Thursday, 24^th May 2012 (London)

Guest of Honour: Richard Mollet, Chief Executive, The Publishers Association

This seminar will offer a timely opportunity to consider the current and future challenges posed by structural change in the publishing industry emanating from the increased popularity of the eBook, declining sales of physical books and the rise of supermarket retailing. Timed to follow the consultation on Public Lending Rights from library loans and the coming changes to copyright law following the Hargreaves Review, it will address emerging issues concerning the future of book revenues in an already pressured market.

Delegates will assess future trends in book retailing, with planned sessions exploring the maturing eBook market, the growth of the tablet and mobile internet, and how they will affect the future of the eReader. The agenda includes discussion of the effect of reduced sales on publishers and authors, as well as high street, independent and online booksellers, and the future role of the book shop as retailers choose new, diverse models for book promotion, discounting and improving customer experience.

For more details or to book click here.

Line-up announcements have been made and tickets have gone on sale for this year’s London Literature Festival, happening at the Southbank Centre from 3-12 July. Amongst the big names making appearances in those ten days are Michael Morpurgo (whose Q&A will almost certainly consist entirely of variations on the question ‘so what’s Steven Spielberg really like?’), John Pilger, Will Self, Andy Kershaw, Siri Hustvedt, Clive Stafford Smith, Noo Saro-Wiwa, Stella Duffy, Mark Haddon and Andy Stanton.

Fed up with self-publishing success stories yet? Waiting for the straw that breaks the camel’s back and sends everyone scurrying back to tried and tested means of publishing? Well tough noogies, because it looks like that ain’t happening any time soon, with The Bookseller bringing news of the latest DIY bidding battle. Century has beaten out four other contenders for the rights to Hugh Howey’s Amazon bestseller Wool, a post-apocalyptic epic initially published in five parts beginning last summer. Not that Amazon reviews necessarily mean anything, but the flurry of four and five star raves for the book might help explain why, despite no marketing push from anyone but Howey himself, Wool is currently sitting in the top 50 paid downloads for Kindle, and has already been downloaded over 140,000 times worldwide.

If, like me, you spend a lot of time on the internet (like… y’know… enough to clock when adverts change on the same web pages) you will probably have noticed the intense ramping up of aNobii activity across all digital channels recently. In the past two months, their online advertising reached the level of intense saturation usually reserved for dating websites – displaying as gates on pirated videos before you watch them, weird sidebar ad placement on forums, promoted tweets, heaps of whacky Pinterest boards… and so on.

So given the company launched in 2006, why now?

That he was in his 84th year doesn’t soften the blow of Maurice Sendak’s death of complications from a stroke earlier this week. The beloved author and artist of Where The Wild Things Are and In The Night Kitchen remained productive until the end, publishing Bumble-Ardy, his 18th book, a mere eight months ago.

Carolyn Jess Cooke is an exceptional writing talent, and author of The Guardian Angel’s Journal, her new novel The Boy Who Could See Demons has just been published.

There are 3 steps to win a copy of the new book:

• Read about the novel below
• Post a question for Carolyn on the BookMachine Facebook page here
• We pick the best 5 questions and if you’ve written one of them, you get a copy of the book. Good luck!

 

 

“Alex Broccoli is ten years old, likes onions on toast, and can balance on the back legs of his chair for fourteen minutes. His best friend is a 9000-year-old demon called Ruen.

When his depressive mother attempts suicide yet again, Alex meets child psychiatrist Anya. Still bearing the scars of her own daughter’s battle with schizophrenia, Anya fears for Alex’s mental health and attempts to convince him that Ruen doesn’t exist. But as she runs out of medical proof for many of Alex’s claims, she is faced with a question: does Alex suffer from schizophrenia, or can he really see demons?”

Competition T&Cs

Closing date is Tuesday 15th May
Open to UK residents only
Winners will be notified via Facebook on Thursday 17th May
Winners agree to have their question featured on BookMachine.org

In a bid to reclaim some of that £3 million of sweet young adult money from Pottermore, Virago Modern Classics is preparing to publish a collection of six hardbacks that share themes of ‘coming of age’. The titles will be released as physical editions only, with similarly styled covers designed by Mira Nameth, and will retail at £12.99 apiece. Virago is seemingly hoping to tap into the ‘gotta catch ‘em all’ collector mentality that so easily takes hold of the young and suggestible, making this initiative very much the Pokemon of things involving Maya Angelou.

Last week I over-read someone on Twitter saying that ‘Trad pub expect authors to do most marketing these days’. I jumped in with my contrarian point of view, as ever the self-righteous asshole, trying to disguise the fact that I was windmilling my fists by using an even tone. Thankfully, that particular conversation didn’t leave either participant with long-term injuries. But it did get me thinking: do publishing houses ask authors to do too much?

Time to blow off that screening of The Avengers you were planning on catching this evening, because something far more exciting has come up: statistics, and plenty of ‘em. Yes, the Publisher’s Association has released its Statistical Yearbook for 2011, and the figures largely confirm what everyone already knows: digital is on the (slow but steady) rise, print is on the (slow but steady) decline and bookshops are continuing to disappear from the high street.

Having had quite enough of all these knee-cappings and assorted other cripplings at the hands of Amazon, American bookselling chain Barnes & Noble has announced that Microsoft is to invest $300 million in its Nook e-reader and its college textbook arm. The two businesses will form a subsidiary of Barnes & Noble dealing with digital and education, which, given that it’s a collaborative attempt between a bookshop and a company largely responsible for shaping the modern world, feels like it should have a more imaginative name than Newco. The stated aim of the partnership is to ‘accelerate the transition into e-reading’, with Microsoft owning 17.6% of Newco.