Not That Auctions Aren't Poetic

Dinitia Smith (NYT) meets Ian Caldwell and Dustin Thomason, co-authors of that hot, hot novel The Rule of Four, soon to be the third-bestselling hardcover fiction in the land. Warning: She pretty much gives away the fictional mystery...and, Publishers Lunch alleges, overlooks some of the details in the real-life tale of its publication. She writes:

In 2001 they finished a draft and gave it to an agent who submitted it to various editors, all of whom turned it down. Susan Kamil, the editorial director of Dial Press, also rejected it, but she invited them to her office to talk about the manuscript and made suggestions...They went back to the drawing board, incorporating Ms. Kamil's ideas. In 2002 they finished another draft. This time editors, including Ms. Kamil, wanted it. "We felt it was only poetic justice to choose Susan," Mr. Thomason said.

Lunch points out that "poetic justice" in this case included an auction which, though the authors refuse to discuss their advance, reportedly brought them something like $500,000. Then again, it sounds like it was money well spent on Dial's part...