A publishing industry expert has testified that enthusiasm for Steven Galloway’s novel The Cellist of Sarajevo was remarkable and rare, putting the author and former University of British Columbia creative writing chair in a “unique class.”
While sales of books published after such breakout successes often fall off, industry veteran Kevin Hanson said he believed sexual assault allegations against Galloway in 2015 affected the performance of the author’s next novel.
Galloway is suing his accuser, a former student with whom he had an affair, and other defendants, alleging they defamed him by publishing the unproven allegations online and elsewhere.
Hanson produced a report for the legal action, providing an estimate of Galloway’s projected earnings, and recalled in his testimony how The Cellist of Sarajevo was one of the “hot books” at the London Book Fair.
“From what I gather there were heated auctions in many territories for the rights to that book,” he told the B.C. Supreme Court trial on Monday.
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Hanson said he believed the alleged defamations affected the diminished performance of Galloway’s subsequent book, The Confabulist.
The court has heard that when the allegations surfaced in November 2015, Penguin Random House Canada shelved the paperback run of The Confabulist.
The assault claims by Galloway’s accuser, known as A.B., were found unsubstantiated by a former judge hired by the university.
Several people originally named as defendants in Galloway’s lawsuit, filed in 2018, have settled with him and offered public apologies.
Galloway testified earlier in the trial that he could no longer write and had been selling boats.
Hanson said publishers determine how much to pay authors based on several factors, and his report sought to forecast Galloway’s earnings from 2016 until his 70th birthday.
Galloway is pictured in his former office at the University of British Columbia in March 2014. (Ben Nelms/CBC)
Arden Beddoes, a lawyer for A.B., whose name is protected under a publication ban, questioned Hanson about the report and its use of assumptions and comparisons to project earnings, including a comparison with Canadian author Miriam Toews, who also saw success abroad with her novel A Complicated Kindness.
“All I’m doing is looking at the numbers,” Hanson told the court under cross-examination. “But if you’re asking me, do I think that there is an impact of the defamations on the performance of The Confabulist, I would say yes.”
Questioning Hanson, Beddoes said The Confabulist, Galloway’s fourth book, hadn’t performed as well as the author’s previous hit novel.
The Cellist of Sarajevo had earned more than $1 million in royalties, Beddoes said, while Galloway’s first two books and The Confabulist earned tens of thousands.
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The defence lawyer said Galloway was “one for four” with successful books.
But Hanson’s report estimated the author’s potential earnings for six more books would range between more than $700,000 and $2 million each, he said.
“Your projection then showed that he would go after that six for six,” Beddoes said.
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Hanson said it was “fairly typical” for writers not to find success until their third book.
“It takes them a few novels to be discovered and understood and for them to find their strengths. That’s a relatively common thing,” he told the court, while noting some first-time authors do see success at the outset.
“Third novels really establish the preeminence of the writer’s capabilities and that was certainly shown in how publishers around the world, not just Random House of Canada, interpreted what was happening. Because collectively, they saw something completely new,” he said of Galloway’s The Cellist of Sarajevo.
Justice Neena Sharma briefly excused Hanson, who was testifying by video, and told Beddoes his questions were improperly worded.
“His answer is basically saying no, I don’t agree with you. He wasn’t one for four,” Sharma said. “He didn’t agree with the underlying assumption in your question.”
Sharma said the question implied that a book earning tens of thousands of dollars in royalties was a “failure,” a characterization the expert witness refuted.
“I would mean no disrespect to Canadian authors who have published books. I know some personally myself and I consider them very successful,” Beddoes said.
“What I’m concerned about is the quantification of damages.”
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Beddoes said The Confabulist didn’t live up to expectations and subsequent novels may also have underperformed.
“In terms of the numbers, it totally did not perform, and the question is why?” Hanson said. “There’s an infinity of possibilities, obviously.”
Hanson was excused after Beddoes finished his cross-examination and Galloway’s lawyer, Daniel Burnett, said his client’s case was closed.
