Where the big hitters at?

[DukeLeto69]

Big hitters = suspected big sellers rather than subjective reader preferences.

 

Maybe we are waiting for the HH:SoT to finally wrap up but where are Abnett’s other books? Interceptor City? Pandaemonium? Gaunt’s Ghosts dossier 2? 

 

Wraight is very quiet! Where is Watchers of the Throne 3? Will we ever get Bloodlines 2?

 

Will we EVER see ADB’s Black Legion 3 or Spears of the Emperor 2?

 

Who are the other big hitters who have gone quiet?

 

Are we seeing the passing of the torch to the next gen of authors?

 

Are BL unsure what to do without the flagship HH series (or will the new Epic set during HH generate tie in work to continue the HH books?)

 

Also while probably not a “big hitter” in terms of sales, Fehervari is a “big hitter” in terms of influence and quality! So we need a new novel from him! And some omnibus/anthologies! 

[Bobss]

While I DO believe there is a valid argument that Black Library's high tide was the Twentytens, and that some authors seem to be winding down their careers, I think this 'big hitter drought' is more likely due to a combination of factors-

 

a) Games Workshop, at least from my perspective, seem to be far more rigid with their release schedule nowadays. To me, it feels like books can't be organically announced or released; they have to be tied into a new model release or a major lore update or even just a fancy WarCom post. imo this has created an artificial bottleneck. This is increased whenever a BIG HITTER author is involved too. When Black Legion 3 is released I'm sure there will be a plethora of strings attached, from WarCom to maybe even major game or model stuff. As someone who loved the fan-friendliness of WarCom when it began, I've grown to hate it in recent years

b) Many big hitters have been involved in the Siege of Terra, and SOT books are massive. This clearly applies to Abnett and ADB the most, with Abnett writing 4 huge tomes and Echoes. clearly interrupting Black Legion 3/Emperor's Spears 2 (Echoes. is awesome so chill). It's not just the writing time, but the general investiture, energy and inertia of these releases that takes the place of 1 or even 2 other books

c) This might be controversial and sort of links into point a), albeit in a reverse kind of way, but GW pushing the 40k story forwards has sort of dismantled this static sandbox that authors loved to play around in. I KNOW this is a talked-to-death topic/moan at this point, and I know a guy like Wraight has rolled well with new background developments in things like his Watchers of the Throne series, but you can't deny this has had an impact on ADB's intentions with Abaddon for example. So, big hitter authors, who imo earned their reputation for writing brilliant off-the-beaten-path stuff, are sort of left out in the cold while your Haleys and Brooks' love to dig into Cawl, Guilliman, the Lion etc.

d) I think we underestimate the impact of covid. Not necessarily in terms of printing and logistics and whatnot, but more of an unseen, cultural impact. I feel like many things have slowed down and seem to swim through syrup nowadays. I've seen it in some instances in my job, in the sports world to a degree and I feel like it's still a thing among BL and its stable

 

All of that said, I do think there's a changing-of-the-guard going on. There's been some really great books released by newer authors recently, and if they haven't had the splash of the big hitters and their own debuts, then that says more about the hobby's health and popularity than anything else. The Infinite and the Divine is banging, but it will never be as beloved as Soul Hunter because BL was a different beast in 2010

 

Just

My

Highly

Anecdotal

Thoughts

[Taliesin]

I'm not really seeing any passing of torches. The previously very prolific group just seems to be publishing fewer novels a year, that much is clear, but they are still around obviously.

I do think Abnett is still very prolific and all his time recently has just been taken up with what is turning out to be 3 final Siege of Terra books, so he is accounted for. Wraight did release 2 books last year but nothing yet for 2023 which is indeed unusual for him as he tends to average 2 a year. Bloodlines 2 we have heard nothing of, I think.

 

Haley's number of releases has dropped significantly since the days of him releasing 4 a year. French however had a fair few. So they are still writing and releasing.

ADB remains a big mystery, zero words on Spear of the Emperor 2 ( aside from SoT, my most highly anticipated book). Any update from him on that would be so appreciated.

 

Fortunately there are some newer authors also releasing good stuff. So I see it as more of a mix now, rather than a passing of torches, they are too young for that as well I think.

[System Sound]

Haley's output is probably limited due to trying to manage the Dawn of Fire series.

