I guess my name will enjoy a little re-vamped exposure this year as my book is released in September 2018 and sold via Amazon (I won't earn a penny). When I say 'my book' what I mean is 'my book' yet 'not my book'. It could have easily appeared with somebody else's name on the cover and if things had gone to the publisher's plan I would not have been consulted at all over the re-vamping of my original 1993 publication!
Astonishing, unbelievable but quite normal today where legality precedes ethics!
As a Member of The Society of Authors here is my letter to the editor (to be published in the 'The Author' journal:
'Dear editor
In the last issue of The Author, 'Fair shares - a call to publishers' prompted me to write on the subject of moral rights. I was astonished to learn almost by chance a book I wrote in 1993 was being re-vamped this year by an art director, without the publisher consulting me. The book – an encyclopedia of woodworking techniques – is highly technical; just one change of a decimal point or a word can change the meaning of a sentence. An example is that wood veneer was re-typed as 6mm thick when it is paper thin (0.6mm)!
The initial contract was so poor my only legal right was to withdraw my name from any future edition that might damage my reputation. I did not want do this – who would want another author's name to go on their book and is that morally right? Negotiating from a zero-strength position by offering to put in several months work voluntarily, I managed to achieve not just a say but the final say in how the content and technical imagery is to be up-dated but this is an unsatisfactory situation. Not receiving a royalty or compensation for my recent work is one thing but it should be a fundamental right for authors to own copyright of title and content. Moral rights, as the intellectual property specialists say, should be inalienable.
Jeremy Broun'
A lot of people will naturally assume that an award-winning book* published in five languages and selling over 25 years would pay off the author's mortgage but I was unable to negotiate any sort of copyright ownership for at least the title or receipt of royalties for the original book, just a modest lump sum on publication in 1993. a few crumbs from the loaf.
With this re-vamped book the most I managed to negotiate was a pitious £100 fee for several weeks work chasing up image contributors in the Themes section to write captions. That was my 'foot in the door' by offering what the art editor couldn't do - write concisely about technicalities in a craft that probably has more techniques, tools and materials attached to it than any other craft. So through my opening 'chess game' move I got to see how the entire book in its 'spreads' form - the draft page layouts and not only was I able over a period of months to slowly slowly catchy monkey make necessary detailed technical changes to the body content but the major prize for me was to re-shape the photographic gallery section of the book and ensure the very best examples of modern work were included. That meant replacing some of the already chosen images, a tricky task.
It was a recipe for disaster for a highly technical book not to have its author engaged from the start. One example is almost the very first image of a dustmask in the spreads looked like a laboratory assistant emerging out of Porton Down, and this was around the time of the Salisbury incident! Home or professional woodworkers do not in the main wear helmets akin to building site workers. Another example was in copying the text manually from the original book a decimal point was moved with reference to thickness of wood veneer resulting in veneer 6mm thick. A book that might have my name on the cover.
However, I have to say the art editor, despite her obvious lack of technical knowledge made an absolutely superb job of the design and presentation and we worked together on the phone sometimes late into the night making tons of adjustments.
So the work I put in over several months I offered to do for free. That was a vital chess move in this game because I had originally been told there was no budget and actually it was a narrow window of opportunity that my book was to be re-vamped at all. The publishing world today is like the bespoke furniture making world - a crowded marketplace.
However like any girl I'm entitled to change my mind and after all the hard work I had put in and the senior editor acknowledging I had made a very significant difference to the book - I naturally asked for more than £100. It was reluctantly doubled and I persisted over the next few months and finally got £500.
Talking of girls there were hardly any examples of female furniture makers when I saw the spreads. Ironically the two key editors were females. There has been a revolution in furniture making in the UK since 1993 with several hugely talented females emerging.
I believe the Themes, (Gallery) section is a tour-de-force, a unique showcase of
the very best work going on in the UK (with a few historical examples from Scandinavia and the USA). The publisher, the global leader in visual books had chosen the art editor well and from a personal point of view in this chess game I won the end game which was to have final say in the technical content and the choice of images in the gallery section. Job done!
My gratitude to two furniture makers who offered me moral support and some technical back up - my friend Andrew Lawton and Christine Meyer-Eaglestone. Not being a 'veneer man' myself I learned about engineered veneer and I was put in touch with people she felt should be included in the book as masters (or mistresses) of their technique.
It was a recipe for disaster for a highly technical book not to have its author engaged from the start. One example is almost the very first image of a dustmask in the spreads looked like a laboratory assistant emerging out of Porton Down, and this was around the time of the Salisbury incident! Home or professional woodworkers do not in the main wear helmets akin to building site workers. Another example was in copying the text manually from the original book a decimal point was moved with reference to thickness of wood veneer resulting in veneer 6mm thick. A book that might have my name on the cover.
However, I have to say the art editor, despite her obvious lack of technical knowledge made an absolutely superb job of the design and presentation and we worked together on the phone sometimes late into the night making tons of adjustments.
So the work I put in over several months I offered to do for free. That was a vital chess move in this game because I had originally been told there was no budget and actually it was a narrow window of opportunity that my book was to be re-vamped at all. The publishing world today is like the bespoke furniture making world - a crowded marketplace.
However like any girl I'm entitled to change my mind and after all the hard work I had put in and the senior editor acknowledging I had made a very significant difference to the book - I naturally asked for more than £100. It was reluctantly doubled and I persisted over the next few months and finally got £500.
Talking of girls there were hardly any examples of female furniture makers when I saw the spreads. Ironically the two key editors were females. There has been a revolution in furniture making in the UK since 1993 with several hugely talented females emerging.
I believe the Themes, (Gallery) section is a tour-de-force, a unique showcase of
the very best work going on in the UK (with a few historical examples from Scandinavia and the USA). The publisher, the global leader in visual books had chosen the art editor well and from a personal point of view in this chess game I won the end game which was to have final say in the technical content and the choice of images in the gallery section. Job done!
My gratitude to two furniture makers who offered me moral support and some technical back up - my friend Andrew Lawton and Christine Meyer-Eaglestone. Not being a 'veneer man' myself I learned about engineered veneer and I was put in touch with people she felt should be included in the book as masters (or mistresses) of their technique.
Receiving three complimentary copies recently, it was a bittersweet experience, considering the past few months I was anxious that my name might not be on 'my' book and that any of my changes would actually be accepted right up to the very end. The last message I had with the art editor was that she had submitted the spreads for approval by the bosses.
*The original edition published in 1993 won the UK Booksellers 'Top 200 Titles' Award from 63,000 books published that year.
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