SECRETS OF ACTION SCREENWRITING!
Yes, I'm yelling... sorry!
So, way back in the year 2000 the last version of my book Secrets Of Action Screenwriting came out and went through a couple of printings without any revisions, and sometime before those books were gone I realized I needed to rewrite the first 6-8 chapters of the book - especially the first 4 - because they were pretty much unchanged from the xeroxed pages I had given friends before there was even the thought of a book. That stuff needed work! Plus, the book had gotten old. So I decided to do a rewrite before it went back into print... then life happened and it got shoved aside. Again and again.
Soon the book had gone out of print... and people began paying crazy prices for used copies on Amazon and eBay. Here is *yesterday's* Amazon used price:
Yes - that says $510 for a book with a cover price of $21.95!
And it sold on eBay once for $999.00 (um, almost a thousand bucks! Wish I got some of that! I guess that means people thought it was good.)
All of this has amused me over the years.
And people keep asking me when the new edition is coming out, and just when I get ready to start the rewrite, some script job comes up.
It just kept getting pushed back on the Big To Do List again and again... never getting To Done.
One of those years, the big Publishers Convention came to Los Angeles and I took what few copies of the book I had left and gave them to interested publishers - and there were a few... and I got some e-mails and some calls about the book and how I was doing on the rewrite... but what I had really wanted out of that was a contract with a firm deadline so I would be forced to rewrite the book.
But this year I decided I HAD to get it finished no matter what.
About halfway through the year I did a Kindle experiment with the Ideas Blue Book - which is probably #3 or #4 today on the Amazon Screenwriting Best Sellers, because it always is. And while actually doing the rewrite I "goofed off" by rewriting two more Blue Books and putting them up (to keep me fresh on the coding side). (And that came in handy, because the coding on Secrets ended up a nightmare - but you'd never notice from the book. Still has a couple of minor issues like a list where the first item has a "1." and the rest have ")"s - pisser) But, um, the book is finally finished. Over 460 pages. (Kindle doesn't have page numbers, so I had to go by number of words divided by average page of the paper book version - and that doesn't include title page, bio, etc junk - and *that* was 463 pages.)
The new edition is completely rewritten, has new chapters and new information and - like the old version - is technique based. Tools, no rules.
Oh, and I thought about pricing it at $510... but the last version sold for $21.95, so I thought a fair price might be... $9.99.
So, almost twice as many pages, for less than half the 2000 original price.
CLICK HERE for more info!
PS: I really wanted it to be 500 pages, and missed it by that much...
- Bill
So, way back in the year 2000 the last version of my book Secrets Of Action Screenwriting came out and went through a couple of printings without any revisions, and sometime before those books were gone I realized I needed to rewrite the first 6-8 chapters of the book - especially the first 4 - because they were pretty much unchanged from the xeroxed pages I had given friends before there was even the thought of a book. That stuff needed work! Plus, the book had gotten old. So I decided to do a rewrite before it went back into print... then life happened and it got shoved aside. Again and again.
Soon the book had gone out of print... and people began paying crazy prices for used copies on Amazon and eBay. Here is *yesterday's* Amazon used price:
Yes - that says $510 for a book with a cover price of $21.95!
And it sold on eBay once for $999.00 (um, almost a thousand bucks! Wish I got some of that! I guess that means people thought it was good.)
All of this has amused me over the years.
And people keep asking me when the new edition is coming out, and just when I get ready to start the rewrite, some script job comes up.
It just kept getting pushed back on the Big To Do List again and again... never getting To Done.
One of those years, the big Publishers Convention came to Los Angeles and I took what few copies of the book I had left and gave them to interested publishers - and there were a few... and I got some e-mails and some calls about the book and how I was doing on the rewrite... but what I had really wanted out of that was a contract with a firm deadline so I would be forced to rewrite the book.
But this year I decided I HAD to get it finished no matter what.
About halfway through the year I did a Kindle experiment with the Ideas Blue Book - which is probably #3 or #4 today on the Amazon Screenwriting Best Sellers, because it always is. And while actually doing the rewrite I "goofed off" by rewriting two more Blue Books and putting them up (to keep me fresh on the coding side). (And that came in handy, because the coding on Secrets ended up a nightmare - but you'd never notice from the book. Still has a couple of minor issues like a list where the first item has a "1." and the rest have ")"s - pisser) But, um, the book is finally finished. Over 460 pages. (Kindle doesn't have page numbers, so I had to go by number of words divided by average page of the paper book version - and that doesn't include title page, bio, etc junk - and *that* was 463 pages.)
The new edition is completely rewritten, has new chapters and new information and - like the old version - is technique based. Tools, no rules.
Oh, and I thought about pricing it at $510... but the last version sold for $21.95, so I thought a fair price might be... $9.99.
So, almost twice as many pages, for less than half the 2000 original price.
CLICK HERE for more info!
PS: I really wanted it to be 500 pages, and missed it by that much...
- Bill
posted by wcmartell at 1:56 PM
4 Comments:
Greating from germany, am the first buyer of this book at amazon.de :)
Just reading it and every paragraph makes me look at an abandoned screenplay of mine from another angle - i am already rewriting it in my head :)
The "The Hero's Job" (Sumo Wrestler/Weapon Smugglers) reminded me of a spy comedy that blatantly and openly defies that rule (and it's central to the comedy factor):
"The Tall Blond Man with One Black Shoe"
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0068655/
Greetings from sunny California. I have a hard copy of the first edition and I just bought the second edition kindle version. It is great that the second edition is finally out. Great work as always.
The links on the blog page do not go to the Kindle edition page. I tried the links on both Firefox and IE browsers with the same result.
Links fixed. Thanks guys!
Could you integrate your Script Secrets into the blog? It feels a bit insulting commenting on them off topic, like i do right now (it won't happen again) but i think people would like the chance :)
Anyways "WHY READ THE TRADES?" is so extensive, like your new book, i start wondering how you do it, lol. You administer your food intravenously, having more time to write, right?
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