 

Fehervari has a full time job and writing is just a sidegig at best for him.

 

Before ADB gone dark on socials, he did tease both Black Legion and Spears as being done/near complete.

[DarkChaplain]

3 hours ago, Taliesin said:

and all his time recently has just been taken up with what is turning out to be 3 final Siege of Terra books, so he is accounted for.

 

I wonder. According to Abnett, the entire thing had been written already before the first one released. And that was ages ago now. Going by his usual output, he might have already written two novels since then - the question is whether we'll see any of them this year, if they exist.

 

 

Either way, a big factor is how much BL is willing to pay their authors. This has already been a topic that turned prospective newcomers away after dipping their toes into Inferno! etc (by the way, Inferno! remains dead and dusted with absolutely no statement from BL about it), and we can clearly tell that Aconyte - which is in many ways more directly tied into board- and tabletop, and even video games with their publications - has been "poaching" BL authors left and right. They clearly offer better conditions and likely also work relationships.

 

David Annandale, for instance, has written at least 5 novels for Aconyte since 2020 - including an Arkham Horror installment (and he is passionate about writing horror, and was a big reason why I was excited about Warhammer Horror) and 3 Marvel tie-ins.

David Guymer is three novels deep, while BL still haven't given him the third Iron Hands novel.

 

Robbie MacNiven, who is unlikely to ever get back to writing a third installment of his Carcharodons, is SEVEN novels deep, with a bunch of anthology contributions on top. He's writing for Twilight Imperium, The Ascent and even Ubisoft's Watch_Dogs IP. And Marvel. These have got to be more rigid than 40k is even with timeline advancements.

C.L.Werner is four novels in.

James Swallow is three novels in - all Ubisoft titles, two of them under the Tom Clancy's Splinter Cell branding, the other co-written with Josh Reynolds, for Watch_Dogs.

 

And the ever-productive, ever-entertaining Josh Reynolds, who I'd call the biggest loss BL have made in the past 15 years?

Ten. Novels. He's even gotten his own, personal Legend of the Five Rings detective? series - something that he's passionate about, too, as can be evidenced by him trying to get BL to allow him to bring back the classic WHFB-holmesian-character Zavant Konniger, or his original (and great) Royal Occultist series.

 

Even WITH all these rigid IPs, of much smaller scopes than any that GW/BL handle, Aconyte has proven the last few years that these authors will take on work there instead of sticking near-exclusively with BL like they used to. Used to be that they'd rather get paycheques from BL than even continue their original content, and outside endeavors were often tied to anthologies, sometimes with Kickstarter funding (the Kaiju Rising and Sharkpunk anthologies spring to mind).

 

And then we had Riot Games picking up folks like Graham McNeill, or editor Laurie Goulding, to work on League of Legends lore. A bunch of folks went and left for it as their day job.

 

BL used to be a source of stable, decent income for these authors. And I might be biased here because I dearly miss Josh, but his case wasn't the only one making the rounds about BL not being all that great to work with and for anymore. Rates being low, editing being off, contacts being eh.  They're not the winning horse for these established authors anymore. Other publishers in adjacent properties seem to understand their value better than BL does, and thus makes working with them a more attractive proposition.

 

I highly doubt they'd skip out on a well-paying freelance gig for BL just because they don't like that the Lion has physically aged or other lore bits, or that they no longer care, or don't want to finish series they've started. It's more likely that it doesn't really pay the bills well enough anymore, especially in this economic downturn, and in the UK in particular.

 

...which on the other hand comes to show that BL must be treating their "chosen ones" really quite well. By which I mean sweet cash.

Edited July 12, 2023 by DarkChaplain

[cheywood]

It seems that a lot of the long established, mid tier writers have taken their talents elsewhere while most of the big names (McNeill and Reynolds being the notable exceptions) have kept writing for 40k. My guess is that, as @DarkChaplain says, BL pays its A-listers extremely well, but someone like Guymer or Annandale isn’t necessarily making all that much more per book than they were when they started out.
 

From what people like Reynolds have said BL can be rather insular. They have their favorites and they take care of them, while other authors get left out in the cold relatively speaking. It makes sense given that a lot of the editors have been around for decades and likely have long-established friendships with many of the old guard. 

