An Unauthorized Biography of Dan Brownby Lisa RogakAndrews McMeel Publishing - Kansas City
See my previous post on this book by using the Google search feature above...
Page 55
"After learning the craft of constructing and writing a novel - one that was actually sold to a major New York publisher - Brown felt he had developed a good sense of what worked and what didn't when it came to commercial fiction. Setting for one, was crucial.... for his novels, he believed that location was perhaps the most important factor, since it would dictate the degree to which secrets could be revealed and present a unique opportunity to educate the reader about a topic they may know little about.
"If you're writing a love story, don't set it in the middle of a parking lot," he said, suggesting that the story be based in a location that is interesting all by itself. Once that is confirmed, he added, it's imperative to show the environment from a fly-on-the-wall perspective. "If you set a story in a private school and don't reveal any inside information about what it's like to work or study at a private school, then you've got a boring setting," he said.
Page 89"Beginning in the 1990's, international corporations saw money and prestige in book publishing companies - especially if they could tie them into other media outlets they owned to facilitate cross-promotion - and so they began snapping up privately owned publishers buy the carload....
"And they needed to make a profit. While publishers of old were primarily interested in producing good literature, the first concern of the conglomerates was financial. Whether a successful book had a literary bent or was more commercial in flavor didn't matter....
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