Category: publishing

“The newly announced chairman of the 2005 Man Booker prize has admitted that the judges are unlikely to read all 130 books in contention, while describing his fellow judges as “light on the minorities” and the process as like a “world federation wrestling match”.”

John Sutherland has been named head of this year’s Booker Prize jury. “He is professor of modern English literature at University College London and writes a column for The Guardian. He has also written or edited 50 books ranging from critiques of classic novels to a book about alcoholism, partly based on his own experiences.”

Then there was the time Daniel Asa Rose took a job as a copy editor – at a porn publication. Even here, (at least some of )the niceties of style need to be followed. Let’s see, do you hyphenate…

Faber & Faber is breaking with its international distributor of the past 23 years, Penguin International, to represent itself – and a group of small independent publishers between them responsible for some spectacular bestsellers.

“The American Library Association has created a new award for children’s books, to be named after the late Dr. Seuss. The Theodor Seuss Geisel Award for outstanding children’s literature will begin next year, the Association for Library Service to Children announced Friday.”

Why do trade publications publish anonymous reviews? “There are nearly 500 books a day published in America, or enough in a year to fill an average-size college library. No one could possibly read reviews of them all, let alone the books themselves. Even the team of Stakhanovite readers at Publishers Weekly can cover only about 10,000 books a year. Faced with this annual tsunami of literature, we all must grasp at any bit of solid support that comes to hand. We have no choice but to seek advice. That’s one reason why Publishers Weekly and Kirkus cling to their policy of anonymity: It suggests a magisterial, objective, authoritative source, unsullied by personal biases. Yet the opinions actually on offer in these magazines are every bit as quirky, perverse and prone to bias as they are in publications where the writers must take responsibility for what they say.”

Writers now spend an extraordinary part of their lives promoting their work. “Now, more than ever, the book-promotion machine is working against the interests of the writers it has been set up to promote. Now, as never before, the marketplace is devouring the hand, the arm and the head that feed it. Authors of all shapes and sizes have become either the dupes or accomplices of a publishing industry that is exploiting its writers as its unpaid representatives.”

Some Arkansas legislators want the state’s public school textbooks to define marriage as the union of a man and a woman — just like the recently approved amendment to the state Constitution.

One of the surprise publishing successes of the year in Europe is a book comprising a stock of desperate, poignant, and occasionally bitter e-mails sent by a Palestinian architect to her friends and relatives, relating her experiences of life in the West Bank during the Palestinian intifada and subsequent Israeli crackdown. The star of the book is the author’s mother-in-law, who seems simultaneously to embody the stressese of in-laws the world over, and to symbolize the indomitable will of a people under siege.

Where to find good writing on books? How about Bookslut? “She [Jessa Crispin] will review books or talk about books that maybe aren’t the biggest best sellers out there, but she loves them. It goes right back to Jessa and the personality she injects into it. It’s attractive to both users and industry folks alike. The combination of the reviews and the blog is very powerful.”