission, or without this copyright notice attached.