 

If I were a betting man I’d say BL isn’t too worried about those authors who’ve left for Aconyte. They’ll spend the money to retain those authors who are irreplaceable from a creative standpoint (and consistently sell well) and they have a ready pool of new talent who want to write for them due to 40k’s popularity. Based on how well they’ve done bringing newer authors on board like Crowley, Rath and Brooks I can’t say they’re wrong. The only truly essential author they’ve lost was Reynolds and that relationship was seemingly a little fractious (by the standards of IP fiction) for a while over creative differences.

 

Edit: At the same time I would be much happier knowing BL paid its authors good rates universally. One of the things I dislike about reading DC/Marvel comics is knowing that, however much money Marvel/DC makes off a storyline in movies, tv and merch, its creators likely made a pittance. BL isn’t nearly that extreme, but businesses should pay their employees/freelancers well, especially if they’re part of a highly profitable multinational corporation. 

Edited July 12, 2023 by cheywood

[darkhorse0607]

While I fully expect financials to be a big part of the reason why authors are leaving BL, I wonder how much editing/pitch selection plays into this as well.

 

As others noted, it does seem like the old guard gets more leeway when pitching ideas than the newer authors do, I can't help but wonder if half of what Abnett has put into his novels would make the cut if he was someone like Rath, Reynolds, or Annandale. Reynolds has been vocal about his desires for the third Fabius book that mostly ended up being cut due to editing decisions or ideas being rejected as an example. Or BL's new thing about trying to turn audio-drama length novellas (Garro Knight of Grey and Cypher for example) into longer books

 

Then you have the overall narrative of 40k being all over the place for the last few years, and I would imagine that could be irritating for authors as well. 40k starts 8th post-Indomitus, so authors might be developing ideas or rough drafts for novels to pitch, then the Psychic Awakening, then GW decided to backtrack the setting to the beginning of the Indomitus Crusade which might alter their plans. Now, even as a relatively up-to-date lore reader (not as much as most of you, but still), I'm even starting to wonder when events are taking place and where we are at timeline-wise. If I was trying to write or plan a novel, and get told by BL "sorry, we changed the time again, we aren't ready for that yet," or "we retconned that already, try something else" then I would get frustrated. You also have situations like the Lion's novel, where Brooks in the afterwards said that he was essentially told by BL how they wanted the story beats to go, which took away from the story he might have wanted to tell. Again, it could be frustrating, and while this exists in most IPs, I do wonder if it's worse for 40k, especially over the last few years since they decided to advance the story. The Dark Imperium series is a decent example of this where they had to do a re-write in some sections and re-release it.

 

My conspiracy though ties into a point made above, in that some of these books are done and have been but GW is sitting on them because they want everything to tie into a big release. We know they do this with models with the rocket troops being a recent example how they sat on them for years even though they were done and packaged, and given that everything seemingly has to be the "BIGGEST THING SINCE THE HORUS HERESY FULL OF EPICNESS" I could see them sitting on things like Black Legion 3 until they feel like they can tie it into a model release or something similar. Obviously complete speculation, but that's where my head is at.

 

It is a bit frustrating though with the lack of communication about releases. I understand that releasing novels is a different beast than releasing models or rules, but sitting through event after event (speaking of the Black Library previews) or wondering week after week if the book you've been waiting for is finally going up for pre-order is getting old

 

Or maybe I'm just cranky because I finished listening to Talon of Horus again and the Audible closing segment reminded me it was released in 2014, and it's almost a decade since and we still haven't gotten the last book of the trilogy.

 

Edited July 12, 2023 by darkhorse0607
edited for another example in the second paragraph

[Taliesin]

Speaking of big hitters, Nate Crowley's first few books have been so very well received, I wonder when he has something coming again,

[Felix Antipodes]

There seems to be two things that come to mind wrt the recent release schedule of BL.

 

The first is that GW seems to be getting more influence again over BL and its content.  The last time this happened we got a massive exodus of talent from the imprint.  Maybe this is starting to happen again for their “lesser” lights (sales-wise).  Their choice to punch out a heap of new releases at the annual BL celebrations then drip feeding releases for the remainder of the year also doesn’t help retain loyal readers.  Doing previews of stuff that doesn’t see the light of day for (many) months also aggravates their readership.

