A recent event has recently made me reexamine the argument from a different angle, namely are readers obligated to the authors? The event in question is Melanie Rawn’s announcement on her website that TOR have cancelled the third book in the Spellbinder series, an urban fantasy/paranormal romance trilogy, due to poor sales but have signed her up to another trilogy closer to the epic fantasy of her earlier days. Rawn’s antics once the news was broken has left me, well quite simply baffled.
Before I get into that I think it is important to provide some background information. This is the second trilogy in a row that Rawn is leaving incomplete, the earlier one being Exiles. The second installment of that series came out in 1997 and ended in a cliffhanger. Melanie underwent some family troubles and a bout of depression that initially left her unable to complete the final volume The Captals Tower. Once Rawn felt herself able to write again she started on Spellbinder. As far as The Captals Tower goes it appears she has done no work on it whatsoever, aside from some possible research a few years ago, and has made no announcement when or if she will ever complete it.
When Melanie made this announcement that Spellbinder was cancelled needless to say that her fan base was not enthused which seems to have come as a surprise to Melanie. She then seems to have had something of a child’s tantrum. With the reaction not being what she expected she took the announcement down. On her website is a thread where her fans can come and rant about the Captals Tower, a place that Rawn has said herself she doesn’t go so fans can go and vent their frustrations without upsetting the author. Yet after the announcement when people were on there voicing their disappoint she turned up with a few catty remarks. On another thread when a reader voiced the opinion that he or she now waits for a series to be completed before buying and reading it Melanie came out and said she doesn’t understand that. Oh come on a reader has been waiting thirteen years so far for a conclusion to Exiles and there is still no end in sight and the author can’t understand that type of behavior? While it is obvious this latest setback is not Melanie’s fault she could have handled it a lot better. With the first two spellbinder books selling poorly there is little chance that another publisher will pickup the third but there is nothing stopping Melanie from self publishing it or posting it on her website. At the time of writing Rawn has made no announcement whatsoever about this book and she shouldn’t be surprised if her fan base doesn’t share the same enthusiasm for the proposed next trilogy. What seems to have set Melanie off is that if her readers take the wait and see approach then her new series will have just as poor sales as Spellbinder did, yet Melanie seems to believe that the readers should buy whatever she writes just because she wrote it. Readers have no such obligation and there is enough of a market out there that they won’t ever have to. Melanie Rawn it times for you to realise your readers are not your bitch.
I agree with you. I have seen multiple confusing, vague, puzzling, and even insulting non-explanations from Rawn over the years about the never-written third book in this trilogy, a book which her fans have awaited for years. So I was surprised that it came as a surprise to -her- that fans reacted negatively to finding out she was not completing her -current- trilogy, either. (Especially since readers have a long history of blaming the author for not finishing a trilogy or a series even when it was the -publisher- who decided not to keep publishing; so this is hardly a new and unforeseeable sort of reaction. And in Rawn's case, it's meanwhle well-known that -she-, not her publisher, is the reason the previous trilogy never got finished.)
ReplyDeleteI've read that personal problems, depression, and a bereavement prevented her from writing CAPTAL'S TOWER. Then I read that a shoulder injury prevented her from writing it. Then I read that she was planning to write it... but couldn't remember what the plot threads from the first two books were and, er, couldn't be bothered to go back and read her own work so she could pick up its threads (and instead was, I gather, asking readers to remind her of the story). Then I read some vague comment from her that she's not the same writer now that she was back when she wrote the first two books of the trilogy... And I'm wondering... Does that means she's not going to write it? She won't say. (And perhaps one reason she won't say is that if she did, maybe then her publisher would finally cancel the contract on the basis of non-delivery and ask her to repay the advance money she accepted upon signing the contract years ago.)
She also snidely goaded her readers in her most-recent novel, FIRE RAISER. The heroine of that novel is, er, a historical author who's NOT writing the expected sequel to a big swords-and-castles novel. (Sound familiar?) The heroine bitches about "reader entitlement" in the novel; and when told fans won't be happy she's not writing the book, the response is, "F**k them."
Not surprisingly, numerous Rawn readers have declared themselves offended by this. Which reaction I found about as surprising as, "The sun rose in the east today."
Meanwhile, Rawn's website is years out of date, with no recent/current information AT ALL about CAPTAL'S TOWER (or FIRE RAISER, as it happens; or THE DIVINER; or her new Tor series). All that curious/frustrated readers can rely on are Rawn's scattered, vague, puzzling, non-responsive comments which don't confirm whether she'll ever write the long-awaited CAPTAL'S TOWER, and Rawn's various scattered snide and petulant comments about "reader entitlement," etc. Is it any WONDER that readers are fed up? I don't see readers treating her like their bitch? I see readers responding to a long run of unprofessional and ill-advised public behavior from this writer.
When you add the weak sales of her current series leading to cancelation of this trilogy, and her announcement that she's moving on to a new series rather than writing CAPTAL'S TOWER... This whole situation feels like watching a train wreck in slow motion.
I read exiles and never bought another book from this author. Why should I start reading her new books not knowing of she will finish them? I was going to buy her latest trilogy but I've decided I won't give her a cent for her books since she likes to play games. She said she is going to write captal's tower in 2014 but its 2015 and no news. I don't think she is the same author and if she did write the final book of exiles, it will be a cheap copy just to get some money. I don't think she can give the book Captal's tower justice after so long.
ReplyDeleteI read exiles and never bought another book from this author. Why should I start reading her new books not knowing of she will finish them? I was going to buy her latest trilogy but I've decided I won't give her a cent for her books since she likes to play games. She said she is going to write captal's tower in 2014 but its 2015 and no news. I don't think she is the same author and if she did write the final book of exiles, it will be a cheap copy just to get some money. I don't think she can give the book Captal's tower justice after so long.
ReplyDelete