When Hachette Book Group acquired Workman Publishing, HBG CEO Michael Pietsch observed that Workman was one of the biggest, if not the biggest, remaining independent trade publishers left in the U.S. Based on available data, a case could indeed be made that Workman was the largest of its kind. Which has raised a question in publishing circles: why are there so few independent publishers of size? There is a dearth of what can be called midsize publishers that fall between the Big Five and the many independent publishers with sales of $20 million or less.
Links of the week October 4 2021 (40)
Our new feature links to interesting blogs or articles posted online, which will help keep you up to date with what's going on in the book world:
4 October 2021
The Houghton Mifflin Harcourt trade division, with 2020 sales of $192 million, was what could have been considered a mini-major before it was acquired by HarperCollins. The Scholastic trade group, with sales of $355 million in the fiscal year ended May 31, is a major player in the children's trade market, but as part of a $1.3 billion publisher, it is clearly not independent. Other trade publishers that could be considered midsize that are also part of larger companies are Disney's publishing division and Abrams, which is owned by the French company La Martinière Groupe, which was itself acquired by Media Participations.
Other trade publishers that qualify as a midsize independent, based on NPD BookScan market share data, are (ordered alphabetically, not by market share) Andrews McMeel, Chronicle, Kensington, Norton, and Sourcebooks. Many of the smaller trade publishers are distributed by three companies-Independent Publishers Group, Ingram Publisher Services, and National Book Network-that combined represent about 900 publishers. The revenue for each of those distributors is the equivalent of a midsize publisher, with Ingram by far the largest of the three.
There's more to authoring than conquering the blank page. Dozens of unique quirks of industry factor into the experience of a creative. If you're an aspiring writer with traditional publishing in mind, pay attention. Here's what to expect from author life:
There are more gatekeepers than you think. At the pitching stage, it can seem like the only person separating you from bestseller status is the right acquiring editor. In reality, players at several key stages need to get behind your work. Prereaders often triage submissions for editors. Individual editors who love your manuscript may have to sell your project to a wider team. Accepted manuscripts might have to pass muster with print retailers for wide distribution. Critical publications may or may not opt to publish a review, let alone a favorable one.
Advice: Don't jockey to get any one individual to fall in love with your book; conceptualize projects with multiple stakeholders in mind.
HarperCollins is to remove a story from David Walliams' The World's Worst Children after it was criticised for using "harmful stereotypes" in its depiction of a Chinese boy. It is understood the new edition of the book will be published in March 2022 without the story "Brian Wong, Who Was Never, Ever Wrong", with a new character to be included instead.
The publisher confirmed the unusual move, after meeting with podcaster and writer Georgie Ma, who had criticised the book on social media earlier this year after coming across the story. A statement from the publisher read: "In consultation with our author and illustrator we can confirm that a new story will be written to replace ‘Brian Wong' in future editions of The World's Worst Children. The update will be scheduled at the next reprint as part of an ongoing commitment to regularly reviewing content."
Written by Walliams and illustrated by Tony Ross, the book was first published by HarperCollins Children's Books in May 2016, and features characters such as Nigel Nit-Boy and Bertha the Blubberer. Its follow-up, The World's Worst Children 2, was published a year later.
Not exactly one hundred years of solitude, to use the title of a well-known novel, but the long coronavirus lockdowns gave many of us a lot more time to read.
As a result, sales of physical books rose strongly: some 202 million paperbacks and hardbacks were sold in the UK in 2020, according to industry figures.
That was the first time these sales had passed the 200 million mark since 2012.
It was a similar picture in the US, where sales hit 751 million last year, the highest figure since 2009.
We aren't sending anyone to Frankfurt this year, but we're hopeful for the spring fairs," said Heather Baror-Shapiro, an agent who also oversees foreign rights for Baror International, when asked about plans for the upcoming Frankfurt Book FairWorld's largest trade fair for books; held annually mid-October at Frankfurt Trade Fair, Germany; First three days exclusively for trade visitors; general public can attend last two.. "Then again, we were hopeful about Frankfurt 2021 last year, too."