The second is that it so many authors, after the initial rush to having a “digital presence”, have either closed down or abandoned their websites or twitter feeds.  This makes it a lot harder to know what they are up to and/or working on, making it seem like they have vanished from the imprint.  Who here wasn’t hanging for the latest update to a the weblog of their favourite talent or thrilled by the latest ADB post on this very forum?  We still have some maintaining their sites or lurking here (Hi! Justin, Denny) but that is becoming a rare beast - which I understand (personal issues, time restrictions, etc).

 

[Ubiquitous1984]

5 hours ago, Felix Antipodes said:

There seems to be two things that come to mind wrt the recent release schedule of BL.

 

The first is that GW seems to be getting more influence again over BL and its content.  The last time this happened we got a massive exodus of talent from the imprint.  Maybe this is starting to happen again for their “lesser” lights (sales-wise).  Their choice to punch out a heap of new releases at the annual BL celebrations then drip feeding releases for the remainder of the year also doesn’t help retain loyal readers.  Doing previews of stuff that doesn’t see the light of day for (many) months also aggravates their readership.

The second is that it so many authors, after the initial rush to having a “digital presence”, have either closed down or abandoned their websites or twitter feeds.  This makes it a lot harder to know what they are up to and/or working on, making it seem like they have vanished from the imprint.  Who here wasn’t hanging for the latest update to a the weblog of their favourite talent or thrilled by the latest ADB post on this very forum?  We still have some maintaining their sites or lurking here (Hi! Justin, Denny) but that is becoming a rare beast - which I understand (personal issues, time restrictions, etc).

 

Just to add to your post (which I fully agree with), the removal of the BL Weekender events has also been a factor.  We used to be able to speak to the authors/management, and whilst they wouldn’t break any NDA’s to give you pre-notice of future releases, their mere presence at the BL event and their interaction with fans gave you confidence in their continued love and support of the IP.  

 

We don’t get to see the authors in this environment anymore, and like Felix alluded to, their web presence has also whittled down.  Out of sight, out of mind.  Inevitably as a fan you start to fear the worst!

[byrd9999]

Just for a different perspective on this, I'm not too bothered about the authors recruited by Aconyte. Their books (except Annandale's horror) never really clicked with me.

 

I love the "new guard" of Nate Crowley, Robert Rath, Mike Brooks, etc...

 

Abnett, Haley, French, Wright are all still writing great books and are at the top of their game.

 

The only fear I have is ADB. I'm currently reading The Emperor's Gift, and it is clear how much of a fantastic writer he is, and his books offer such a fantastic POV on the Warhammer universe.

 

I know he's had personal difficulties in his writing, and it's clear how much BL are supporting him, but I do worry he might opt for the easier option of Chinese-US money like Graham McNeill did.

 

If that did happen, and he wants to step back from BL, I hope we get a BL3 and an ES2 before he goes.

[cheywood]

39 minutes ago, byrd9999 said:

Just for a different perspective on this, I'm not too bothered about the authors recruited by Aconyte. Their books (except Annandale's horror) never really clicked with me.

 

I love the "new guard" of Nate Crowley, Robert Rath, Mike Brooks, etc...

 

Abnett, Haley, French, Wright are all still writing great books and are at the top of their game.

 

The only fear I have is ADB. I'm currently reading The Emperor's Gift, and it is clear how much of a fantastic writer he is, and his books offer such a fantastic POV on the Warhammer universe.

 

I know he's had personal difficulties in his writing, and it's clear how much BL are supporting him, but I do worry he might opt for the easier option of Chinese-US money like Graham McNeill did.

 

If that did happen, and he wants to step back from BL, I hope we get a BL3 and an ES2 before he goes.

As someone who used to spend far too much time browsing ADB’s Twitter this surprises me. ADB is the author I’m least worried about leaving. He lives and breathes 40k more so than any other BL contributor. He’s never even published a novel outside of the setting as far as I know. On the other hand Abnett, Haley, French and Wraight have all dipped their toes in other settings, with Abnett at this point being one of the more prolific IP writers of the 21st century across both comics and conventional novels. 

 

As I understand it ADB’s not currently experiencing the same degree of mental health issues he was a few years back. Things got dark for a while there and he came pretty close to making that most drastic of decisions, but he’s talked a lot about how therapy and a good support system put him in a better place and he feels healthy now. He’s said he’s just a slow writer regardless of his mental health and confidence in what he’s writing. 
 

