Ian McEwan signs on with Amazon.com for backlist
Ian McEwan, the Booker prize winner, has become "the first mainstream British author" to sign an exclusive deal through Amazon to double the royalties he receives on his back catalogue, reports the Times.
"This weekend his agent in America revealed that he quietly signed a deal last summer with Rosetta Books, an independent ebook publisher."
According to the report, Rosetta Books doubled his royalties and secured an exclusive deal with Amazon for electronic versions of his back catalogue in the US. The deal covers five titles, including The Cement Garden and The Child in Time. It guarantees him more than 50% of all royalties.
As the Times points out the deal backs the Society of Authors position that writers should receive a higher percentage of digital royalites. Other writers seeking a bigger slice of the publishing pie include Martin Amis and the historian Antony Beevor. Last week they backed a campaign for authors to be given royalties of up to 75% on ebooks.
Comments on this article
By Marcus
http://entertainment.timesonline.co.uk/tol/arts_and_entertainment/books/article6999918.ece26 Jan 10 11:51
By Bottom's up
This is a significent moment what ho? It's why the big publishers have their lawyers going over every single contract with thier authors (who are often slow to understand the implications of the new technologies), tying to either assert digital rights or get the author to sign up to ebook rates that are advantageous to the publisher.26 Jan 10 20:29
