TIH 564: Adam Nevill on Cunning Folk, No One Gets Out Alive Movie Adaptation, and Horror Publishing and Bookstore Discounts

This is the transcript for the video version. Add 3 minutes and 30 seconds for the audio.

00:00.00
Michael David Wilson
So you were talking before about writing cunning folk during the global Pandemic. So I'm wondering what was that specifically like in terms of both. The process how it might have differed and in terms of whether it affected your writing being in that Bizarre situation.

00:29.20
Adam Nevill
The main advantage was the lack of disruption and distraction. Um I really felt that book. I was able to write in a concentrated fashion every single day and I never really lost the um.

00:58.18
Adam Nevill
I guess the voice I was writing it in voice probably not the right word. The style I was writing it in I was able to just jump back in every morning. Um, often a day because I I've worked from home is 2009. There are you know relentless ringing of the doorbells. People coming and going and um, no twenty twenty was I seemed to get such an enormous amount done I seem to regain time in that year um so my own activities. Were curtailed as well. I wasn't kayaking as much we'd we'd take the family walk or what have you but I just seem to get so much time so much more time to write um and had that continuity and that momentum day after day. Um, which I don't always get when I'm writing a book. Um, and I was more or less I think I got to the end of that year and I I put three hundred miles on the clock of my calf. And that was almost all driving to various places in devon to put my c kayx in the water. Um I walked more and I definitely paddled further than I drove in that year

02:32.57
Adam Nevill
Because on a Saturday we'll we'll paddle up to thirty kilometers plus ah maybe up to 16 on a Tuesday night so yeah I was in this I guess almost like ah like a twenty mile radius for a year um so when I was out out of the house I was on the sea or I was walking or I was in a natural environment and if anyone's familiar with the book is very much a book about ah the natural world. Um.

03:09.86
Adam Nevill
So I think I had a kind of more of an affinity with a landscape and the natural world and was able to write about it more easily to write that kind of book same with the reddening I mean that so much of that came from my walks walking the the southwest coast path. For a few years and I took lots of photographs and and made lots of notes so they were they were 2 books really that came out of um I guess being in being in nature and then being cloistered away in my office. Writing about it so it was ah it was a it was a terrible time in many ways obviously for for a lot of ah for a lot of people. But um I did find those 2 years 2020 2023 of my most productive ever.

04:05.99
Michael David Wilson
And I fear allows it is a folk horror book as it is set in a rural environment. It is almost a perfect book given your situation given your own location. Given the unique period of time that Covid was in which almost like nature. Are you going to say took over but reclaimed is perhaps a better way of kind of considering it.

04:43.73
Michael David Wilson
I'm wondering did did you know that was this the book that you always planned on writing you know next at the time or was it. Something that almost came out of being in that situation and you're like wait a minute I have to write this folk I wrote this horrid. That's concerned with the natural elements.

05:12.58
Adam Nevill
Well, it was I wrote it as a screenplay first in 2019 um, it. It's a screenplay that's still in development. Um, but. So I had the story and I had the characters and it really was the story of a family that just did not go on with their neighbors. So the the it was a kind of block horror with limited locations and a limited caste which I was advised to write. Um, so it was about these 2 warring households I think the the kind of emphasis on the natural world and and its connection to folklore and. And and cunning magic and so forth. You know that that was definitely enhanced or embellished by the resurgence of nature and being confined to you know Twenty Square miles of Coastline. For the best part of a year um but I I wrote the screenplay in 2019 and it was it was picked up almost immediately. But I just ah I thought the chances of this ever being made.

06:41.51
Adam Nevill
The same with the vessel and the same with all the fiends of hell those my those were my 3 original screenplays. The chances of them being made adapted into films are so remote. Um, it's really difficult to get a film made it really really is difficult. Salute anyone that gets a film made that I thought I I really become attached to the characters and to the stories and I am primarily a novelist so I thought I I want to adapt all 3 of my original screenplays into. Into novels. So I knew in 2019 I was going to adapt cunning folk into a novel in 2020 and the you know the pandemic was just coincidental and then I did wrote ah the vessel in 21 um, in a slightly experimental fashion in that I removed all interior from the characters and then all the fiends was a screenplay I wrote in 2020 and developed it with the film management people I have at Gotham. Who've represented me for years and I just asked them. You know I'd like to have a go at writing ah a bigger studio. Yeah big studio film I've written two sort of screenplays for british indie films can i.

08:08.60
Adam Nevill
Can I work on this with you guys and they were fabulous. Their sort of experience. They could bring from working in Hollywood and so all the fiends of help was my attempt in a screenplay at a big studio film and I'd started a novella. About an alien invasion in 2018 supposed to be a novella in between writing rewriting drafts of the reding but it it dragged on to 60000 words and a very slow 60000 words that I hit pause on it and thought I'll return to this sometime in the future. And then when I wrote my collection of short stories. We'd know the derelictions in 2019 those were the short stories without any characters in them. An idea that I you know I'd wanted to try for years I'd written one one story and I wrote another 5 and the final story in that collection or out another 6 um was this alien invasion idea again. So there'd been the unfinished novella the short story and then I tried it as as a screenplay and then finally in. 202045 I turn it into a novel so that story took 5 years to to become a book. Um, it's been a screenplay and unfinished novella and a short story without characters in it.

