08/02/2007
Looking at the Business of Gay "Celebrity" Books
Citing numbers from Nielsen BookScan, the Washington Blade's Katherine Volin looks at the disappointing sales of gay "celebrity" books and what's behind the numbers.
Says Charles Flowers, executive director of Lambda Literary Foundation: "The publishers are looking for a way for someone to sell the book and that’s part of the attraction of a celeb book, they’ve got this platform. I’m not sure people make the leap to, ‘Do I want to read a whole book about this person, or by this person?’ So I think it’s something to be careful about in acquiring a celebrity book. If they’re over-exposed, people may not buy a book about them or by them. They already have their opinion made or think they know the person."
I was a bit surprised by the low numbers, though I'm not sure why. It seems all the promotion in the world can't do as much for book sales as a single appearance on Oprah.
A few of the notable books and their sales numbers:
38,000 — "The Confession" by James McGreevey
19,000 — "Silent Partner" by Dina Matos McGreevey
15,000 — "A Guide to Quality, Taste and Style" by Tim Gunn and Kate Moloney
14,000 — "Red Carpets and Other Banana Skins" by Rupert Everett
9,000 — "Man in the Middle" by John Amaechi
9,000 — "Now It's My Turn" by Mary Cheney
8,000 — "There's Nothing in this Book That I Meant to Say" by Paula Poundstone
6,000 — "Tab Hunter Confidential" by Tab Hunter and Eddie Muller
6,000 — "Here's What We'll Say" by Reichen Lehmkuhl
3,000 — "Alone in the Trenches" by Esera Tuaolo and John Rosengren
3,000 — "Include Me Out" by Farley Granger and Robert Calhoun
1,000 — "I Had to Say Something" by Mike Jones with Same Gallegos
1,000 — "La Dolce Musto" by Michael Musto
Gay books a bust [washington blade]
Posted 10:42 AM EST by Andy Towle in Books, James McGreevey, John Amaechi, Mary Cheney, Mike Jones, News, Rupert Everett, Tim Gunn | Permalink
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16, 12, 8.
Posted by: Mike B. | Aug 2, 2007 12:18:45 PM
The only book on the list above I read was Rupert's, which overall was a disappointment, and sometimes felt like a chore to read, since I was looking for a LOT more dirt and celebrity name-dropping. It really was much more badly written than his "Hello Darling, Are You Working?", which was wonderful.
The only others on the list I would even consider reading would be Michael Musto's (love him) or Tab Hunter's (he was gorgeous back in the day).
As for Reichen's & the Nazi child Mary Cheney's books...I think all unsold copies should be taken to Iraq and passed out to civilians or given in school (just to give them one more reason to hate us...or confuse them even more)
Posted by: Jordan | Aug 2, 2007 12:30:13 PM
Quality of the books aside (and let's be honest--the quality of a book has nothing to do with how well it sells--look at "The Secret") gay people don't read any more than straight people--and look at how many straight "celebrity" books don't do well.
Posted by: db | Aug 2, 2007 12:35:38 PM
I guess I would consider myself to be well read I just find biographies in general to be well... boring - having said that, I thought Ed White's book was pretty entertaining in a fabulousgayexpat kind of way. I bought Everett's book but given the poor reviews it seems to be getting here maybe I'll skip it.
Posted by: Giovanni | Aug 2, 2007 12:46:10 PM
Bet I know what Cheney's friends and family are getting for Christmas, one of those 9000 books Lynn "sold". He'll use the rest when he shoots skeet.
Who in the hell would buy 9000 copies of that bitches book? Are there that many lesbians that read?
Oh, and Mike, maybe you didn't have to say anything, especially to a ghost writer.
Posted by: Tom | Aug 2, 2007 12:48:31 PM
The only book of the bunch I bought was Rupert Everett's and it was so dull I began skipping pages faster and faster hoping to find something, anything, interesting. Nada. I threw it away.
Posted by: phil | Aug 2, 2007 12:57:54 PM
Talk about a reading problem. The solution begins at home, or at least Towleroad. It must be frustrating for Andy to spend the time and effort to find, outline, and link to so many interesting articles when it's repeatedly obvious from so many people's comments that they haven't bothered to read the original material before pontificating.
