The Bodies Keep Piling Up

Kate Miciak, V-P and executive editor for Bantam Dell, would also make a great detective. When asked what the biggest challenge facing mystery publishers is, her intuition kicks in and she says, "I suppose everybody made mention of the glutted marketplace."

They certainly did. Although each words it differently (Little, Brown publisher Michael Pietsch notes "the vast torrent of competition," while Random House editorial director Jonathan Karp laments the difficulty of "standing out in such a crowded field"), mystery publishers all struggle with fierce competition.

However, as with the weather, everybody complains about the congested mystery market, but nobody does anything about it. Few are cutting back on mystery programs, and some are expanding.

Mira, the romantic suspense and thriller imprint of Harlequin, is growing, says Dianne Moggy, editorial director, single titles: "Romantic suspense continues to perform exceedingly well, and Mira authors such as Carla Neggers and Sharon Sala have hit the New York Times top 15 list in the past 18 months." Mira has distributed more than 4,000 galleys for Erica Spindler's See Jane Die (June), hoping to push that forward as well.

Warren H. Phillips, copublisher of Bridge Works, reports, "We've expanded into mysteries explosively, going from 7% of our list in 2002 to 45% of our 2004 list." New titles include Melissa Clark's Find Courtney (Oct.)

In September, Dorchester launches an imprint of old and new paperback pulp crime novels, Hard Case Crime. The two initial titles are a reprint of Lawrence Block's Grifter's Game and Max Phillips's Fade to Blonde, with two more in October and two in November. The imprint will begin offering two books every other month in March 2005. "We wanted a critical mass by the end of the year," explains Charles Ardai, who, with Phillips, created the imprint.

Morrow launched the trade paperback mystery imprint Dark Alley in September 2003. The imprint features, in the words of publicist Diana Tynan, "books geared toward guys who would go see Trainspotting." Forthcoming titles include Jon Evans's Dark Places (June) and Isaac Adamson's Kinki Lullabye (Oct.)

These newcomers might look to Berkley Prime Crime, celebrating its 10th anniversary, for inspiration. Founder and executive editor Natalee Rosenstein tells PW, "We have achieved a remarkable level of brand name recognition." To celebrate the milestone, the imprint is hosting group signings at mystery bookstores such as Kate's Mystery Books in Cambridge, Mass., and High Crimes in Denver.

One effect of the crowded market: quality and originality are crucial. Says Viking senior editor Ray Roberts, "If it's pro forma, it's going to read like that." Roberts is particularly enthusiastic about Michael Simon's Dirty Sally, due in July.

Hyperion publisher Ellen Archer says, "You see it with the success of The Da Vinci Code, something that breaks the formulaic mode." Indeed, Dan Brown's mega-bestseller is on everybody's lips this year. Jane Dentinger, senior editor of Mystery Guild, says, "The success of The Da Vinci Code has to be a bellwether."

"Although books are bought on the quality of the writing first, we do try to find works that have something unusual about them," admits Canongate associate publisher Tad Floridis. As an example he points to The Cutting Room (2003), which features a crime-solving gay art dealer. Louise Welsh's novel now has close to 150,000 copies in print in the U.S. and the U.K. Floridis notes that an attention-getting element is especially important for smaller houses, which "don't have the budget to spend a lot of money to define someone in the marketplace as the new Dan Brown."

"You definitely need a hook," says Mysterious Press associate editor Kristen Weber. One such attention magnet—a significant one, at that—is Double Homicide (Warner, Oct.), the first collaboration by the bestselling duo Faye and Jonathan Kellerman.

In a bid to draw attention to what Doubleday editor-in-chief Bill Thomas calls the house's "small, focused list" of suspense titles, the publisher has organized a "Let Doubleday Thrill You All Summer Long" campaign to promote three titles—Death Match by Lincoln Child (May), Blackbird Papers by Ian Smith (June) and Darkly Dreaming Dexter by Jeff Lindsay (July), with samplers, tabletop easels and bookmarks.

Speedy mysteries à la Encyclopedia Brown are the gimmick in Ken Weber's Five-Minute Mysteries Series from Running Press, which last month added Absolutely Amazing Five-Minute Mysteries and Utterly Ingenious Five-Minute Mysteries. Multimedia accompaniments are a burgeoning trend. In January 2005, Random House will publish Rupert Holmes's Swing, a musical murder mystery that includes a CD of original songs. Explains Karp, "We're hoping this book will be reviewed by both book critics and music critics." (Which makes sense, given that Holmes is the noted composer of such ditties as "Escape"—known as "The Pina Colada Song"—and the Tony-winning Broadway musical The Mystery of Edwin Drood.)

