Books

Yesterday we featured career advice from Nancy Gibbs and Michael Duffy, TIME editors and authors of The Presidents Club. Today we’ll showcase how they managed to research and write their book about the world’s most exclusive fraternity in addition to having a day job.

Their book five years and as Gibbs points out, this meant working on weekends, during personal time, whenever it could be squeezed in. For those of us with intense schedules and a passion project on the to-do list, take note. Gibbs explains:

“We have day jobs so we pushed the deadline back a year at some point when we realized we were never going to finish. It was really fun to do. It was a wonderufl, I looked forward to Saturday coming and being able to just getting lost in the 1950s. It was really fun so it did not feel work.”

In addition to carving time to make this book a reality, the authors split their responsibilities. She adds, “By and large because Duffy has a tremendously rich rolodex, I did the dead presidents and he did the living ones. And then we swapped chapters, read the entire thing aloud to each other over the phone which is sort of our writing process. It’s how we hear what the language sounds like, we’ve been doing this together for TIME for so long, someone starts, sends it off, they work on it, sends it back, so it felt very natural.”

Plus, they’ve already co-authored another book together so their system works very well. “She and I have written hundreds of stories together so we have a pretty good sense of what it takes to get something over the bar,” Duffy notes.

“We’ve written a book together before so we have a pretty good sense of what a book should do….And when you have 14 presidents, all of whom have had complicated and interesting and sometimes difficult relationships with other men, we wanted to look at them each individually. We wanted to show them how they’re different. And we wanted to show how they’re human because they’re fundamentally human beings.”

As for sources, working with sources sounded pretty organic in terms of fascinating insight into the presidents’ rituals, relationships and oh yes — rivalries.

Duffy adds, “It helps covering the White House under Clinton and Bush, so I know all the players and I’m still in touch with most of them all these years but I was a reporter in Washington starting with Carter so I really was around….so I in some ways had the easy part and Nancy had to deal with books and records and people who were dead, I think she had the harder job.”

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Okay. Sit down. Hold onto your hat, and maybe even get a barf bag ready if you’re sensitive. What we’re about to reveal is…shocking.

Gwyneth Paltrow did not write her whole cookbook by herself.

Rachael Ray doesn’t do all her own stuff either.

We’ll ready the fainting couch. When you’ve revived, check this out: a cookbook ghostwriter has explained what it’s like to be her in the New York Times.

It doesn’t sound like an easy job: the ghostwriter must “produce a credible book from the thin air of a chef’s mind and menu — to cajole and probe, to elicit ideas and anecdotes by any means necessary.”

“‘Write up something about all the kinds of chiles,’ one Mexican-American chef demanded of me, providing no further details. ‘There should be a really solid guide to poultry,’ a barbecue maven prescribed for his own forthcoming book. (After much stalling, he sent the writer a link to the Wikipedia page for ‘chicken.’)”

The pay is not very good. The chefs can be abusive or prima donnas. But if you make it, you’re golden – chefs even put your name on the front of the book, like with Paltrow’s aforementioned ghostwriter, Julia Turshen (though, interestingly enough, Paltrow claims to have written every word herself while Turshen lists the book on her website under ‘Work’). After the success of ‘My Father’s Daughter,’ Turshen and Paltrow are working on a second book.

So how much do Kindle Single authors really make? Even if you’re not a big-name writer, the money from joining the Kindle Single program can be significant.

As a reminder, the Kindle Single program requires authors to submit a pitch and wait for it to be accepted (in contrast to Amazon’s Kindle Direct program where authors can upload almost anything and make it available for sale). Sometimes Amazon pays an advance for a Kindle Single, sometimes it pays just royalties. The program has sold more than 2 million singles, with Amazon’s take reportedly around $1 million.

PaidContent recently interviewed a dozen authors about their sales figures.

Mishka Shubaly was approached by Amazon Kindle Single editor David Blum, who asked Shubaly to write something.

“I said, ‘Dave, this is the stupidest thing I’ve ever heard. I don’t know anybody who owns a nerd pad, and there’s all this free stuff out there so nobody’s going to buy anything, and if they buy anything, why would they buy my stuff? And I’m sober now, I don’t have any more stories.’

He said, ‘Don’t you have ONE more story?’ and I said, ‘Well, I did get shipwrecked that one time.’”

That story sold 20,000 copies. Shubaly, a musician who was working part-time in a bar, took his first royalty check to the bar and said he quit. “He was like why, and I was like ‘Look at this check, man,’ and he said, ‘I’d quit too.’”

Oliver Broudy, former managing editor of The Paris Review, has written two Kindle Singles and even though Amazon took a loss on the second, they’ve signed him up to write a third. “They’re trying to develop an editorial brand here, and this is the price they’re willing to pay, much as they’re willing to take a loss on e-books because they want to sell Kindles. There’s definitely a literary culture within the Kindle Singles program, and that’s a very good thing.”

The actual sales for authors varies wildly–Shubaly’s royalties have topped six figures while author Will Bunch is estimated to have made more like $8,000–but that’s still not something to sneeze at. Won’t pay the mortgage all year but as an extra revenue stream (and one that will continue to see sales every now and then), yeah. Not bad.

Everyone needs a book of their own these days to be considered a thought leader, and everybody wants to be a thought leader.

That’s where ghostwriting comes in.

