Howzat? A Hat-trick! by Sue Moorcroft

I’ve been so focused on the publication of Want to Know a Secret? (Choc Lit, 1 November 2010, £7.99) that a happy truth has only just dawned on me.

In fact, I have THREE books being published on one day!

This is because the hardback large print version of Starting Over and the softback large print book of what was originally a serial for The People’s Friend, One Summer in Malta (both Magna), also have a publication date of 1 November 2010, too. So, I have a hat-trick.

The synchronicity is completely out of my hands, of course. Choc Lit had decided on the publication date of Want to Know a Secret? ages ago. Equally, they placed my large print rights with Magna ages ago. And I sold the large print rights to One Summer in Malta ages ago. But it has given me a day to be proud of.

For anybody who doesn’t know about subsidiary rights, in publishing, this is a good time to explain that books can come out in many forms: hardback, paperback, trade paperback, audio, large print, all the various ebook formats etc. And that’s before you get to the foreign rights: the US version, the Australian, the South African, and then different languages, too.

Subsidiary rights can really earn you money, because you don’t normally have to do much more work to get a whole new fee. Subsidiary rights can make the difference between an author being able to make a living, or not. So let’s hear it for subsidiary rights sales! Yeahhhh!

And that’s why writers get excited when their publisher or agent goes to a book fair. Because rights get sold.