New Headline for Author Solutions

The last time Author Solutions made huge headlines was last year when the company was being acquired by the Penguin Group in a deal worthy of dot com boom excitement. This time around, it might not be as much fun.

NYC-based law firm, Giskan Solotaroff Anderson & Stewart, have posted the following notice to their web site:

Giskan Solotaroff Anderson & Stewart LLP is currently investigating the

The Death of the ISBN?

It’s news to just about no one at all that digital publishing has taken a heavy toll on many aspects of traditional publishing, but here’s one we hadn’t thought of before. The Economist looks at what may be a death knell for the ISBN:

Look inside any book published since 1970 and you will find a number. But perhaps not for much longer. The International Standard Book Number (ISBN), invented in

Indie Bookstores Holding the Fort

Despite increased crumbling of the big chains and ever more encroachment from electronic fronts, book sales numbers from 2012 indicate that independent bookstores continue to be the cornerstone of the industry. From Christian Science Monitor:

The overall story of 2012 for US bookstores was more up-and-down than anything. Sales numbers were higher than in 2011 for the months of April, May, June,

Globe and Mail Cuts Book Section… Until it Bleeds

Sad to report that the Globe and Mail, once Canada’s most important newspaper, has further cut its books section. According to NOW Toronto, “Editor Martin Levin and assistant editor Jack Kirchhoff will no longer serve in their posts, leaving the national newspaper without a literary editor.”

Levin told NOW that the paper is bowing to the perceived endless need for celebrity gossip. “It’s all

Book Publicity 101

We see a lot of books for potential review at January Magazine. A lot. Most often, review books arrive with minimum fanfare. A book, a press release in an envelope of a suitable size to accommodate both. Truthfully? We like it that way. We tend to note the aberrations, though. For instance, the single book that arrives in a box big enough for 10 will make us frown. (And it happens far, far more

Fiction Trends for 2013: Editors Share What’s Hot and What’s Not

What will top fiction editors be looking for in 2013? An interesting article on the Andrew Lownie Agency’s blog talks to several of the top editors of fiction in the United Kingdom… and comes up with not much that is new.

Unsurprisingly, editors are mostly looking for good books and strong stories. Transworld’s Sarah Adams says, “Forgive the clichés, but I’m looking for compelling storytelling,

Why Big Name Authors are “Going Ghost”

Writing a book is super hard work. And, let’s face it: if you’re a big successful author who has a busy schedule and a lot of dough, what would you want to lock yourself into a quiet room for? Especially when there a boatloads of unbusy, poor authors out there happy to nibble at your crumbs?

While hiring ghost writers to keep a literary franchise going isn’t brand new, more authors seem to be

Penguin and Random Merger Will Create Global Publishing Giant

News that the merger of Random House and Pengiun Books will go forward has all facets of the industry speculating on how this marriage between giants will impact the book business.

But The Telegraph broke the worst news of all: one of the best ever opportunities for a pun has been missed. There will be no Random Penguin, as so many had hoped. And no Penguin House. Instead, as Katherine Rushton

Penguin House? Random Bird? Rumors of Random/Penguin Discussions Confirmed

The bookworld has been atwitter today with chatter that publishing giants Random House and Penguin have been discussing a merger. As of Thursday afternoon, we have confirmation from the source that the talks, at least, are true. Earlier today, Pearson issued the following statement:

Pearson confirms that it is discussing with Bertelsmann a possible combination of Penguin and Random House. The

The Birth of a Literary Prize

There are times in life when we are galvanized by inequity. So it was for a group of women who were touched by a panel at the recent Vancouver Writers Festival and determined to do something to right a perceived wrong.

The Writers Festival panel looked at facts: since 1901, the Nobel Prize for Literature has only been taken home by a woman a dozen times. In Canada, the prestigious Stephen

D&M Publishers Enters Protection

Sad news from Vancouver, Canada, yesterday. D&M, one of the country’s most respected publishers, has filed for creditor protection. From Quill & Quire:

The Vancouver-based firm announced late Monday that it has filed a notice of intention under the Bankruptcy and Insolvency Act. According to a statement, the company intends “to carry on its operations during this restructuring process” and has

Book Expo 2012: Day 1

Book Expo America, the annual confab where publishers give away thousands of advance copies and canvas bags to booksellers, press and other industry folk began yesterday in earnest when thousands of book lovers stormed the gates inside New York City’s Jacob Javits Convention Center as if it was the running of the bulls.

Every year, the anticipation grows to a fever pitch as the line to enter

Bestselling Mystery Authors Get on the Bus

In an era when the book industry seems constantly brimming with gloomy news and various variations on news of a falling sky, word about Atria’s Mystery Bus Tour is strangely uplifting.The premise is astonishingly simple… almost old-timey, really. Atria, a division of Simon and Schuster is stuffing four accomplished mystery writers on a bus and sending them on an eight day tour that will hit a

Big Six Find E-Books Profitable

Big publishers are finding that electronic books are generally more profitable than their print counterparts, according to Paid Content.Here’s the thing, though: since production costs on e-books are fixed and distribution costs pretty much nonexistent on what planet is this news? Especially since, in many cases, they’ve been able to hang onto electronic rights that a more prepared marketplace

E-Books: The Sky is Falling. Again.

Are e-books a bubble? And, if the answer is yes, when is it going to burst? That’s what novelist turned technology naysayer Ewan Morrison asks in The Guardian today, preparing us for a brave new world where the whole e-book thing blows up in our faces:The internet is full of ironies. I, for one, could never have guessed that writing about the end of books would generate more income for me than

Print vs. Electronic: Enter the Golden Age

Not long ago we were arguing for or against reading electronically. In an interesting piece for the Guardian, writer and editor Robert McCrum points out that the battle now is complete and, in some ways, there are no winners or losers: just a redistribution of priority.If the ebook is all about ease, and short attention spans, the ink and paper book must satisfy not just the thrill of reading,

The Return of the Beautiful Book

With the entire print publishing industry under threat from electronic fronts, the most correct response might just be for the industry to create more beautiful books. In a lengthy and well-considered piece in the Guardian, Kathryn Hughes explores the idea of, not fewer books, but more beautiful ones:Publishers have started building their marketing strategies around form rather than content. The

Are We Sick of Celebrity Excess?

At a time of international financial crisis and lots of attendant personal strife for many readers have we, as a culture, finally lost our taste for empty tales of pointless riches and celebrity excess? With sales in the usually dependable category of celebrity biographies down almost by half, that would seem to be the case. From The Telegraph:According to industry figures quoted in The

Increased Transparency for Authors

When it comes to their sales figures, it’s been a tradition to treat authors like mushrooms and keep them in the dark. But it looks as though all of that is about to change. From the New York Times:Three major publishers said on Wednesday that they would allow their authors to access book sales data directly online, a move that appeared to challenge Amazon and its continued efforts to woo authors

Publishing Industry Ready for Reboot as Frankfurt Gets Underway

Publishing is facing a revolution, author Mitch Joel told a rapt audience at the Frankfurt Book Fair, which opened today. Joel, a digital marketing expert and the author of Six Pixels of Separation (Grand Central), told his audience that the industry is ready for a reboot. From Publishers Weekly:Consumers in today’s networked world are moving faster than marketers, Joel noted, and their