Anyone work in publishing? Re: Meghan McCain's Memoir

[jennyparnassus]

So, it's going around the internet that Meghan McCain's memoir, which came out on April 26, only sold less than 300 copies in the first eleven days of sales.

www.washingtonexaminer.com/news/washington-secrets/meghan-mccains-bad-republican-book-flops-too

Here's a link to an article about it, but there's a bunch of other stuff on the internet about it right now.

So, she tweeted herself that this book release was a "soft release" and that the Audible version has already been out for awhile and is doing well.

I'm still so confused as to how it could possibly be correct that she only sold less than 300 copies. I mean, my local independent book store requires people to pre-purchase books in order to attend a book release / book launch party. So, if Meghan McCain had a book release / book launch party and people were required to pre-purchase the book, wouldn't that account for a bunch of sales just from that?  I thought that publishers / book publicists, etc. had ways of driving up sales for books written by famous people. 

[tacokick]

I would want to know where they are getting these numbers. I haven’t been able to see a real source, but maybe I missed it?

I have published a few books and I only get those numbers, as the author, twice a year from my publisher. It’s not really published anywhere publicly. Book sellers have insider info but wouldn’t know how many copies were sold on Amazon or other stores as far as I know.

These numbers seem extremely low for public figures. Normally sales from people like that are what prop up the publishing industry for the rest of us.

ETA

It is possible that if it was an Audible book first people just aren’t buying a physical copy and they aren’t doing much to promote it, it didn’t sell much?

[hermione]

Well - I’m a librarian and had no idea she released a book. I just checked and we own one copy across three locations. It is checked out but there are zero holds on it - which likely means someone stumbled across it on the new shelf.

[Velar Fricative]

May 8, 2022 14:06:18 GMT -5 hermione said:

Well - I’m a librarian and had no idea she released a book. I just checked and we own one copy across three locations. It is checked out but there are zero holds on it - which likely means someone stumbled across it on the new shelf.

Mine bought about a dozen copies and several are checked out or on hold. Which makes me wonder if the 300 copies includes physical books purchased by libraries because I’d imagine many libraries around the country have ordered it.

Not that I wouldn’t be gleeful if this were true, but I’m pretty skeptical.

[af1212]

I only knew she released a book because I saw her apparent photo shoot where she propped the book up on her dads grave and had photos taken of herself standing behind it.

[Pom]

May 8, 2022 14:50:46 GMT -5 af1212 said:

I only knew she released a book because I saw her apparent photo shoot where she propped the book up on her dads grave and had photos taken of herself standing behind it.

Gross.

[jennyparnassus]

May 8, 2022 14:50:46 GMT -5 af1212 said:

I only knew she released a book because I saw her apparent photo shoot where she propped the book up on her dads grave and had photos taken of herself standing behind it.

I've seen other people post similar things to promote newly released books in the past. I'm not completely sure in which situations I think that this is "okay" and in what situations I think that this is "gross." 

However, I saw this particular photo, and I was personally surprised at how "modest" John McCain's grave / headstone appeared in the photo. I've seen the graves of other famous Americans (General George Meade, the Union General at the Battle of Gettysburg comes to mind) that were modest. I guess that it just surprised me. 

[bears]

I don't believe the 244 books, but I am guessing it is much lower than expected by McCain and her publishers. I don't think anyone actually likes her--she was on the View to start drama and she did a great job with that. It didn't gain her any fans.

Edited because my first post didn't make any sense.

[jeaniebueller]

On that note, check out Steve Schmidt’s twitter thread about her from yesterday. It’s a lot.

[wanderingback]

May 8, 2022 17:44:55 GMT -5 bears said:

I don't believe the 244 books, but I am sure it is much lower. I don't think anyone actually likes her--she was on the View to start drama and she did a great job with that. It didn't gain her any fans.

I’m genuinely curious, how are you "sure" it’s much lower? You have inside info?

[wanderingback]

.

[NewOrleans]

Please don’t click the link. The WE is a conservative rag.

If you want to be amused about Meghan McCain, though, please tune into Steve Schmidt dragging her across Twitter and back and spilling tea like Lady Whistledown

[bears]

May 8, 2022 17:50:13 GMT -5 wanderingback said:

May 8, 2022 17:44:55 GMT -5 bears said:

I don't believe the 244 books, but I am sure it is much lower. I don't think anyone actually likes her--she was on the View to start drama and she did a great job with that. It didn't gain her any fans.

I’m genuinely curious, how are you "sure" it’s much lower? You have inside info?

Lol. I wrote that weird.  I meant to say I don't believe it's as low as 244, but I'm sure it is much lower than she/her publishers expected.
ETA: and by "sure," I meant "I'm spitballing here."  The other definition of "sure."

[jennyparnassus]

I admit that I am really naive and uninformed about the book publishing world. 

