Diminishing Returns

Here's an interesting post at Tobias Buckell's blog. His "Xenowealth" sequence (Crystal Rain, Ragamuffin, Sly Mongoose) is being put on hold (he has two more books in the sequence worked out) and he will instead work on a near-future book called Arctic Rising.

Which is a darn shame, as it appears that one of the reasons is sales. Sales have been (it seems) decent, but the Big Box stores (and WalMart now enters the picture) don't want it, most of the sales have been online (that darned internet again), so the publisher wants to do something different.

Now, Buckell isn't some obscure author in the genre. In addition to the "Xenowealth" books, he's written a best-seller (a HALO "media" novel, The Cole Protocol) and has contributed to a multimedia project that has been nominated for a Hugo Award.

Remember when just getting a Hugo Award got you lots of cred with the publishers and fans? When writing three books that (in total sales, when you put in hardcover + paperback + big box + online) do well would mean more would come?

Has the field gotten too big? Too many sub-genres? Have the publishers gotten too greedy? Too interested in the bottom line and not enough interested in the long-term?

Goodness, it appears the guy sells well. He certainly writes well. The fans seem to like him (take a look around on his site for that picture of a fan clutching an autographed copy of the book...he certainly has appeal across the ages!). He's done stuff that expands the boundary of "classic" SF. He's written about women, about "people of color". He's launched rockets from small Caribbean islands. He's written nifty essays to help beginning writers.

Heck, he even has a nifty subway system that goes between the stars! What does it take these days to keep a series going?