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The Building of a Franchise Author
Heather Vogel Frederick -- 10/9/00
Could Bernard Cornwell be Patrick O'Brian on land? HarperCollins clearly hopes so



Quick, name the British writer whose last four novels have soared to the top of the bestseller lists in the U.K., whose net sales there top four million, and whose books have been translated into 16 languages. No, it's not J.K. Rowling.

"Bernard Cornwell is a huge, huge number-one bestseller in the U.K.," said Dan Conaway, executive editor at HarperCollins. "He's a big star there, but in this country, he's somewhat undiscovered as yet."

All that is about to change, if HarperCollins has anything to say about it.

With the release of Sharpe's Fortress next month (see starred review in Forecasts, Sept. 25), the 16th installment in Cornwell's series about Richard Sharpe, a soldier who rises through the ranks to become an officer in the British army during the Napoleonic wars, the publisher is hoping to finally push him into the literary spotlight on this side of the Atlantic.

Harper's efforts to establish Cornwell began three years ago, not coincidentally, when Jane Friedman took over as Harper president and CEO. She was aware of Cornwell's status in the U.K., but Friedman admitted to PW: "I immediately thought, 'Well, he must be very British.' And then I read him, and discovered he is a master storyteller and a great craftsman who should have worldwide popularity."

"Jane has a nose for that sort of thing," added Conaway. "I think a number of us really didn't know what we had until we sat down and started looking at it." He said they discovered that Cornwell's net sales in the U.S. were over a million copies--"We quickly realized there's a deep bed of readership out there."

Cornwell might have been hovering below the radar , but he's far from unknown. Mention his name to a bookseller, for instance, and the accolades flow immediately. "I'm a big fan," said Rob Pine, head buyer at Books & Co. in Dayton, Ohio. Martha Holland of the Concord Bookshop in Concord, Mass., called the Sharpe series "absolutely wonderful," and Robert Segedy, manager/buyer at McIntyre's Fine Books in Pittsboro, N.C., said Cornwell is "just too good not to be discovered. I can't see why he's not number one here, especially when compared to some of the lesser talents who get propelled right up the charts."

Although Cornwell has written many other books--including last May's Stonehenge , whose sales here thus far have been "terrific," according to Conaway--he is best known for his Sharpe series, which he began writing more than 20 years ago.

The initial impetus, the author explained, speaking with PW from his home on Cape Cod, was twofold. A fan of C. S. Forester's Hornblower stories since childhood, in his 20s (he's now 56) Cornwell noticed that no one had ever done on land what writers like Forester and Patrick O'Brian were doing at sea. It occurred to him that perhaps he should leap into the breach. "But I don't think I ever would have done it, as I got a proper job and all," said Cornwell, a former journalist who worked for the BBC and Thames Television news until serendipity intervened. "I fell in love with an American," he explained. The newlyweds moved to the U.S., where Cornwell initially couldn't get a green card. "So I said, rather airily, 'Don't worry, darling, I'll write a book.'"

The result was Sharpe's Rifles, and two decades later, the series is still going strong. No one is more surprised than Cornwell, who, in fact, thought he'd ended the series about seven years ago--just as the TV series starring Sean Bean (which eventually made its way to PBS here) debuted in Britain. "There was this huge push from my publisher to get Sharpe back into the bookshops, so he's had a second lease on life."

Cornwell got busy on a number of prequels, starting with Sharpe's Tiger and Sharpe's Triumph. Next up is Sharpe's Fortress, to be followed by Sharpe's Trafalgar, which has already appeared in Britain. Two more are in the works.

"It's always a joy to start a Sharpe book," Cornwell said. "I know Sharpe so well and I adore him--he's fun to be with and easy to write--although I think he behaves appallingly." Which, of course, is part of the fast-fisted maverick's appeal.

"He's an Indiana Jones type," said publicist Justin L ber, while Conaway called him "a classic up-by-the-bootstraps fellow. He's not titled, he has no advantages, he works his way up from the ground."

If Sharpe's rough edges, bravery in battle and winning way with the ladies appeal to male readers, his charm certainly isn't lost on women.

"In the words of my wife, 'Sharpe rocks,'" said Books & Co.'s Pine. "We tend to genderize too much in this business, and I think Cornwell initially got pegged as a male military history author. He's starting to break out of that."

Friedman is well aware of this "untapped market," as she calls it--a third of Cornwell's sales in the U.K. are to women readers, and the head of his international fan club is a woman, she points out--and is determined to mine it.

Some booksellers are already on the job. Concord Bookshop's Holland, for instance, said she handsells the series to her female customers. "Women tend to feel it's a guy kind of thing," she said, "but Sharpe is such a remarkable character, and there are women in the books, too. I tell them, 'If you like Patrick O'Brian, you'll like the Sharpe series, too.'"

The name Patrick O'Brian tends to come up frequently when Cornwell is mentioned.

