A Package Deal

Eight years ago, Raymond Obstfeld had an idea for what he thought would make a great book: a collection of quotations from the world of rock ‘n’ roll.

The Tustin novelist drafted a book proposal, and his agent sent it to 10 publishing houses. The result: Not one publisher felt there would be any interest in such a book.

Since then, Obstfeld has seen two different rock ‘n’ roll quotation books hit bookstores. It’s not the only time he’s been beaten to the punch on what he thought was a sure-fire book idea.

Obstfeld’s solution was to start his own book packaging-publishing company: A year and a half ago he formed Fossil Press with Los Angeles writer Patricia Fitzgerald.

A book-packaging company, Obstfeld explains, does just that: It comes up with an idea for a book, hires a writer to write it, edits it, designs the cover and text and then sells the entire package to a publishing house, which does the actual printing and distribution.

“I have file cabinets full of ideas,” says Obstfeld, 44, who in addition to being a novelist is an English teacher at Orange Coast College in Costa Mesa. “It made sense to become a packager and publisher and basically edit other writers through these projects that I don’t have time to write.”

Obstfeld says that, according to industry figures, about one out of five books now originates with a book packager.

For publishers, he says, the advantage of working with a book packager is reduced production cost because “all the basic work is done.”

Although publishers can make whatever changes they feel necessary, Obstfeld says, packaging his own book ideas helps ensure that they’ll be published the way he envisioned them. As the author of nearly 35 books, ranging from mysteries and spy thrillers to mainstream novels, that hasn’t always happened.

“That’s easily an understatement,” he says. “In some cases it would be the cover in which they’d emphasize some cheesier aspect--you wrote a whole novel that has 10 pages of sex in it out of 500 pages, and there’s a naked person on the cover, so you find that disturbing.”

Fossil Press got off to a quick start.

Within the first six weeks it had sold two books: “Twang: The Ultimate Country-Western Quotation Book,” compiled by Sheila Burgener of Huntington Beach, and “JabberRock: The Ultimate Rock ‘n’ Roll Quotation Book,” compiled by Obstfeld and Fitzgerald. (Obstfeld says it’s twice as long as other rock ‘n’ roll quotation books and features both humorous and serious quotations on topics ranging from sex and drugs to the creative process and aging.)

Both quotation books, sold to Henry Holt & Co., will be released next fall.

“JabberRock” was sold on the basis of 100 pages of text and a book cover design; “Twang” sold on 20 pages of text. Obstfeld acknowledges that his publishing track record helped convince Holt to buy the books.

“Part of selling something like this on a proposal is the publisher has to have faith you’ll finish the book on time, because they have to schedule it,” he says. “A lot of times people just can’t finish. They have 50 pages in them but not 300.”

Fossil Press has two dozen book projects in various stages of production. All but one of the ideas have been in-house.

To write the books, Obstfeld and Fitzgerald have recruited 15 writers--all but two former writing students of Obstfeld’s at Orange Coast College, where he has taught creative writing for 20 years. The writers of in-house book ideas share profits 50-50 with Fossil Press.

Fossil Press is a small operation. Obstfeld, who serves as executive director, works out of his home in Tustin; creative director Fitzgerald works out of her home office in Los Angeles. Obstfeld’s wife, Loretta Hancock, is senior editor, and Melinda Mullis, owner of Danhausen Group Design in Costa Mesa, is art director. (Obstfeld and Fitzgerald have master’s degrees in creative writing; in December, Hancock will complete work on hers at Chapman University in Orange.)

Although the company will continue to package books, Obstfeld says, the ultimate plan is to publish some titles themselves, such as regional books or those that require “someone to hand-publish and hand-sell them to the right places.”

To get their feet wet, Obstfeld says, they have just published “Jitters: The Best of Southern California Coffeehouse Fiction and Poetry, 1996.” Fossil Press is distributing the book in bookstores and coffeehouses throughout Southern California.

Fliers soliciting material were sent to coffeehouses, resulting in about 1,000 fiction and poetry submissions.

Obstfeld and author Gordon McAlpine, a creative-writing instructor at Chapman University, narrowed the field to about 40 poetry and 20 fiction finalists. Novelist and book critic Carolyn See made the final selection of stories that appear in the book; Suzanne Lummis, founding director of the Los Angeles Poetry Festival, selected the poetry.

First-place winners in each category received $100 each; second-place winners received $50. The others whose work is featured received copies of the book.

Obstfeld says they will do a second edition of “Jitters” next year.

Among books being packaged by Fossil Press are “Black Op: The U.S. Government’s Secret Experimentation on Its Own People,” a book Obstfeld is co-writing with J.B. Allen of Tustin.

The book, he says, chronicles fully documented cases of radiation, biochemical, drug and medical experiments secretly conducted on Americans by the CIA, the military and other federal agencies over the past 50 years.

Early this month, actor Morgan Freeman optioned film rights to “Black Op.” And Obstfeld received further good news from Hollywood: Two of his own books, a mainstream novel called “Earth Angel” and an occult novel he wrote a decade ago, “The Reincarnation of Reese Erikson,” were optioned by different production companies.

“Suddenly, in one week, everybody seemed to think we were hot,” he says with a laugh.

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Obstfeld says creating compelling promotional material is crucial to selling a book to a publisher.

For “SpiritWise,” an examination of Native American moral teachings that Obstfeld is co-writing with Emily Hackbarth of Costa Mesa, Fossil Press imprinted a photograph of an Indian shaman on a raggedly cut leather cover, which they tied with rawhide, beads and a feather. Inside, on several parchment-like pages, was a quiz asking publishing house editors how much they know about the moral teachings of Native Americans.

Sample question: The responsibility for keeping an Iroquois marriage together rested with:

A) The wife.

B) A shaman who acted as marriage counselor.

C) The mothers-in-law.

(Answer: C)

“SpiritWise” promotional pieces were sent to 25 publishing houses the Friday before Labor Day. By that Tuesday, Obstfeld says, four major publishers had called to say they wanted to look at the book.

Once they’ve piqued a publisher’s interest, Obstfeld and company send a specially designed box that contains the partial or complete manuscript, a synopsis, a sample cover and layout of the book, a marketing and promotional report and biographies of the authors.

Separately from Fossil, Obstfeld is writing a novel and a screenplay and has two nonfiction books coming out soon.

“Kinky Cats, Immortal Amoebas and Nine-Armed Octopuses: How Animal Behavior Compares to Human Notions of Morality” will be published by HarperCollins in December. “Doing Good,” a 1,500-page comparative-religion book, will be published by William Morrow next fall.

Although he has taken a hands-on approach by co-writing several of Fossil Press’ first books, Obstfeld plans to only be editing them by the end of the year.