Have you ever actually seen an olive branch? Self-publishing has dramatically changed the freedom and control authors exercise over their writing careers. The self-publishing successes of top-selling and midlist authors have made it possible for many of them to earn more income from their writing and have raised questions about why authors need publishers. Those… Read More
#FutureChat recap: Crowdfunding's crowded fund of opinion
‘A writer’s work has value and should be paid for’ As our #FutureChat recap comes to the ether, my Bookseller colleague Philip Jones, inCornerstone in joint venture with Unbound, is reporting that the UK’s Penguin Random House imprint Cornerstone will take over publishing trade editions of books crowdfunded on the Unbound platform. Jones writes: Unbound… Read More
A New Architecture Of Algorithms: Could Trajectory Make Books ‘Discoverable’ At Last?
‘To Read More Books In A Similar Vein’ As the book publishing industry heads into its first major conference of the year this week — Digital Book World (hash it #DBW15 with us) in New York City — we learn now that we won’t be seeing one late-breaking major development on the program. And that’s not the… Read More
Music For Writers: Martin Bresnick And The Terrible Beauty Of Sorrow
‘We Will Always Sing Such Songs Of Longing’ Each time I visited, my grandmother wept bitterly about the murder of her parents, her brother, her two sisters, and all their children. Can a child comfort a grandmother, a grandfather? I became a witness, a musician, and a composer. Martin Bresnick is a native New Yorker.… Read More
'Grace notes for ebooks': A new Trajectory for discoverability
When the machines read your book The Bookseller on the stands in London this morning reports that Bowker — the ProQuest-owned US ISBN agency and publishing research firm — is in final talks for a partnership with a company called Trajectory. The aim at Bowker is to offer authors and small publishers a new way to generate… Read More
In 2015, What’s Cooler Than Saying ‘Cool’? Saying Something Specific
This Year, Please Do Not ‘Take It To The Next Level’ They banished absolutely! in 1993. They banished BFF three years ago. Ginormous has been out since 2012. Metrosexual has been gone since 2004. Don’t talk to me about ginormous metrosexuals or I’ll know you didn’t get the memo. Speaking of memos, they’ve even banished words that aren’t words, such… Read More
‘Murder, She Read!’ Taking A Deep Dive Into Mystery With Nielsen
Do We Have A Clue What’s Happening In Mystery/Crime Reading? Their safe and secure lives rocked by a shocking revelation! Their routines turned upside down! Their world wracked by fear of the unknown now stalking them all! No, not the characters in a Dorothy Sayers mystery. I’m talking about the publishers. As I wrote in… Read More
Opening a 'Cracked Eye': The short and the short of it
Follow @Porter_Anderson In short: Another online literary journal enters a crowded field A very crowded field. In fact, there are now so many books — and so many journals and magazines of fiction and other writings — that a new one based in London is banking on “short” as the ace up its sleeve. Short.… Read More
Music For Writers: When Florent Ghys Watches ‘Télévision’
Forget Your Writing Prompts This is the album of the future, and it’s fast becoming a hit. So says a pert, authoritative voice in the opening of the second track on composer-performer Florent Ghys’ new album Télévision from Cantaloupe Music. It’s called a CD. That’s short for compact disc. The music on one of these is… Read More
A Delicate Balance: Can Blurb Become All Things To All Authors?
‘The Best Parts Of Your 2014′ If you’re like me, you may find it somewhat difficult to remember “the best parts of your 2014,” but this, nevertheless, is the kind of talk we expect from Blurb. Here’s some more: The best parts of your 2014 were moments only you could live. Now turn them into… Read More