Murderati

If you haven't visited the blog, Murderati take a look at Allison Brennan's post on MMPs vs. Hardcover. Her latest book, Cutting Edge, was just released. I picked it up yesterday in MMP, BTW.

Brennan is superb at reducing difficult subjects down to the basics and helping other authors apply the concepts to their own writing cnreers. She's becoming widely known for her unselfish generosity and honest opinions of industry issues. After reading this post I understand better the pros and cons of mass market paperbacks vs the author's desire to be in hardback. From all sides, the reader's, the author's and the publisher's.

I was quite irritated when my entire collection of J.D.Robb In Death books suddenly wouldn't fit on the same shelf with the hardcovers the series gravated to, not to mention the expense and length of time I had to wait on a library copy to become available. Personally, I think if an author begins a series in one format they should stick with it. In Roberts' case, the success of the In Death books was proven in the paperback format and fans like me already had about twenty books on their shelf and speaking for myself, I like the paperback format. Hard covers are bigger, heavier, and I can't take them to the tub for fear of drowning my $25 investment or getting the edges wavy from the humidity.


I found Toni Mcgee Causey's blogpost on secondary characters a big help a couple weeks ago and I returned to Murderati again for Allison's post last week on Discovering Your Voice (which in turn led me to buy all three of Toni's Bobbie Faye books).

I guess that's what a good writer's blog should do .

Do you like the hardcover or paperback? Do you buy just your keepers in hardback versions? I currently have three Nora Roberts hardcovers, a Deborah Smith, all of Gabaldon's in paper and hardback, I'm hinting for the Twilight Saga in hardback for Christmas and I'd like to have Charlaine Harris' Sookie Stackhouse books in hardcover. (But I don't think they are all available in hardback, which doesn't make sense.)

And thennnn there are those weird narrow, thick, tall paperbacks which I hope was part of a failed marketing scheme to push yet another size paperback on us. It was proported to be more comfortable, easier to read, etc.etc. I found them just the opposite and of course they won't fit on the shelf with their companions.

Ok, I'm done with my rant. What do you think?