Michael Connelly serves as a hard-bitten L.A. tour guide on the DVD Blue Neon Night, but you won't find it at your local Blockbuster. Instead, Little, Brown produced 72,000 copies to be shipped with 350,000 copies of Connelly's latest, The Narrows (May). Booksellers will offer DVDs to purchasers on a first-come-first-served-basis. "The idea is to get people into stores right away," says Little, Brown's Pietsch.

And Hyperion evidently believes that, though DVDs are dandy, liquor is quicker. To promote J.A. Konrath's new series—Whiskey Sour (June), Bloody Mary (2005) and Rusty Nail (2006)—all featuring protagonist Jacqueline "Jack" Daniels, Archer says, "At sales conference we're going to be giving out little bottles of whiskey with sour mix to our reps, and at BEA one evening we'll be passing out whiskey sours and coasters. And it looks like we're going to get out about 20,000 copies of Whiskey Sour in hardcover."

Mystery writers tour relentlessly, and they benefit from a strong specialized network. "There isn't anything like Bouchercon for general novelists," notes Judith Curr, publisher of Washington Square Press. For last month's Atria release of Bad Men, Irish author John Connolly embarked on his fourth 25-city tour. "By the time he's done he'll have visited 100 cities in America," Curr reports. She notes that, shortly after publication, the title has 44,000 copies in print.

Because that mystery network is so strong, there's an increasing tendency to tour even foreign authors (such as Connolly). Trafalgar Square, which distributes British author Michael Jecks's medieval mysteries The Outlaws of Ennor and The Tolls of Death (both from Headline, March and June, respectively), reports that Jecks will tour the U.S. for the second year in a row, with appearances at Bouchercon and Magna cum Murder, as well as several bookstores.

But even while touring, writers need to personalize their appearances in order to attract notice. To promote The Bookman's Promise (Scribner, Mar.), author John Dunning visited 26 cities, in which he not only read at bookstores but conducted seminars on book collecting, in keeping with his continuing character Cliff Janeway, a rare book dealer.

Series featuring the same crime-solver are a perennial in the mystery category. But while launches are easy enough to publicize, later titles often don't attract attention the way debuts do. Upcoming sophomore efforts include Night Game (Oct.) in Chronicle's John Marquez series; No Man's Enemies (May) in the Simon Abelard series from The Do-Not Press (distributed by Dufour); and this month's Marital Privilege, in the Wilhelmina Carson series from New Millennium. In August, Berkley will publish the mass market edition of Terry Devane's third Sheldon Gold title, A Stain upon the Robe (out last year from Putnam), which was recently optioned by Flatiron Films.

So how do houses solicit interest in a second or fourth or eighth book? "That falls squarely on the shoulders of the marketing department," says Bantam Dell's Miciak. She points to a March gatefold ad in Time for the mass market edition of Lee Child's Persuader, which also mentions his May hardcover, The Enemy, as an example of ongoing efforts to build an established author's audience.

And even though Dutton will publish the fourth entry in the Bubbles Yablonsky series, Bubbles a Broad, in June, executive publicity director Lisa Johnson says, "We feel like we're still launching [author] Sarah [Strohmeyer]. Part of it is just the traditional way of publishing mysteries. And with each book you get a bigger audience and you build on the foundation. We all do the big, glitzy, push-out books, but some of it is old-fashioned building the readership and letting it grow every time."

In many cases, publishers rely on an author's growing reputation that's established through a variety of series and/or stand-alone titles. At Harcourt, Robert Wilson's first Inspector Falcòn novel, The Blind Man of Seville, has just been released as a Harvest trade paperback. Sales and marketing v-p Laurie Brown notes, "We look forward to an even larger audience for the next Falcòn title, The Vanished Hands [Jan. 2005], as Wilson's visibility has been enhanced by his West African series, the Bruce Medway novels and his enormously successful stand-alone title, A Small Death in Lisbon [Harcourt, 2000]."

However, many publishers noted that time for a writer's development is a luxury they can ill afford. As Scribner senior editor Susanne Kirk puts it, "Sadly, less time is given now for growth than used to be the case. Ten or 15 years ago, I could do six books by somebody, but now if the company doesn't see growth from book to book it's often more difficult to continue." In many cases, however, optimism prevails. At Putnam, publisher and editor-in-chief Neil Nyren cites by way of example author Randy Wayne White, whose 11th Doc Ford novel, Tampa Burn, will be published in May: "He appears regularly on the Times extended list, and we think we can break him through, so we do a lot of touring with him."

HarperCollins executive editor Dan Conaway adds, "There used to be a tradition where this sort of build was more expected over a number of books. What's harder these days is the fact that, in a certain way, everybody—editors, authors, agents—has to defer instant gratification." In June, HC publishes After the Rain, the sixth novel in Chuck Logan's Phil Broker series. Conaway adds that hard/soft coordination of both scheduling and cover looks is key. He says, "A lot of these people are going to break out first in mass market. The hardcover is for visibility and review coverage, but it's the paperback where you have the chance to get larger numbers."

