"Brain Diving: The Ghost with the Most" by Brain Ruh, _ANN_ http://www.animenewsnetwork.com/brain-diving/2011-08-09
> "This time, though, instead of a fictional book about the supernatural I'm > going to be examining a nonfiction book about Japanese ghosts – Patrick > Drazen's A Gathering of Spirits: Japan's Ghost Story Tradition: From > Folklore and Kabuki to Anime and Manga, which was recently self-published > through the iUniverse service. This is Drazen's second book; the first one, > Anime Explosion! The What? Why? & Wow! of Japanese Animation, came out in > 2002 from Stone Bridge Press and was an introduction to many of the genres > and themes that can be found in anime. > I think the switch from a commercial press to self-publication may indicate > the direction English-language anime and manga scholarship may be heading in. > A few years ago, when Japanese popular culture seemed like the Next Big > Thing, there were more publishers that seemed like they were willing to take > a chance on books about anime and manga. > > Unfortunately, as I know firsthand (and as I've heard from other authors, > confirming that it's not just me) these books didn't sell nearly as well as > anyone was hoping, which in turn meant that these publishers didn't want to > take risks with additional books along these lines. After all, all publishers > need to make money in one way or another to stay afloat. In the last few > years, the majority of books on anime and manga have been published by > university presses, perhaps most notably the University of Minnesota Press. > > ...However, this puts books like Drazen's in an odd predicament. It's not > really an academic book, since it lacks the references and theories something > like that would entail, which means it's not a good candidate for a > university press. However, since few popular presses have seen their books on > anime and manga reflect positively on their bottom lines, there aren't many > other options these days other than self-publishing. Of course, these days > publishing a book on your own doesn't have nearly the same connotations it > did decades ago, when vanity presses were the domain of those with more money > (and ego) than sense. These days you can self-publish a quality product, get > it up on Amazon for all to see, and (if you're savvy about these things) > perhaps even make a tidy profit." -- gwern http://www.gwern.net _______________________________________________ WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@lists.wikimedia.org To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
