I got two things in the mail today. One was a couple of boxes of Foundation ActionScript Animation 3.0: Making Things Move! I’d put up pictures, but it looks pretty much like the last version. 🙂 Always a good feeling to get the hard copy in your hands, smell the fresh ink, flip through all the pages and say to yourself, “I really wrote all those words???” Those of who preordered should bet seeing is shortly.
The other item I got was a royalty check for the original version of Making Things Move. I know I’ve probably gone over this before, but the way writing generally works is you agree to an advance and a royalty rate. You get the advance in three payments usually, the last one when you finish the writing and editing. The advance is yours to keep. Even if the book never sells a single copy, you kept your end of the bargain and you’re all set.
Now, as the book sells, you start making a small percentage of each sale. Generally, as the numbers go up, your percentage gets higher. Kind of like tax brackets. The catch is, you don’t see any of that royalty at first. It goes to pay off your advance. Say you get a $5000 advance, and you make $2 per book sold (not real figures, not even close). After 2500 books are sold, your advance is paid off. After that, the royalties are actually paid to you in the form of a quarterly check.
Now, here’s the other catch. I’ve heard that 90% or more of all books never make back their advances. I can say that I’ve written or contributed to 10 or 11 books so far. Other than Making Things Move, the only royalty check I ever saw was something like $100 for Flash MX Most Wanted. I still get quarterly royalty statements that show how many hundreds or thousands of dollars are still “owed” on my advance. Again, it’s not “owed” in the sense that I’ll have to pay it, but it’s obvious for most of them that they aren’t ever going to sell enough copies to break even.
But with Making Things Move, the first quarter sales alone paid off almost the entire advance. The second quarter I got a check that blew my mind. And each additional quarter, I’ve gotten checks even larger! I’m talking double or triple the amount of the first check. I figured that by now, it would start slowing down. But the check I got today was the biggest ever. In fact, it’s just shy of the amount I originally got as an advance! I can’t say how much, but let’s just say it just about covered my Mac Book Pro and family’s trip to Japan. 🙂 So yeah, it was a pleasant surprise to say the least.
Anyway, this is blowing my mind. All I can say is THANK YOU to all of you who bought it, reviewed it, recommended it, used it as a text book, etc. You have made it a success beyond my wildest dreams. And now the next version is just about to hit the shelves. I can only hope it lives up to the praise you have given the first version.