The Unexpectedly Long Life of an eBook by Catherine Czerkawska
The Curiosity Cabinet started out as a trilogy for Radio 4 back in the 1990s. I then rewrote it, with significant changes, as a novel. It took a very long time to find a publisher. It was some time in the late 90s, when I was looking for a new agent, that one of them called it ‘a library novel fit only for housewives.’ I wasn’t a newcomer in any sense. I had a long and occasionally award winning career as a playwright and poet, and two published novels behind me so I could laugh it off. But it still stung a bit. Eventually, I secured representation at one of the bigger London agencies. She told me that she liked the novel, but she thought it was ‘too quiet’ to sell. Nevertheless, she sent it out to the big boys. I forget how many there were back then – certainly a few more than the current Big Five, but all the same, amalgamations had occurred and the so called mid-list was on the slide. Agents and publishers were already talking about the ‘decline of the mid-list’. One even co...