{"id":385,"date":"2011-07-25T04:04:00","date_gmt":"2011-07-25T04:04:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/joanhilty.net\/site\/?p=385"},"modified":"2014-05-29T18:53:45","modified_gmt":"2014-05-29T18:53:45","slug":"taking-the-heat-san-diegosummertime-thoughts-on-the-graphic-novel-market","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/joanhilty.net\/site\/?p=385","title":{"rendered":"Taking the heat: San Diego\/summertime thoughts on the graphic novel market"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>In the conference prequel to San Diego Comicon, graphic novel sales <a href=\"http:\/\/www.publishersweekly.com\/pw\/by-topic\/industry-news\/trade-shows-events\/article\/48083-icv2-report-graphic-novel-sales-up-slightly-in-2011.html\">moved up<\/a> despite a tough overall publishing environment. So: how to continue the trend?<\/p>\n<p>I thought most about this not while reading the <a href=\"http:\/\/www.latimes.com\/news\/custom\/topofthetimes\/national\/la-gd-cover24-2008jul24,0,4472641.story\">various<\/a> <a href=\"http:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2011\/07\/22\/movies\/twilight-and-auteurs-haunt-comic-con-in-san-diego.html?_r=1&amp;scp=3&amp;sq=san%20diego&amp;st=cse\">big-time coverage<\/a> of SDCC, but while reading <a href=\"http:\/\/www.timescolonist.com\/news\/Graphic+novel+leap+into+leagues+author\/5151653\/story.html\">regional reportage<\/a> of a Canadian artist&#8217;s graphic novel debut, which has the enthusiastic but oddly educational tone that many journalists still use to introduce the concept to a general audience. As an insider, I&#8217;m usually puzzled by that, but this time I started to think about the ways in which GNs need to be considered in the larger context of trade publishing. That Victoria Times-Colonist article, for instance, accurately points out in the lede that GNs can range from &#8220;new ground&#8221; to &#8220;compilations&#8221;. This is definitely what skews publishers&#8217; understanding of GN sales; it&#8217;s almost like an alternate universe where anthologies, usually a category-killer in trade publishing, can by contrast be the strongest performers in GNs if they&#8217;re part of <a href=\"http:\/\/www.comicsbeat.com\/2011\/07\/12\/charlaine-harris-plans-new-3-book-graphic-novel-series\/\">an<\/a> <a href=\"http:\/\/scifipulse.net\/?p=42799\">existing<\/a> <a href=\"http:\/\/herocomplex.latimes.com\/2011\/07\/19\/bone-jeff-smith-says-early-hollywood-footage-was-mind-blowing\/\">franchise.<\/a> (Yes, I did just hyper-direct you to <em>Bone, True Blood<\/em> and <em>Green Lantern<\/em> in three words. Now you see the issue.)\u00c2\u00a0So the ongoing challenge is: how to make this into a marketing\/literary language that everyone can use to their collective benefit?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>In the conference prequel to San Diego Comicon, graphic novel sales moved up despite a tough overall publishing environment. So: how to continue the trend? I thought most about this not while reading the various big-time coverage of SDCC, but &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/joanhilty.net\/site\/?p=385\">Continue reading <span class=\"meta-nav\">&rarr;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-385","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-bittergirl"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/joanhilty.net\/site\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/385","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/joanhilty.net\/site\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/joanhilty.net\/site\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/joanhilty.net\/site\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/joanhilty.net\/site\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=385"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/joanhilty.net\/site\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/385\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/joanhilty.net\/site\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=385"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/joanhilty.net\/site\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=385"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/joanhilty.net\/site\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=385"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}