Books - Library loans

The Irish Public Lending Right statement has arrived in the inbox. The earnings are not great, but what is interesting to me is the number of loans.

All six of my westerns (by 'Ross Morton') are represented in the Irish and UK libraries:

Death at Bethesda Falls
Last Chance Saloon
The $300 Man
Blind Justice at Wedlock
Old Guns
The Magnificent Mendozas

For 2015 They have clocked up between them 217 loans.

Not many, true; by averages that suggests that 36 people have read each book.
In truth, it shows how averages can be skewed.

Book - loans
Blind Justice - 69
Last Chance Saloon - 39
Old Guns - 46
The Magnificent Mendozas - 24
Death at Bethesda Falls - 29
The $300 Man - 10

It's heartening to know that the oldest, Death at Bethesda Falls (published in 2007) is still finding a readership.

The loans in the UK libraries are considerably higher; that statement comes out in the new year.

Writing – and readership

Most authors write to be read. The financial consideration is important, naturally, but it is rarely the main impetus. We write because we cannot not write.

So the transformation over the last decade or so has to be welcomed, whereby readers can post reviews on the Internet – whether that’s in a blog or on Amazon and the other online book sites. Considered feedback is always welcome. We’re trying to entertain – following in a long line of storytellers stretching back to that distant age in caves when the social media was verbal and illustrations were paintings on rock.

The other helpful feedback tool for the author has been around for twenty-five years – the PLR. Last year’s (July 2013-June 2014) Public Lending Rights statements have just been issued, and they make interesting reading.

Of all 20 of my books registered with PLR, only 5 titles show readers. This is because the rest are not supplied to or obtained by British libraries. The five titles reflect the hardback and the large print editions - two of each, separately registered.

Yet those 5 have clocked up almost 8,000 readers among them. That’s good to know: because that’s a minimum readership figure, based on a sample of libraries, not all of them, in UK.

These titles are all westerns (because Robert Hale has a high representation of books in public libraries):

Death at Bethesda Falls (2007) – 1,300+

Last Chance Saloon (2008) – 1,500+

The $300 Man (2009) – 1,600+

Blind Justice at Wedlock (2011) – 1,600+

Old Guns (2012) – 1,700+

My latest western The Magnificent Mendozas (2014) was published and registered after the cut-off date of June 2014, so won’t appear on a statement until January 2016.

This proves that there is a readership for westerns out there, no matter what the naysayers might pontificate.

 
The British Library has taken on the administration of PLR. They collect loans data from a changing sample of UK public library authorities. This year’s payments are based on loans data collected from 44 library authorities across the UK during the year July 2013 – June 2014.
 
The maximum earnings for any author amount to £6,600; 190 registered authors were paid this for 2013/2014. Interestingly, there were 22,053 authors who received PLR payment and 16,996 who were paid nil or their loans were below the minimum threshold (i.e. loans didn’t amount to £1 or more).
 
Compared to last year’s figures, there are about 300 less recipients of PLR this year; and about 1,200 more authors who fell into the nil bracket. It is not clear whether or not that’s due to a fall in library readership or the choice of libraries in the sample or some other factor, such as more authors are going independent so aren’t represented in local libraries.

So, the moral for authors is, register your book with PLR.

https://www.plr.uk.com/

 

 

 If you hanker after writing a western - or any genre fiction novel, come to that - you might like to have a look at Write a Western in 30 Days, which reviewers have said is useful for all genre writers, not only those who write westerns!

 

Amazon UK paperback here

Amazon UK e-book here

Amazon COM paperback here

Amazon COM e-book here

 

 

 

 

 



 

'Two distinct races'

Charles Lamb (1775-1834) had a few things to say about borrowing.

‘The human species, according to the best theory I can form of it, is composed of two distinct races, the men who borrow, and the men who lend.’ – The Two Races of Men

‘I mean you borrowers of books – those mutilators of collections, spoilers of the symmetry of shelves, and creators of odd volumes. – The Two Races of Men.

I believe that there are readers who buy books and readers who borrow. [We’ll ignore those people who borrow books from us but never return them…] There are plenty of reasons why readers borrow – cost and storage space being just two. I may have a collection of about 4,000 books, but in my lifetime I’ve read thousands more. Space precludes storing so many. I’ve borrowed from the public library when I couldn’t afford to buy sufficient books to read; and of course pre-Internet, I delved into the non-fiction shelves for research. Like most generalisations, I’m sure this separation into two types of book readers will fall down under close scrutiny, but I feel that it has a grain of truth in it. Until relatively recent times, authors received no payment for books borrowed from libraries.

It seems only fair that authors should benefit in some small measure from institutional borrowing of their work. Twenty-eight countries have a Public Lending Right programme. The first was implemented in Denmark in 1946; the UK’s PLR was enacted in 1979.

As a resident of the EU (UK citizen living in Spain), I am able to take advantage of the PLR system applied to libraries in the UK and Eire. It is a welcome annual event, receiving notification of the pecuniary reward (taxable) along with the number of borrowers for my registered books.

Registered authors are eligible for payment if their PLR earnings reach a minimum of £1. The rate per loan is currently 6.2 pence [and for foreign readers who may not be aware, there are 100 pence in the £]. There is an upper limit for any author, £6,600. Last month, PLR made payments totalling £6.1 million to 22,327 authors. It is funded by the Department of Culture, Media and Sport through the British Library. Writers can register online. A book has to be registered by 30 June to be eligible for assessment in the following January.

To read the rules about registration, please go to the website www.plr.uk.com

A list of the hundred most borrowed titles included James Patterson fifteen times; needless to say, he was the most borrowed fiction author (for the seventh year running); Nora Roberts dropped from fourth place last year to sixth; M.C. Beaton was seventh and tenth was David Baldacci (previously eighteenth). Lee Child had the two top most borrowed titles; J.K. Rowling’s The Casual Vacancy was the tenth most borrowed title, well beaten by Fifty Shades of Grey (third).

 

The top twenty of the 100 most-borrowed books in Scotland are all crime novels.
 
Top non-fiction author was cookery expert Mary Berry.
 
The full list can be found on the website.
 
Last year my books (penname Ross Morton) were borrowed 5,464 times from the UK libraries. That’s a great feeling, to know that that number of people have read my novels.
 
Since its publication in 2007, my first novel Death at Bethesda Falls has been borrowed 8,709 times.
 
My most-borrowed title is The $300 Man.

If you can't borrow it, please purchased post-free world-wide from here

So, I must go against the advice of Shakespeare, in Hamlet: ‘… neither a borrower, nor a lender be…’ (I know, he was talking about money, rather than books!)