09:41.94
Adam Nevill
So yeah, it's sometimes it's things happening a roundabout fashion. That's just what it takes um, cunning folk in the vessel were far more straightforward but cunning folk was very very different to my original scream. It was the original screenplay. My first draft I turned into the novel. And once I started writing the novel I never thought of the screenplay. It just became um its own creation whereas the vessel I deliberately tried to close the gap between page and screen I wanted the.

10:20.41
Adam Nevill
The story to feel more like a film hence the whole story is told more or less through action dialogue and description without any interior from the characters. Um. Whereas all the fiends is is is back to being I guess a more traditionally written novel I try and do something different with every book.

10:46.40
Michael David Wilson
Yeah, and yeah and I mean I know that we've spoke a little bit before about screenwriting. But I mean you said that these days I mean the the chances of. You know a screenplay being made into a film is pretty remote so that begs the question why you know as primarily a novelist. Why are you continuing to write these screenplays. Are you writing it more as a palette cleanser between books are you doing it so that you've now almost got this blueprint this plan that will. Informed a novel because you seem to have now created this pattern where you write the screenplay then you adapt the screenplay into a novel are there financial considerations is there anyone paying you to write these screenplays and then finally. A lot of questions here. But finally how long does it take you to write each screenplay what investment of time are we looking at so.

12:02.56
Adam Nevill
Well, there is a lot of questions I've tried to remember the first one for me it was it was because I love film and I I tend to imagine most of my books is films certainly the richer one. No one gets out alive I imagine them both. Films I wanted to see and actually wrote the sequel to each and included within the novel which is why those 2 books are in coming 2 parts. They were my imaginary films and imaginary sequels to the first films. So. Always have that abiding interest in horror films and it was when the ritual was ritual was made and I was kept in the loop and I had a set visit and I looked at the generations of screenplays and although I was just the author of the book. It really did. You know trigger an interest in me and I thought this this is something I've got to have a go at so I started reading about screenplays and reading screenplays and I thought 2018 it was. I'd finished the reding at the end of 2017 I'd spent just over a year in it and I wasn't happy with it. So I spent another year rewriting it and at the same time is rewriting it I thought I'm gonna write my first screenplay which was the vessel. Um, which wasn't.

13:29.72
Adam Nevill
The most ambitious I kept things simple baby steps and then um I tried another one um imaginarium who made the ritual. I showed it to them and they said if it's you know if it's crap. We'll tell you um and they liked tech and I said we'll develop it with you. That was the vessel and then I wrote cunning folk and that went through the same route. And then I wrote all the fiends. So I wrote 3 1 a year for 3 years and wasn't going to let those stories and characters just die as screenplays and development hell I wanted them to have some kind of life. Um, and when you write a screenplay you you know you think about everything from the inside out so I had 3 complete stories. Why would I not turn them into turn them into novels. Um. But that was a kind of chapter I've stopped now I haven't written a screenplay since 2021 I've written 3 um 2 of them in so ones in hiatus one is still in a very active development that came very close to getting the trigger last year the third one and the big studio film they looked at it.

15:00.19
Adam Nevill
And I had so many interesting meetings with interesting people and they like the writing and they like set pieces but they weren't keen on the the enigma. But um I made some really good connections through it. But it's not I seriously doubt it's going to become a film. In ah in the form that I've chosen. Um, so that was a kind of a period 2018 to 21 when I was writing screenplays and then 20 to 23.

15:38.38
Adam Nevill
When I was turning him into novels. But that's that's a chapter I'm kind of closing now I've written three I've adapted 3 screenplays into novels I don't have any plans to write an original screenplay again from scratch speculatively. That's writing them on your own without a production company or because traditionally you know screenwriters I consider myself a novelist a dilettante with screenplays but a screen a screenwriter will write an outline or a treatment and then that's commissioned. For them to develop it into ah into a full screenplay and then so on and so forth it goes through different drafts as directors come in and you know they want to put their stamp on it and you'll get a director's draft and so on and so forth, but it usually starts with ah with ah you know a logline outline treatment.

16:33.94
Adam Nevill
And then it becomes a screenplay I I made particularly hard work of it for myself by because I wanted to learn how to write a screenplay I was doing it for my own benefit more than anything else. Um, he was a year two thousand and eighteen I had an opportunity I'm gonna. Rewriting a novel but I'll write my first screenplay and I'll study screenplay writing because I love film and I'd seen one happen um with the ritual all through the development to the shoot. Um in future. I would follow the traditional path is I would write an outline and possibly you know turn it into a short story and then try and interest someone with that I wouldn't write an entire screenplay start to finish. Speculatively and go out with a finished screenplay. Um, one of the problems with doing that is no no matter how attached you are to your story once producers look at it.

