Rebirth 2004: A lone figure in the literary world

Chapter 259: One Qi Becomes Three Pure Ones (asking for monthly tickets!)
The editors had no idea how much it would cost to build a road. But Zhang Chao's words made his meaning clear: either he, the publisher, or both would take out a portion of the profits to build a road for Shilei Village.

Of course, if such a condition is attached, Zhang Chao must make some concessions to the publisher in terms of royalties, first printing or other aspects. It is equivalent to co-investment, but the specific operation must be carried out by the publisher.

Since the first novel, the royalties for the first print of Zhang Chao's works have never been less than one million yuan, and the publishing house has naturally made a lot of money. So after the entire sales cycle, it is definitely more than enough to harden the gravel road in Shilei Village.

As for the specific details of the contract, I will definitely have to wait until I get the stack of papers in the village chief's hand and then find Zhang Chao or "Chaotide Culture" to confirm.

So almost all editors raised their hands enthusiastically:

“Our publishing house can!”

"Both cement roads and asphalt roads are fine!"

"We can also harden the roads in the village!"

……

When the village chief saw the pairs of eager eyes and waving hands in front of him, he was shocked - this stack of light paper was so valuable?

Thinking back to the day when Zhang Chao revealed his identity, the county leaders were arrogant at first but respectful later. I thought it was too exaggerated.

Looking at it now, it is not only not exaggerated, but not even grand enough!

He also remembered that the light in Zhang Chao's cabin was on all night that night, and the next day he handed him the stack of manuscript paper and explained the follow-up matters one by one.

Then he packed his luggage, put on his backpack, and asked the village chief to arrange a tractor to take him down the mountain. The county actually responded quickly and sent a car up the mountain in the afternoon to pick up Zhang Chao for a lecture in the county, but he just missed it.

Because of this, he was blamed a lot, and people blamed him for letting Zhang Chao run away.

"Village chief, village chief? What are you thinking about?" The voice of an editor brought him back from his memories.

Another editor said, "Now we are all willing to build a road for the village, what should we do?"

The village chief thought for a moment and said, "Wait a moment." Then he took out a small cloth bag from his arms, took out a piece of paper from the small cloth bag, put on his reading glasses and looked at it carefully.

The editors were speechless. Zhang Chao seemed to be addicted to playing with memes.

The village chief looked at it for a while before saying, "Zhang Chao said that if everyone is willing to build the road, the manuscript can be published by no more than three publishing houses at the same time. You need to talk to the village committee one by one about which three publishers they are. The village committee will have to be satisfied before it can be published."

After the village chief finished speaking, the editors started to make a commotion. They had never heard of a book being published by three publishing houses at the same time. Isn't this ridiculous?

After a while, several editors from publishing houses who had never cooperated with Zhang Chao and only came to try their luck expressed their withdrawal after communicating with their superiors through the village committee's landline. They could not accept such a frivolous publishing plan.

As for the editors of Chunfeng Publishing House, Huacheng Publishing House and other publishing houses that had cooperated with Zhang Chao or had more contact with him, they kept their composure and did not join in the fun. They knew that every time Zhang Chao did something, he was not doing it randomly - the saying "wearing leather pants over cotton pants" must have a reason.

In particular, the publishing house that participated in the "bidding meeting" for Zhang Chao's first novel "A Young Man Like You" held at the school three years ago was impressed by his ability to control the publishing direction of his works.

They don't believe that Zhang Chao, who was so stingy about publishing conditions back then, would now joke about his own profits.

Seeing that there were fewer people joining the competition, the village chief quickly took out a small cloth bag from his arms, took out a piece of paper from the small cloth bag, put on his reading glasses and began to read it.

Editors: “…” Zhang Chao, don’t go too far!
After reading the note, the village chief added, "Zhang Chao said that if the three publishers can publish at the same time, the remaining publisher can decide after reading the manuscript tonight."

The editors stopped talking and began to look eagerly at the stack of papers in the village chief's hand. No matter how bizarre the conditions Zhang Chao proposed were, they should read the book first.

The publishers that had withdrawn earlier were filled with regret: they should have waited to read the manuscript before making any decision! But it was too late to regret. The remaining dozen or so publishers’ editors collectively stayed at the village committee, preparing to read the manuscript all night.

The village chief knew that this was a major event related to the future development of Shilei Village, so he quickly arranged for dinner for everyone and sent two braziers to raise the room temperature. In the mountainous areas of Yunnan and Guizhou in January, the night temperature can drop to zero degrees.

The editors, who had originally planned to make do with the bread, biscuits and other dry food they brought with them, were cheered up after eating hot rice, pork and crucian carp, and soon began to circulate Zhang Chao's manuscript.

Starting with Zhu Yanling from Huacheng Society and Shan Yingqi from Chunfeng Society, who arrived first, they passed the page to the next one after reading it.

This was the first time that everyone saw Zhang Chao's handwritten manuscripts. At first glance, everyone curled their lips: "The handwriting is so ugly..." The manuscript paper was of various types and sizes, and some parts were even written in pencil.

