Sleepy Sickness?! Royalty Ripoff

WHY DO I SLEEP LIKE IT'S A DISEASE? Too long! Too long! From midnight till midday only waking up long enough to light cigarettes and then drop them smouldering back on me... Yes.

I moved my hamsters last night. I don't know why but they took to sitting in a row kissing and washing one another, great fat furballs that they are. I had to keep trying not to laugh at them. Laughter might offend them. This morning I put a lid back on a pen and that was enough to startle one of them back to the nest. Seriously how do they survive in the wild with REAL distractions I cannot imagine... but hey.

Well I didn't write anything yesterday but made up for it today, somehow churning out three entire pages... I can tell you what was holding me back now: the fact that I was writing from heavy notes and constantly feeling the need to check I had included everything etc etc all very neurotic-making. Now the notes have ended and I'm writing off the top of my head which is so much more comfortable. I think I've done 5000 words so - wow! - "only" another 70,000 to go, haha!!

Thanks for all the nice messages from people I didn't know before yesterday... there isn't really any news... oh except I took a look through the tawdry "creative writing" section in my local bookshop (which is WH Smiths - if you know the British high street you will know that WH Smiths is great at selling books by volume and great for popular choices, but if you want something even slightly obscure, chances are they will not stock it. Anyway they had nothing on biography writing. So the volume I gravitated to was called "Writing a Blockbuster"; I turned to the end, the legal contracts bit. And the author would have me believe that for my blockbuster I should accept the following rates for paperback rights:

First 10,000 copies 7.5% of cover price
Thereafter 10% of same.
Export sales (ie Australia etc) 10% of a lower figure cannot remember the terminology.

I was so ANGRY and depressed by this. It happens in the music business as well. That sales in overseas territories accrue you lesser royalties. WHY?? Why should I get less just because a book is bought in India, New Zealand, Tuvalu, South Africa or wherever. British publishers sell books all over the world (a colonial hangover) and I think that settling for less is so unfair.

Then we get to those 7.5%/10% royalty rates. NO!
If you have to sign a contract like that surely the rate should change at 5000 copies and go up to 12.5% after 20,000 and 15% after 30,000 and maybe even higher. That is why I fret about getting a good agent I hate the feeling of being exploited. Ugh! Does anyone actually know about these things who can give me some advice PLEASE!

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Video:
Sinead O'Connor - Don't Cry for me Argentina (sorry I could not think of anything else and I've got stuff on the hob at home...)

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RIGHT: RE THE GREAT VIDEOS DEBATE, BECAUSE there was only one vote in it, the concensus says:
The videos stay as they are now.
Ie. the first day they come out big.
Then they go to the sidebar,
then they go to my other blogs, where they came from.