Book 'em, Spidey! 2: The Peter Parker Book Tour continues

So. Peter Parker's published a portfolio of pretty pictures. That's liable to put a spring in your step and a swing in your web, isn't it?



But as we saw last time, if only Spidey knew a little bit about the publishing and bookselling industry like, ahem, a little stuffed bull knows, he coulda saved himself a lotta heartache and tearful nights later on: soon he will know, as do Thomas Pynchon and Helen Fielding, the pain of the published author. Let's take a further look and see how the Webs book tour compares to real life publishing and give this storyline a reality check, shall we?


All panels in this post are from Amazing Spider-Man #304 (early September 1988); written by David Michelinie, art by Todd McFarlane (pencils), Joe Rubinstein (inks), and Bob Sharen (colors)

Reality check: Spouse traveling with author on book tour?: Probably not.

Whoa, MJ, we were counting on you to interject a tone of reality and bust Peter's dreams wide open here...after all, if there's someone who oughta know enough not to trust the promises of a publicist, it's a fashion model. But gosh, ain't that sweet: bekerchiefed Mary Jane thinks it might be kinda neat to bunk up with a published author (well, aside from that fling with Peter Benchley circa ASM #134...). Is it support for her hapless but well-intentioned husband, or is it simply so she can go to Los Angeles with him? Uh, probably the first, but she's leaping at the second awful fast, isn't she?

Except...there's usually not a budget to send a first-time author (cheap though they're getting him) and his significant other on a book tour. It's a fact of life for traveling writers: get used to life on the road minus your sweetie for a while, because the publisher usually ain't ponying up for two plane tickets, two meal expenses, and two sets of mints on the hotel pillows. Granted, some major writers certainly command such perks, but although Petey's the original swinger, he hasn't got the swing in the publishing world to get that yet. That said, it's not unheard of, and without Pete on board, publisher Wiltonbooks basically has no publicity tour, so it's in their best interest to float him a few perks. (But gosh, doesn't your heart go out to Peter? You gotta sympathize with a guy who scrimps and saves to show his wife the good life, and when he finally cuts a break and has the opportunity to treat her with a trip, it's to a place she was at last month. Way to show who wears the Spider-Pants in the household, Mrs. W-P!

Still, good ol' grounded-in-reality Aunt May will have a better and clearer view on the situation, won't she?

Webs will be available at Kmart:
Mmmmm, maybe, but it's a long shot.

Yaaaaaahhhhhh! Don't sneak up on her like that, Pete! The old dear has had seventeen heart attacks since ASM #1, three of them in the last anniversary issue! Don't leap down and slap an advance reading copy in her face!

And, oh, for Pete's sake, looks like everybody's an enabler in this story. This storyline really coulda benefited from a cute sassy bookstore clerk (or little stuffed bull) smacking Peter in the face and saying "Snap outta it!" Because all Aunt May is concerned about is seeing her nephew's book on display and sale in the local chain discount department store...

Except that's a long shot, Aunt May. It is tough, tough, tough for a publisher to place a book in a chain non-book store like Kmart, and later during the 1990s and beyond, Target. Chain bookstores like Barnes & Noble and Borders and independent bookstores like New York's Shakespeare and Co. and (to get nostalgic for a moment) St. Paul's late lamented Hungry Mind, buy books from publishers' sales reps directly: reps present from the publisher's catalogue to a buyer or a team of trained subject buyers at these stories to convince them to take titles from their catalog of upcoming, soon-to-be-published books, and for the most part those stores carry a sizable or substantial percentage of the various titles. Kmart buys their books indirectly: the reps present not to Kmart or Target direct but to a local or national wholesaler (like Levy or Anderson News) who will in turn present their picks to Kmart or Target. The rep will not present his or her entire catalogue to the wholesaler buyer for Kmart, but instead focus on a very small number of titles with the biggest potential. Why? Because Kmart don't bother with small potatoes, baby. The Kmart book section and shelf space is much more limited than even a small indie bookstore, and there's a higher pressure to stock books with a strong regional appeal or proven bestsellers (which is why your Target is stocked to the gills with Stephen King, Janet Evanovich and Sophie Kinsella). In short, those books don't have the chain bookstore or indie bookstore luxury of sitting on the shelves for six months waiting to sell—it's all about turning over stock fast fast fast, generally within a month, or the book is pulled as a proven dud and returned to the publisher, pronto. See how different it is than the non-returnable comic book store world? Since when Kmart wants a book they want a lot, that could mean a lot of returns of unsold stock to the publisher. Such massive returns are a major economic hit for a publisher—they probably overprinted to have enough stock for a Kmart buy and therefore will never be able to sell off that returned stock.

