Hey, let’s write a book
I talked to a few publishers this year about doing a book of Badlangauge.net. I even wrote a few pitches.
The problem is that the book I wanted to write was different from the book editors wanted to publish.
I couldn’t put my finger on the problem except that they kept on referencing titles like The Tipping Point, The Long Tail, Freakonomics and similar titles.
Now, thanks to Wired, I can see what they were getting at. I loved and deeply dug their article last month: What’s the big idea? It contains a DIY guide to coming up with a catchy, paradoxical title and a winning premise.
As with Hollywood, the book that is good is different from the book that will sell. Anyhow, I’m flat out with business prose until Christmas at the earliest and then I probably have to put together a book for a client. I’m still working away on my book for pilots (If I’m going to write a book for no money, I might as well write it about something I love). I guess BadLanguage.net won’t hit the bookshelves for a while yet. But you can get it all here for nothing!
Technorati Tags: Wired, Paradoxonomics, books, publishing
Mark Larson wrote:
Interesting how the business demands guide the language of the cover. Ugh. You see the same titling crutches in lots of academic material as well, using the same form: Catchy Title [colon] Explanatory Sub-Title. It’s great to have the explanation, but in another way, it kills the suspense. I’m thinking of a book like The Ten Faces of Innovation. It not only has a long sub-title, but also has each of the ten faces depicted on the cover. For me, with all that info upfront, I’m less likely to actually open the book if copy doesn’t really hit home. (And I’m one of those who really likes reading the jacket copy). So there’s more pressure to make the title catchy or outlandish or zany or what-have-you. I suspect I browse and skim the fiction books more closely because the covers hold information back. Is it just me?
Seems like part of a bigger cultural thing going on here that I can’t quite put my finger on. There’s more and more non-fiction not just for reference or edification or technical guidance, but mass entertainment (much of it quite good). Surely it’s tied in with our newly webbed world.
Posted on 14-Nov-07 at 6:45 pm | Permalink
Peter wrote:
Title: The Selfish Meme
Subtitle: Why the Worst Ideas can get the Best Results
Premise: Organisations can turn Groupthink on its head, and put it to work for them.
Hey! This is fun. Of course, the hard part is holding one’s nose for long enough to churn out 250 pages of this stuff.
Title: Irrelevant Design
Subtitle: Why our brains are fooled by detail.
Premise: Stop seeing the wood, and notice the forest!
Of course, then there’s the book promotion tour. How do you keep a straight face when you’re pimping this kind of crap? It’s a tough job, but I guess somebody’s got to do it.
(In fairness, every now and then a Big Idea book comes along that really *is* worth reading, but they’re rarely the biggest hits. I wonder why?)
Posted on 14-Nov-07 at 7:16 pm | Permalink
Il blog del Mestiere di Scrivere wrote:
http://mesti...
Va’ dove ti porta il titolo. Solo qualche giorno fa, quando ho visto una pila di libri che faceva concorrenza alla mia modesta altezza, ho saputo che uno dei libri più venduti in Italia in questo periodo si intitola Sfogliandolo mi è ve…
Posted on 15-Nov-07 at 10:18 pm | Permalink