January 15, 2006
This is what I fear:

There's a lot of competition for the reading public. TV. DVDs, movies, the Internet. Radio.

Hell, family, friends, running, rainbows, butterflies, birdwatching, whatever.

So everyone talks about how this threatens reading and they're right, it probably does.

But that's not what I'm talking about today. It's not the background noise I'm talking about.

How many of you have ever gone to a booksigning or author event?

I'm curious. Because prior to starting to write, this was not on my activity list. Even today, I don't run out and catch author talks, events, etc., as a leisure pasttime, generally speaking.

Yet, at least in theory, authors are being pushed--by each other, if not by their publishers--to promote, promote, promote. Library talks, Rotary club talks, radio and TV interviews, conferences, book signings and standing on the top of tall buildings and shouting our names.

Yet, for all this, I don't see much in my area. The bookstores don't do many signings. The library talks I've been involved in are sporadic. Yet clearly, if you look at the 195,000 books reportedly published every year in the U.S., a huge chunk of us are doing some form of publicity.

And I wonder, as this increases, if it won't become just background noise. Oh, look, another unknown author's flogging his book down at Borders, oh, yawn, what's on Fox?

Sometimes we seem to be preaching to the choir. Yeah, I'll shell out some bucks to go to Magna cum Murder and introduce myself--or re-introduce myself--to the same 360 non-authors who were there last year, and maybe a few will bother to pick up a copy of my book instead of the guest of honor's, which this year was Harlan Coben. Hell, they gave out a paperback of one of his early thrillers for FREE to all comers.

Yet, we all shine on (like the moon and the stars and the sun), doing our best to rise above a herd that seems to be growing larger and more vocal all the time.

Not sure about this? Here's a challenge. Visit the website of the International Thriller Writers, Inc. www.internationalthrillerwriters.com. Find the page that lists all the authors. Pop in on some part of the alphabet. How many of these authors have you ever heard of? Ever? And a lot of them are quite successful. It's just ... there's so many of us! All clamoring for your attention. And even in a really good year, I don't read more than 55 or 60 novels.

Best,
Mark Terry