I happened to look at the listing for Infoquake on Amazon the other day and see that there are 57 (update: actually only 19) used copies for sale there, going as low as $7.50 per. People sometimes ask if I “mind” them purchasing used copies of my book at a discount rather than paying the full $15 cover price for a brand-spanking-new copy. And my answer is always “no, buy the book anywhere you can get your hands on it.”
The issue, of course, is how much money I make per book. If you walk into your local used bookstore and buy your copy of Infoquake there, neither I nor my publisher sees a dime. If you buy it new, I see — well, I won’t go into specifics, but it’s more than a dime. (Like seven or eight times more.)
So habitual book readers are well aware that buying a new hardcover from an author is a vote of support for that author. You don’t have to spend $25 to $30 to read these books. Most books will make it to trade paperback or mass market paperback within a year where they’re much cheaper. Either that, or you can easily find a used copy on Amazon or eBay or in your local used book dealer.
So which authors will I automatically purchase a hardcover edition of their works, no questions asked?
- William Gibson. The godfather of cyberpunk may not quite have equaled his achievement with Neuromancer yet, but that’s simply because Neuromancer broke so much new ground. Gibson gets better and better with each book, and Pattern Recognition might have been his most mature, most affecting book yet.
- George R. R. Martin. As long as his Song of Ice and Fire doesn’t go on for too much longer, I’m there. Oh, and he’d better not have really killed off Davos the Onion Knight, or I will hunt him down like the mongrel dog he is.
- China Miéville. Another author whose imaginary powers seem to be just barely off the runway and headed for stratospheric heights. I happen to think that Perdido Street Station was quite overrated, but The Scar and Iron Council were two of the most visionary novels I’ve read in years.
- Richard Powers. Thousands of people walked by London’s Globe Theater every day in the 16th and 17th centuries without bothering to check out Shakespeare’s plays. They missed out. Millions of people walk by Richard Powers’ novels today in the bookstore without buying them. They’re missing out. Yes, he’s that good.
- Thomas Pynchon. I will not brook any argument on this point: Thomas Pynchon is the reincarnation of Herman Melville, Groucho Marx, Eleanor Roosevelt, and Eugene Debs all rolled into one. Some people wait in line for the latest Harry Potter, but I’d happily line up outside my local Barnes & Noble at midnight for a copy of his upcoming Against the Day.
- Philip Roth. Ever since American Pastoral, Roth has just gotten better and better. To paraphrase Kanye West, if the Nobel committee doesn’t recognize Roth before he kicks the bucket, they’ll lose credibility.
- J. K. Rowling. All right, I’ll admit it, I’m as besotted as your average thirteen-year-old with these Harry Potter books. (Although that last one was something of a disappointment.) My desire to own these books in hardcover has more to do with Mary GrandPré’s artwork than the contents, however. How can you British people stand buying such inferior-looking books?
- Kurt Vonnegut. Vonnegut doesn’t write novels anymore, so I’m pretty safe there. But his novels were such an important part of my teenage years, that I’m glad to subsidize him doing whatever the hell he wants in his twilight years.
So that’s my list. These aren’t the only authors whose books I buy in hardcover; they’re just the only ones who get an automatic buy from me (when I have the money).
All right, so who’s on your list?