On this, the release day for my post-apocalyptic book Five Suns Saga Part 1, I wanted to share a little story about epigraphs and copyright. Those are those quotes you see at the beginnings of books, quite often song lyrics. Since those dog-eared Stephen King paperbacks I loved as a teen, I’ve always enjoyed seeing a snippet of song lyric at the front of a book, wondering how it ties into the story…
The Epigraph: Shiny Object
I desperately wanted to include an epigraph in the Five Suns books. I had the perfect one in mind:
I saw flowers on the hillside
And a millionaire pissing on the lawn
Saw a prisoner take a pistol
And say, “Join me in song, join me in song”
It’s a line from the Iron & Wine song “Walking Far From Home,” one of my favorite tunes ever.
I thought this was perfect for Five Suns because it expresses the insanity I think would come with a sort of doomsday apocalyptic scenario where there’s more going on than meets the eye, which is exactly what the Five Suns world is all about.
The copyright: carrot on a stick
In order to include lyrics to a song in a book, whether as an epigraph or in the body of the text, you have to obtain permission from the “rights holders.” Putting quotes around something with a dash and a person’s name doesn’t cut it. Song lyrics are copyrighted, and someone owns those suckers. And it’s often not the artist, unless they’re indies without labels.
This works the same for self-published and traditionally-published authors. Stephen King probably has assistants who seek out the permissions for him, but most authors (or their publishers) have to do this themselves.
So, last October, knowing this might take a while, I started the process. First it was a scavenger hunt to find the rights holder. For some reason, this isn’t easily accessible information.
Once I found the publishing company who owned the rights, I had to fill out a formal request. Which lyrics, how I plan to use them, how many copies of the book I expect to sell (I wrote in “50 bajillion,” which their website returned as an error for some reason), plus a dozen other details, then I wait.
At this point, I don’t know if the publishing company will say yes, no, or yes but you have to pay us fifty thousand dollars to use these lyrics.
A month goes by. Then two. Then three. I check in to the publisher’s website portal and check my request, but there’s no movement. No change. I quit worrying about epigraphs and copyright for a while, since I have no control over this part.
Three more months go by, and I’ve given up hope.
Finally, six months after I began this process and less than two months before the book is due to be published, I write an email to the head of the rights division at the publishing company. Hey man, what’s the deal?
He writes back: we determined months ago that we do not actually own those rights and we do not know who does, so we do not know where to direct you. We sent you an email about this, it must have gotten lost in your spam folder.
LIES!!! ALL LIES!!!
Just kidding.
So, I give up. No epigraph for my Five Suns Saga. But, if you’re reading this, and you read the book, just look at those lyrics up above and pretend that they’re on a page near the front of the book, with quotes around it, and a dash below with “Iron & Wine” in italics.
Because that’s as close as we’re going to get.
Also, p.s.: if you’re an author and you’re reading this, and you’re wondering if it’s okay to use song lyrics (or something similar) in your book, my advice is: get legal advice! I’m not a lawyer and this ain’t a legal blog.