"Cornwell is part of the historical fiction publishing trend of the last decade that started with Patrick O'Brian," said Borders spokesperson Kendra Smith, who noted that Cornwell's sales and popularity climbed steadily with each title. "He's definitely on our radar screen."

Such comparisons are catnip to HarperCollins.

"My quest, and the quest I gave to all the HarperCollins people, is, how do we take Bernard Cornwell and 'Patrick O'Brian' him?" said Friedman.

The first step was packaging. Cornwell's paperback originals "had this downmarket commercial look," said Conaway, who witnessed the rise of Patrick O'Brian when he worked at W.W. Norton. "I thought the packaging for Patrick O'Brian was perfect, and his readers are the readers we went after. I shamelessly said 'this is the kind of packaging we want, something classy and upmarket.'"

The new look was launched last year, when HarperCollins moved Cornwell into hardcover for Sharpe's Triumph and simultaneously repackaged three of his backlist titles (Sharpe's Tiger, Sharpe's Battle and Sharpe's Devil) in trade paperback. Penguin owns the paperback rights to 11 of Cornwell's backlist titles, but HarperCollins plans to repackage the others.

Another avenue the publisher intends to pursue is Cornwell's cross-generational appeal.

"I think that teenagers can read him and enjoy him, too," said Friedman, drawing a parallel to Michael Crichton, whom she published years ago and whose ability to appeal to a broad age range she said helped "catapult" him to stardom.

Some students in Cleveland have already discovered this.

After Fairview High School teacher Jim Grealis got hooked on the Sharpe series, he introduced it to his students. "It occurred to me that the books would make a great way to teach both history and reading," he told PW. With the backing of local cable TV provider Cox Communications, which funded the purchase of the books and PBS videotapes, Grealis began using the series to inspire reluctant readers. It was an instant success. "In 24 years of teaching, I've never had so many kids come up and say they couldn't put a book down," he said.

All told, the future is looking bright for Cornwell.

"Our numbers with each book have doubled, so we're moving in the right direction," said Friedman. "And the reviews are starting to come in from places like the Wall Street Journal, which really helps to broaden the audience."

Aside from a tour for Sharpe's Fortress, Cornwell's profile should be helped by more Sharpe episodes on BBC starring Bean, best known for his villainous roles in Patriot Games and the James Bond flick Goldeneye. He's an amazingly productive writer. "We see Bernard as a cornerstone of this company, now and in the future," said Conaway, who is currently in negotiations with the author for a new series contract. The house is behind Cornwell all the way.

"This is really a cause celebre here at HarperCollins," said Friedman. "He's number one in the U.K., and we want him to be number one everywhere."


25 Years Later

Breast Cancer:
No Longer Taboo

When customers come into Women and Children First bookstore in Chicago searching for books about breast cancer, they have an entire shelf of titles from which to choose a book to match their particular need. The same holds true of many bookstores throughout the country, but that wasn't always the case. October is National Breast Cancer Awareness Month, books on the subject are more readily available than ever.

"Different people have different concerns at different points in their treatment," said Linda Bubon, co-owner of Women and Children First. For someone concerned about their own risks Bubon might suggest Assess Your True Risk of Breast Cancer (Holt/Owl) by Patricia T. Kelly.

"We're seeing more personal stories by survivors, but not enough books about how to detect breast cancer," said Deb Williams, spokesperson for Barnes & Noble. Two titles that have been selling well at B&N are Dr. Susan Love's Breast Book, recently reissued by Perseus Books, and Before I Say Goodbye: Recollections and Observations from One Woman's Final Year (Owl) by Ruth Picardie.

In the last 25 years, booksellers say, they have seen the number of breast cancer books increase along with the overall category of women's health. This month, Harper's Quill imprint reissued First, You Cry by Betty Rollin, a breast cancer memoir first published in 1975.

"It was groundbreaking even in terms of its format for someone to talk about illness," said Bubon. "It was before the memoir."

Rollin told PW that in 1975 First, You Cry was a tough sell. "It was a really different era," she said. As Rollin points out in her new introduction to the book, the mid-'70s was a time when people were extremely uncomfortable with the words breast and cancer, let alone putting the two together.

It was Rollin's idea to bring First, You Cry back to print to mark the 25th anniversary of her cancer, but she said both the support from Harper and the reaction from the media have overwhelmed her.

Susan Weinberg, editorial director of Quill, said the house recognized that Rollin's book stands the test of time. "It is the kind of book you'd recommend to someone today," she said. This is the first time that First, You Cry is being published in trade paperback, Weinberg added, "so to me it is a new book."

The first serial is featured in this month's More magazine. Other media coverage includes a Parade feature, a New York Times Magazine dialogue and an interview on NBC Nightly News. Rollin will also appear on Lifetime this month and is scheduled to play herself in a small part on the soap One Life to Live.

"Now, as much of a joy as it is to see First, You Cry republished, my joy is tempered by a sobering fact," writes Rollin. "Nobody would be interested in reading a book about breast cancer if one out of nine women didn't get it and the other eight weren't afraid of getting it."
--Bridget Kinsella