17:47.65
Adam Nevill
And directors and so forth it will have to change again and again, um my record on 1 of them is 15 drafts. It's 15 versions over five and a half years um

18:05.82
Adam Nevill
I'm just trying to think of one of your other questions. Maybe you can prompt me.

18:11.51
Michael David Wilson
And I mean one of the questions was simply how long does it typically take to write a screenplay I mean baked into that I suppose is the number of drafts which is going to vary.

18:27.58
Michael David Wilson
As you say from project to project.

18:30.68
Adam Nevill
I found with all of them see I would write I would I would do so I do a lot of research and then I would write a treatment. Um, one thing I found in the film industry. Is a lot of people don't they don't read so I kind of do it the old school way is I would write a treatment almost 40 to 60 pages. So I knew everything about the characters and the scenes and so forth and that took quite a long time and then I wrote an outline. And which I divided everything up into into scenes and acts to try and get all the arcs in place. So by the time I'd finished that process that preliminary process with the research the treatment and the outline the actual screen place took it. First drafts took about six weeks all all together I probably worked to them for five or six months whereas a lot of um I think modern screenwriters the out the treatments are only a couple of pages because. You know, film executives and so forth aren't going to read 60 page outlines apparently back in the the time in the silver screen and and and onwards the 40 s and the 50 s the treatments used to be over 200 pages long.

20:01.23
Adam Nevill
So everything has gotten shorter and shorter and more concise and brief. Um, so I was kind of in the middle. Um, but I think I'm really pleased with the 3 novels and I and I think.

20:19.91
Adam Nevill
Kind of structurally they 3 of my strongest books particularly cunning Folk. You know I don't I like and dislike all of my books equally. But I think the two I'm most pleased with from a ah writingly point of view in terms of. Story The structure that there's nothing I would change. Oddly it's cunning folk and lost girl. Um, and it's.

20:55.41
Adam Nevill
It is a really good discipline learning how to write screenplays because I think it made me a much better storyteller because most of my books prior to that I would do lots of reading around the subject and. Scenes would start to suggest themselves to me and I would write a few scenes and the whole story would grow out of that. The story would just sort of come out of the the act of writing the first few scenes whereas with the last 3 books. Um I Saw where to enter and where to finish I had everything thought through everything every scene every eventuality every reaction of every character to everything that happened and so on and so forth and to have that. Complete vision for a story. Um and ah development processes are quite brutal as well because people will question every single creative decision. You've made every single line can get micromanaged.

22:08.90
Adam Nevill
And people will have an issue with with this and that which surprises me why so many films that actually appear are so poor because having been through the development process I'm just like well nothing escapes anyone. Everything is is scrutinized. And micromanaged from the inside out and yet you I see so much kind of sloppy storytelling in film and Tv um, where I think the actions. The action is just not credible. Um, and the reactions of the characters in the stories are just not credible and it's as if you know you've just been poorly prepared as a viewer to accept everything you're you're watching you know you have to turn off any kind of discriminatory.

23:05.58
Adam Nevill
Facility you have to accept it. Um, so there is a there is a dislocation there between so much of what I watch and the development processes I've been through and I've watched occurring where I've had a kind of executive production producer role.

23:25.41
Adam Nevill
But it definitely made me just just just trying to write screenplays and reading about them and and and going through the development process. It made me a much tighter storyteller and I think more critical of my stories and plots. Um, and I think it's resulting in that the book that I started in January now I can see how that experience um of writing screenplays and development is being brought into play in this novel. And that I'm writing mini treatments for each scene before I write the scene in the first draft so you know I spent an all enormous amount of time writing and rewriting screenplays. But it's helping me as a novelist too. So the time wasn't wasted and you know I've written 3 original novels that have come out of that that process that started as screenplays. Um was there anything else in your question.

24:43.22
Michael David Wilson
Well I mean I feel that very little time is wasted because there are always creative lessons to learn or there are sometimes just answers.

25:00.38
Michael David Wilson
Bob and I, we wrote a screenplay a few years back. We adapted their watching and then I've written another screenplay based on one of my short stories called what would Wesley do I'm now actually adapting the screenplay. Into a novel so it's been a bizarre one went from short story to screenplay to novel. But you know even if it's just telling us whether we do or don't want to actively write screenplays I mean when interviewing people. On their deathbed and I don't know who who is this person who goes around interviewing people when they're dying. But it said that people they don't really regret that things that they do they regret what they didn't do what they don't have answers to. But I do find that like yourself I mean even if I'm not going to pursue screenwriting and I mean there's kind of a question mark over that anyway, but it helps you shape or plan. Future stories and novels it helps with a framework I think it gives you a deeper appreciation of storytelling as a craft.

