Shopping An Idea Is Not Shopping A Book

Writers like to sell books because that's how they make a living.

To make a living at writing, they have to write books that people want to buy. For a sports writer, their tome must be timely, pertinent and reveal something new. No one buys old news, do they?

Over at Sports Illustrated, Franz Lidz broke a news story and got all sorts of coverage. The first openly gay professional athlete comes out of the closet, and it's all the national media can talk about. Mr. Lidz has written a couple of books before, which makes him a known commodity in the publishing world.

Great to be known, but having a solid platform isn't going to compensate for a topic that's gone stale, if it was ever in high demand at all.

There are rumors floating around that Jason Collins the openly gay athlete wants to pen his memoirs. Franz Lidz would, of course, be his ghostwriter.

Or not.

It depends on who you talk to.

Mr. Collins took to Twitter to deny the story.

His agent says he's gotten all sorts of offers on all sorts of deals, but Jason doesn't know if he wants to write a book.

Yet secret sources in publishing say that ICM literary agent Kristine Dahl is shopping a book, but as this is nonfiction, there is no manuscript. It's only an idea being pitched.

An idea, you see, is not an actual book. There are no words on a page just yet. It's a notion, a concept of a book, probably something with a quick turnaround to capture the buzz that's likely to fade.

The rumor mill has one publisher turning down the book. That would suggest that at least one publisher doesn't think the story will sell.

Either Mr. Collins got it all out in the Sports Illustrated article, or the book-buying public doesn't care about his life as a gay athlete hiding in the shadows, acting straight out of fear. So if the idea of a
memoir isn't generating enthusiasm, why would anyone admit they were shopping that book?

If the buzz generated by media outlets was only vibrating within the media outlets, the publishers worry that their target audience yawned or shrugged their shoulders at the announcement, and went back to watching the NBA playoffs that aren't featuring Mr. Collins because he's not a huge star in the basketball firmament.

Sure he's a professional athlete, but he's no LeBron James. Or even Dwayne Wade. Jason Collins simply isn't big enough to snag public interest in his journey of sexual discovery. A publisher isn't going to offer a sizable advance for someone not sizable in his field, who never was a big name with big stats making a big difference on the court.

So maybe Jason Collins isn't shopping a book. His agent might be shopping a treatment. Everyone is right, in their way. It's a matter of language, and the use of words that mean what the speaker wants them to mean.