Wide-Eyed And Bookish In the United Kingdom, Zoe Sugg—known as Zoella to her huge fan base—has pulled off the kind of book-sales numbers that most authors and publishers will never see. Her first book, Girl Online, became the biggest seller in its initial week of any novelist’s debut since BookScan began its data-gathering efforts. What that… Read More
At Frankfurt: Can books find true fans?
Fanning the flames When asking Pan Macmillan’s Naomi Bacon to join us at Frankfurt Book Fair’s Business Club for a discussion of “hardcore fandom” and books in our “Hug the Alien” series of events, I hadn’t counted on getting video in the bargain. But we got it, and it’s good stuff. Bacon, with the… Read More
Girl Online Spooked: What The Zoella Ghostwriting Issue Tells Us
Ghosts Creep Us Out For A Reason This graphic landed in my Twitter stream today, supposedly from the UK-based “Campaign For Real Authors,” hashing themselves as #CFRA. I suspect this is from the Authors Electric collective, which in 2012 had some blog commentary focused on the priority some publishers seem to have for celebrity books over the… 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
Writer Unboxed | On 'Social' Media
When did we all descend into the Valley of the Corporate-Cute? Shall we say with straight faces that the brave Tunisians – whose dogged grace inaugurated the Arab Spring — tweeted their way to freedom? I suppose they’re lucky that Twitter co-founders Jack Dorsey and “Biz” Stone didn’t consign them to quacking in glory or chirping their triumph. And does it make you love a social networking/sharing/bookmarking service better to find it spelled Tumblr instead of Tumbler? Flickr instead of Flicker? Licorize, Pinterest, YouTube. Read More