A peek at the self-published edition of Eragon.
https://www.paolini.net/2015/01/28/self-published-edition-eragon/
This is a short video available on the refurbished paolini.net, of Christopher discussing the self-published edition of Eragon.
- "I want to show all of you something pretty special today. I have here a copy of the self-published edition of Eragon"
gasp! Shock! What a twist! If anybody in the world still has one of those, it would be the author.I'm not even being sarcastic, if I self-published a book I'd keep a copy of it. If only to remind myself to get a professional editor next time.
- "These are pretty rare, because, a, we didn't print that many of them (at least not compared to the Random House edition), but also because they're all paperbacks. And paperbacks don't last too well."
There are paperbacks from the 1970s that are still readable. There are paperback novels from the 1930s that are still in readable condition.
No, seriously. I found one on Abe Books, a Penguin edition of Edmund Blunden's Undertone of War, published 1937. Still intact, still readable. One of the first paperback novels ever printed (Penguin began printing paperback books in 1935, for the record).
This one, in fact. Sure, it's nearly $4000 dollars, but saying "paperbacks don't last too well" as an excuse for the rarity of your self-published dreck is simply wrong. A much loved paperback in a public library can last upwards of 30 years before needing to be replaced.
- “But I have an absolutely pristine copy”
Because it’s one of the ones you never sold, and/or the one you kept for yourself? Yeah, it’s not like lots of authors, especially self-published authors, don’t have exactly that. The smugness in his voice and expression are completely unwarranted, and completely insufferable. If he was merely a fan or a collector this might be notable, but he's the author, and the son of the guy who printed the damn things, I’d honestly be shocked if he didn’t have a copy of his own. Or a boxful (or several) that didn’t sell.
- “I love this book”
- “Not only because of what it meant to my family, but because I [stuttering] I still like the cover”
The cover YOU drew?
- “I think it’s eye-catching, for one thing. And we designed it to grab people’s attention from 30 feet away in a bookstore.”
What modern book cover is NOT designed to be eye-catching and attention-getting?
- “I drew the art […] the eye”
- “my sister put the colour in for the iris, and my dad was the one who did the layout”
Yeah, it does have that certain “self-published book cover designed by an amateur” look to it.
- “As you can see, this is.. this is the book. We had blurbs on the back”
I’m starting to see why some people thought Trump sounded smart.
- “and a horrible self-portrait of mine, that I did in about five minutes”
Paolini. Dude. If you’re trying to sell a novel, compete in the marketplace with professionally published authors with decades more experience and the backing of huge publishing corporations, you do NOT put “a horrible self portrait [you] did in about five minutes” on the BACK COVER.
It’s like, Marketing 101, dude. Best foot forward. You finished “school” when you were 15 and printed Eragon when you were 19, surely some time in there you had a few hours to do a decent self-portrait?
Better yet, why not just omit the self-portrait entirely? I’ll bet I can pull a dozen fantasy novels off of my bookshelf that DON’T have images of the author, let alone a “horrible self-portrait”, on the back cover.
Let’s see… A Dark Winter by Dave Luckett? No portrait. The Shadow’s Heir by KJ Taylor? No portrait. Royal Assassin by Robin Hobb? No portrait. Harry Potter, Lord of the Rings, Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell, The Tangle Box, The Eyes of the Dragon, Villains!, Brother Night, Obernewtyn, Artemis Fowl, Guinevere, Labyrinth, The Omega Scroll, Half a War, Terra, We Are Pirates, Percy Jackson, Beyond the Shroud, The Vampire’s Holiday…! No pictures of the author anywhere near the cover!
- “And we had very very small type inside. Because we were trying to save space”
Instead of, y’know, getting an editor to look at it and cut all the unnecessary scenes and descriptions.
- “the self-published version is about 15,000 words longer than the Random House edition. Uh, we tightened up a lot of travelling during editing.”
If the travel scenes in the Random House version is what you consider to be “tightened up”, I shudder to think of what the original was like.
- “I also want to show you another version… now this is an edition of Eragon that we gave to our local library”
So, it’s the same version, it’s just the one that has a library barcode and identification stamp.
- “I went to them and I said […] I would love to see [a copy of Eragon] that has actually been read.”
this amuses me more than it should.
- “and as you can see, this has been beat up a bit, and scuffed”
It’s still shiny. A truly beloved library book would have had the sheen from the cover rubbed right off. It would be dull and bent and torn and dirty. This one barely looks any different from the “pristine” copy except for a slight bend mark on the cover, and a barcode on the front.
- “It’s also been well-used by the reader”
Um, no. No it hasn’t. For a library book, it looks underutilised. As a librarian, I’ve seen what can happen to a newly printed book even inside of a month of circulation, and this doesn’t look even remotely “well-used”.
- “so I keep [the library’s copy] on my shelf just to remind me that people actually do read my books on occasion”
As he says this, he tilts the cover towards himself slightly, and you can see his shirt reflecting off the book cover. In clear mirror-like detail. THIS IS NOT A WELL-USED, MUCH-LOVED LIBRARY BOOK. I have SEEN “much loved” library books, I see them quite a lot, and this one hasn’t even had the shine worn off the front cover yet!
If I were to guess, I’d say it stayed on the shelf for a few months, virtually untouched by public library standards, for the whole time between it being donated and it being replaced by the Random House version. Maybe 20 people have taken that book out of the library, IF that.
- “I really am proud of this, it’s still a beautiful cover I think”
- “and actually quite valuable at the moment, collectors have really gone after these.”
Sadly this is true, although the gods only know why. The self-published edition can fetch anywehre from $1000 to $2500 on AbeBooks, but usually fetches around $250 on ebay.
- “I don’t know the exact price, but they’ve gone for thousands and thousands of dollars.”
Two thousands, more or less. For some reason.
And that's pretty much the end of it. Which is a good thing, because I'm not sure how much more of his smug self-satisfied smirk I could endure.