26:21.99
Adam Nevill
It makes you a better storyteller definitely and it brings in brevity and an economy that that you might not have had before and makes you think harder I think about all the decisions you make. Whereas you know when you're writing a novel. It can be quite um, it can be an experience where you're almost not. Aware enough. You're not conscious enough of how much you're writing um and then you come to rewrite it and it seems almost impossible. You know it's not working. You know it's not right? You know it needs an enormous amount of editing. Um, and eventually you get there to the version that's acceptable to you but you know well I talk for my own experience I often think why did I not think the first the first draft through a bit better but I will do now because of that experience. Um.

27:30.15
Adam Nevill
Writing screenplays. Um I mean I I'd be writing up to my record was fourteen drafts of 1 novel. Usually it's around 7 I'd quite like to get it down to about 5 Um.

27:46.79
Adam Nevill
But did you find that with the writing the screenplay and then writing prose, the benefits.

27:54.74
Michael David Wilson
And oh there's definitely immeasurable benefits and I mean sometimes people talk about Writer's block. But if if you've got the screenplay or you've even taken a kind of screenplay. Approach It will be very difficult to have a sort of Writer's block because the pieces are there now you're still going to have creative problems and things that you're going to have to deal with this isn't some magic solution where everything kids now.

28:30.99
Michael David Wilson
Easy. But I think there'll always be a step to take So I think it would be almost impossible to find yourself blocked and incapable of writing anything further or because you've got the pieces there.

28:46.19
Adam Nevill
Yeah and it is a different discipline because you know 110 pages most of it's wide space and you you're telling a story in pictures you you can't resort to the you know the.

29:02.79
Adam Nevill
The inner lives of characters. Um, which was very strange for me to start with but I actually really started to enjoy it I really enjoy writing them I just wish it was much easieries to get the night into films.

29:20.74
Adam Nevill
I Mean the the the second part of it is I think is far more difficult which is if you get something into development then it's a collaborative effort you know and you you do have to accept that you don't have creative control.

29:39.94
Adam Nevill
And you know quite often. You're asked to change things and you're just adamant that that that's wrong. That's the detriment of the story and then you're thinking. Well we're at odds here we're trying to tell different kinds of stories and and. All kinds of other variables are brought into it in terms of you know what will get financed and what would be more acceptable to sales agents and distributors and so Forth. So But once you accept that you know and you learn the hard way that this is. Now a collaborative effort and these things are incredibly expensive to make um and no one is he's going to be an author that you know writes and directs and has it all their own Way. So the second half of it I think is more difficult. But writing the writing the treatments or writing the screenplays I would just get so absorbed. Um, but you can get to if you write the entire screenplay speculative Screenplay. You can get too attached because.

30:53.50
Adam Nevill
You can see it so I could imagine mine So vividly as films you know and and I'd put lots of intricate symbolism in them and that would pop later on in the story and um.

31:10.73
Adam Nevill
The people that read them were very kind they did. They did say you know they're really good to read your screenplays. Um, but then you get the but the the one thing I heard over and over again.

31:27.20
Adam Nevill
In meetings was I was writing um quite esoteric they would call them a 24 films which are the films that I love you know? and and if if I could make horror films. It would be in the a 24 style.

31:47.18
Adam Nevill
I was involved with you know people wanting to make different kinds of films. Um, but now a fabulous experience and I've learned so much and I'm very grateful very lucky.

32:05.43
Adam Nevill
To get that kind of knowledge and expertise from people with so much experience in the film industry because I didn't have any you know I've learned a great deal. Um, but I think I've learned you know not to spend six months writing a speculative screenplay again the next time I go in. Um, and I've I you know I've been asked for things from film companies I'll I'll write a treatment you know in an outline.

32:39.10
Michael David Wilson
And I wonder with your experience on no one gets out alive I mean what were the specifics of what you did in that role. Equally what were some of the limitations and the things that you could not do.

32:59.70
Adam Nevill
I would be the first person to say my role was a minor role I was more I guess as the author of the book more of a consultant or a second pair of eyes. So I didn't have I had a vote. But I didn't have a final decision on anything I was part of the team that was developing the screenplay but you know the producers would have the final say on everything and the director. But. Could be useful as a second pair of eyes reading the successive generations of screenplays. Um, and that that was quite a tricky one. No one gets out alive because as you know the novel set in Birmingham and the original. The first screenplay was. W written by a british screenwriter John Croker and set in Birmingham and for various reasons it was changed to the us. So it it instead of being a novel about a british girl in the gig economy. In another town that wasn't her hometown I mean in very compromised circumstances. It was about a migrant from Mexico in America.

34:29.56
Adam Nevill
Without the right documentation but with the same screenwriter. So Although it was quite an inspired decision to move it to another country and there were parallels between situations for the character in each country. With the screenplay that was that was a real challenge. So yeah, there were a lot of drafts and a lot of conversations and so Forth. So It was more I guess more of a consultancy role in that. Um.

35:05.91
Adam Nevill
But going forward. You know I'd like more virol um to be a screenwriter particularly with the adaptations of my books if I'm involved now that I have some experience as screenwriter. I'd like to um, be involved in the writing more.