E.g., with all due respect to the "experts" here, the actual one quoted in the article, Charles Flowers, former book editor of works b Andrew Holleran, E. Lynn Harris, Michelangelo Signorile, Sarah Schulman, et al., and currently executive director of Lambda Literary Foundation, which has been sponsoring the annual Lambda Literary Awards for 18 years across all genres of LGBT literature and publishes a quarterly book review.
Per Flowers, “Ten or fifteen thousand, that’s about right [for a gay celeb memoir]," so one can understand the thrust of the article when contrasting that average to such inferior sales.
As the article further notes, release of some of the poorer sellers, e.g., Cheney and Lehmkuhl, coincided with tons of free publicity; she more among "serious" venues, and he more in Celebrity Worship Land itself. His of course totally coincidental affair with Lance Bass resulted in both Bass's outing and Reichen's butter mold face and claims of being raped at the USAF Academy appearing on everything from "Access Hollywood" to "Inside Edition" to "Howard Stern" to "Tyra Banks."
Yet even Satan's Daughter, with the help of gay Repugs and soccer fascist moms, sold half as many books as he did. So what's up with THAT, and his claim of 1,815,935 myspace "friends."
Whatever one might say about these two and the others, John Amaechi has "done" quite a bit for our community and his sales, relative to the others and his previous invisibility to all but the most obsessed pro basketball fans, is a bit encouraging.
What I'm more eager to see are sales figures on LGBT nonfiction books not built around personalities and LGBT fiction books.
God help us if we are to be judged by how many of us respond to celebrity machinations.
Posted by: Leland | Aug 2, 2007 1:09:07 PM
they only "gay author" i've ever read consistently over the years has been gore vidal...and his subject matter is seldom if ever "gay". i used to think that because i was gay i had to read as many gay authors as possible. that was until i got thru about the 25th book and realized that i hadn't read anything interesting.
i don't really like to ghetto-ize my life or my library.
however, a great gay author is tom spanbauer from portland, oregon. i think "the man who fell in love with the moon" is a must read for every gay man. hilarious and heartfelt.
he's also written 'faraway places' and "in the city of sky hunters". both very good books.
oh and i forgot, armistead maupin was a joy back in the day. i haven't gotten around to his more recent works, yet.
books i've read written solely for the purpose of celebrity have seldom held my interest. i did, however, enjoy jane fonda's book. she's lived a life and had something to say to me.
Posted by: psgoodguy | Aug 2, 2007 1:15:29 PM
Should have read: "Yet even Satan's Daughter, with the help of gay Repugs and soccer fascist moms, sold half as many MORE books as he did."
"ghetto-ize" your library? Oh, Helen, please!
Posted by: Leland | Aug 2, 2007 1:21:12 PM
I'm amazed Reichen has 6000 fans who can read.
Posted by: Scott | Aug 2, 2007 1:22:09 PM
@ PSGOODGUY:
"oh and i forgot, armistead maupin was a joy back in the day. i haven't gotten around to his more recent works, yet."
If you *really* loved the early "Tales of the City" you might want to skip the latest one. It's just...not good. And it breaks my heart to say that, because those original books got me through My Worst Summer.
And yeah, this post is about biography, but the state of "gay" literature in general is pretty piss-poor. E. Lynn Harris was mentioned earlier, and he's quite possibly the worst writer of our generation. Who is writing really good gay novels these days? (Hint: The answer isn't Michael Cunningham; he's a hack, too.)
Posted by: Mike B. | Aug 2, 2007 1:24:44 PM
Maybe gay people under the age of 70 aint very interesting to be writing books about?
Well, David, I don't know, but the youngest son is likely to be gay--according to some scientific shit Andy once posted here.
Posted by: Derrick from Philly | Aug 2, 2007 1:31:42 PM
Would be interesting to see the numbers for similar books by similar straight celebs. The last "celeb" book I read was Anderson Cooper's.
Posted by: Gary | Aug 2, 2007 2:19:10 PM
"Who is writing really good gay novels these days?"
I'd say Allan Hollinghurst for one though I actually like Michael Cunningham ( a Hack? Really?) a lot - Evening nonwithstanding. Specimen Days was challenging and maybe a bit "pulitzeree" (hey, it worked the last time...) but I love Whitman so I appreciated the effort. You also might want to give Mike Albo a try - he's very perceptive and incredibly funny.
