Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Posting-Version: version B 2.10.PCS 1/10/84; site mtgzz.UUCP Path: utzoo!linus!philabs!cmcl2!seismo!harvard!talcott!panda!genrad!decvax!harpo!whuxlm!whuxl!houxm!mtuxo!mtgzz!ecl From: ecl@mtgzz.UUCP (e.c.leeper) Newsgroups: net.sf-lovers Subject: Science Fiction Book Club Message-ID: <1059@mtgzz.UUCP> Date: Mon, 26-Aug-85 02:58:07 EDT Article-I.D.: mtgzz.1059 Posted: Mon Aug 26 02:58:07 1985 Date-Received: Fri, 23-Aug-85 07:00:41 EDT Organization: AT&T Information Systems Labs, Holmdel NJ Lines: 79 Comments on The Science Fiction Book Club An article by Evelyn C. Leeper Recently, Ellen Asher of the Doubleday Science Fiction Book Club (SFBC) came to speak at NJSFS (the New Jersey Science Fiction Society). Some of her comments were fairly interesting, so I will relay them as I remember them. The SFBC is one of seven Doubleday book clubs (Asher said she likes to think of it as one sucker on the book club tentacle of the Doubleday octopus). It is the largest of their specialty clubs (they also have a military history club and the Mystery Guild, for example). I don't recall if it's larger than their Literary Guild, though. The seven clubs have a membership totaling over one million, and since the mailing list that the SFBC sells (which includes expired members) is about 250,000, one can conclude that the SFBC itself has about 200,000 members. (The actual figures are secret, apparently.) There was a lot of discussion about the books that are selected. There are several considerations. The books are printed "letter-press" rather than offset, so that books relying on strange typographies or complicated interior illustrations have little chance of being chosen (alternate selections can be printer offset in special cases, but the main selections cannot be). Most are issued as hardcovers, though they occasionally issue a trade paperback. (There is a new LeGuin--I've forgotten the title--that will be a trade paperback, slip-cased with cassette.) Because of the "negative option" method used (see below), and because so many of the members are minors, the main selections usually do not include "adult" (sexual) material. Doubleday has no desire to get hauled into court for sending unsolicited sexual material to minors. Several of us (including me) decried the swing from science fiction to fantasy that we see the SFBC taking. There appear to be several reasons for this. One, fantasy sells (according to Asher, and she should know). Two, there is a lot more fantasy available than there used to be. (Look in you local Waldenbooks or B. Dalton if you don't believe this.) Three, and this is my observation based on an extended conversation, Asher likes fantasy better than science fiction, and Arthurian/high fantasy better than dark fantasy (including horror, but also works by such authors as Glen Cook and Stephen Brust). While she buys the obligatory science fiction (no one would dream of not offering the latest Asimov or Niven), she tends to go for the new fantasy authors more than the new science fiction authors. This is, of course, somewhat self-fulfilling. As more fantasy is offered, people who prefer fantasy join the SFBC because they can get more of what they want, while people who prefer science fiction leave (or are dropped) because they can't find what they want. (If a member hasn't bought a book in a year, they are sent a letter asking them to return an enclosed card if they wish to remain a member. This way the SFBC doesn't keep spending postage on people who never buy anything.) Someone asked about how well the book club editions hold up over time. Asher replied that they are printed on acid-free paper, so should last reasonably well. This provoked a stir of surprise, since Gregg Press and Bluejay Books have been promoting their books as being superior to most because of the acid-free paper. Why doesn't the SFBC mention this in their advertising? Asher said that every time this was suggested, the powers that be at Doubleday insisted that no one would understand what that meant, so it didn't pay to advertise it. If enough people wrote the SFBC and asked them to switch to acid-free paper, they might realize that we *do* know what the stuff is! There has been some discussion about the "negative option" method that the SFBC uses (if you don't reply otherwise, you automatically get the main selections). People have claimed that there is some way to get on a "positive option" list, where you don't have to reply each month. When I asked about this, the response was that there was such a list, but it is reserved for people who have some good reason to be on it. Most of the people on the list, for example, are overseas, where the cost of postage and handling is high enough that the SFBC felt that the default sending of the selections wouldn't be fair (not to mention the problems of getting the cards back to the SFBC back in time to have them not send the selections, if negative option were in effect). I suspect that people who travel a good deal (the military, etc.) could also be put on the list. No one talked about the cost of postage and handling. Evryone knows it's high; everyone knows there's not much that can be done about it. Evelyn C. Leeper ...ihnp4!mtgzz!ecl