The Lie of the Legacy Deal: Why the Big 5 Won’t Make You a Star - or a Living
New authors still fall for it.
The lavish promise of landing a contract with a Big Five publisher—Penguin Random House, HarperCollins, Macmillan, Hachette, or Simon & Schuster—remains tantalizing bait for aspiring writers. But like the dream of becoming a movie star or a rock god, the trope of the “standard rich and famous” book deal is a relic of the now long-gone twentieth century. But this fantasy has long outlived its sell-by date thanks to ubiquitous marketing, MFA programs, and fading Boomer nostalgia.
You already know the familiar pitch: Get an agent, land that contract, and your book will be in stores nationwide. You’ll reach a huge audience; maybe even land a film deal. Best of all, you’ll be a “real author.” It’s an enticing story.
It’s also demonstrably false.
Let’s look at the facts.
The Big Five don’t rely on new authors. They barely care about them. The industry’s own numbers show that 60–80 percent of their revenue comes from backlist titles. For those who aren’t hip to legacy publishing lingo, the “backlist” consists of books published years or even decades ago. So publishers aren’t in the business of discovering the next great storyteller. They’re in the business of squeezing every red cent from the Milking Phase.
Related: The Corporate IP Death Cycle
The far greater revenues Big Five houses rake in from the backlist explains why they funnel marketing dollars into James Patterson-branded product, repackaged Tolkien editions, and "new" George R.R. Martin releases that are mostly just lore compilations. If you’re not already a household name, you’re not an oldpub priority. You’re not even a risk; you’re a tax write-off.
The average debut author at a Big Five house gets little to no marketing support. That advance you hear about? Odds are, it will be around $2500. And unless your book earns out, which most don’t, you won’t see another cent in royalties.
Meanwhile, your contract will likely grant the publisher rights for your eBook, audiobook, and possibly even derivative works—in perpetuity.
Congratulations, RealAuthor™. You sold your future for the privilege of being ignored.
Related: The Penguin in the Coal Mine
And even if your book does move a few thousand copies, the credit will go to the house, not you. Because, see, your audience isn’t yours. It belongs to their mailing list; their bookstore co-op. When they drop you after one or two underperforming releases, you start over from scratch: no brand; no writing income.
“Be that as it may,” a fair number of folks in the online writing scene have replied, “it’s the authors who get Barnes and Noble co-op who also get the movie and TV deals. Maybe the Big Five aren’t a path to riches, but under the current gatekeeping regime, they’re still the pipleine to cultural relevance. If we want to challenge the mainstream, we need to get our titles on the table at B&N, the production slate in Hollywood, and the streaming lineup on Netflix.”
And I agree with that assessment, for the most part. The one stumbling block to that strategy is that, in light of the numbers we discussed above, saying we need our guys to get bookstore co-op and movie deals is tantamount to saying we need them to have been published in the 1960s, become best sellers, and probably died in the interim.
It should be a safe assumption that if you’re reading this post, you’re interested in realistic, actionable solutions. If somehow gaining enough online clout to gatecrash oldpub, or hiding your power level long enough to get established and change the system from within could work, someone would have done it by now.
The good news is that the winds are changing. New publishers like Aethon Books and Ark Press are pioneering new business models that acknowledge and leverage the drastic changes the industry has undergone in th past quarter century. Some of these outfits have serious money behind them—the same money that reclaimed swaths of social media, and even the government, from the old regime.
Meanwhile, the slop dished out by oldpub, Hollywood, and AAA game studios is hemorrhaging mindshare. It has been for years. Name the most recent IP created by a debut writer that’s gotten the golden ticket treatment and risen to become a lasting cultural force. The best the current system has managed within the past decade have been vanity projects pushed with big media blitzes that still only achieved niche status.
Contrast that with what smart authors are building right now, in the open, without permission. Newpub lets creators retain all their rights, work at their own pace, and experiment to build audiences that care about their books. Are you unlikely to become an overnight success? Yes, but the newpub vs oldpub question is shaping up to be a tortoise and the hare race with the Big Five falling behind as indies extend their lead. They may not have fancy Manhattan cocktail parties, but they keep total control. Along with the lion’s share of their earnings.
Here’s the truth no fly-by-night agent or litfic washout editor wants you to hear: If you're just starting out, signing with a Big Five publisher is a liability, not an asset. It won’t give you reach. It won’t give you stability. And it won’t give you readers. The “Pick me!” instant career path they promise died twenty years ago. What remains is a propaganda organ maintained by backlist inertia.
Don’t sell your soul to a dying industry. Cultivate the platform they’d make you build anyway. Write what matters, and own your rights.
And never forget that you have final authority over your writing career, if you’re willing to keep it.
Get early looks at my works in progress, the chance to influence my writing, and VIP access to my exclusive Discord.
Sign up at Patreon or SubscribeStar now.
Dark fantasy minus the grim plus heroes you can relate to battling vs overwhelming odds
