As early as January of this year, Lin Chaoyang's interview appeared in the "Paris Review", and he entered the attention of the American literary world. However, at that time, he was still known as the winner of the new French Renaudot Literary Prize.

Known.

"The Truman Show" was released almost at the same time as the current issue of "The Paris Review," and it initially only attracted attention in the American literary world.

Later, Random House had a certain effect in promoting the novel, and many ordinary readers also noticed the novel. Only then did everyone learn that the film adaptation of the novel had been released in the United States the year before, and had also won a lot of awards as a non-English film.

Common achievements.

The sales of "The Truman Show" gradually started due to this kind of attention.

Many people in later generations always have a misunderstanding. When they see slogans such as "The New York Times' best-selling works" or "The New York Times' works that have been on the list for 20 consecutive weeks", they will subconsciously think that the sales of a book

Huge sales were achieved.

In fact, book sales in the United States follow a common sales curve, with fiction sales typically peaking two to six weeks after release, and nonfiction sales usually peaking at some point in the first 15 weeks.

.

Although many people believe that gold always shines, and those neglected good books will slowly attract readers,

It ended up being a classic, but in fact there are very few cases like this.

Most of the time, if a book is not well received by the market when it is first released, it will most likely be submerged in the endless sea of ​​new books.

In such a market environment, sales performance in the new period is particularly important.

When "The Truman Show" was first released, it was the off-season for the American book market, and three or four thousand copies a week were enough to make it onto the bestseller list.

But as luck would have it, the weekly sales of novels are always a little behind.

As time goes by, the American book market becomes more and more popular, and it will normally reach its peak season in November and December. At this time, the standard for being on the bestseller list will also increase to about 10,000 copies per week.

So although the sales of "The Truman Show" continued to rise in the following months, it was still a little short of being on the best-seller list.

It was not until June that the novel finally made it onto the New York Times bestseller list.

In addition to the film adaptation and the author's award-winning influence, the most critical thing is the fermentation of the novel's reputation.

What is the story of "The Truman Show"?

The protagonist Truman was raised in a huge studio by fists since he was a child. All his relatives and friends around him,

His life experiences are all false. He seems happy and contented, but in fact he has lost his freedom since birth.

When he discovered the truth of this world, he rushed to the other side of freedom without hesitation.

Pursue freedom at all costs!

For American readers, the explicit views expressed in "The Truman Show" fit their values ​​too well.

From one word to ten, and from ten to hundreds, the reputation of "The Truman Show" spread little by little among American readers. Good literary works have such a communication ability.

According to statistics, 25% of new books on the New York Times best-seller list will only briefly appear at the bottom of the list in the first few weeks of their release, and then disappear a week later. Less than 40% of the books will be on the list.

Stayed on the order for more than 5 weeks.

"The Truman Show" has been on the list for five consecutive weeks, which has surpassed most of the best-sellers on the list.

Although the sales volume is not explosive, it makes Random House even more optimistic, because based on their experience, only books with sales trends like this that continue to rise and are on the list are truly popular works with a long tail effect.

Many of the books that have explosive sales as soon as they are published are hyped, and may quickly exhaust their potential after the first few weeks of explosive sales.

The hot sales of "The Truman Show" made Random House pay more attention to Lin Chaoyang, and the royalty settlement was naturally happy.

In the American book market, professional books have always been expensive, often costing hundreds of dollars. On the contrary, fictional books such as novels are relatively affordable.

Especially when a novel is reprinted many times, the price will become more affordable.

"The Truman Show" was published in the United States at a price of $19.9, and sold 92,000 copies in half a year. According to the contract signed by Lin Chaoyang and Random House, after tax was deducted, he received about $150,000 in royalties.

It may not seem like much, but after all, this is just the royalties of a novel in a single country for half a year.

You know, "The Truman Show" is not only published in the United States.

Since the beginning of this year, the publishing royalties of "The Truman Show" have been settled once in France and Japan.

In the last settlement cycle, "The Truman Show" sold 312,000 copies in France and 185,000 copies in Japan, with the total settlement royalties reaching US$830,000.

If we also include the royalties from Lin Chaoyang's other novels published abroad in the first half of the year, he has earned millions of dollars in royalties from overseas publishing alone in this half year, and this does not include royalties from Xiangjiang.

Last year, Lin Chaoyang went to France to receive the award and signed a bunch of publishing contracts. This year, "The Truman Show" will be published in various European countries one after another, which will also bring him a lot of royalties.

Previously, in order to surprise Tao Yushu, he helped Tao Yushu acquire the Yulang Institution with his swollen treasury. His pockets were empty. Now, only half a year later, the treasury is full again.

Lin Chaoyang thought happily that although writing a book is not as profitable as starting a company, it is worse than running a steady stream of money.

Unexpectedly, on the third Friday of July, Yulang Institution announced a plan for a private placement of new shares.

The number of additional shares issued this time accounts for 15% of the total share capital. In addition to setting up an option pool to reward employees, these shares

Others are private placements rather than raising funds from the public.

In this way, it avoided negative effects on its own stocks, and Yulang Institution also successfully raised nearly 100 million Hong Kong dollars in funds.