PaidContent reports that the ghostwriting industry is booming. One consultant launched Gotham Ghostwriters in 2008 as a “one-stop shop for executives, consultants and others looking for a book to burnish their reputation.” Last year, the company took in $700,000 of revenue on 11 book projects and seven book proposals.

The company takes a 15% cut on each contract and helps its freelance authors navigate the business side of ghostwriting. It is currently seeking an intern.

Crime writer George Pelecanos’s latest book is going on sale today for a dollar.

If Pelecanos was a self-published author like Amanda Hocking that would make plenty of sense. But this is George Pelecanos, author of (by our count) 18 books and producer for two seasons of The Wire.

So why is his latest e-book a buck?

“Our goal is to increase George’s audience,” Reagan Arthur, editorial director of Reagan Arthur Books, an imprint of Lagardere SCA’s Hachette Book Group, told the WSJ. “We’re saying, if you’re curious about his work, why wait?”

Pelecanos stands to make 17 cents for each copy of “What It Was.” Even if 100,000 people purchase this book (and according to the WSJ, his previous best-selling novel sold 29,000 copies), he won’t make money, he told the WSJ. “But the assumption is that if the majority like the book we’ve brought them into the tent. Hopefully, that will trigger sales in my library.”

This is a fast crime novel, sexy and violent, and perfect for this kind of promotion,” he said.

We hope this strategy works out for Mr. Pelecanos. We also hope it doesn’t become a required strategy, because soon a lot more authors will be struggling for money if they only get 17 cents per copy sold.

UK-based Andrew Lownie Literary Agency asked 20 editors on both sides of the pond what they’d be seeking in 2012.

The answers should be illuminating to authors….

A commissioning editor at UK publisher Summersdale is seeking true crime, travel, gardening and pets books, especially from “extremely talented and committed non-fiction authors who already have a following for their work and know how to promote themselves without having unrealistic expectations.” Oh, hey, that’s easy.

More helpful is the editor at Penguin Press who says she’s “looking for authors who want to write about their passion – however unconventional – whether it’s for weathervanes, bridge or graffitti.” And if you’re obsessed with trains and can write well, you’ve got an insta-sale. No, really.

And in possibly the least helpful comment from an editor, ever, one says she is looking for “ideas or stories with a strong, interesting narrative structure.”

So, the same as in 2011, then. Or 2010.

But we’re fairly sure nobody has asked for a book from a railfan until this year.

Morris Philipson was director of the University of Chicago Press from 1967 to 2000, a long and noble career.

Last week he died of a heart attack at age 85.

Philipson was responsible during his tenure for introducing innovations that transformed academic publishing, “once almost exclusively the domain of important but arcane scholarly works,” and in the process turning University of Chicago Press into one of the most important academic presses in the country.

He published the first work of fiction in the publishing house’s history, which ended up being “A River Runs Through It,” a book that became “a perennial money-maker” for the press.

Through this and other more “consumer-friendly” works he was able to finance the expensive, academic, money-losing ventures.

According to the New York Times, Philipson famously once said: “The commercial publisher says of his book, ‘This is no good, but it’ll make a lot of money.’ The university publisher says, ‘This is good and it won’t make money.’ ”

He added, “Suppose an important book sells only 100 or 200 copies a year? Doesn’t it deserve to live? We think so.”

We don’t know whether to laugh or cry or both….Aaron Shapiro, CEO of digital agency HUGE, needed to promote his new book, Users Not Customers, about companies transitioning to digital.

So he hired laid-off Borders employees—Borders being a perfect cautionary tale for what not to do, he says.

Adweek picked up on photos of ex-Borders employees selling hard copies of his books from kiosks distributed around New York. He also purchased a billboard that read in part:

So to recap: The book argues that a brick and mortar bookstore should have embraced the digital world, which is why its laid-off employees are selling a physical book from a physical location while advertising the fact that they used to work at a failed company that failed because it didn’t embrace the digital world?

Even though this strategy is making our heads explode, it appears to be working—and the Borders employees are probably not complaining.

PaidContent tipped us off to a new site that targets people between the ages of 18-34 who read books. (They still exist!)

It’s not about the business of books—instead, it’s meant to help hip readers figure out what to read next and to discuss their favorite works of literature.

“We want it to be a Jezebel, TechCrunch, Valleywag type of site,” newly hired executive editor Bethanne Patrick told PaidContent.

The best part? They’re hiring.

Position one: a “Creator of Awesomeness” (aka staff writer).

We’re looking for someone to write for Book Riot full-time, posting 3-4 times per day on a variety of book-related topics. To do this job well, you not only need to be a voracious reader, but a wide-ranging one; we want someone who can write about more than just a couple of genres. A working knowledge of WordPress, Photoshop, and social media platforms (Twitter, Tumblr, Facebook, etc) are also important to us. Our ideal candidate will already have an active blog that, at least part-time, is bookish.

To apply, send email to bookriot (at) bookriot (dot) com. Put the job title in the subject line. Include your LinkedIn profile or resume, and URL for your bookish blog.

We will contact you if we are interested in speaking further.

You can also apply to be BookRiot’s “Riot Emcee” (aka community manager), but a big Klout score isn’t going to be the only qualification here. To do this job right, the ad says, “you should be able to answer at least a $300 Jeopardy question about literature.” So brush up on your reading and apply for either of these jobs here.