Scribner to Reprint Bestselling Running Novel
By Lynn Andriani -- Publishers Weekly, 2/12/2009 10:59:00 AM
A self-published novel about running that took off in the 1970s is coming back into print this spring. On April 7, Scribner will publish Once a Runner by John L. Parker, Jr., which is now a cult classic, having landed in the number-one spot on BookFinder.com’s top 10 list of out-of-print books of 2007 in the U.S. Parker’s agent, Byrd Leavell, said Once a Runner is “Rocky for runners,” and Runner’s World called it “the best novel ever written about running.” There are 100,000 copies of the book in print, and used copies have sold for as much as $300 on Amazon. There’s even a fake movie trailer for the book online that generated considerable buzz—until it turned out to be a fake.
Parker, a three-time Southeastern Conference mile champion, filled Once a Runner with nitty-gritty details of life as an elite distance runner, with anecdotes about losing toenails, sore Achilles tendons and the need for 12 hours of sleep. He couldn’t find a publisher, so he self-published the book, setting up a company called Cedarwinds Publishing. Via Cedarwinds, Parker also published a few other novels and nonfiction books about running. He marketed Once a Runner primarily through a direct mail catalog that he assembled twice a year, which featured Cedarwinds titles, as well as endurance sports titles from other publishers. Parker’s last print run—the 10th—sold out in 2004, and since then, used copies in good condition, originally priced at $6.95, have gone for upwards of $250 online.
Breakaway Books published OAR’s sequel, Again to Carthage, in 2007; a 6,000-copy first printing sold out in three weeks. Runner’s World excerpted the new novel, and the article caught the eye of agent Byrd Leavell, of the Waxman Literary Agency. He read it, and was inspired to contact Parker and try to get a publisher to reissue the book. Six houses bid, and the winner was Brant Rumble at Scribner. Parker is working on a prequel to OAR, titled Cold Island Blues. Leavell said he will bring it to Scribner in April.
OAR’s reissue, a $24 hardcover, won’t be released in bookstores until April, but Fleet Feet, a national chain of more than 85 running stores, had an exclusive deal to sell the book early. In November 2008, it ordered 5,000, sold out, and went back to Scribner for another 5,000. Scribner is working on getting Parker on a panel at the Boston Marathon in April, as well as an event at Nike headquarters in Oregon. But for all the planned promotions, OAR is the kind of book that tends to thrive with word-of-mouth publicity. For instance, last spring, a trailer for the movie—with “reviews” from Rolling Stone and Runner’s World, show times and ticket prices—appeared online but turned out to be a hoax. It was created by a fan.
Parker said having a major publisher reprint OAR is bittersweet. “If the book had found a publisher right away, it might have sold a few thousand copies like most first novels and then disappeared without a trace,” he said. ‘At least this way it’s still alive and being re-discovered by each new generation of runners. I’m hopeful that with this new edition it might be discovered by an even larger audience.”