I also wouldn’t be too stressed about him heading to Riot or another IP company. Riot wants people who can write fiction but also help manage other projects and structure the company’s lore approach across their various projects and mediums. For all that his prose is lacking, McNeill has a lot of knowledge about how to create IP and experience working directly for GW integrating lore and game concepts. To the best of my knowledge, while ADB has worked on table top role playing games and what not, he’s exclusively worked as a fiction writer the past 15 years or so. I’d be surprised if he suddenly wanted to uproot his family from Ireland and take a job that involves way more day to day stress and work that he’s less familiar with.
 

Financially I don’t get the sense that ADB’s particularly at risk. He lives in the north of Ireland where I don’t think cost of living is especially high, and he has mentioned things like housing renovations that you don’t typically hear starving artists talk about. Not saying he’s inordinately wealthy, but maybe his wife/family make a good living, or GW pays him enough to make his low output less relevant. Either way, I think if ADB ever takes a step back from BL it will because he’s taken a step back from creative endeavors in general, not merely moved on to a more profitable opportunity.

[byrd9999]

Aw, dang. Now I'm torn between wanting you to be right, because it's the best possible outcome, and wanting me to be right because it's important to be right when discussing things with strangers on the Internet! 

[Sothalor]

Total conjecture here, but I wonder how much of a factor BL's seeming commitment to FOMO, insta-sold out limited print volumes affects things like author long-tail payouts and royalties.

 

Take Robert Rath's Assassinorum: Kingmaker, for instance. That book sold out pretty darned quickly, both hardcover and paperback releases. Did that put a functional, sharp, "soft cap" of sorts on Rath's earnings for that novel? IE. (purely making up numbers here) if BL printed, say, 2,000 hardcover copies and then 3,000 paperback copies - which all sold, but they could have printed 4,000 hardcovers and 5,000 paperbacks and still sold them all. How much of a difference might that have made to what the author ultimately receives?

 

And might such a thing be happening repeatedly across multiple releases?

[Ubiquitous1984]

3 hours ago, cheywood said:

 

Financially I don’t get the sense that ADB’s particularly at risk. He lives in the north of Ireland where I don’t think cost of living is especially high, and he has mentioned things like housing renovations that you don’t typically hear starving artists talk about. Not saying he’s inordinately wealthy, but maybe his wife/family make a good living, or GW pays him enough to make his low output less relevant. Either way, I think if ADB ever takes a step back from BL it will because he’s taken a step back from creative endeavors in general, not merely moved on to a more profitable opportunity.

I think BL have thrown him a few bones in recent years with re-releases of his books, especially in special edition format.  Hopefully that’s helped top-up his income (assuming he sees any money from these releases - you have to assume the author does as they have to sign the bloody things!)

[Ubiquitous1984]

1 minute ago, Sothalor said:

Total conjecture here, but I wonder how much of a factor BL's seeming commitment to FOMO, insta-sold out limited print volumes affects things like author long-tail payouts and royalties.

 

Take Robert Rath's Assassinorum: Kingmaker, for instance. That book sold out pretty darned quickly, both hardcover and paperback releases. Did that put a functional, sharp, "soft cap" of sorts on Rath's earnings for that novel? IE. (purely making up numbers here) if BL printed, say, 2,000 hardcover copies and then 3,000 paperback copies - which all sold, but they could have printed 4,000 hardcovers and 5,000 paperbacks and still sold them all. How much of a difference might that have made to what the author ultimately receives?

 

And might such a thing be happening repeatedly across multiple releases?

BL sell a huge amount of ebooks and audiobooks, too.  I assume the profit margin is highest for limited edition, following by ebooks and then audiobooks.  The payouts for these digital formats are not limited to an initial print run, and can go on for many years (can you imagine the royalties Abnett must have made from Horus Rising?) Hardback books and softbacks must be bottom of the financial barrel, otherwise they’d print more (IMO).  

[Scribe]

3 hours ago, Sothalor said:

Total conjecture here, but I wonder how much of a factor BL's seeming commitment to FOMO, insta-sold out limited print volumes affects things like author long-tail payouts and royalties.