Posted by: Giovanni | Aug 2, 2007 3:29:54 PM
@ GIOVANNI:
I was completely underwhelmed by "The Hours." I think that "Mrs Dalloway" is a really good novel; I think that Cunningham's riff on it was just poorly conceived and executed.
"Overwritten" I think the kids are calling it these days.
I have read Michael Albo -- and he's really good. There are a couple of clips on YouTube of his performances that are worth finding. I haven't heard of Hollinghurst, though. I'll check him out.
Posted by: Mike B. | Aug 2, 2007 3:45:19 PM
My Uncle, who is 61 gave me the Tab Hunter book to read as he had known Hunter back in the olden days and I found it not to bad. Someone above said that it came across kind of conservative to them, but when you remember the era it was mostly about, what they considered wild and crazy we mostly think of as a bit conservative.
The other celeb book he gave me was called....**the man who made Rock Hudson**...about the agent who had Hudson and just about every hot young stud in Hollywood as his clients back in the late 40's and 50's. Very good book for name dropping.
I am a bio freak, but then I'm also a history freak, so they sort of fit together. Mostly I read about famous people of the past, not celeb's. But I found that gay writers of the 50's were usually pretty good. I've read Maupins early book and Richy's stuff. Even Isherwood from that era.
Posted by: Joshua | Aug 2, 2007 5:00:59 PM
I have read a few of the books and have enjoyed some and not others, but I wouldn't depend on the opinions of the people on this board any more than I do main stream critic. If a book looks interesting to me I will read it even if I hear it's not good. We don't know who the people responding to these stories are--why would I trust thier judgement?
Posted by: db | Aug 2, 2007 6:06:13 PM
Rupert Everett's book was one of the most boring, self-indulgent, and narcissistic books I have ever read. Hours of my life I'll never get back. John Amaechi's book was simply boring. The best one I read was Mary Cheney's.
Posted by: LincolnLounger | Aug 2, 2007 7:59:12 PM
Wow, Giovanni, I actually agree with you about something. Hollinghurst is good, real good. Read "The Line of Beauty" guys!
Posted by: jmg | Aug 2, 2007 8:25:53 PM
I'm a gay writer & I wrote a travel e-book about Oman available at EscapeArtist.com. I've sold 6 books in as many months, but I'm neither a hack nor the daughter of Satan. I would be willing to date Lance Bass or even Reichen to raise my sales, though.
Posted by: Daniel | Aug 2, 2007 9:05:47 PM
I'm glad to see people mentioning Alan Hollinghurst. Amazing writer. "The Line of Beauty" is one of the best books I've read in the last ten years or so. Seriously, if you're looking for a good gay novel, check him out.
I just finished Armistead Maupin's "Michael Tolliver Lives" and it was just okay. It was lovely to spend some time again with Anna Madrigal and to know Mouse is happy. But it's a creampuff of a book. AM has a painterly eye, as ever, but it evaporates as soon as you turn the last page.
Posted by: Turtle | Aug 2, 2007 10:04:03 PM
P.S. Hey, Andy, if you're reading this, it would be worth checking out a subscription to Nielsen BookScan and regularly updating us on "gay" book sales. It's next to impossible to find actual book numbers on the internets and you'd have that niche pretty much all to yourself.
Posted by: Turtle | Aug 2, 2007 10:06:42 PM
I read the Rupert Everett book. It won't interest those looking for star dish, because the most interesting parts of the book are beyond those. I found it astoundingly well written - far better than Dirk Bogarde's books. Given it got a million pound advance, obviously others did too.
Posted by: Jimbo | Aug 3, 2007 7:14:17 AM
It would be nice if either the original article or Andy mentioned that BookScan, their source for the sales, admits to accounting for only 70% of all book sales. If you add another 30% to these totals, some don't look as bad. 30% may not sound like much, but it should at least be mentioned. (Anytime BookScan is mentioned in the NY Times or Bookslut.com, this fact is mentioned so people know the truth.)
And Giovanni, when answering a question about gay novels, you mentioned Cunningham's "Evening," only he didn't write the novel, he only wrote the screenplay. Just a heads up.
Posted by: Donny B | Aug 3, 2007 10:46:40 AM
I loved the Tab Hunter book, and yes, he was stunning as a young actor...omg.
I also liked a book called "The Gay Face of God" by an archbishop Bruce simpson.
Maupin has been a favorite of mine also
Posted by: Jack | Aug 3, 2007 3:58:52 PM