Rebirth in America

At the entrance of Bantam Books, there is a wall with a giant bantam painted on it, which is their company's logo.

Editors at Bantam Books are busy reading manuscripts.

They need to find valuable manuscripts among thousands of submissions, then sign contracts with authors and publish them!

"Hey! Andrew! Do you still remember where you put the magic school novel you showed me more than a year ago?" A middle-aged man wearing thick bottle-bottom glasses rushed out of his office .

Andrew, a junior editor in the office, was turning to review a manuscript. The man yelling at him was a man named White, the editor-in-chief of Bantam Books, who managed more than a dozen editors.

"Editor, what magic school? I have no memory at all." Andrew immediately stood up and answered. He is the editor in charge of fantasy novels.

"It's a novel about a little black-haired boy with a lightning scar on his forehead. He is a little wizard, and his parents are also..." White gestured with his hands, and he patiently explained the content of the book to Andrew.

"Uh... I'm sorry, I don't have any memory at all. How long ago did I give you that book?" Andrew tried to remember.

"It seems to be more than ten months old, or less than ten months old? Who knows, I only know that it was written by a seven-year-old child named Alex Carpenter! Well, he should be eight years old now ." White became anxious, wondering if the manuscript had been returned.

"Carpenter? This name sounds familiar!" someone said from the side.

"Isn't there a Carpenter brother who is very popular recently? I heard that they are brothers, very talented, and have released a best-selling record." Another person immediately thought of the recent hot news.

"Oh! Yes, yes!" These words attracted more people to echo.

"Ah! I remembered, it was the novel called "Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone"!" Andrew suddenly remembered, because the author was incredibly young, which impressed him deeply.

"Did you return the manuscript?" White said, staring at Andrew very seriously.

Andrew said hesitantly: "I...I have already sent it back!"

White was furious and said angrily: "Didn't I tell you to wait first?"

Andrew secretly said in his heart: "It's not you who said that the subject matter was not suitable and the writing style was not suitable, so you asked me to reject the manuscript!"

At this time, another editor suddenly said: "I seem to have seen this author submit a manuscript to our publishing house last month. Did he revise it before submitting it?"

This editor is called Carl, a new editor, and he has a competitive relationship with Andrew. Karl had worked in other publishing houses before, and he only switched to Bantam Publishing House as an editor six months ago.

"So where is the manuscript? Where is it?" White asked overjoyed, pressing Karl's shoulder.

"The manuscript...I took the manuscript home." Karl began to hesitate.

"Took it home?" White did not blame Karl for this. He knew that sometimes there were too many manuscripts, and even if he took them home to read, there would still be many people there. "Then go back and get it quickly!"

"Okay! Okay!" Carl breathed a sigh of relief when he heard this. After he took the book back, his eight or nine-year-old daughter saw it. As a result, she was immediately fascinated by the book and refused to let it go no matter what, so he could only wait for his daughter to read it before returning the manuscript to the author.

In his opinion, the writing style of this book is too straightforward and contains common words. However, considering that the author of the book is only seven or eight years old, it is understandable.

Originally, Andrew was attracted by the story described in this book, including the setting of the magical world, all kinds of strange magic, interesting life in a magic school, etc. He has rarely seen similar novels in his daily life, and because of this, the market prospect of this book is very unclear.

Publishing a novel in a new genre that has never been published before is a big risk.

So he put the book in the hands of editor-in-chief White and asked him to make a decision. Unexpectedly, White gave up because of the other party's writing style and the subject matter of the novel. After all, their company mainly targets adult users. If the writing style is not good, it will definitely not be sold.

As a result, long after Andrew returned the manuscript, White listened to a tape of an interview with the Carpenters on the radio. In that interview, Alex mentioned that he had written a novel, so White was reminded of it.

He made a secret calculation in his mind. With the Carpenter brothers' current reputation, even if the book was terrible, he would be sure to make a profit. However, he still wanted to read the manuscript first, so he immediately asked Andrew, who was in charge.

Unexpectedly, Alex's book manuscript was sent to them again. Maybe Alex was rejected by publishers so many times that he forgot he had sent it once.

Fortunately, Karl, who received the manuscript, was a new editor, and he did not understand what had happened. Otherwise, he should return the manuscript of the book and write a letter telling the other party what the problem is, followed by a few words of encouragement. Unexpectedly, with a little negligence, he left the manuscript of this book at home and was "occupied" by his daughter. As time passed, he forgot about it.

This was a serious oversight, something like this had never happened to Carl before.

"Could it be that White thought this book could be published? Fortunately, the author didn't write a letter asking for the manuscript back!" Carl thought to himself.

The manuscript was soon handed into White's hands, and he looked through it again, this time very carefully.

Standing aside, Karl didn't dare to take a breath. He stared nervously at the editor's face, fearing that the other person would suddenly lose his temper.

White quickly finished "Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone". He touched his chin and then asked: "What do you think of this manuscript? Is it marketable?"

"Well, I think works with this theme are rare on the market, but judging from my daughter's feedback, this type of work is very attractive to children." Karl said carefully.

"Children's market! Yes, you are right." White slapped the manuscript in his hand and continued: "Have you read the book "The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe"?"

"A follow-up novel to Lewis's "The Magician's Nephew"?" Carl suddenly remembered a set of children's literature novels, UU Kanshu www.uukanshu.net, which was a fantasy novel written by the British writer C.S. Lewis in 1950.

The story begins with a little boy and a girl accidentally entering a different world, becoming Narnia, where they experienced a series of adventures and saw the creation of that world. Afterwards, he buried an apple seed brought from another world in the garden, and it grew into a big tree.

"Yes!" White replied affirmatively.

"You mean, this book can also be used as a fantasy literary novel, targeting the market at children?" Karl suddenly became excited. He thought this was a good idea. Most importantly, his position in the company was strengthened. At least in front of the boss, he performed better than Andrew.

"Do you know why I suddenly remembered this manuscript?" White continued to ask.

"Because of the Carpenter brothers?" Carl said with great happiness: "Could it be said that the author of this manuscript was really written by the Carpenter brothers?"

"At least now it seems that it should be written by Alex Carpenter. As for the specific situation, you can find out about it from the author." White handed the manuscript to Carl, and then said: "You are the one who made the real book. Be the editor in charge."

"Me? Okay! I'll call the author right away." Karl took the manuscript, then stood up and prepared to leave the editor's office.

"No, you'd better come to the door in person. It's not too late to buy a plane ticket now, go quickly!" White ordered without hesitation.