35:30.29
Michael David Wilson
And so now going forward when you're selling the film adaptation rights would involvement be a deal breaker for you if somebody wanted to buy the riots but they don't want you involved in the. Process is that a non-starter or is that something you would consider for having it out in the world as a film I mean I suppose there are both creative and financial decisions to consider.

36:05.24
Adam Nevill
Well, it wouldn't be a. It wouldn't be a deal breaker but I'd definitely throw my hat in the ring. Um, so on the on the 3 screenplays that were in a form of development I was the I was the screenwriter.

36:22.92
Adam Nevill
If someone takes an option on your book. It's their decision who they have as a screenwriter I mean there would be reservations about me because a lot of people don't like novelists adapting their own books. Obvious reasons and also I don't have much experience. You know I'm not a season screenwriter or showrunner I've I've written three off my own bat. Um, So yeah. It's's it's a good question, I'd definitely throw my hat in the ring. Um, and at least now I you know I have something to to demonstrate. Well you know this is my style. Um.

37:17.92
Michael David Wilson
And at the moment are there Any books that look like they may be making their way to the screen or I suppose what we gone.

37:29.45
Adam Nevill
I mean cunning folk is in the good place with me as a screenwriter that's that's been quite a long development various things have happened. I I won't talk about um but that's still going. Um, it's had Peaks. It's had Troughs. It's had Peaks but it's still it's still in the fight and then there's a.

38:03.69
Adam Nevill
Few of my novels um work for all of them other than houses small shadows are under some form of option and some of them are being more actively developed whether it will result in him getting the trigger eventually I don't know but um. Think I have 6 that are in some form of development. One of my own screenplays and 5 of the novels. Where I'm not a screenwriter because this was you know these these deals were done sometime before so who knows 2 have been made and 5 count. Another 5 came really close. In fact, one we were only. We were only a few months away from starting the shoot. But um, that's how it goes you know I'm grateful unfortunate to even be in the mix even be considered for it.

39:20.99
Michael David Wilson
Yeah I feel after the writer's right as Well. There's so much uncertainty right now I mean talking to other people in the industry talking to my film manager. Yeah I Mean. It seemed like a great result for the writers or at least you know a not disastrous result. But now we're in this uncertain period particularly because you know these big studios. They always win in the end. So we're seeing a number of projects that are canceled and I mean even if the writers win money in some way that this studio always wins so we're we're in this very tumultuous and uncertain time.

40:11.79
Adam Nevill
I think that's right and I wouldn't roll out more industrial action and also I mean the enormous impact that streamers have had on the industry I mean the sheer amount that's been in production and so forth, but you know all of these all of the streamers. Are they sustainable business models and for how much longer will they be how many of them are turning a profit So I Do think there'll be more flux and and and change your head.

40:51.90
Michael David Wilson
Yeah, yeah, I mean I think unless is a really huge kind of streaming platform like you know the the biggest like Amazon like Netflix then. It's difficult to to know how much longevity they'll have you know, just just like publishers I mean they come and go we kind of alluded to that off the yeah, the kind of changes that we've seen within the horror landscape.

41:25.54
Michael David Wilson
In the last decade or so I mean there's not so many kind of like we were talking about websites and podcasts. There are very few that were about when we started you know talking when we had that interview in Notting Hill in 2011 there aren't many of us left. There are a lot of writers even that have come and gone in that time.

41:53.20
Adam Nevill
Yeah, yeah, there's half as many bricks and mortar bookshops now. Um, but you have you know Amazon Kdp and there's been the explosion of the indie sector and the rise and rise and rise of ingram and Amazon.

42:10.55
Adam Nevill
It's constantly changing and then the other big game changer of course is is is going to be technology the impact of Ai which we're all speculating and fearing and so forth.

42:29.93
Adam Nevill
Or anticipating. So yeah, it's just constant change. But despite it all I Think if you you know as an author as a publisher if you follow ah your own kind of best practice.

42:48.59
Adam Nevill
And you aim for quality control that that will never be obsolete.

43:01.77
Adam Nevill
From your storytelling to your writing all the way through to the publishing I think that's probably more important than ever to maintain those standards now and to aspire to and to you know to strive For. To get as close to excellence as you can.

43:24.58
Michael David Wilson
Yeah, we said before about how ritual limited came about when the mainstream was not just going away from horror but almost trying to cloak at your horror titles In. Of genres if we fast forward to now I mean how do you think the attitude from the mainstream to horror is how do you feel that the horror scene has shifted both in terms of mainstream and independent publishing.

44:03.39
Adam Nevill
Yeah I I will admit that I I don't pay as much attention to it as I used to I mean when I was working in publishing for 11 years I was ah I was aware of everything that was coming out everything that was happening. But since I've I embarked on this on the indie route in 2016 I pay less attention to it and more attention really just to my own press and my own readership. But. In my peripheral vision. It does appear to be having another bout of popularity with traditional publishing I mean um, it it never it never to my eye ever seems to go completely out of vogue in America. The Uk blows hot and cold on it more often. Um, but I do see um you know titan publish a lot of horror in the Uk now and and in the Us and then. You know there are writers like Paul Trembly and Grady Hendrix and and Josh Malliman who appear to you know they have the confidence of of Joe Hill big publishers and they they publish regularly.

