Royalty Terms
Title Statements
From: Adaeze Nwosu, rights manager
To: Yusuf Demirel, contracts officer
Subject: The translation list, before we close the half-year
Set out for me again the three terms that govern every contract on the translation list, so that I can check the statements before they go out.
From: Yusuf Demirel
To: Adaeze Nwosu
Subject: RE: The translation list, before we close the half-year
These three, and they apply to every title on the list:
- The royalty is 8 percent of the list price on the first 5,000 copies of a title sold, and 11 percent of the list price on every copy sold beyond the first 5,000.
- Where a title is published as a co-edition, the royalty is figured not on the list price but on 70 percent of the list price. The two rates and the 5,000-copy break are unchanged.
- Every contract carries an advance against royalties. We pay the author nothing further until the royalty a title has earned exceeds the advance paid on it, and then we pay only the difference. An advance is never reclaimed from the author, and is never set against another title.
Copies sold, list prices and advances are in the Title Statements tab.
Position of the six titles on the translation list as at the half-year.
| Title | Edition | List price | Copies sold to date | Advance paid |
|---|
| Salt and Chalk | single | $20.00 | 8,000 | $9,000 |
| The Long Ledger | co-edition | $25.00 | 12,000 | $12,000 |
| Winter Timetable | single | $15.00 | 4,200 | $6,000 |
| Mira's Almanac | co-edition | $30.00 | 6,000 | $7,500 |
| Quiet Machines | single | $18.00 | 5,000 | $7,200 |
| Ferry Notes | co-edition | $22.00 | 9,000 | $14,000 |
Suppose that each of the six titles sells a further 2,000 copies in the second half of the year, and that nothing else changes. By how much would the total the publisher owes the six authors, over and above the advances already paid, be greater than it is now?
