spectacular fantasy failure in 1999-2000?

[guessingo]

I am listening to Writing Excuses on how to deal with external influences. Brandon said there was some author who had a huge fantasy failure because he only read Tolkein.

Who was it and what was the book? He didn't say.

[Shivertongue]

I was wondering the same thing after listening to that cast. A fair number of books came out in that timeframe, though...

[Bookstore Guy]

Hmm.  I know of a failure around 2005, but not 2000.  The failure in 2005 was for similar reasons.

[guessingo]

what was the failure in 2005?

[Lord Terrisman]

I was listening to Writing Excuses  and was wondering the same thing.  I can't think of any authors who decided to write just because they read Tolkien.  Actually I take that back there was this one author (whose name escapes me) who wrote the Mithgar series( which I've heard is like himself writing his own adventures with his own cast of characters in Middle Earth).  I'm not sure when the first book came out and I'm not sure if that was the failure.  Hope that helps some.

[Peter Ahlstrom]

I remember hearing about this (the 2000 one) but I can't remember the guy's name. I believe it was a Random House author said to have been given one of the largest advances ever. I think the series was trying to capitalize on the popularity of Terry Goodkind. However, it was about righteous men trying to protect the world from vindictive evil women, and it did not go over well.

I think the name was something common like John, with a two-syllable last name perhaps starting with S. (Not Scalzi!)

(It's not the Mithgar series by Dennis L. McKiernan.)

Wait! I found it. Robert Newcomb, first book in 2002.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Newcomb

[Bookstore Guy]

ah yes.  you know though, i think this was more of a failure due to how much they advanced him--the novels weren't horrid as I recall, just not awesome.  this is the same case as the 2005 failure Eldon Thompson, whose first novel was released the same day as Brandon's, and WAS horrid.  As I recall, Thompson got a huge advance based on Terry Brooks' word alone.

Are we seeing the correlation here?  Two books trying to cash in on the Terrys?  Man.  talk about bad juju.

[readerMom]

I have started mistrusting any book with a quote from Terry Brooks on it.

[Peter Ahlstrom]

I was wondering about Eldon Thompson while trying to come up with Newcomb...I have not read Eldon's book, however I think Brandon said that he liked it. But I could be remembering incorrectly.

Newcomb's rapidly diminishing numbers of book reviews on Amazon demonstrate that people just plain didn't read the later books.

[Bookstore Guy]

I was wondering about Eldon Thompson while trying to come up with Newcomb...I have not read Eldon's book, however I think Brandon said that he liked it. But I could be remembering incorrectly.

Newcomb's rapidly diminishing numbers of book reviews on Amazon demonstrate that people just plain didn't read the later books.

No.  Brandon didn't like it.  He felt bad for Eldon.  We had many a conversation about how derivative it was.  It is seriously awful.  You see, there are these two brothers walking through the woods, and one is good with a bow while the other is good with a sword.  They end up being recruited by a mysterious wise-type person to go searching for a magic sword...<vomit>  Seriously, what do you expect when Brooks says you are awesome and is your mentor.  You know a book is bad when dozens of people actually took the time to return it to the bookstore because the opening 3rd was like reading a Tolkien rip-off/Brooks clone.  If the average reader sees this, you are screwed.

Yeah, with Newcomb's stuff, people just stopped reading it.  He may have to reinvent himself the way Jack Campbell did.  His new books after the initial trilogy didn't sell for crap.

[Lord Terrisman]

Bookstore Guy thank you for the warning.  You never know I've never heard of the guy so I might have wasted money on his book.  Thank you for the fair warning (note to self don't read Eldon Thompson or Newcomb).

[Peter Ahlstrom]

Ah, I see that Eldon wrote a screenplay for Terry. Eeenteresting.

His first book has mediocre Amazon reviews—more 3-star reviews than other star counts. Newcomb's first has worse, but more of them (so more people read it)—and 48% of them are 1-star reviews.

[guessingo]

did he get a 6 book deal? It looks like he published 6 books in the series then it got cancelled. How big of an advance could he have gotten as a first time author? I heard terry goodkind got one of the biggest for a first time fantasy author due to a bidding war. However, I doubt it was more than $100,000. I can't see a publisher throwing 6 figures at first time authors. Even if a book is good it does not mean it will sell.

[Bookstore Guy]

Seems like Eldon's was above $100,000...per book.  I think Newcomb's was as well.  You have to understand, those were different times.  A lot has changed over the past 5-10 years.  And really it is due to examples like this that current new authors (economic factors aside) are treated with much more caution.

[guessingo]

so authors used to get more money up fron then they do now? Why did they get more up front? I would think that only a small % of releases are big hits, many do ok, and then a significant number bomb out or have low sales. A book can be good quality and still not sell well.

Are there just more books published now?

so this guy eidon got a 6 book deal having NEVER published before with $100,000/book up front or $600,000? I can see that kind of money or more if you are famous and writing a first book (see Sarah Palin or Hillary Clinton), but what fan base does this guy have?

I would also think that alot of selling a new author is the author's willingness and ability to market themselves on top of the publisher.

I get the impression now that first time authors generally get 1 book deals with maybe a $10k advance. This way the publisher can find out if the guy can sell books. Then once they prove themselves they more. I am sure Robert Jordan got big advances for his books after they became hits. I would bet that Stephen King probably gets upward of $1 million advance/book.