45:37.55
Adam Nevill
Um, and then quite quite a few authors have been translated into english like Mariana in reques at Granta um, she got I think she new book coming out lady this year I read all of hers. Um I think that the kind of distinction between traditional publishing and some of the small and mid-sized publishers and the bigger indie publishers. Ah, don't think there's such a ah distinction between them now at least not amongst readers I mean what I have noticed is is how much the horror community has grown particularly in social media Facebook and and Instagram. And there doesn't seem to be any interest really in terms of publisher loyalty from where the books are coming from or or not as much. Um, obviously the the hardback collector.

46:49.99
Adam Nevill
Presses that that's different. But um, you know I'll often see a title the cover of a title and and lots of positive reviews and lots of talk and engagement with a particular title. But. And I'll look at it and I think I've never heard of that publisher but it seems to have such widespread um mainstream interest from probably even a micro press. So. You know if I look at a book and think that's an interesting cover. There's a lot of chatter about it. It might be from harper collins or it might be from a micropress. Um, it's it's more of a level playing field now I think. Because the the you know the market has moved online and onto Amazon the old monopoly where traditional publishers can really with I guess the the chains. Controlled everything that was on the shelves of bookshops and everything that was available. That's that's that's been and gone now. Um what I what I have noticed is there's just so much of everything in every genre.

48:15.69
Adam Nevill
Because the you know book production is so much easier the route to market as they say is available to everyone. So.

48:35.19
Adam Nevill
Discovery health continues to get continues to worsen years year by year. Um I don't envy anyone starting now I mean you guys would be aware of that. You'd have more. Of an awareness than me of the horror field as it stands and what's been published and what's been popular and the trends because you're watching it all the time and constantly interviewing writers I mean. I'm interested in what what your take is on on horror say the last four or five years

49:20.77
Bob Pastorella
Yeah, it's booming.

49:20.90
Michael David Wilson
Yeah and I think you're right that there's less of a monopoly from the big traditional publishers I think readers and consumers of Horror. They're just interested in. Well-written. Original thought provoking stories. It doesn't really matter who published the book I think the the story concept. The idea the writer is far more important and if you get a favorite writer then you're going to follow them to whatever publish.

49:59.29
Michael David Wilson
Or indie publish. Yeah that they go for and you know more and more people they're going a hybrid route anyway, I mean if we look at Gemma Amor who started off as indie publishing. She's now got some.

50:16.76
Michael David Wilson
Traditional books as well. We've seen people go the other way like Chuck Wendig who was more kind of indie to begin with and now has the traditional books. Ah course we've seen with both you and David Moody you know going from these big houses to almost exclusively independent publishing and I think that.

50:46.81
Michael David Wilson
Yeah, what people want is they want a well told story the the advantage of course that the big presses have is having all that money behind them and then the potential to really market and advertise the story. If they sowed Hugh and that that is a massive caveat because a lot of times you know I've spoken to people that they have put things out with a small press. They have put it out with the biggest presses that exist and it was the small press who did more with the marketing.

51:24.88
Michael David Wilson
The big publishers they put the book out and then they didn't really do anything with it.

51:28.43
Adam Nevill
Well, there's I mean that it's very true. The difference between the front list and the mid list is a huge distinction I was a midlist writer and you know up to I don't know 2000.

51:45.44
Adam Nevill
13/14 the midlist was still a reasonable place to be I mean there'll always be that publishing you know people should jump at it if they get the opportunity to get on the front list and ah you know a big publisher can get 50 to 100000 copies of your book. In a nationwide supermarket chain with a national rail advertising campaign etc which you you know it tends to be thrillers that the crime and thriller and sometimes epic fantasy that that gets that kind of belief and push from. From traditional publishers. Although the obviously the first 2 books would have to meet their sales expectations for that to continue. But the middle list really did change. You know, um, there was very little on. Or no marketing or publicity spend um often the authors had to do so much of it I mean for most writers that will still be preferable than going through the horrors of doing it yourself.

52:58.88
Adam Nevill
Which really is it really is hard gra and it's expensive. Um, you have you, you do have to invest in yourself. Um, but you know frontless publishing fabulous If you get that opportunity.

53:18.80
Adam Nevill
Mid list for me. No I would never go back on a mid list.

53:35.96
Adam Nevill
Being indie is infinitely preferable to that if you want a career and you want to produce a body of work. Um, positioned and presented in the way that's satisfactory to you? um.

53:57.56
Adam Nevill
So yeah, it's ah it's influx I mean that is the advantage of traditional publishing if you get on the front list and you get the foreign rights dales and and so on and so forth. Um.

54:12.57
Adam Nevill
But you don't know you don't know if that's going to happen. Um I think most most of the big publishers now are owned by these big media groups as well and the the remuneration is just shocking. It's ah.

54:31.86
Adam Nevill
And the the higher the book discounts the smaller the net receipts. So the trickle that goes to the writer. You know it's going it. It's going from a a trickle to droplets. Um.