Penguin also coordinates publication of its paperback reprints, for example timing this month's mass market paperback of Donna Leon's Uniform Justice to coincide with Grove/Atlantic's publication of her Doctored Evidence, and Soho Press will publish Jacqueline Winspear's Birds of a Feather in May, which is when Penguin will reprint her Maisie Dobbs.

Even longtime authors need to be supported with each new effort. In July, Knopf will publish 300,000 copies of Carl Hiaasen's Skinny Dip. Although Hiaasen seems to hit bestseller lists effortlessly, executive publicity director Paul Bogaards says, "We come out with all guns blazing." Skinny Dip will be serialized in Men's Health Best Life magazine, and Hiaasen will embark on a five-city tour.

When Morrow published Lawrence Block's The Burglar on the Prowl last month, the house used phone booth advertising in New York City and ran a trompe l'oeil ad in the New Yorker that featured a hand reaching from the cover of the book to steal jewelry from an adjacent (fake) jewelry ad. Such innovative moves seem to work. "I have seen his audience grow with every single book. This book has higher numbers than Small Town [2003]," says associate publisher Libby Jordan.

Simon & Schuster will install outdoor advertising in Times Square for Nighttime Is My Time (Apr.), Mary Higgins Clark's 29th novel, and for Jeffery Deaver's Garden of Beasts (July), his 19th, while Sandra Brown's Whitehot (Aug.) will be the subject of a transit campaign.

Sometimes a change in the books themselves is in order, as is the case with Pocket's Alex Shanahan series by Lynne Heitman. According to senior editor Lauren McKenna, "Lynne keeps this series fresh by reinventing her protagonist, from Alex's first appearance in Hard Landing [2001] as the head of operations at Logan Airport to a new career—as a private investigator—in the third book, this month's First Class Killing. Alex had to hit rock bottom before she could expand as a character and tackle a new career while facing the different aspects of her personality."

One thing's for sure: With this many books, publishers can't afford to rest on the laurels of successful authors. "The second you start coasting, you lose," says Little, Brown's Pietsch.

With so many books out there, few niches remain unexplored. (One exception is the Christian suspense sub-genre, dominated by Zondervan author Terri Blackstock, whose next is River's Edge, out in August.) As a result, hot trends tend to be "not so much new as renewed," as Ballantine editor Mark Tavani describes the return to popularity of international thrillers. At Ballantine, Steve Berry's debut, The Amber Room (2003), became a bestseller after the author's Today appearance. His hardcover follow-up, The Romanov Prophecy, and the mass market of The Amber Room are both due in September, and Berry has already signed with Ballantine for two more.

"For the first time since the spy-versus-spy mania of the '60s and the phenomenon of James Bond, people are more interested in espionage and counterintelligence," agrees Lyons Press editor Jay McCullough. In June the publisher releases React: CIA Black Ops by Robin Moore and Chuck Lightfoot.

"In The Exile [Tor/Forge, Aug.], Allan Folsom takes you to three different continents and different cultures, and he has a couple of villains in there who are transcendent," says executive editor Bob Gleason. A $250,000 marketing campaign will include TV advertising on CNN and A&E.

One popular trend shows no sign of abating: exotic—ergo often mysterious—locales. Tantalus Zero (Libertine, Apr.) by Marshall Moore, M.D., follows a Navy doctor to Antarctica. Dragon's Eye (Overlook, Apr.) by Andy Oakes takes place in Shanghai, while an April Lyons Press release names its setting in the title—The Devil in Buenos Aires by Lily Powell. The Damascened Blade (Carroll & Graf, Aug.) by Barbara Cleverly is set during the last days of the Raj, and the same house's A Dead Man in Trieste (Nov.) by Michael Pearce is the first in a series set in British embassies and consulates in Europe in the early 1900s. According to C&G publisher Will Balliett, "The cozies aren't set in a village in the Lake District any more. All those villages are taken, so we had to go to India and the old capitals of Europe."

Michael André Bernstein's Conspirators (FSG, Apr.) tells of a double agent in Austria on the eve of WWI. Mary-Jane Deeb's A Christmas Mystery in Provence (Paraclete Press, Dec.), her follow-up to February's Murder on the Riviera, takes place in Grasse, France. More traditional U.K. settings, like those in Anthea Fraser's Jigsaw and John Gardner's Angels Dining at the Ritz (both Severn House, May), are holding steady.

Women—as authors or protagonists or both—have gained a strong foothold in the once predominantly male mystery market. Hyperion's Archer says, "It's a very exciting time for me as a woman and as a feminist. Even 10 years ago you didn't see women in the mystery category at the top of the list. The difference now is that men are crossing over and reading women."