Like most Americans in the international literary rights community, Baror-Shapiro is skipping Frankfurt this year. And though she has no concerns about getting her job done, she, like most, is hopeful that an in-person event is on the horizon. When that will come, however, is anyone's guess.
For Baror-Shapiro and other agents and rights professionals, work for this year's Frankfurt, which is taking place in person beginning October 20, is largely being done via Zoom. Business that usually happens at the endless line of tables in the rights center at the show, or in cafés and bars near the Frankfurt fairgrounds, is being conducted via video chats. For many, this year was about improving upon existing approaches to selling foreign rights virtually.
Elise Valmorbida, author of The Happy Writing Book: Discover the Positive Power of Creative Writing, reports on how her 20-plus years as practitioner and teacher have given her a firm belief that creative writing can deepen your appreciation of life, and empower you as an agent of positive change
"But, seriously, can creative writing be taught?"
Many people ask me this, dubiously, eyebrows knitting, certain of the impossibilities.
Their assumption is that talent, imagination and wordsmithery cannot be learned, that you've either got it or you ain't.
I don't assume this. Writing is a craft. It is something you can learn. Don't let anyone persuade you otherwise. And, while we're here, why don't people question whether music or fine art can be taught?
It was author David Finkel who taught me to "report cinematically." This was key, he argued, to writing a story that feels like a movie, using the variety of camera angles available to the cinematographer, from wide establishing shots to extreme close-ups. Creating such a story, writing coach Donald Murray advised, requires the author to "alter the distance between the writer and the subject matter." Out in the field, this means standing on a hilltop to observe and describe the battlefield below, then getting close enough to read the tattoo on the back of a soldier's hand. These days, such images can be captured in still shots and videos via the cell phone. For the dutiful writer, a notebook is the best kind of camera.
Where did the creators of cinema learn to write cinematically? There were precedents in the history of the visual arts, from cave paintings to tapestries to landscape paintings to portraits to photographs. Some of these showed scenes from a distance, others from close up. But where did those visual artists learn the master tricks of distance, perspective, and point of view?
Its knack for creating tension and controversy has helped it remain an energising force in publishing for more than 50 years - but how do writers, publishers and judges cope with the annual agony of the Booker?
From Rushdie's victory onwards, life has changed dramatically for most of the authors who have won the prize. (In the early days this was "an Oscar-type thing", as an internal memo referred to it: a vaguely art-deco, female figure holding aloft a shallow dish, more than half a metre tall.) "It made it possible for me to live by my work, which I have done ever since," Rushdie told me. When Ben Okri heard his name announced a decade later, at a banquet at Guildhall in London, "I got up, walked slowly, in a dreamlike way, past all these tables and made my way across," he told me. "You could divide my literary life in that walk."
The prize today is worth £50,000 and a guaranteed surge in sales. It remains transformative for its winner. Hilary Mantel's Wolf Hall was already a bestseller when it won in 2009; even so, she told me, "You feel your status change overnight". Bernardine Evaristo, who won jointly with Margaret Atwood in 2019, is, two years on, still busy with press interviews.
The plight of the high street bookshop, struggling against the power of the online giants, is a common complaint either side of the Atlantic. But not often do the prominent players, the authors and publishers, put their words into action and take a stand against the tide.
This month, Dave Eggers, the award-winning campaigning author, is to risk American sales of his new novel, The Every, by limiting access to the hardback copies. Only small bookstores will stock it.
For the US release of the book, on Tuesday, Eggers will allow hardcover editions to go on sale only in small bookstores. Weeks later, Vintage, a division of Random House, will publish an e-book and a paperback version. Even then, customers won't be able to buy the hardcover on Amazon. Eggers's maverick move has been met with great gratitude by America's independent bookstore owners, who are struggling with the huge post-Covid shift to online services.