54:50.72
Adam Nevill
That's a consideration.

54:50.98
Michael David Wilson
Yeah, yeah, and I mean a lot of people and indie publishers. They've been told that if they want to see their books in bookstores Then they need to give really a retail discount of a minimum of 55% and I know that this is something that you've kind of fought back against with ritual limited I believe that you've said you're only going to Give. 40% and that you know that that's your kind of maximum.

55:26.30
Adam Nevill
Yeah I kind of just acknowledged right at the beginning in 2016 you know what? what am I going to be giving up by going in d what am I going to be giving up and I was offered I think it was 3 2 book deals for the reddening and the plus one which would have been cunning folk so it was a massive decision to make and I thought I'll be giving up foreign rights. My books have always had good foreign rights translations and I think across the the 12 novels now. And even a couple of short stories I'm up to about 50 ah foreign editions that are nearly all still in print. So I thought I'd be giving up that and I'd be giving up bookshops. Um, but. You know the the book trade was just in freefall. It was imploding um but actually neither of those things happened the the ritual limited books are being foreign editions are coming out or foreign rights have been bought more than the pan mcmillans. Um, 8 the 8 Pan mcmillan titles and also the other thing I really disagree with is book discounting the really high discounting up to 80% you know, 65 to 80% the prevailing rate is supposed to be 54%. That's.

57:01.11
Adam Nevill
The discount that bookshops buy books from publishers 54% but um, almost no one buys them at 54%. It's much higher. Um, so I thought well because I'm going to set mine at 40% going all the way back to the 90 s pre-net book agreement that's rolled me out of the entire physical book trade but it didn't and it's slowly grown and there's one title I think that's core stock now in Barnes and noble. So obviously I'm not selling tens of thousands to bookshops. Um or the amount that panletmillan used to sell when I was having new titles coming out through Pan Macmillan it's not on that scale but libraries and bookshops do buy and stock a lot of the ritual limited books. I was down in London a couple of years ago and I I had ah was working on a film but I had ah an afternoon and an evening and I went around all the bookshops in the west end and I found I think it was the reddening in nearly all of them.

58:15.97
Adam Nevill
And I was really surprised I thought well you know I can see ingram who I've got 2 paperback distributors on print on demand I can see every month that there there are certain number ordered but I don't know where they're going I don't know who's ordering them. You know are they online retailers. Are they people walking into bookshops with an isbn number. But no, it's actually bookshops ordering them. Um every month. So.

58:51.60
Adam Nevill
And the the difference that makes as a business decision is enormous to the room. You know the remuneration that comes back to the press and the author Bob's rubbing his eyes of sleep I think.

59:10.15
Michael David Wilson
See now I'm thinking I'm gonna just set all of my books to 40% and see see what happens. There's probably a better idea isn there often and is set the lot. Yeah.

59:18.30
Adam Nevill
Well try one.

59:28.66
Adam Nevill
Well I mean with me it's I guess there's a continuity from the the 8 panicck millin books um at 1 at 1 point there was a lot of them in whsmith's and and and water stones and usually 1 supermarket usually astor. Used to stock my new books. Um, so there's still that you know a new Adam Neville title comes out some of those retailers will stop the new book because they did well with the books on the back list now. Or some libraries will always get my new book. Um, but I I don't really know you know, but everybody advised you cannot restrict discounts.

01:00:23.22
Adam Nevill
Below 55% I think it was otherwise no one will touch you and I thought well I'm only interested in the online retailers now. Um.

01:00:40.80
Adam Nevill
But it didn't seem to make any difference. In fact I put I put 2 That's right I because you always have to ah you always have to experiment I put 2 at 55 and

01:00:57.22
Adam Nevill
Compared to the other books. The sales didn't change except for one of them was less than all the books at 40 at 55 I've and I know it run for about a year

01:01:14.51
Michael David Wilson
And yeah, this is a thing independent publishing. We just have to carry out these experiments and kind of see what does and doesn't work. But it's impossible. You know to be able to.

01:01:32.63
Michael David Wilson
Have a completely fair experiment because each book is different anyway. But yeah, yeah, and something that people might have noted is at the start of this conversation you were talking.

01:01:35.86
Adam Nevill
Yeah, there's always variables to take into account.

01:01:48.97
Michael David Wilson
About having 5 different versions of each book now 2 of those versions are the mass market and the paperback. So there may be people thinking. Okay well what is the justification for having. 2 types of paperback. What are the advantages of each and then of course why did you decide to go down that route.

01:02:16.46
Adam Nevill
Yeah, that I brought in on cunning folk. Well there's a limb edit hardback and then ingram had always done my paperbacks but in cunning folk just as it was coming out. They had real problems. There was paper shortages. Um, they didn't have every ah they didn't have the freight drivers everyone was was I think other than Amazon oh it was a massive shortage of long distance. Truck drivers and there was sickness through covid so the pre-orders weren't being fulfilled and when I when I ordered copies from my web store and sample copies. They took like three months to arrive. On express delivery. So I just thought some something's up here and then you look on all the different forums and lots of authors were saying the same thing and they were all saying because Kdp had has really improved from create space I thought there. Paperbacks now are almost as good as ingram's get your files changed and put them on Amazon as well because I noticed with my Amazon listings all of the paperbacks were listed as.

