Rebirth 2004: A lone figure in the literary world

Chapter 47 The clown is actually me?
Although 2004 is not as fast as 2024, it is still relatively convenient to send a file over the Internet.

If the March issue of Huacheng was printed by its own printing factory in Yangcheng and then distributed to all parts of the country, it would be a waste of time. So Xiao Jianguo simply sent the electronic layout of this issue to several reliable printing companies in cities with large orders, asked them to print it, and then let the channels pick up the goods themselves.

The profit will be a little smaller, but the speed is fast.

Xiao Jianguo would never have thought that this issue of Huacheng would sell out for nearly a year, and after repeated reprints, the sales volume eventually exceeded one million copies. It became the only pure literature journal with a single issue sales volume of over one million after the 90s, and it was also the most glorious moment of Huacheng during his tenure as editor-in-chief and president. Until his retirement, it was the most prestigious topic for Comrade Xiao.

Of course, these are all things to follow.

For a time, Zhu Yanling's status in Huacheng Publishing House soared. For several days, Wang Hongzhao didn't dare to look up when he saw her, and could only lower his head and pretend to review manuscripts.

Zhu Yanling also had no time to pay attention to these trivial matters in the office. Her most important job at the moment was to proofread "Better Days" and contact book sales channels in various places, so as to sell the first print of 40 copies of "Better Days" as soon as possible.

Proofreading only requires carefulness and patience, but book sales also require connections and an appropriate introduction to the novel.

If your introduction is not strong enough, people will think that you lack confidence, which proves that the novel is unlikely to sell well; if your introduction is too strong, people will think that you are exaggerating, which proves that the novel is unlikely to sell well.

In the era before online shopping took off, several traditional channels were very powerful. The top one was naturally the Xinhua Bookstore system, which, with more than 15000 stores across the country, was almost the only bookseller that dared to say that it could sell books to every corner of the country.

In addition, the central cities of the country have their own book wholesale markets. The Capital Book Wholesale Market in Yanjing is the core of book wholesale in North China, the Book Purchasing Center in Yangcheng is the core of South China, and the Publishing House of Jiangsu Province is also a local lord.

Zhu Yanling had to communicate with each of these families one by one. Huacheng Publishing House couldn't afford full-time sales staff for a while. The editor-in-chief and editors had to shoulder this burden.

The first print run of "Youth Like You" is 40 copies, and the orders received so far have barely reached 20 copies. There is still one month before the planned official release, and we should be able to order 10-15 copies. The rest will definitely be sold through Huacheng's own retail channels. And judging by everyone's enthusiasm for ordering, it should not be a problem to sell more than 18 million copies within 100 months.

Thinking of this, Zhu Yanling breathed a sigh of relief.

On the campus of Changfu No. 3 Middle School, Zhang Chao still lived a calm life as a senior in high school, and even started to go to the playground to play basketball again. The depressed Chen Huan was happy at this time, and passed him a few good balls, but none of them hit his head.

Perhaps it was because they saw Zhang Chao every day, and out of a "cheat on the gods by being close to the temple" mentality, the students of No. 3 Middle School were not so fanatical about him.

Besides, Fuhai is not one of the first-tier cities like Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou and Shenzhen, and the Internet penetration rate among students is not that high. Although "Midnight Tide" has set off a huge wave on the Internet, in this small place, there are only a few ripples.

However, there are indeed many junior students who look at Zhang Chao with timidity and admiration as he walks around the campus every day. Zhang Chao is used to it.

The most obvious change is that he has received more invitations to write articles, some sent to the school mailbox, and some sent to his mailbox. Among them are literary journals such as "Youth Literature" and "Zhongshan", and many newspapers have invited him to open a column. The payment standard for traditional literary journals is still not high, mostly maintained at 50 to 150 per thousand words, which is the starting point of the decline of pure literature in the late s and early s.

But newspapers are different. Newspapers with good sales do not rely on the price of 500 cents, but on various advertisements, so they live a comfortable life. So some newspapers even offered him a high price of yuan per thousand words. But this could not dispel Zhang Chao's idea of ​​stopping writing for a while.

On March 3, Zhang Chao checked his balance at the school's ATM and found that he had more than 15 yuan, which was basically the royalties from the major newspapers and magazines that reprinted his articles from January to February. In the recent evening self-study classes, Zhang Chao rarely attended the classes in person—of course, his mind was basically not online.

However, Chen Huan in the back seat couldn't help but exclaimed: "Ah, this guy was finally caught!"

Then a newspaper was placed in front of Zhang Chao, which was about the incident at Yunnan University. This news was more refreshing than medicated oil, and it made Zhang Chao feel as if his body and soul were one.

The incident at Yunnan University had a bad impact. Zhang Chao had been obsessed with writing before and ignored various social news, so he didn't pay attention to this incident.

This is a textbook case in the entire history of Chinese journalism and communication.

I will not go into the details of the incident, but in the years after it happened, most people blamed it on school bullying, believing that bullying led to the tragedy.

The whole tragedy is mostly caused by negative personality traits. Unfortunately, people are taking their anger out on the wrong people.

Thinking of this, Zhang Chao was filled with righteous indignation. As a reborn person who understood the cause and effect, a youth opinion leader, and a pioneer of anti-bullying literature, he felt that he had to clarify the matter in the media and prevent this farce from happening.

Zhang Chao wants to prove that he can not only create momentum, but also be the only clear-headed person in the public opinion field!
The next day during evening self-study, Zhang Chao went into the small classroom, opened the document, and typed in the title:
"Please open your eyes before you party, don't become a clown"

Zhang Chao has thought it through. The article will kindly remind reporters to pay attention to scale, depth and comprehensiveness in reporting, and not to mislead readers and viewers for the sake of sensationalism.

Zhang Chao found again the passion he had when he wrote his first three articles.

"Ding ding ding..." The QQ number on the lower right corner was flashing. Zhang Chao clicked it and saw a link from Dongfangxing. The address was a report on Xinlang.com.

Zhang Chao clicked on it and saw——

Midnight Tides: The Great Prophet

Um! ?

Zhang Chao hurriedly read on. The reporter who wrote this report believed that although the novel "Better Days Like You" had not been serialized to the end, its theme was undoubtedly about the resistance of the bullied against the bullies. Therefore, he praised Zhang Chao and said that his novel was an accurate prophecy.

Zhang Chao was dumbfounded! The wind was blowing in the wrong direction!
He immediately searched again with keywords and found that similar reports and discussions were already rampant on the Internet, but had not yet spread to print media. The various forums were particularly exaggerated:

……

Zhang Chao: The clown is actually me?
(End of this chapter)