Read Online The Thieves of Manhattan by Adam Langer - Free Book Online Page B
Authors: Adam Langer
Ads: Link
y’all, yo.”
Roth surveyed the convivial conference room. It didn’t take long for him to figure out that Jim Merrill and Rowell Templen had made a deal with Blade Markham behind his back. His mind reeling with thoughts of betrayal, he gritted his teeth. He shook hands with Blade, then seethed as Merrill told Roth that he had just signed a half-million-dollar contract to publish
Blade by Blade
. Apparently, Merrill said, “young Rowell” had discovered the manuscript on his own and had taken the initiative of bringing it directly to Merrill’s attention.
“Young Rowell will be working directly on the book, but I’d like you to look over his shoulder a bit during the process,” Merrill said to Roth, then added, as he always did, that the opening of
Blade by Blade
, probably the only part that he had troubled himself to read, was “a real knockout.”
This news would have been humiliating enough, but when Templen looked up at Jed with an oily, smug, and victoriouscheshire, and observed that he was sure he would “find Jed’s feedback invaluable,” Roth could not stand it anymore. “If you’ll excuse me, gentlemen,” he said, then walked fast out the door, letting it slam behind him.
Jim Merrill caught up with Roth when he was halfway down the hall and demanded to know the meaning of his behavior; exactly who did he think he was? Roth thought of trying to convince Merrill that Blade’s book was a fraud, but after Merrill informed Roth that he had outbid three other publishers for the book and was planning to make
Blade by Blade
his lead title for the following autumn, Roth just walked away.
“You can’t leave when I’m talking to you, Jed,” Merrill said.
“Of course I can,” Roth responded. “Because I don’t work for you anymore.”
THE CONFIDENT MAN’S STORY, PART VIII
“Well,” Jed Roth said, handing me a glass of faulkner with two ice cubes in it as I sat on his living room couch, “now you have some idea why Rowell Templen has my job and I have none, why Blade Markham has a book contract and you have none, why we’re two jobless men with enough free time to drink whiskey after midnight.”
I clinked Roth’s glass and swigged to the freedoms afforded to the unemployed.
Roth said his initial inclination after leaving Merrill was to start looking for another editing job, but he figured that he would probably find himself in a similar predicament, continuingto work in a frightened industry more concerned with its own survival than its legacy, one that had never quite lived up to his fantasy version of it anyway. He would spend more time improving the writing of celebrities who had been signed for their names, not their prose; more time ignoring obvious inventions in fake or exaggerated memoirs if those inventions would mean better sales. He would continue to live in a world of books, but would read fewer and fewer of them. When he had started out in New York, he’d read so much, but ever since he had begun working at Merrill, he read only the books that were relevant to his job, which wasn’t really reading at all. He was unable to recall the last time he’d read solely for pleasure.
“So,” I asked Roth as I sipped the whiskey that I certainly didn’t need, “you would have published my stories if you could have?”
Roth laughed as if my question was so presumptuous and the answer so obvious that he didn’t need to offer it.
“Of course not,” he finally said, and when I looked at him, somewhat dumbfounded and more than a little defensive, he said, “No, Ian. You’re a decent writer. You know how to take a story from your life and tell it in a way that makes it sound smart and sad and witty and real. You know how to do that, but in the end, so what?”
“So, you’d think that would be enough,” I said.
Roth made a
peh
sound with his lips. “Why would you think that, Ian?” he asked, and in the suddenly fierce gaze with which he now regarded me, I could see the way
Roth surveyed the convivial conference room. It didn’t take long for him to figure out that Jim Merrill and Rowell Templen had made a deal with Blade Markham behind his back. His mind reeling with thoughts of betrayal, he gritted his teeth. He shook hands with Blade, then seethed as Merrill told Roth that he had just signed a half-million-dollar contract to publish
Blade by Blade
. Apparently, Merrill said, “young Rowell” had discovered the manuscript on his own and had taken the initiative of bringing it directly to Merrill’s attention.
“Young Rowell will be working directly on the book, but I’d like you to look over his shoulder a bit during the process,” Merrill said to Roth, then added, as he always did, that the opening of
Blade by Blade
, probably the only part that he had troubled himself to read, was “a real knockout.”
This news would have been humiliating enough, but when Templen looked up at Jed with an oily, smug, and victoriouscheshire, and observed that he was sure he would “find Jed’s feedback invaluable,” Roth could not stand it anymore. “If you’ll excuse me, gentlemen,” he said, then walked fast out the door, letting it slam behind him.
Jim Merrill caught up with Roth when he was halfway down the hall and demanded to know the meaning of his behavior; exactly who did he think he was? Roth thought of trying to convince Merrill that Blade’s book was a fraud, but after Merrill informed Roth that he had outbid three other publishers for the book and was planning to make
Blade by Blade
his lead title for the following autumn, Roth just walked away.
“You can’t leave when I’m talking to you, Jed,” Merrill said.
“Of course I can,” Roth responded. “Because I don’t work for you anymore.”
THE CONFIDENT MAN’S STORY, PART VIII
“Well,” Jed Roth said, handing me a glass of faulkner with two ice cubes in it as I sat on his living room couch, “now you have some idea why Rowell Templen has my job and I have none, why Blade Markham has a book contract and you have none, why we’re two jobless men with enough free time to drink whiskey after midnight.”
I clinked Roth’s glass and swigged to the freedoms afforded to the unemployed.
Roth said his initial inclination after leaving Merrill was to start looking for another editing job, but he figured that he would probably find himself in a similar predicament, continuingto work in a frightened industry more concerned with its own survival than its legacy, one that had never quite lived up to his fantasy version of it anyway. He would spend more time improving the writing of celebrities who had been signed for their names, not their prose; more time ignoring obvious inventions in fake or exaggerated memoirs if those inventions would mean better sales. He would continue to live in a world of books, but would read fewer and fewer of them. When he had started out in New York, he’d read so much, but ever since he had begun working at Merrill, he read only the books that were relevant to his job, which wasn’t really reading at all. He was unable to recall the last time he’d read solely for pleasure.
“So,” I asked Roth as I sipped the whiskey that I certainly didn’t need, “you would have published my stories if you could have?”
Roth laughed as if my question was so presumptuous and the answer so obvious that he didn’t need to offer it.
“Of course not,” he finally said, and when I looked at him, somewhat dumbfounded and more than a little defensive, he said, “No, Ian. You’re a decent writer. You know how to take a story from your life and tell it in a way that makes it sound smart and sad and witty and real. You know how to do that, but in the end, so what?”
“So, you’d think that would be enough,” I said.
Roth made a
peh
sound with his lips. “Why would you think that, Ian?” he asked, and in the suddenly fierce gaze with which he now regarded me, I could see the way
Similar Books