I had read before that book publishers have ways of increasing the sales of books that they want to promote. For instance, if a political thought leader writes a book, I was under the impression that a political convention or conference would purchase copies of the book for every single attendee at the convention and conference, and then tack the price of the book onto the convention or conference fee, and then include a copy of the book with every registration package at check-in. Thus, every attendee at the convention or conference "purchased" the book. 

Years ago, there was a book published about customer service that included a chapter or a section or something that talked about how well my large multi-national employer (at that time) did something customer-service related. Someone in upper management at my company purchased a copy of said book for every single employee, so we each received our own copy of the book. 

I'm just really surprised that McCain's publisher or book publicist or whatever didn't apparently do research or legwork or whatever to ensure that the sales could be increased in some fashion. 

Also, when I Googled McCain's book for more information about the book sales, I noted that two AP Journalists just released a book about Dr. Jill Biden, and this book reportedly has very, very poor sales as well.  

[hermione]

May 8, 2022 14:44:56 GMT -5 Velar Fricative said:

May 8, 2022 14:06:18 GMT -5 hermione said:

Well - I’m a librarian and had no idea she released a book. I just checked and we own one copy across three locations. It is checked out but there are zero holds on it - which likely means someone stumbled across it on the new shelf.

Mine bought about a dozen copies and several are checked out or on hold. Which makes me wonder if the 300 copies includes physical books purchased by libraries because I’d imagine many libraries around the country have ordered it.

Not that I wouldn’t be gleeful if this were true, but I’m pretty skeptical.

Of our 21 member co-op 4 copies have been purchased. Insanely low but it does seem like just library purchase would be well over 300 copies.

[nsl]

May 8, 2022 19:19:06 GMT -5 jennyparnassus said:

I'm just really surprised that McCain's publisher or book publicist or whatever didn't apparently do research or legwork or whatever to ensure that the sales could be increased in some fashion. 

Oh, they did the research. Publishing has its fair share of idiots, but not to that degree. There is unquestionably a story here, possibly related to why her book was released exclusively on Audible to begin with. That's rare, especially for political memoirs. Only knowing what I have been forced to learn about her from social media over the years, my guess is that she pissed off a lot of the wrong people, and they are all protected job-wise from watching her go down in flames. Those people are probably loving these numbers.

Re: the grossness of her posing with her book at her father's gravesite: Considering that her entire schtick is that she's John McCain's daughter--she has no accomplishments of her own aside from that one fact--I vote very gross.  Without her father she'd be nothing, and now that he's gone the only way she can have him seen endorsing her work is to pose with it where he's buried. Gross.

[nsl]

May 8, 2022 19:38:33 GMT -5 hermione said:

May 8, 2022 14:44:56 GMT -5 Velar Fricative said:

Mine bought about a dozen copies and several are checked out or on hold. Which makes me wonder if the 300 copies includes physical books purchased by libraries because I’d imagine many libraries around the country have ordered it.

Not that I wouldn’t be gleeful if this were true, but I’m pretty skeptical.

Of our 21 member co-op 4 copies have been purchased. Insanely low but it does seem like just library purchase would be well over 300 copies.

I'm curious, does that include audio purchases? I'm only familiar with school library purchasing, but my library uses Sora for both ebook and audio--does Overdrive allow for the kind of large-scale licensing across multiple libraries that Sora does?

[hermione]

May 8, 2022 19:41:25 GMT -5 nsl said:

May 8, 2022 19:38:33 GMT -5 hermione said:

Of our 21 member co-op 4 copies have been purchased. Insanely low but it does seem like just library purchase would be well over 300 copies.

I'm curious, does that include audio purchases? I'm only familiar with school library purchasing, but my library uses Sora for both ebook and audio--does Overdrive allow for the kind of large-scale licensing across multiple libraries that Sora does?

Nothing but 4 physical copies in the entire cooperative. I’ll look tomorrow to see if OD has it (I don’t have the log info here at home).

[hermione]

May 8, 2022 19:41:25 GMT -5 nsl said:

May 8, 2022 19:38:33 GMT -5 hermione said:

Of our 21 member co-op 4 copies have been purchased. Insanely low but it does seem like just library purchase would be well over 300 copies.

I'm curious, does that include audio purchases? I'm only familiar with school library purchasing, but my library uses Sora for both ebook and audio--does Overdrive allow for the kind of large-scale licensing across multiple libraries that Sora does?

Overdrive has the eBook, not the eAudio. No purchases in my cooperative.

[YeahSure]

May 8, 2022 14:44:56 GMT -5 Velar Fricative said:

May 8, 2022 14:06:18 GMT -5 hermione said:

Well - I’m a librarian and had no idea she released a book. I just checked and we own one copy across three locations. It is checked out but there are zero holds on it - which likely means someone stumbled across it on the new shelf.