As I said yesterday, the storyline tries to convince us in some issues that the book is a major success, and in others points out the thing just ain't selling. (Non-communication between various comic book editorial boards at Marvel ain't a twenty-first century innovation, kids!). Some of the evidence points towards the publisher positioning this as a very, very major book indeed, despite the amateur design and poor format. It certainly is possible the Wiltonbooks national accounts or special sales rep has sold several thousand to wholesalers and it's going to be stocked in Kmart and other major non-book outlets across the country, but it's a long shot. The book world doesn't work that way in conjunction with the Kmart kingdom.

(Not long after this story, however (in 1992), the Kmart Corporation acquired Borders Books, which led a lot of people in the book industry to believe it was now gonna be a lot easier to pitch books for sale in Kmart. But the red tape and bureaucracy never really cleared up and by the time Kmart sold off Borders three years later the much hoped-for Golden Age of Books in your local Super K never materialized.)

That said...it's just Aunt May hoping that, and what the heck does she know about the book world, anyway? And y'know, I'm not even certain there was a Kmart in Queens in the late 1980s. (There wasn't one in Manhattan until the very late 1990s!) Anybody know?

Private jet for Pete and MJ to LA:
Noooooo, I'm callin' shenanigans on that one.

One of the problems in determining whether Webs is a major or minor book is not knowing what kind of publisher the fictional "Wiltonbooks" is. When I first read this story in 1988 I assumed they were riffing on then-booming, now-failing mall bookstore chain Waldenbooks (a bookstore, not a publisher), but it occurs to me it's entirely possible it's a pastiche or parody of major book publisher and big-time player in the literature world Warner Books, at the time distributed by Random House but now part of the mega-com-globe-co conglomerate known as Hatchette Book Group USA. I kinda like to think they were riffing on Warner Books back then, because of its connections to Time-Warner, the parent company of Marvel's Distinguished Competition. (Which might explain why Marvel is painting them as a buncha rubes with more money than sense in publishing).

For example...the private jet. Uh uh. No way. Ain't gonna happen. Not for a first time author, not for a yet-unproven book. Not even if they're trying to butter him up: Peter's book simply cannot be that commercially viable. I work in sales rather than publicity, but I do know this: you have to be the top of the top, and have proven selling power, to hitch a ride in the company jet. Tom Clancy might command that kind of respect. Peter McFirstBook flies Eastern Airlines, stopping in Dallas for a four hour layover. And what's up with that "hectic check-in procedures at LAX"? Um, LA is Peter and Mary Jane's destination. There's no "check in" when you get off a plane. Certainly not when you're being escorted for a publicity tour. The publicist and/or driver will meet you at the airport and help you with your luggage. All Pete has to do is stumble tiredly off the plane and look for the guy holding a sign that says PARKER on it. And hey, it's the late eighties, he doesn't even have to meet his party at the baggage claim! That bit about the limo, however, is spot-on: publicists hire drivers in town cars or limos to escort and taxi authors from place to place. You do not want your author relying on public transport or even catching their own taxi: you are charged with getting him from event to event on time, and having a hired driver for the tour is the way to ensure that.

Peter's scheduled to appear at the "ABF": Yes, actually, that's precisely accurate. And at a posh charity gala? Uh, not so much.

ASM #304 is cover-dated September 1988, which means the comic was on sale in the early summer that year. (Until a handful of years ago comics had built themselves up a hefty advance cover date based on the increasingly outdated supermarket and drug store magazine racking system). From this panel, however, we can date this story absolutely precisely and accurately: this scene takes place on June 1, 1988.

