Business Musings: My Day in Negotiation

In dealing with movie and TV producers, and foreign rights publishers, and pretty much anyone who wants subsidiary rights to my book, I hold all of the power in the negotiation.

I know, I know. A bunch of you just did double-takes. How can I have more power than a Hollywood studio?

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Business Musings: Running A (Writing) Business In Uncertain Times

To do modeling for the next year of your business, you need to be as clear-eyed as possible. You should research trends for your business for similar economic times, if you can.

Then you figure out as best you can what your future will be.

Here’s how you do it.

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Business Musings: The Freelance Scramble Part Three: The Unthinkable

Two weeks ago, I wrote what I thought would be a short post explaining a term I’d used, “the freelance scramble.” Only that post turned out longer than expected. In fact, I realized I had a short series here. The freelance scramble happens when the cash doesn’t flow the way that a writer expects it too. Longtime freelancers have learned the dance that I call […]

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The Business Rusch: Ain’t Nothing Perfect

Every week, I get dozens of e-mails from folks who read my blog. Most of the emails are links or comments on the topic at hand, some are requests for information, and a few are about decisions. Either the writer has trouble with their traditional publisher, needs help with subsidiary rights, wants a list of IP attorneys to go after someone for something or, increasingly, […]

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The Business Rusch: Attack of the Popcorn Kittens!!!!!!!!!!

I’m going to try to give you a peek inside my mind. It’s really a strange place, as you’ll see. But in order for this post to make sense, you need some insight into how messy my subconscious can be. Over the decades, I’ve learned to listen to my subconscious, which is where all my best ideas come from. My subconscious communicates in imagery, metaphor, […]

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The Business Rusch: The All-Important Fan Base

I spent the holidays seeing movies. I expected to relax. I did not expect to find a blog topic, but I did. Two of the movies I saw, Jack Reacher, and The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey, came from books. Both films had a different approach to the book’s fan base.  In one case, it might pay off. In another, it didn’t. For months, I have […]

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The Business Rusch: Want To Be Read 100 Years From Now? Here’s How.

So, you want to be an artist. You want to be one of those writers everyone has read, even though you’re long dead. You want your work in libraries, on bookstore shelves, and in digital format. You want professors to assign your work, or kids to sneak that “crap” that everyone decries but everyone loves. There are two very simple ways to do this: 1. […]

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The Business Rusch: The Writer’s Guide To Evaluating A Traditional Publishing Company

The Business Rusch: The Writer’s Guide To Evaluating A Traditional Publishing Company Kristine Kathryn Rusch  About once a week, I get an e-mail from someone asking me to recommend a traditional publisher for them. I can’t, not because I don’t believe in traditional publishing, but because I have no idea what that person wants in a publisher, what that person is currently writing, and what’s […]

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The Business Rusch: Deal Breakers Continued

  The Business Rusch: Deal Breakers Continued Kristine Kathryn Rusch Before we get too deep into this week’s blog post, let me point you to a few things that came up in the last few days. Last week, I recommended that all writers, even those with an agent, hire an intellectual properties attorney to vet new contracts.  Most agents do not have a law degree, […]

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The Business Rusch: Deal Breakers

The Business Rusch: Deal Breakers Kristine Kathryn Rusch For the bulk of my thirty-year career in publishing, the industry has remained the same.  In fact, the industry hadn’t changed much since the end of the Second World War.  Oh, there were changes—the rise of mass market paperbacks, the decline of the slick magazines, the introduction of computerized ordering—but those things happened slowly and usually one […]

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