Leaked! Details of a Meeting at a Top Publishing Firm!
9.00 am
Boss Editor: Order! Order!
Editor #1: Okay, two of our sixteen baby-and-cowboy lines are ending. We need new names for them. The lines in question are Mission: Pregnancy and Sleepless in Maternity Wards in Texas.
Editor #3: How about - hey, what's that popular movie with David Duchovny and Minnie Driver? Return To Me? We can call ours Return My Babies.
Editor #2: We used that last month.
Editor #1: Okay. Hmm. I got it! Autumn in Maternity Wards!
Boss Editor: And there's always the trusty Mission thing, but do note that there are seven secret agent lines that need new retitlings too. Can we stick to something with babies in it?
Editor #2: Tots-tanic? Baby-ator? I got it! The Spy Who Impregnated Me!
Editor #1: Darlin', that title is reserved as the new name for the Month of Living Dangerously with My Secret Agent from WACK line.
Editor #2: Bummer. Very well, anyone got better ideas?
Everyone shakes their heads.
Boss Editor: Well, there's always one solution. (looks at the not-too-subtly-hidden-listening device at the corner of a wall)
Phone rings and Boss Editor answers.
Boss Editor: Marketing says the right titles will be Baby Boom in Texas and Cowboys Go Totty. Done. Next, we need new ideas for new lines. Two for our Hahapreen Romance line and three for our Solowet Intimate Moments line. Oh, by the way, marketing asks us to change the Solowet line. Seems the title gives the wrong impression that the line of romance has only one main character in the romance.
Editor #3: But what else can we call Solowet? How about Solodex?
Phone rings.
Boss Editor: Marketing says we'll call it Hahapreen Impregnator line, specializing in frigid virgins getting impregnated in one night stands with secret Navy SEAL agents from Texas. It seems 65% percent of the website poll respondents like Navy SEALs and Texas, so there's a market out there to bleed dry. Now, about the ideas for the new lines?
Editor #1: Virgins.
Editor #2: Cowboys.
Editor #3: Navy SEALs.
Editor #1: Strippers.
Editor #2: Marketing reports a 98% higher than expected sales of the books in the stripping secret agent cowboys line.
Boss Editor: Hold on a minute. (answers phone) Marketing suggests all the new lines will have these themes. We'll vary them in cycles, with one book in each trilogy featuring amnesia, the other one reunion, and one more secret babies. The usual. We'll call them Mission: The Preggernator, Surprise, You're... Just a Little Bit Pregnant, and - uhm, let me check again with Marketing - ah yes, The Spy Who Spermatozoaed Me.
Editor #2: Maybe we can add in some titles adapted from Jerry Springer? The polls on our website says that 80% of our readers love Springer, and we all know those cows have little attention span.
Editor #2: Boss, I have a proposal from Author #453, I can't remember her name, and she humbly begs to be allowed to write a story featuring intelligent, socially healthy people falling in love without any babies or cowboys or bodyguarding duties thrown in.
Boss Editor: Blasphemy! Who does she think she is? A friggin' writer? Send her packing. Call Author #454 and tell her to write us that lead cowboy-pregnant-baby title instead.
Editor #1: Imagine the nerves of these workers! Next thing you know they'll be demanding creative license!
Collective gasp at that horrifying thought.
Chief Boss: Whatever, we'll just remove that flowery lettering of Author #453's name on her books and demote her. That'll have her begging for our forgiveness in no time. In the meantime, call Authors #234, #177, #876, and #345 and tell them their assignments for the next two weeks. Remind them that sales are down 0.000986% and Marketing is not happy.
Editors: Yes indeed.
Boss Editor: Well, there's nothing else, so let's adjourn for the day. Marketing wants us to boost up the horoscope page on our website, and we must get down to work ASAP.