Ginny, the disturbingly blank-stared publicist, has booked Peter at the "American Book Fair...day after tomorrow." That's a fictional name but it's very clearly and obviously the American Booksellers Association: the annual trade show for book publishers and booksellers (called the ABA Show back then, it's now known as BookExpo America). The ABA show changes city venues each year (this year's BEA is in New York City and I hope to see some of you there...stop by the Norton booth!) but in a startling nod to reality, 1988's ABA did indeed take place in Anaheim, California, a long-time frequent location for the show. The ABA/BEA is where publishers present brand-new and forthcoming books to assembled bookstores, media, and each other, and it's the perfect place for Peter to appear. Authors do signings and parties and meet 'n' greets, copies of finished or advance books are signed and given away, and Ginny will have Pete settled down in the Wiltonbooks booth or one of those lengthy autographing lines where everybody in the book industry lines up to get a copy because the books are free. So, it's an ultra-smart and accurate place to launch a book, even though it's a title that has more New York City interest.

I'm pretty certain that Ginny's blowing a little smoke up Pete's tailpipe (ewww, I wish I hadn't used that metaphor) by having him on the guest list at a posh museum charity gala. You an' me live and breath the antics of our friendly neighborhood Spider-Man, but Peter Parker is a nobody in the celebrity world of Los Angeles. Mary Jane will be a bigger draw for paparazzi at that party, especially when we find out later Glenn Close and Geraldo Rivera are there as well. Now, here's my thinking: as improbable a place for Peter to appear, I think Ginny's smarter than she is letting on. Wiltonbooks has wanted Spider-Man to appear alongside Peter at media appearances. What better way to ensure that than for Ginny to book Peter in at a museum with easily-stolen antiquities, hire special guest villain the Silver Fox to debonairly saunter in and relieve the museum of some lovely items, thus causing Pete to press the button that activates his Spider-Signal Watch, summoning everyone's favorite webslinger to save the day and make a publicity appearance to talk up the book? That's precisely what I thought the plot of this storyline was going to be when I first read it, and it impressed the heck out of me: I really liked the idea of a conniving book publicist pulling Spidey's strings on his book tour to get press. As it turned out, that's not what happened. I have the utmost respect and admiration for David Michelinie, but yet again I think I shoulda been writing the Spider-Man on Book Tour storyline.

No, here's what probably was going on in Ginny's head instead of that:


"My god, if his wife's skirt was any shorter it'd be around her neck. Hey, that's the way to get publicity for this turkey photo book...parade puny Parker and his knockout wife in front of the cameras. They'll all be busy clicking away at her and maybe he'll get in the shot once or twice. I wonder if I could get her to wear a tube top?"

Special bonus early Todd McFarlane flashback!:




We tend to remember McFarlane's visual innovations (just call them "changes" if you're a McFarlane-hater. Me, I kinda liked the dynamism but some of his early stuff was very sloppy in design) on Spidey: the knotted weblines all over the place, Mary Jane's big puffy hair and proto-Image Comics good girl bod, but what stands out when I re-read these stories from Todd's first year on the character is how often he was trying (and sometimes succeeding) in channeling the spirit of Ditko back to the character. Take a look at those two panels above: that's a Ditko-style Spidey he's trying to present, with big eyes and slim build and very detailed webbing design. And that little Spider-wave not only captures the unease of Peter in the situation, it's also a homage to Ditko's quirky and distinctive hand and wrist design. Now don't think I'm saying "Todd's as good as Steve!" Heavens, no. Ditko woulda filled these panels with interesting shaded and detailed backgrounds rather than blank space or short-hand blobs for figures, and Todd's not on that level. But it's very interesting and telling that after decades of Spidey-design being heavily John Romita-influenced, Todd's groundbreaking new look had some fans fuming at its new direction...a direction that was actually reminiscent of Spider-Man's roots.

Book tours don't begin and end at the same venue: authors are often trotted across the country for weeks and weeks, eating bad food, sleeping in non-descript hotels, appearing on talk shows where the host clearly hasn't read your book and doing bookstore signing events where five or ten people show up and you sell three books. There's a lot more to this storyline than Amazing Spider-Man #304...it continued in future issues and crossed over into Spectacular Spider-Man and Web of Spider-Man. In the not-too-distant future I'll continue examining and giving a reality check to these tales of Marvel's first superhero published author, showing you that the writers of these comic books have no idea how a bookstore book signing works. I'll also reveal the secret identity of the real-life famous 1980s author who flirted outrageously with poor clueless Peter Parker. A fabulous proven author and star of the literati world coming onto a first-time author? Wow, this storyline is fictional.