Monday, April 20, 2009

The pink octopus is bitterly disappointed

She thought one day lay down** was like a short reading vacation. She's even been practicing.


I had to send her over to Editorial Anonymous for a brush up on publishing terms.

sell-in and sell-through

proofs


ARCs

Galleys

and what sounds fun, but isn't what you think: strippable



For all the definitions click Publishing Dictionary.


**one day lay down, or lay down is the date when a title goes on sale in a special "not before today" way. It's usually reserved for books that have a lot of popular demand: Stephenie Meyer, William Gibson, Michael Crichton and the like. It's pretty much the antithesis of vacation day for bookstore staffers!

7 comments:

Kristin Laughtin said...

The octopus looks so cute like that! (I love cephalopods. I'm currently wearing earrings that look like cuttlefish.)

Yikes! That definition of sell-in is one more intimidating thing to consider in the process of publication. (Not that authors probably have very much power in that area anyway...)

Heather Wardell said...

The octopus looks so cute and shy. Is she embarrassed that she didn't know those terms? Or just pondering other meanings of 'strippable'?

I need an octopus. Of course, who doesn't need one?

Thanks for the links to the terminology... good things to know!

Anonymous said...

I think the pink octopus looks a little sad & tired - might be thinking, "so many books, so little time... how will I ever manage to read them all?"

Haste yee back ;-) said...

Okay, test,
What's the gutter?

How do illustrators plan for it?

Haste yee back ;-)

Gwen said...

I am suddenly reminded of how sad and tired employees at Borders looked upon the release of the last Harry Potter book.

I have to ask where you got the octopus. My freshmen roommate in college had an octopus with only 7 tentacles and we named it Heppy (the heptapus). I have been looking for a cute octopus/heptapus ever since.

none said...

That is one sad 'pus. Awww.

Jenny Maloney said...

Actually, speaking as one of those bookstore staffers, the hardest day is the day *before* the S.O.S. (strict on sale) date--when the books are physically present in the store's back room and everyone is asking for it and you have to tell them to turn around and come back tomorrow because it's more than your job's worth to hand over that latest Meyer or Rowling book.