Enjoy your Doctor Who books while you can

[23skidoo]

OK, this might not involve books of the same calibre as, say, that Michael Moorcock book, or even The Brilliant Book of Doctor Who 2011. But I fear the chocks have been removed and the sled is starting down the slippery slope.

According to the Sarah Jane TV blog, Penguin Character Books has cancelled its print editions of the upcoming novelisations of The Nightmare Man and Death of the Doctor in favor of releasing them exclusively as e-books. Adding insult to injury, it looks like the sales price for these will be about the same as the print versions.

http://sarahjanetv.blogspot.com/2010/09/future-is-changing.html

I don't know what pisses me off more. The fact this is happening (these pieces of fiction are lost as far as I'm concerned. They will not have any chance of attaining the same longevity as, say, Doctor Who and the Image of the Fendahl. Collectors are particularly f*cked - are you reading this, Mr. Howe*?) or the fact the blog seems to think this is a GOOD IDEA.

Hey, I'm all for Big Finish making its audios available for download too. I advocated for that for years. AS AN OPTION. I'd never want to see them stop making CDs. The same goes for Doctor Who franchise books, it doesn't matter if it's Sarah Jane or the main series. Make it an option, sure - I'm sure Penguin and BBC Books would make some good extra coin - but don't castrate the releases by sticking them in a temporary, volatile media with zero potential for longevity beyond 3-5 years.

I just hope someone with a brain is still working for Penguin and BBC Books and they'll follow the lead of Pocket Books and their Starfleet Corps of Engineers e-books and release print editions later.

Alex

* Mr. Howe = David Howe, compiler of the Howe's Transcendental Toybox series of books indexing and pricing DW collectables. Basically the Doctor Who equivalent of Overstreet's Comic Book Price Guide.

 

[Allyn Gibson]

But I fear the chocks have been removed and the sled is starting down the slippery slope.

Alex, aren't you being a bit pessimistic?

Let's see what the situation is:

Penguin Character Books has cancelled its print editions of the upcoming novelisations of The Nightmare Man and Death of the Doctor in favor of releasing them exclusively as e-books.

As last week's post on that blog makes clear, Sarah Jane merchandise, for whatever reason, doesn't sell.

Penguin has already invested the money in commissioning the books, paying the authors, and having the books edited. That blog post says "we can surmise that a lack of interest from the target audience or even budgeting constraints may have been at fault."

I think that's true. There's a sunk cost already, publishing the books in dead tree format will cost more money, and if there isn't interest from the "target audience," there's little chance of Penguin recouping their investment.

Publishing the titles as eBooks isn't a solution, but it does give them the opportunity to make a little money from already-existing work, and I think Penguin is aware of that. However, Penguin can reach an older, more tech savvy audience -- like adult Doctor Who fans -- who would be willing to buy an eBook. Penguin's "target audience," though, gets left out in the cold.

There is a vast difference between Doctor Who and Sarah Jane. Doctor Who sells. Doctor Who sells a lot. It even looks like BBC Books is bringing some old EDAs and PDAs back into print in the very near future.

(I also know the background story on why BBC Books is attempting a book like Michael Moorcock's. They are trying to expand the brand. You don't do that when a publishing line is in decline; a line in decline is more likely to retrench and retry old successes because they worked in the past.)

Doctor Who books are healthy. You're being a chicken little, Alex.

 

[wamdue]

Cant say im surprised the Sarah Jane books dont sell, SJA is aimed at a generation, who have never known life without the internet, DVDs, and the CBBC Channel being on Freeview, they have no need of a book version of an episode.

I have a small collection of Doctor Who books, and would have liked some SJA ones, which is new fiction, not just rewrites of the TV series episodes, if I want to see those again, ill either get the DVD, or there is nearly always at least one episode on iPlayer.

 

[Cutter John]

Novelizations of episodes were fine back in the days before DVR's, vhs, and the internet, when a book was the only way to relive the story. But kinda useless these days.

 

[Samurai8472]

So I guess this is canceled then?

 

[wamdue]

So I guess this is canceled then?

as a physical book yes it has.

 

[Bones2]

It even looks like BBC Books is bringing some old EDAs and PDAs back into print in the very near future.

Oooh, that's a new one on me. Where did you hear this?

 

[Allyn Gibson]

It even looks like BBC Books is bringing some old EDAs and PDAs back into print in the very near future.

Oooh, that's a new one on me. Where did you hear this?

New ISBN codes have been generated for some of Kate Orman's and Lance Parkin's books, and they've shown up on Amazon.co.uk. (Example: The Infinity Doctors.)

Someone asked Parkin about this on Gallifrey Base, thinking that there might have been a mistake, and Parkin said that there are, in fact, noises about bringing some of the older books back into print early next year.

 

[Lonemagpie]

Actually, don't bet on seeing prints of NAs and EDAs - AIUI it's now policy when the author asks for the rights to an OOP book to be returned, that they'll assign a potential ebook ISBN while they decide whether they want to keep the rights for a possible reprint, or just decide they'll never bother and hand them over.

Lance obviously already took back the rights to his Virgin books before this policy became live, which is why only his BBC books appear on Amazon- and in fact the ISBNs, I'm told, should not have appeared on Amazon, but everyone's now hoping that the fact that they did, and generated some interest, might actually *cause* a rerelease.

Personally, I'm not bothering until I see if they *do* actually release anything.

 

[Lonemagpie]

they'll assign a potential ebook ISBN

Or POD ISBN, I should add

 

[DAK]

Well that sucks. I don't buy the Sara Jane books (nor do I watch the show), but I do buy the Doctor Who books and I would have bought the "Death of the Doctor" novelization, and I suspect the same would be true of many Who fans who don't buy the SJ books. What the heck does one do with an EBook anyway? Do I need to buy one of those overpriced Kindles?