Mine bought about a dozen copies and several are checked out or on hold. Which makes me wonder if the 300 copies includes physical books purchased by libraries because I’d imagine many libraries around the country have ordered it.

Not that I wouldn’t be gleeful if this were true, but I’m pretty skeptical.

The consortium I work in has four on order, with two on hold. The nearby large city has four copies on order, with zero holds.

[waverly]

100 libraries in our consortium and 17 copies.  No holds. 

[neverfstop]

apparently steve schmidt read it & is started a war....lol, don't mind if Sarah Palin's congressional campaign is a casulaty

nymag.com/intelligencer/2022/05/steve-schmidt-goes-to-war-with-the-mccain-family.html

Steve Schmidt, the onetime John McCain campaign strategist who has turned into a fierce critic of the Republican Party and hero to a certain kind of resistance liberal, published a blog post on Sunday night accusing McCain of concealing the truth about an affair he was having — and asserting that he was too afraid of Sarah Palin to halt the GOP’s slide into lunacy. The post comes on the heels of attacks Schmidt leveled at Meghan McCain over the weekend, in which he accused the late senator’s daughter of being a “bully, entitled, unaccomplished, spoiled and mean,” among many other things.


In Sunday’s post, Schmidt writes that a New York Times story published in 2008, which implied that McCain had an affair with a female lobbyist, was true. At the time, McCain was running for president against Barack Obama. The senator had been married to Cindy McCain since 1980, and they would remain together through his death in 2018.

[jeaniebueller]

Amazing that McCain met with Palin and thought she was qualified and Schmidt (and any other normal human being) spoke to her for 5 minutes and realized she was a disaster. Did the guy who didn't vet her ever get any shit for it

[af1212]

Just looked at my county library system.

27 libraries.

2 copies in system.

1 checked out.

0 holds.

[af1212]

Also I had no idea that she has written 4 books. How were the others received does anyone know?

[basilosaurus]

May 10, 2022 7:56:28 GMT -5 af1212 said:

Also I had no idea that she has written 4 books. How were the others received does anyone know?

I'll judge a book by its cover and say they look stupid. 

Only 2 copies, none checked out, at Philadelphia free library which is a pretty big system.

[af1212]

May 10, 2022 8:18:29 GMT -5 basilosaurus said:

May 10, 2022 7:56:28 GMT -5 af1212 said:

Also I had no idea that she has written 4 books. How were the others received does anyone know?

I'll judge a book by its cover and say they look stupid. 

Only 2 copies, none checked out, at Philadelphia free library which is a pretty big system.

Yes!! Something like 55 libraries.

[rupertpenny]

May 8, 2022 19:19:06 GMT -5 jennyparnassus said:

I admit that I am really naive and uninformed about the book publishing world. 

I had read before that book publishers have ways of increasing the sales of books that they want to promote. For instance, if a political thought leader writes a book, I was under the impression that a political convention or conference would purchase copies of the book for every single attendee at the convention and conference, and then tack the price of the book onto the convention or conference fee, and then include a copy of the book with every registration package at check-in. Thus, every attendee at the convention or conference "purchased" the book. 

Years ago, there was a book published about customer service that included a chapter or a section or something that talked about how well my large multi-national employer (at that time) did something customer-service related. Someone in upper management at my company purchased a copy of said book for every single employee, so we each received our own copy of the book. 

I'm just really surprised that McCain's publisher or book publicist or whatever didn't apparently do research or legwork or whatever to ensure that the sales could be increased in some fashion. 

Also, when I Googled McCain's book for more information about the book sales, I noted that two AP Journalists just released a book about Dr. Jill Biden, and this book reportedly has very, very poor sales as well.  

Yeah, this is a thing although I don't think the publisher is involved other than knowing that a book might be lucrative because of this. I think it's usually PACs or other entities doing the buying, but who is going to do that for Meghan McCain? Republicans and Democrats both hate her and even if she does have a PAC it probably doesn't have any money in it because, really, who is going to give Meghan McCain money?

[msmerymac]

May 10, 2022 7:56:28 GMT -5 af1212 said:

Also I had no idea that she has written 4 books. How were the others received does anyone know?

I read her first one years and years ago and remember it being fairly popular at the time. Which is probably why I read it. 

www.amazon.com/dp/B00JJ9GQ7E/ref=dp-kindle-redirect?_encoding=UTF8&btkr=1

Sounds like her schtick hasn't really changed since she was 25. 

[Michelle]

My question is this: what is new that she could put in her book? Like so many others have stated, I hadn't heard she released a book. So the marketing hasn't been great. Could it be that they signed her up for X number of books, so she wrote this one, and it sucks, so they don't want to market it because it would hurt their publishing brand more to market it than for it to quietly be released and flop?

I love biographies by political figures or those who can tell all about political figures. But what is left that she can spill that is of any significance?