But the important thing is the content of the novel. We are all experienced editors, so it seems that we are working very fast. But in less than an hour, the room was full of discussions and even chaotic.

"Is it a children's novel? A fairy tale? It doesn't look like it..."

"It's either a fairy tale or a children's novel. It's a bit like The Grass House by his teacher Cao Wenxuan."

"How can it not be a fairy tale? Doesn't the wizard grandfather here know magic?"

"Where does it say he can cast spells? Why don't I see it?"

"Hey, that's weird. Wasn't this part about chasing fireflies in the mountains already written? Why is it written again here?"

"Look carefully, the writing is different. In the first part, Wei Xiaoliang followed the fireflies to find the way home, while in the second part, he followed the fireflies to avoid the witch."

"Is the sound in the forest coming from the villagers who are looking for him, or is it coming from the changeling?"

"A changeling, huh? Look at this page. It clearly says that the sound came from a depth darker than darkness."

"That's not right. The following page overturns the previous statement."

"Don't take mine. Take mine if you've finished reading your own."

"Which chapter and section is the one marked in your hand? I want to take another look. Why am I getting more and more confused the more I read?"

……

The 400-page manuscript soon became a mess as everyone took it away. The editors were all confused. Zhang Chao's story was a masterpiece in terms of concept, writing style and rhythm at the beginning.

Compared with the works of Yang Hongying and others, it is more pure and simple, without the exaggeration and humor that are deliberately designed to please young readers; compared with Cao Wenxuan's works, it lacks the hidden preaching that comes first with the theme.

Just when everyone was excited about Zhang Chao's new breakthrough in creation, the subsequent development of the story made them fall into a maze.

The constant emergence of new branches brings the plot into a variety of complicated possibilities. It is a bit like his graduation work "Crime Police Glory" last year, but it is very different upon closer inspection.

"The Glory of a Criminal Policeman" is a story about different people's different experiences and interpretations of the same thing in different narrative contexts. It deconstructs objectivity and facts, allowing the characters' fates to end in different ways, and demonstrates the possibilities of novels at the technical level.

The story of "The Boy and the Meteor Shower" is more like different people's interpretations and expectations of the existing plot and subsequent development. Zhang Chao constantly derived new plots based on different interpretations and expectations. However, these derived plots will be re-collected by Zhang Chao every once in a while, just like a river, which goes through the process of "main stream-tributary-main stream" and constantly branching and merging.

No matter which tributary the reader enters, he will eventually return to the main stream.

"Does Zhang Chao have split personality?" An editor rubbed his temples to relieve the swelling feeling caused by his brain running at high speed.

Zhu Yanling and Shan Yingqi, who read the manuscript first, were also the first to read the second half of the novel. They both found that the further into the second half of the novel, the fewer the derivative plots and the more focused the narrative.

It seems that as the story progresses, Zhang Chao’s different “personalities” become more unified in their opinions on the direction of development, and eventually the different personalities begin to merge into one.

"Everyone, stop for a moment!" Zhu Yanling and Shan Yingqi looked at each other and said to everyone in the room.

"Hmm?" Although Zhu Yanling was not the most experienced editor here, she was the editor who had worked with Zhang Chao the earliest and had the most contact with him, so as soon as she opened her mouth, everyone fell silent.

Zhu Yanling sorted out her thoughts and said to everyone, "I think I roughly understand why Zhang Chao said that this story can be handed over to three publishing houses for publication.

From this 400-page manuscript, we can break down at least three stories with coherent plots, complete content, clear themes, but different focuses.

Some are bedtime stories for children, others are more realistic novels, and the complete work can be considered a modernist work of great exploration.”

As soon as Zhu Yanling finished speaking, everyone exclaimed "Oh" in sudden enlightenment - no wonder they couldn't understand it, it turned out that Zhang Chao had incorporated such a complex and completely different narrative method into one story.

If Zhu Yanling hadn't seen the second half first, I'm afraid everyone would be confused. Then everyone secretly took a deep breath. It seemed that no one had ever completed such a unique and novel way of creation.

Did Zhang Chao come here to "live in seclusion" just to complete a work that subverts existing creative cognition?

Shan Yingqi also stood up and added: "Let's not discuss the details first, let's read the whole story first. Then we can discuss how to disassemble and combine this manuscript.

Some of the derivative plots were interrupted and had no subsequent response, so they were excluded first. Some derivative plots were intertwined and integrated later, so they need to be specially marked.

But I just checked and found that the ending of this story is fixed, which means that all clues and possibilities will converge on one line. We need to find this line. "

The editors now had a direction for reading, and quickly reorganized the manuscripts in their hands, sorting them out in order of priority, and the reading progress immediately increased.

The next morning, the village chief came to the village committee with a big pot full of corn and eggs. He found that the editors were still busy with their work, all with dark circles under their eyes.

Sometimes they divided the manuscript into several parts, and then overlapped the different parts; sometimes they took out specific pages from different parts and inserted them into other parts.

During this time, they kept discussing and even arguing, but soon they would reach some kind of consensus and then tacitly start to arrange the manuscript again. No one looked at the village chief.