01:03:50.65
Adam Nevill
Titled temporarily unavailable. We don't know when I thought what it's never been on ago going to be unavailable. They're printed by ingram in an Amazon sell them. That's the way it's always worked for like the first 5 books but suddenly I was getting this ah temporarily unavailable notice. And people were saying oh it's because ingram's got this paper shortage logistics problems and so on and so forth in the pandemic. It's not there anymore. So I had my paperback files resized and I put put them on Amazon and. Almost all the sales with paperback until ingram sorted itself out with through Amazon so other than the launch period of cunning folk I corrected that so you. I would recommend that if you do do the indie room. You have your p od paperbacks on both Kdp and ingram with the same isbn number. That's really important. The only thing really, that's different is the barcode is in a different position on the back. And obviously the copyright page if you acknowledge the printer that would be different so you need to cover both those bases. So it's one paperback edition but through 2 distributors and then there's a limbs edition hardback the ebook the audiobook and then.

01:05:20.96
Adam Nevill
I do a second hard back one of these laminette hardbacks. Um, which actually are really nice now I didn't like them for a long time and the print on demand hardbacks because I I felt that the dust jackets were too loose. But actually the plc hardbacks. They're really nice. Um, so that becomes like this the mass market hardback I guess so all together in the life cycle of these books.

01:05:56.82
Adam Nevill
Are 5 editions and 4 of them stay in print permanently and you kind of have to have 5 editions because that's what readers want you know some people prefer audio books some people prefer ebooks some people prefer paperbacks.

01:06:13.59
Adam Nevill
Some people want hardbacks. But then once the 600 have gone I'm endlessly getting emails saying do you have any line around. Do you know where I can get hold of one so that's why we did the second hardback for people that missed out on the 600 um

01:06:29.66
Michael David Wilson
Yeah, and that second one was was that via ingram did you say the second one? yeah.

01:06:32.70
Adam Nevill
And I do it through do it through both Ingraham and Amazon as well as sends the paper back and those hardbacks um don't sell many through Amazon.

01:06:51.26
Adam Nevill
Think because of the price point but a lot through ingram and it's building every month and I think it's libraries and bookshops buying them but also through my web store I've I've restocked to think I only did them though. They're only available last Halloween.

01:07:10.30
Adam Nevill
I think I've restocked them 4 times now in the web store so it takes a while for people to become aware of them and so forth, but the what there was ah there was an interest in them. There was a demand for them. So um, something I'm glad I did.

01:07:36.13
Michael David Wilson
Yeah, and if we look at cunning folk on Amazon I mean there's the option to buy the paperback but it but there's ah, there's only one option so that would be the Amazon printed one if you wanted the Ingram.

01:07:48.56
Adam Nevill
Yeah.

01:07:53.79
Michael David Wilson
Printed 1 presumably, you go to a bookstore or another online retailer.

01:07:58.21
Adam Nevill
Well, that's up to the retail is where they take their stock from where they buy their inventory from I mean as I don't want to point the finger because I don't know for sure. But you know I I have suspected There's a bit of a war going on between um Amazon and ingram over the print on-demand paperback market because what worked just like clockwork for years is ingram were producing the paperbacks and you know Amazon were ordering them.

01:08:34.14
Adam Nevill
And keeping so much inventory and selling them and just reordering them. But then suddenly title unavailable on Amazon and the. Sales level drops on ingram but you make them available on Amazon and actually the the level of sales didn't just ah, restore itself. It became much bigger because you know if Amazon are producing the books.

01:09:12.22
Adam Nevill
It makes sense for them to put their thumb on the scales a bit and make them more available than than buying in paperbacks from from third parties. This is me me surmising how things work so that's why I say.

01:09:31.87
Adam Nevill
You need to have the two because if people are buying a paper back from Amazon Amazon will print it but libraries and bookshops. They won't be buying their stock from Amazon I think on principle so that's where ingram comes in and ingram covers.

01:09:50.24
Adam Nevill
Um, more more outlets as well. So the 2 if you if you use the 2 Um, you're covering all the you're covering all the bases I think.

01:10:07.30
Adam Nevill
We won't get onto audio books because you and I have already discussed this Michael and there is no. There is no well the jury is still out on what to do with those.

01:10:16.87
Michael David Wilson
No yeah I mean if if we were to talk about audiobooks we would need to dedicate another hour alone to audiobooks and we still wouldn't get to the bottom of it and given.

01:10:39.10
Adam Nevill
Actually I have noticed it's twenty past one for someone who's usually asleep at ten o'clock I've done all right I may have been just talking gibberish half asleep.

01:10:53.24
Michael David Wilson
It's been very useful.