Recently I had a conversation with a friend who told me about the latest rejection of her novel (by an agent). There was nothing but praise from the agent, but ultimately the verdict came down to “This book is just too smart to sell.”
Much scratching of head and muttered curses ensued and I sympathized. I’ve read the book in question and it is indeed a smart book. Very smart. It’s one of the rare examples of a novel that, from time to time, we hear about from an author in his or her cups complaining of being ignored by the publishing industry with the final dismissal of “Well, I’m just too good for them.” The natural reaction to this is an unspoken “Yeah, right” and then move on to the next subject.
But I’ve come to believe that in a few instances, this is exactly true.
Agent and publisher have one problem in common—how to sell a book. The agent must sell it to the publisher who must sell it to you, the general public. In pursuit of this, much time and skull sweat is spent trying to figure out—to divine—what will sell. It’s nigh unto an impossible task and usually the publisher puts work out, crosses collective fingers, and hopes for the best.
Except in some instances where they are convinced they have a Winner and then extra effort is put into the book—sales-wise. A campaign is mounted. There is advertising. Reviews are purchased (yes, Virginia, reviews can be bought). An author tour is undertaken and underwritten. Radio interviews, and if things look especially good some local television. Attempts are made to transform the author into a Personality.
Certain sometimes vague common denominators about such a book must be in place, however. The all-elusive Accessibility about sums it up. It must be popular, which means that readers with a reading ability of about the eighth-grade must be appealed to. (Perhaps I exaggerate a little, but just look at best sellers and the level of writing they exhibit. Never mind subject matter, that’s not what I’m talking about. I’m talking about vocabulary and depth.)
Which brings me to my point. Some novels may well be considered “too good” for the publishing mills. And by that I mean they require something from the reader. They demand a bit more attention, a bit more commitment, a bit more general background education. They require that the reader step up to the plate prepared to participate in the reading experience at a level approaching that which the writer had in writing it. They elicit a projicient extrospective perspicacity on the part of the reader equal if not superior to the proffered text.
In short, you might have to do a little work to really enjoy the book.
Granted, some novels are abstruse to the point of diminishing returns (Finnegan’s Wake, Moderan) while others hide their cleverness beneath prose so under-challenging that whatever message may have been there is overlooked (most Kurt Vonnegut, in my most humble opinion, but The Old Man and the Sea certainly).
We have a legacy of smart novels from the age when The Novel was the chief entertainment of a book buying class that possessed both vocabulary and philosophical depth. Which is why today we still find exceptional work published.
But seldom from new writers.
Don’t get me wrong, I am not for a moment condeming any new writers. Excellent work comes out all the time from new writers. But there is a level of intellectual conformism in style and approach that makes the rare “smart” novel something of an oddity. For every Donna Tartt, how many Ken Folletts get published? For every Matt Ruff or John Crowley, how many Dan Simmons or Jasper Ffordes get published. For every Guy Davenport, Umberto Eco….
Anyway, this is not to slam any writer who produces good work that is in some way “safe” by virtue of being accessible. Nor is it to say that the novels of which I speak don’t ever get published. Obviously they do. Sometimes you have to find them from obscure little publishers tucked off in the corner of East Erudite or some such, or they get lucky enough to find a smart imprint within a larger consortium.
But how often do they sell well? How often are they really promoted? And how many rejections do they garner before finding a Believer who takes the chance?
These are books that do not compromise. Now, no writer intentionally compromises, and this is really not about the writer anyway. What it is about is a mindset in the publishing industry that would bar a Thomas Pynchon if he came on the scene brand new today because no one would know “how to market it.” I’m talking about an attitude on the part of the gatekeepers that predetermines what would be “too smart” for the reading public.
Which all comes down to the ledger. What is being said is not that the book isn’t worth publishing, but that the publisher can only conceive of a small audience for it, which makes it not worth while.
Or some such nonsense.
Smart novels that get readily snapped up, it seems to me, wear a cloak of something else that the publisher recognizes as salable. Something that can be reduced to a one-line sales pitch. This may be how a lot of smart writers get themselves to the point where they can start writing that wholly unclassifiable, “too good to be published” work that is their true forte (consider William Gibson). Michael Chabon is doing interesting, unclassifiable work (smart work) now, but his first couple of novels, while smart on one level, wore an overcoat of relative conventionality (Mysteries of Pittsburgh, Wonderboys). He makes money now, he can publish what he wants.
Finally, though, this is a cop-out. The agent (or publisher) is basically admitting to a lack of imagination or energy or both. What they’re saying is that, in the market as it exists today, it would be too damn much effort for them to sell this book, because, well, it is clearly good, it is clearly worthy, but it is also clearly over the heads of the sales department. It is a confession of surrender to the fact that The Market has beaten them into submission with its apparent demands for more of the same pabulum that fills supermarket book shelves. (You’d never see William Gaddis shelved in the local QuickMart next to John Grisham.)
So next time you hear the phrase “my novel was too good for them”—pause. One or two percent of those people may be telling the unadorned truth. They might actually be someone with something worth reading.
But only one or two percent.
I’d be perfectly happy to be convinced that this is not really the case. In fact, I do believe that if the writer perseveres, eventually good work gets published. But the playing field is anything but level.