Category: publishing

“Readers of fiction want their favourite authors’ life stories to show a bit of leg, and to have an air of romance about them. JK Rowling, for instance, did herself no harm with her tales of writing, broke and unpublished, in the corner of an Edinburgh cafe.”

“So Amazon’s selling 100,000 Kindles a week, or it is if you believe Stuff.tv… But a quick browse on the Kindle book store set me wondering what exactly people are reading on the damn thing.”

The book was 2,268th position on the Amazon sales list, up from 396,224th the previous day.

“The author book tour has become an endangered species. Long-rumored, much feared, the demise of traditional tours by authors though many American cities have gone into a steep decline in the last year or two. Book industry insiders say that the reduction in touring authors ranges somewhere between one-third and one-half, with little likelihood of a rebound.”

“A Geneva-based international trade lawyer whose poignant, humane and funny collection of stories about her home country, Zimbabwe, has impressed critics was tonight named winner of the Guardian First Book Award. Petina Gappah became only the second short story writer to win the award in its 10-year history.”

A new “Save Borders” Facebook has spring up; management and support staff have been laid off, but in-store workers still have their jobs for now; “considerable interest has been expressed [by potential purchasers] either in the business and/or certain stores”; even the chain’s book-buying is “running with a skeleton staff.”

“Veteran Mexican poet and novelist José Emilio Pacheco has won the [€125,000] Cervantes Prize, the most prestigious literary award for writing in Spanish.”

“A new testing method can rapidly determine the condition of old books and documents by analyzing the bouquet of volatile organic compounds (VOCs) released by paper off-gassing. The technology promises to help conservators assess the condition of old works quickly, while not harming the documents.”

A new document on the future of libraries in the UK “advocates reforms to the library service up to and including everything from Lovefilm-style delivery, national online borrowing and the ability to return a book wherever you are. … In the document, [arts minister Margaret] Hodge raises the prospect of libraries being allowed to sell books as well as lend them.”

“Possibly the most noble and eloquent poetry-kvetch in the history of the art in English is Ben Jonson (1572-1637). … In his angry denunciations of the stupid audiences, ignorant critics, dumb fads, inept rivals, and general decay of poetry and taste in his time, Jonson sometimes hurled Classical allusions.”