Although the investment strategy of Yulang Institution has been a little more radical in the past two years, the development momentum of the industry has remained good, with steady progress, and it is actually not short of this small amount of funds.

The targets of Yulang Institution's private placement of new shares include Bank of East Asia and TVB. Among them, Bank of East Asia's investment is reciprocal, and the other two companies are strategic investments to expand distribution channels for animation products under Yulang Institution.

This operation not only solved the problem of concentrated shareholding ratio of major shareholders, but also introduced powerful shareholders.

On the day of Yulang Institution's announcement, the stock price rose in response. As of the close of the day, the stock price had soared 34%, and the market value directly exceeded the HK$1 billion mark.

As the major shareholder of Yulang Institution, Lam's Pictures held more than 80% of the shares before the issuance of additional shares, worth HK$570 million.

After the additional stock issuance, the shareholding ratio dropped to about 70%. The value of the stock not only did not decrease, but also increased sharply to 70%.

billion Hong Kong dollars.

This is the beauty of capital operation!

Looking at the high-spirited photo of his wife on the cover of the newspaper, Lin Chaoyang felt that his little treasury suddenly lost its flavor.

It’s hard to code words, it turns out that money comes quickly without money!

In the afternoon of this day, several guests came to Lin Chaoyang's home. The first one was Dong Qiao, an old acquaintance, followed by an old couple who were over seventy years old.

"Mr. Xia, long time no see!"

"Hello, Ms. Lin!"

This old couple is Xia Chengying and Lin Haiyin from Wandao.

As early as last year, Lin Haiyin asked Dong Qiao to take the lead, hoping to introduce Lin Chaoyang's works to Bay Island.

As a result, Lin Chaoyang stayed in the mainland for several months at the beginning of the year and never returned to Xiangjiang, so the matter was dragged on.

Lin Chaoyang had met Xia Chengying in his early years. When Xia Chengying visited Yanjing with a student delegation from the Chinese University of Hong Kong, he had a pleasant conversation with Lin Chaoyang, who was a librarian at the Yanjing University Library at the time.

"The Death of Van Gogh" was first introduced to Xiangjiang, which was led by him.

When we meet again today, there is a sense of joy in seeing each other again after a long separation.

After greeting each other for a few words, Lin Chaoyang said politely, "I should be the one to visit you two."

Lin Haiyin said with a smile: "Lin Sheng is overly modest. You have won awards overseas and have greatly brought glory to our country. I came here to show my sincerity."

After some polite remarks, Lin Chaoyang first had a little chat with Lin Haiyin and his wife.

Xia Chengying was born into a family of officials in Yanjing. In his early years, his father Xia Renhu served as Secretary-General of the State Council of the Beiyang Government. He studied at Peking Normal University, the predecessor of Yanjing Normal University, and was an alumnus of Tao Yushu.

Lin Haiyin moved to Yanjing with her parents when she was young, and did not return to Bay Island until 1948. She also has simple and deep feelings for Yanjing.

"Yanjing City has changed a lot now, but it is mainly outside the Second Ring Road. Nanliu Lane is still there, and my father bought a yard there. It should be roughly the same as before."

When Lin Haiyin was a child, he lived temporarily in the Fujian Yongchun Guild Hall in Chunshu Hutong and the Guangdong Jiaoling Guild Hall in Hufangqiao Street. The longest place he lived in was Nanliu Lane at the west entrance of Liulichang West Street in Xicheng District.

Nowadays, the Yongchun Guild Hall in Fujian and the Jiaoling Guild Hall in Guangdong have long since changed. Only the courtyard house in Nanliu Lane is still alive.

When asked about old memories from childhood, Lin Haiyin couldn't hide the smile on her face as she listened to Lin Chaoyang's narration.

"When I was a kid, my favorites were dry steamed buns dipped in sugar and noodles with soybean paste. I could drink three big bowls of hot soybean juice in one meal.

My mother couldn't understand it at that time, and she always frowned and said:

How can you swallow this dry food?

How can you chew that hard, thick noodles?

Bean juice is almost like water!

She is a native of Bay Island, but she has a Yanjing stomach like me."

Lin Haiyin spoke with a look of nostalgia on his face, and Lin Chaoyang said with a smile:

"It just so happens that the weather has been hot recently. I will make you some authentic Lao Yanjing fried noodles later."

Hearing this, Lin Haiyin expressed joy, with a bit of expectation on his face.

Today, Lin Haiyin and his wife came here to discuss the publication of Lin Chaoyang's works. It was obvious that no one mentioned this matter after meeting. Instead, they talked about common things and reminiscing about the past became today's theme.

Lin Haiyin and his wife started chatting, and talked about their studying experience in Yanjing, and the various experiences they had in Yanjing when they were young. Although the past events were long ago, they seemed to be vividly remembered.

Seeing that it was almost noon, Lin Chaoyang was getting ready to cook. Dong Qiao teased Lin Haiyin and his wife, "Chaoyang's cooking skills are outstanding. If I hadn't come with you two today, I wouldn't be so lucky.
To be continued...