One woman in particular has inspired a new generation of women writers: Janet Evanovich. "People are looking for lighter fiction in general, and comic mysteries started with Janet Evanovich," says Weber at Mysterious Press. Kensington is packaging Laura Levine's Jaine Austen series "in a more Janet Evanovich way," according to editorial director John Scognamiglio. The third title in the series, Killer Blonde, is due in July. Forthcoming titles from Evanovich herself are Metro Girl (HarperCollins, Nov.) and the latest Stephanie Plum mystery, Ten Big Ones (St. Martin's, June).

Chick lit, too, has now arrived full-force in the mystery genre. NAL/Signet will launch three new chick lit mystery series, whose protagonists mysteriously share a first name. Leann Sweeney's Pick Your Poison (May) features Texas heiress Abby Rose; Mum's the Word (Nov.) by Kate Collins stars florist Abby Knight; and Victoria Laurie's Abby Cooper, Psychic Eye (Dec.) showcases a psychic intuitive. Red Dress Ink, the chick lit imprint of Harlequin, will publish Jennifer Sturman's The Pact in December.

Says Weber, "You start with Nancy Drew, and then there's Miss Marple. You want something in the middle." Hoping to fill that gap, Mysterious Press will publish See Isabelle Run by Elizabeth Bloom in March 2005.

There are also young female protagonists who fall outside the chick lit umbrella. In June, Crown/Three Rivers Press will publish Maggie Estep's second Ruby Murphy mystery, in trade paperback. The first book in the series, Hex, was a New York Times notable book. Harmony publisher Shaye Areheart (who edits Estep) says, "It's an infinite market: women love stories where women are at the center of something great that's going on."

At Holt, Alafair Burke's continuing character, Samantha Kincaid, returns in Missing Justice (June), and Holt has signed up two more books. "It's not chick lit, though," says editor-in-chief Jennifer Barth. "It deals with serious crimes and heinous deeds." (And why not, considering the fact that this author's dad is noted crime writer James Lee Burke.)

Probate officer and sleuth Sarah Kaufman tracks down the clues in O'Brien's Desk (Sunstone, Apr.), a historical novel set in the U.S. in the 1920s. And in Bill Pronzini's The Alias Man (Walker & Co., June), three women who have suffered at the hands of a confidence man band together.

Older women, too, are getting their due, as exemplified in Sue Henry's Serpent's Trail (NAL, Apr.), the first in a series about retired RVer Maxie McNabb. And Pocket's mass market Passport to Peril series, which debuted in February with Alpine for You, combines demographics with a youthful American protagonist who leads senior citizen tours. August will see Pasta Imperfect, set in Italy.

In addition to publishing chick lit mysteries like Sheryl Anderson's Killer Heels (May), St. Martin's/Minotaur is combining mystery with "street life" fiction, resulting in Solomon Jones's Ride or Die (Aug.) "It's not always doing something completely different, but sometimes somebody putting a fresh new spin on it," says editor Monique Patterson.

And speaking of new spins, check out Siren's Call by Mary Ann Mitchell, coming in April 2005 from Medallion Press, a one-year-old publisher located in Barrington, Ill. The woman's angle here, says sales and marketing v-p Leslie Burbank, is the fact that the villain is a female serial killer. According to Burbank, "A major push is planned in terms of getting this book to the big screen." Hannibella Lecter, anyone?

University presses, more closely associated with academic monographs than genre fiction, are also getting into the mystery game. As part of its Latino Voices series, Northwestern University Press is publishing two mysteries by Manuel Ramos in May: The Last Client of Luis Montez and Blues for the Buffalo.

In August, the University Press of Colorado will publish 15,000 copies of Marianne Wesson's Chilling Effect, the third in a series starring detective Lucinda Hayes (but the first the press has handled); and the University Press of New England is launching its new Hardscrabble Crime imprint this spring with Snap Hook (May) by John R. Corrigan.

"We have four mysteries on our spring list. This is an anomaly, but also something of an experiment to see if we can lump mysteries together to sell them more effectively," says University of New Mexico Press publicist Amanda Sutton. All four titles—Accustomed to the Dark (Mar.), Dead Pawn (Apr.), The Ghost Ocean (Apr.) and Present Danger (Nov.)—have a regional connection to the Southwest. "That makes them easier to market to audiences that are close to the physical press, requiring less time, energy and work force from our limited university press resources," Sutton explains.

Since these university presses are new to mysteries, they might take comfort in the, well, mysterious forces that sometimes move the genre. "So much of it is serendipitous, striking at the right time," says Dutton's Johnson. "You can do all the planning in the world for a Da Vinci Code, but you need a little bit of luck."