 

Take Robert Rath's Assassinorum: Kingmaker, for instance. That book sold out pretty darned quickly, both hardcover and paperback releases. Did that put a functional, sharp, "soft cap" of sorts on Rath's earnings for that novel? IE. (purely making up numbers here) if BL printed, say, 2,000 hardcover copies and then 3,000 paperback copies - which all sold, but they could have printed 4,000 hardcovers and 5,000 paperbacks and still sold them all. How much of a difference might that have made to what the author ultimately receives?

 

And might such a thing be happening repeatedly across multiple releases?

 

Sad reacts only.

 

I cannot express my joy at reading Echo's. I sure hope we get some new ADB stuff this year.

[cheywood]

3 hours ago, Ubiquitous1984 said:

I think BL have thrown him a few bones in recent years with re-releases of his books, especially in special edition format.  Hopefully that’s helped top-up his income (assuming he sees any money from these releases - you have to assume the author does as they have to sign the bloody things!)

I vaguely recall Haley saying the special/limited editions generally work out pretty well for him, and that BL pays out a small fee for signing them. Considering how many BL puts out I’d like to think they’re decent enough to make it worthwhile for everyone involved (they certainly do so for the scalpers ), but it’s not like the authors have much say in how BL releases their work.

[DukeLeto69]

13 hours ago, cheywood said:

I vaguely recall Haley saying the special/limited editions generally work out pretty well for him, and that BL pays out a small fee for signing them. Considering how many BL puts out I’d like to think they’re decent enough to make it worthwhile for everyone involved (they certainly do so for the scalpers ), but it’s not like the authors have much say in how BL releases their work.

 

Each author has a royalty rate for a novel based on a % of the wholesale price of the novel. BL has a base % royalty rate but more successful authors can negotiate an increased % rate.

 

When an author writes a novel they receive an advance as a flat fee. That is as it says, an advance on future royalties. BL then pays the author no royalties until the sales of the novel are at a level where the novel has “earned out”. From that point forward the author starts to receive royalties at their agreed % of wholesale price.

 

Authors LOVE special superdoopa limited editions because the price is soooo much higher. Eg 5% (making that up) of £50 is £2.50 whereas 5% of £5 is £0.25 so the book “earns out” far more quickly and they start to get paid royalties.

 

Same goes for hardbacks vs paperbacks. HBs are much better earners per unit then PBs.

 

A quirk of BL/GW is they sell many of their books (and all special editions and increasingly all hardbacks) direct rather than through “bookstores”. That means the difference between wholesale and retail price is meaningless (beyond deductible distribution costs). However, I have no idea how that is handled regarding author % royalties although you can assume the direct wholesale price is higher and therefore better for the author!

 

Ebooks are proportionately better earners for authors because there is a narrower gap between wholesale and retail price. Audiobooks also but I believe not as good as ebooks due to an increase in production costs (inc fees for the voice actor and studio time).

 

The other thing that works in favour of the “big hitters” is the ability to negotiate a bigger advance because BL know they normally sell more books.

 

So, for example, Abnett will get a bigger % royalty rate and a bigger advance than a newer less established author by some margin.

 

I expect that BL will commission an author to write a book of a certain length (wordcount) and that is reflected in the advance. If the author goes over the brief for the wordcount (and you can assume in doing so spent more time writing the book) then that is on the author. They have basically done more work for the same money.

 

This is where the trend for “short novels” has been interesting. Note how they have smaller wordcounts but have often been hardbacks. Win/win for the authors who still get  their % royalty of wholesale price (which is higher than standard novel in PB) but the amount of time spent working/writing should in theory be less.

Edited July 14, 2023 by DukeLeto69

[DukeLeto69]

Looks like I killed my own thread LOL!

 

I realised I didn’t include short stories in that last post. AFAIK shorts follow a different model. Generally the author gets a flat fee and that is it. In the days of paper/print only releases they never saw another penny. Eshorts changed that as it provided a retail channel to buy a single short that wasn’t there before.

 

When shorts are bundled in an anthology publishers (or at least BL, some might) do not pay royalties. The reason is that every short has a different  word count and breaking down the proportion of each book to know what each author should receive AND account for different royalty rates just does not happen (single author short story collections are different I believe).

 

So if you want to support your fav authors, buy their short stories as EShorts as these “earn out” like novels and eventually pay royalties. Then reward yourself with a dead tree anthology for your collection without feeling bad the author gets nothing!

Edited July 15, 2023 by DukeLeto69