Kickstarting a classic
18th February 2016
“But you’re the head of publishing for a bona fide fiction publisher, why on earth are you running a Kickstarter to make a book in your free time.” You didn’t ask, but let’s pretend you did…
For the simple reason that I found a hidden hoard of forgotten fiction, and like anyone with a book they discovered for themselves, sharing it is important. In my case, the mother-lode is 1920s silent-era Hollywood fiction. I unearthed a collection of out of print and long unavailable books by a clutch of writers who were living at the centre of the new industry and art form. Together they paint a thrilling portrait of being at the start of something remarkable. First among these books calling to be re-discovered is Frances Marion’s Minnie Flynn.
Marion was the highest paid writer in early Hollywood and successfully transitioned from the silent to the sound era, winning Academy Awards along the way. She published a debut novel in 1925 and it, to be frank, sank without trace. Most of Marion’s novelist contemporaries always sold the books back to Hollywood to be made into films, but Minnie Flynn – excoriating in its portrayal of film-star ambition and opportunism – saw no such treatment. But now, 90 years on, this account of early film-making by a key insider will make an invaluable contribution to our knowledge of the era.
So, recognising the loss to history and my opportunity to do something about it, I chose to step in, with my battered first edition and the right connections to produce a first-rate new edition. Too many Kickstarters don’t get a full set of costs before launching and find, to their peril, their budget won’t stretch to cover all their essential expenses.
In my case, design, production, printing and shipping costs were the first things I needed to lock down. The second was to make sure I had a printer who would do the job on credit and not take a down-payment/full price in advance and then go bust. Oh, the numbers of printers who went out of business in the last five years would amaze and sadden you. With these things in place I found a model for the jacket photo, my amazing niece Beth Davies, inveigled Rebellion’s lead designer Sam Gretton to spend some free time pulling the jacket together based on a 1930’s German book I spotted in a window once, and suddenly, I had a Kickstarter.
Thrillingly, it’s something that people have wanted to support and it hit its goal within 2 weeks, and there are 10 days left to go. So shortly I’ll have to take a scalpel to my first edition and cut it to pieces so I can feed it through a optical recognition scanner to begin the process of re-setting and proofing the new edition. I don’t mind destroying one book to create a hundred more. Once that is in place it will be frankly wonderful not to have to wait for a slot in the publishing calendar, but instead simply a ship the new edition to the campaign’s backers as soon as I possibly can…