‘Three years ago Rebecca’s project got a pledge from Scott. This year they got married.’ That’s from Kickstarter’s look-back in handkerchieves at 2014. My associate at The Bookseller Charlotte Eyre has ably written up the attractive annual report that Kickstarter creates to regale us with how well things have gone. Her story, Kickstarter publishing projects raised… Read More
When ‘There Are No Words,’ I Can’t Even
One of the most perceptive regulars in #FutureChat, The FutureBook digital publishing community’s weekly live discussion, is Carla Douglas of BeyondPaperEditing.com in Kingston, Ontario. And in a recent doing of the discussion, Douglas pointed out that writing, while once among the most isolated and solitary of careers has been made one of the most social by digital… Read More
The Bookseller's Books of 2014: 66 by Women, 54 by Men
‘What are these lists good for?’ And how 2014 of The Bookseller staff to have asked itself this. It has been a very “wait a minute, what are we doing?” kind of year in publishing. And not always a lot of answers at the ready. Or maybe too many answers at the ready, no way… Read More
Music For Writers: Cerrone’s ‘Cities’ Of Ancient Urban Mythology
Turn Off The Lights I have to agree with Tony Frankel at Stage and Cinema on this one: Get into your headphones and shut your eyes. Invisible Cities wants to live inside your head. And the darker that place might be, the better. Never in all my travels had I ventured as far as Adelma.… Read More
Plunging In: The Bookseller's first Independent Author Preview
Here’s the good news: I do think that pretty much all the books I’ve included are good enough to be traditionally published, and by that I mean, well enough written. That should be music to any weary stigma-fighter’s ears. My colleague Caroline Sanderson is filling me in here on her experiences in choosing the very first round… Read More
Music For Writers: Seeing Through Philip Glass
‘The Trouble With My Career’ Once when I interviewed Philip Glass, he told me: The trouble with my career is I’m finally doing what I want to do. And the reason it’s a problem is that I’m doing it all day long and don’t have time to do anything else. And maybe the most remarkable thing… Read More
#FutureBook recap: The Bookseller 100
Even as we started #FutureChat, some of the keenest observations on The Bookseller’s new listing of the 100 most influential people in the UK book business were being drawn by my colleague Philip Jones in his commentary,Centuries apart. He wrote: Looking back at the first Bookseller Century (as it was then known, in 2009), is like… Read More
New And Serious Talk For Authors
Quiet Qualms, Important Inquiries Most major ebook retailers have suffered anemic or declining sales over the last 12-18 months. The gravy train of exponential sales growth is over. Indies have hit a brick wall and are scrambling to make sense of it. Mark Coker In a way, Mark Coker of Smashwords may be saying what we… Read More
Can #EthicalAuthor break through the scepticism?
A funny thing happens when you start talking about ethical behaviour in one setting or another: suddenly everybody was there first. I don’t think this is specific to the authorial community or the wider publishing community: I think we’d find that in almost any industry, a move toward guidelines for ethical business conduct would find… Read More
Writerly Mystique Vs. Self-Exposure: Mind The Gap
‘About My Generation’ When the teacher comes around asking, “How did you spend your weekend?” my answer will be…responding to comments at Writer Unboxed. As a regular contributor to that large, avidly commented-upon authors’ site, I provide columns under the branding “Provocations in Publishing.” The idea of that phrase is to help the unprepared reader of… Read More