A recent study in People and Nature claims that animals are being written out of novels at a similar rate to their extinction in the real world. The German Centre for Integrative Biodiversity Research searched the entire online Project Gutenberg Contains thousands of classic texts, available for download. The site, which looks a bit dull, is backed by university departments and other institutions all over the world and gives links to sites which will help you download a Project Gutenberg text to an e-book.. http://www.gutenberg.org
I think he's right, but not because animals have been written out of novels. They've just been written in the wrong way.
Like all such headline-making research papers, context is everything. I am not sure that public-domain books only, written in English only, from a western canon only, are fully representative of the rich and increasingly human diverse fictional world today. But the decline in actual biodiversity is terrifyingly real. According to the latest reports from the UN and WWF, we have not only lost 60% of animal populations since 1970, but one million animal and plant species are at risk of extinction if we do not act now.
Faber and Wonderbly have joined forces to create a new digital platform offering readers personalised poetry collections which are printed and delivered to customers.
Created in partnership with Wonderbly Studios, a division of the personalised books publishing company, Pagesmith will enable readers to choose and curate their selection from eight themes: love, loss, companionship, family, nature, wellbeing, new horizons and women's voices.
The customer will also be able to add a dedication, pick a cover and choose their own title. The custom-made book will then be printed on demand, as a hardback, and shipped straight to the receiver's door, for a retail price of £30 plus shipping.
Stephen Page, executive chair of Faber & Faber, said of the launch: "For many years at Faber we have been exploring ways to use technology to reach readers in new ways with literary work, leading to such innovations as The Waste Land app and our partnership with Bloomsbury on Drama Online. Meeting Asi [Sharabi, c.e.o. of Wonderbly],and his team at Wonderbly, we knew we had found a brilliant partner in pursuing an ambitious, new, high-quality way for readers to give poetry to others. The result is Pagesmith, which we are so proud to be launching today, and which we look forward to evolving as one of the most innovative digital platforms in the world."
As the Folio Society publishes a new edition of Venetia, the actor and broadcaster reflects on what makes an excellent Regency romance
From the absolutely appalling cover art that has defaced her books since she was first published, you would think Georgette Heyer the most gooey, ghastly, cutesy, sentimental and trashy author who ever dared put pen to paper. The surprise in store for you, if you have not encountered her before, is that once you tear off, burn or ignore those disgusting covers you will discover her to be one of the wittiest, most insightful and rewarding prose writers imaginable. Her stories satisfy all the requirements of romantic fiction, but the language she uses, the dialogue, the ironic awareness, the satire and insight - these rise far above the genre.
'I still feel slightly amazed and incredibly lucky that I get paid to do the thing I love most in the world, which is to read!'
How did you get into publishing?
Answering this question made me realise that I've now spent over half my life working in the publishing industry. This should probably make me feel old, but actually I still feel slightly amazed and incredibly lucky that I get paid to do the thing I love most in the world, which is to read!
When a former student of hers was murdered, Nicola Garrard set out to write a story challenging the racist stereotypes that had devalued his death
In 2017, I left the North London school where I had taught for 15 years. Following an interview at a leafy comprehensive in Sussex, I sat in my car, telephoned my wife and cried so much she thought I'd failed the interview. But I had been crying for a very different reason.
"It's another world!' I explained. ‘Only 5% are on Free School Meals! 5%!"
For context, 70% of my London students qualified for Free School Meals, meaning many families rely on foodbanks and live in temporary or crowded accommodation. Knife crime is a fact of life. Older students (and Black male teachers) expect to be stopped by police on the way to school. Boys are acutely aware of the precise moment they cease to be seen as a sweet child and become viewed as a threat. They work hard, nurture ambitious dreams, but poverty exerts a downward force, forcing some talented students to drop out of A-Levels.