Well, it’s no longer March Madness, but I guess it’s now April idiocy. Unfortunately, I have one more spring ritual that I’d rather forget. I always lose my NCAA pool. Just like the way the flowers come up every year, I pull out my brackets, bluff my way through the early rounds and finish my pool picks. For some reason, I do well in the first few rounds, peak in the middle rounds, and usually finish those rounds at the top of the chart. Then I start getting excited. This year, I’m in first place all alone with over $600 in the pot.
But those last 2 rounds remain, and I always seem to do poorly when push comes to shove comes to foul. So I’ll be watching the games this weekend, and trying not to think of all the ways I could spend that money. But I’ll finish Monday night without an extra cent to my name.
I’ve got over 30 mysteries to read now for the 2008 Best Novel Edgar. There are a lot of new books this year!
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My 8-year-old son is winning our family March Madness pool. Luckily, we don’t have $600 on the line — just the choice of the next restaurant when we go out to eat!
by Judy
on April 4th, 2008 at 6:21 am
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I’m not much of a B-ball fan, or a pool player. I used to buy Superlotto tickets though, before Ohio joined that multi-state mega thing. When the odds went from ten million to one to 100 million to one I decided to stop wasting my money.
And when I did buy lotto tickets, I always waiting until the jackpot got above 20 million. I didn’t want to waste my luck on a small jackpot. If I’m going to be rich, I want to be reallllly rich.
Anyhoo, good luck Jeff, and Judy, order the happy meal, you get a free toy.
by C.R.
on April 4th, 2008 at 6:37 am
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Davidson screwed me up. Otherwise I’d have the final four. Still, I messed up enough along the way that I have no chance.
Who in the hell would pick Davidson?
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Missed my chance to get into a bracket this year….no biggie. However, with all the upsets this year, I may have done better.
So CR does NOT play the Mega game????
Hot dogs, I know now I won’t have to share my kabillions with at least one person when I win.
Thank goodness for that. CR would probably fire up one of those seagars he puffs on with his other writing groupies….then I’d have to push him off the stage while we were on the TV news.
Zz
by Zorro
on April 4th, 2008 at 7:33 am
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I don’t understand that whole bracket thing. Never have, never will. But best of luck to those of you who do it!
by Casey
on April 4th, 2008 at 8:00 am
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TOTALLY CHANGING THE SUBJECT . . .
There’s a Wall Street Journal story this morning that Harper Collins is launching a new book imprint that (1) will pay no or very small advances to writers, (2) won’t accept returns from bookstores, (3) won’t pay for front table displays in bookstores and (4) will concentrate on Internet sales.
So, is this good for us or bad for us? How about for readers? The publishing industry in general?
Obviously this is an experiment, that if successful, could dramatically change how publishers do business.
by C.R.
on April 4th, 2008 at 8:22 am
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Yikes! CR, can’t say if this is good or bad, just know it sounds scary from an author’s perspective.
by Casey
on April 4th, 2008 at 8:48 am
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I think we have to come to terms with the fact that the world of books is changing drastically. But we’d better get our million dollar advances before they stop giving them.
by Judy
on April 4th, 2008 at 8:54 am
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I wonder what this would do to subsidiary rights?
by C.R.
on April 4th, 2008 at 9:25 am
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I found a link and read the article. It talks about the fact that publishers say they’re going broke because of the huge advances authors get. Hmmm . . .
by Casey
on April 4th, 2008 at 1:08 pm
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Easy to cure…..just stop giving advances to people like Hilary for books about village idiots. Didn’t she get some huge advance for a book I never did see nor did I hear anyone ever chat about.
Then there was the one for OJ about if he killed his wife/girl friend this is how he would have done it.
Why……would anyone advance a dime on trash like that?
Hey, CR. Invite me along on that writers week….you and I can do some bad things, go to jail, Casey will bail us, we can boo-hoo on Oprah and get a kabillion $$ advance from some publisher for “our story”.
What do ya say? But what bad thing could we do????
Zz
by Zorro
on April 4th, 2008 at 1:29 pm
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I agree with you on the huge advances for celebrity books, Zman. I wonder how many of those books actually sell through — earn back their advances.
As to your offer: YOU AIN’T COMING ALONG!!!!!!
by C.R.
on April 4th, 2008 at 1:55 pm
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I finally found the whole story, too. It may be a troubling trend for high-rollers like us, but it may benefit the little midlist gnomes out there. Here’s some of it:
NEW YORK — In an ever-uncertain market for publishers, HarperCollins is looking to resolve two of the industry’s major concerns: High author advances and the high rate of returned books.
The longtime and energetic founder-president of Hyperion, Robert S. Miller, has left to join HarperCollins, where he will head a new imprint specializing in short, “popular-priced” books, nonreturnable shipments to stores and lowered money to authors up front in exchange for increased profit sharing.
“Our goal will be to effectively publish books that might not otherwise emerge in an increasingly ‘big book’ environment, an environment in which established authors are under enormous pressure to top their previous successes, while new authors are finding it harder and harder to be published at all,” Miller said in a statement issued Thursday by HarperCollins, part of Rupert Murdoch’s News Corp. and already the distributor of Hyperion.
by C.R.
on April 4th, 2008 at 2:06 pm
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Bet not one of them sells through.
As to my offer……I hear jail food is to die for!
Zz
by Zorro
on April 4th, 2008 at 2:07 pm
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I didn’t find it that good, actually. But Carol liked it.
by C.R.
on April 4th, 2008 at 2:56 pm
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When were you two in the clink?
Zz
by Zorro
on April 4th, 2008 at 4:13 pm
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That’s where we met. You can imagine her surprise — not to mention the guards’ — when she found out I was a man. (Not much of one, but a man.)
She was in for armed robbery. Me, for stealing Girl Scout cookies.
I dressed up like a Girl Scout leader and went door-to-door telling people that the cookies they just bought were tainted. I took the “bad” cookies and gave them a fake coupon for good cookies. It was a great scam for about eight years.
by C.R.
on April 4th, 2008 at 4:31 pm
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CR, living in NE Oh under the Federal witness protection plan. Wow!
CR
by Zorro
on April 5th, 2008 at 7:09 am
