Author Sells Shares of Royalties for Unfinished Novel

Poets & Writers: Tao Lin, the author of two poetry collections, a novel, and a story collection, last Thursday posted a rather unusual offer on his blog. For two thousand dollars, readers can purchase a 10-percent share of the royalties, including all U.S. serial, reprint, textbook, and film royalties, for his unfinished novel, which is tentatively scheduled for publication next year by Melville House, an independent press in Brooklyn, New York. Tao, who writes on reader-of-depressing-books.blogspot.com about how he recently quit his job and needs money in order to have time to write, is a poetry editor of 3:AM Magazine.

Why that’s brilliant! That’s the best idea I’ve seen in hours! I mean he came in, he threw it on the floor, and the cat licked it right up. That’s how great it is. All he has to do is get 10 investors, then he’ll have $20,000 to live on while he writes a novel. And they’ll own all his royalties, for a book which he projects will sell at last 13000 units, with a great chance of a lot more. You can do the math: this is so brilliant, I wish I was wearing rubber boots.