New York Magazine shows how deals for first fiction have gone through the roof since the success of Charles Frazier's Cold Mountain. (The figures, which speak louder than words, are listed below.) An established writer with so-so sales is soiled, but publishers can tout a debut novelist as the hot new thing. A writer's track record is like credit, says Christy Fletcher, an agent: "It s better to have no credit than bad credit. I showed the article to a friend, a published novelist. "I'm going to change my name," he says.
$4,000,000: Stephen Carter, for first two novels
$1,200,000: Daniel Mason, for The Piano Tuner and a second novel
$1,000,000: Hari Kunzru, for The Impressionist
 $625,000: Plum Sykes, for Bergdorf Blondes
 $500,000: Arthur Phillips, for Prague
 $500,000: Jonathan Safran Foer, for Everything is Illuminated
 $475,000: Alisa Valdes-Rodriguez, for The Dirty Girls Social Club
 The New Literary Lottery [New York Magazine]