The village chief didn't know what the charm of Zhang Chao's stack of paper was that could make these "cultured people" so obsessed with it, even to the point of losing their appetite. He could only shake his head, put the pot aside, and quietly leave.

The editors worked until almost noon before they barely reached a consensus. Zhu Yanling's intuition last night was correct. Zhang Chao's manuscript could be published as at least three books.

The first book is a fairy tale with a certain magical color. Just remove the overly plain plots in the manuscript and cut off some complicated branches to make the story line always focused, concise and interesting. The length is about 1 words.

The second book is a fresh, simple, natural and true legendary story. It removes the derivative content with strong magical colors and retains the more complex story clues. It is both suspenseful and interesting to read. The length is about 2 words.

The third book is the complete version of the manuscript, which only requires the deletion of some derivative plots that were obviously started and then abandoned. Under the appearance of children's literature, it is a pioneering work with extremely experimental and avant-garde colors.

Even for an experienced editor, it is difficult to judge the limit of the literary value of the third book. But once it is published, it will definitely cause a sensation!

In fact, if Zhang Chao had limited the number of publishing houses to 4 or 5 and given the editors more time, they might have been able to compile a new version.

In fact, during the editing process, a senior editor suggested that this story should be a novella or a long novella in terms of structure, but Zhang Chao used his own literary techniques to stretch the story to be extremely full.

Although the old editor's words made sense, everyone decided to ignore him. How could a novella make as much money as a novel?

Now that the manuscript has been compiled, the editors are in a dilemma - it is really difficult to make the decision!

The first one is a children's book, which has a vast market but fierce competition, and Zhang Chao has never lowered the age of readers so much. But the market for children's book derivatives is very attractive.

The second book is about realistic legends, and the age range of its readers completely overlaps with that of Zhang Chao’s fans. This is the most mature and stable market for Zhang Chao’s works, so it is the safest choice.

The third book is more of a pure literature. Not to mention children, even young readers rarely get into it. Its sales can only be boosted by Zhang Chao’s fame and reputation, but it is certainly not as good as the first two books.

But publishing is not just about sales. Under the premise that sales are guaranteed to a certain extent, the "added value" of the work is very important - social response, literary history status, and most importantly, whether it can win a heavyweight literary award.

There is no doubt that the third book has the greatest chance of winning!
Different profit expectations determined different conditions offered by the publishing house to Shilei Village. A dozen editors took turns using the village committee's landline to call their respective presidents; when one person made a call, the others had to squat ten meters away to avoid being overheard.

It was not until the evening that everyone finally decided on their own conditions. Then a sacred and solemn scene occurred:
More than a dozen well-known editors in the industry lined up outside the Shilei Village Committee, taking turns to go in and report their conditions to the village chief and accountants, waiting for the final "decision."

When Zhu Yanling and Shan Yingqi saw the scene, they were in a trance and returned to the scene three years ago, when they were muttering "this is not a loss of sovereignty and humiliation of the country" while handing the note with the conditions to Zhang Chao with full expectation.

I couldn't help but shudder all over - to the publishing house, Zhang Chao was simply a devil, torturing people and making them unable to stop...

Let’s not talk about the situation in Shilei Village. Zhang Chao, the instigator, had already left Yunnan and Guizhou and flew all the way back...

Fuhai.

The New Year is coming, and Zhang Chao doesn't want to go back and forth between Yanjing and Fuhai anymore. Judging from the emails, "Tide Culture" has developed steadily without him. Xing Siyuan's "Crazy Spoiled Beautiful Girl: My Boyfriend Is Not Easy to Mess With" quickly topped the bestseller list after its release, with sales exceeding 2 copies in two months.

The first part of Liu Cixin's "The Three-Body Problem" was successfully serialized and caused a huge sensation in the science fiction world. The strange and bizarre Three-Body civilization, the "Smart Son" blocking human technology, the terrifying and elegant "Harp" plan, and the tragic "Don't answer" trilogy...

The grand imagination of "The Three-Body Problem" completely broke through the ceiling of Chinese science fiction, and even world science fiction, on the "collision between Earth and alien civilization", and elevated human speculation on cosmic civilization to a new level.

From then on, there were no more “Four Heavenly Kings” in Chinese science fiction.

The only embarrassing thing was that he didn't have enough manuscripts for his work "The Great Doctor" in "Youth", so he had to keep reducing the number of words in each issue and barely managed to hold on until his return.

As for novel sales, adaptation rights, movie box office... Huang Jiefu handled them in an orderly manner, as can be seen from his ever-growing bank balance.

In this way, Zhang Chao checked emails and finished the manuscripts of "The Great Doctor" and finally returned to his home in Changfu.

When he opened the door and appeared in front of his parents, his father could barely hold back his excitement. When his mother saw Zhang Chao, who had become darker, thinner, and with an untidy beard, she thought about how much he had suffered, and couldn't help but shed two lines of tears:
"My son!"

(Two chapters combined into one, please give me a monthly ticket)

(End of this chapter)