Category: publishing

Satirist Michael Moore picked up the top prize at this week’s British Book Awards, winning for his indictment of conservative U.S. policy, Stupid White Men. Moore beat out a strange field of competitors including Booker-winning author Yann Martel (Life of Pi) and a star player for the Manchester United soccer team, who wrote a best-selling autobiography. The award carries no prize money, which is probably all the same to Moore, who has also been carrying home prizes by the truckload for his last film, Bowling For Columbine.

Some of Random House’s biggest writers are considering leaving the publisher “after the ouster five weeks ago of its publisher and editor in chief, Ann Godoff, who soon began seeking to lure many of them to a new imprint. The shake-up is raising questions among authors, agents and critics about the future of the venerable Random House imprint, the home of William Faulkner, Robert Penn Warren and Truman Capote, and an important institution in modern American letters.”

Several cities around North Ameria have embraced the “if everyone read the same book” idea. Not in Pittsburgh. Since the launch of that city’s porogram, “several activities – including a theatrical presentation of the book’s rape trial at the Hazlett Theater, North Side, and classes sponsored by the University of Pittsburgh’s Center for Lifetime Learning – have been canceled for lack of interest.”

So Salon magazine is on the financial ropes. But Salon’s publisher says the online mag’s finances are not unusual for a magazine. ” ‘Being a public company has been a huge burden. How long does the average magazine take to reach profitability? Sports Illustrated — 12 years. USA Today — 10 years.’ But these publications were developed inside corporations big enough to hide the years of losses in a dark corner of the accounting department. Salon does not have that luxury. Every expenditure drops directly to the bottom line, where it’s paraded past the investment community.”

Barnes & Noble reports that last quarter’s book sales were sluggish, with growth coming only in newly-opened stores. And “according to preliminary estimates from the U.S. Census Bureau, total bookstore sales fell 3.2% in last year’s fourth quarter, to $4.42 billion.”

Simon Tolkien, the grandson of J. R. R. Tolkien, is a successful barrister, and he has a book contract in Britain and America. But five years ago he had a fallingout with his father over the movies to be made from his grandfather’s books. Seems the Tolkiens had no control over the movies since JRR had sold them years ago. Simon’s dad wanted mothing to do with the movie-makers, but Simon…

“Reviewing books is not a particularly well-paid form of journalism and it takes time. A book of any more ambition than a thriller can’t be read for review at a rate of more than 40, or at most 60, pages an hour. Some books are only 120-pages long and can comfortably be digested in a couple of hours. Others, though, are 400, or 600 pages, or, in some dreadful instances, even more, and they can easily take days to get through. The reviewer’s fee, however, usually remains the same. So, shocking as it may seem, the truth is that some reviewers skip some books. And there are a few who skip through all the books…”

Publisher Pierre Turgeon has started a new English-language publishing house, and the more he talks about it, the more people he convinces that there may be a way to bridge the gap between the French and Anglo worlds of Canadian culture. Never one to shy away from controversy, Turgeon is attempting to sell the notion that French Canadians have an interest in Anglo-Canadian culture, and vice versa, a theory which has seen richer men to the poorhouse. Still, if anyone can bridge the gap, say the experts, it’s Turgeon, and if the new house is a success, it could also provide a much-needed shot in the arm to the rest of the English-language publishing industry.

Less than a month after the Alfred Knopf pubishing house took Michael Bellesiles’s controversial book on guns in America off the market, the volume has found a new, albeit somewhat less prestigious, publisher. “Soft Skull Press of Brooklyn, N.Y., which calls itself ‘a small, radical, independent publisher,’ will republish a revised edition in October. The book will have a new introduction and what a Soft Skull statement called ‘several clarifications concerning research.'” Bellesiles lost his job at Emory University last year when claims surfaced that much of his research for the book was falsified.

The controversial president of the National Writers’ Union abruptly announced his departure from the post last week, but the infighting which has plagued the NWU in recent days doesn’t appear to be waning with Jonathan Tasini’s resignation. “Some in the anti-Tasini faction Your Union said they expect next fall’s election to be intense,” and nobody appears to be above taking shots at Tasini as he leaves the premises.