To the editor: It’s unhappy to see Catapult Books go, however utterly comprehensible (“Catapult Books is being sold; authors mourn a major loss to L.A.’s literary scene,” Oct. 23). I’ve made my residing as a novelist for 40 years, working for the Massive 5 publishers earlier than going indie.
The union’s objective of higher pay and job stability is nice in concept, however it’s seldom viable within the publishing trade. All of us work and thrive — or not — on the whims of readers, the financial system that typically restricts disposable revenue, and an ever-changing panorama of leisure choices that chop that disposable revenue into items.
It’s seemingly that Catapult couldn’t, in good religion, meet the union’s calls for. Neither, I assume, can the entity that purchased Catapult, and that’s most likely why 20 individuals are actually jobless. My coronary heart is with the 16 authors in limbo and the house owners of what as soon as was a jewel in L.A.’s leisure crown.
Rebecca Forster, Los Angeles
