ePublishing Week in Brief – October 28th to November 1st, 2013
ePublishing Week in Brief – October 28th to November 1st, 2013
Amazon’s publishing arm has growing pains
Late last week, industry blog Shelf Awareness reported that Amazon’s key publishing executive in New York, Larry Kirshbaum, will leave early next year, and return to his most recent career as a literary agent. After Kirshbaum joined Amazon’s AMZN +1.14% book publishing business in May 2011, he signed up big-name authors to pen books for Amazon, such as director Penny Marshall and the self-help guru Timothy Ferriss, known for his “4-Hour” books. Their books are available in physical form via the company’s adult trade imprint called New Harvest, distributed in a partnership with Houghton Mifflin, and as e-books, only through Amazon.
But Amazon’s efforts to become a real book publisher have not fared very well, at least so far, especially in the area of adult trades. The business does not even merit much, if any, attention from Wall Street. On its earnings call last week with investors, not one analyst asked how the publishing business was doing and it was not mentioned in any analyst reports available to MarketWatch. A few analysts did not respond to questions about Amazon’s publishing business.
http://www.marketwatch.com/story/amazons-publishing-arm-has-growing-pains-2013-10-29
Allegiant sells nearly half million copies on first day of publishing
Veronica Roth’s trilogy sold nearly a half million copies its publication day, Oct. 22, while over the weekend, the Texas Book Festival saw best-selling authors speak to literary enthusiasts. Read on for more headlines:
Allegiant, the final book in Veronica Roth’s Divergent trilogy, sold 455,000 copies globally on its first day across all formats — a record for publisher HarperCollins. The book has a two-million-copy first printing.
http://shelf-life.ew.com/2013/10/28/on-the-books-allegiant-sales/
Africa: The Next Frontier for African Literature Is African Publishing
Living in the age of the amorphous Internet as a young writer comes with its obligations, delusions and accusations. These arise from trying to interact in a world in which the anonymous ‘everyone’ can know the infinite ‘everything’ about the world and consequently expect too much.
The young writer based in Africa, or of African descent, or whose stories are set in an African country, has to deal with these dynamics. This, obviously, was not the case in the 1960s heydays of the African Writers Series – supposing the Series is a convenient historical marker – when print was the only medium, and fame was remote and seemed to be left, almost entirely, to serendipity.
Today, the idea that an audience is always within reach – online readers, agents, reviewers, prize judges – is the precondition of the African writer’s creative process. Meanwhile, if one is to follow Henry James’ advice to “Be one of those on whom nothing is lost,” the Internet, in making everything within reach, has made the writer’s ambition infinite.
http://allafrica.com/stories/201310291275.html
Book fair explores self-publishing
“People have always wanted to tell their story. A lot of barriers have visit this page fallen thanks to the explosion of social networks and new technologies,” said Florian Geuppert of French company Books on Demand.
With an annual print-run of three million books and 17,000 digital versions, his company is one of top players in the world of self-publishing, a key theme at this year’s Frankfurt Book Fair in western Germany.
Self-publishing, which allows an author to publish a manuscript for a traditional paper book or e-book without going through a publishing company, accounted for just three percent of France’s book market last year.
In the United States however it now boasts a 17-percent share of the market after significant growth in recent years.
http://www.canoe.ca/Travel/Activities/Festivals/2013/10/10/21192201-relaxnews.html
Penguin Random House acquires Figment
Figment, a site for teenager writers with 300,000 members, was acquired byPenguin Random Houseyesterday. (Remember when Penguin released Book Country and Pearson bought Author Solutions last year?) Figment’s deal is a bit of a headscratcher: just last year, the company bought a rivaling site from HarperCollins calledInkpop.
Dana Goodyear of The New Yorker and Jacob Lewis, formerly of The New Yorker and Condé Nast Portfolio, founded Figment together in 2010. Lewis is now at Penguin Random House as the vice president and publishing director of Crown/Broadway/Hogarth.
“Random House Children’s Books’ new relationship with Figment supports our ongoing strategy and increasingly important efforts to communicate and engage directly with our readers,” said Barbara Marcus, the president and publisher of Random House Children’s Books.
http://www.mhpbooks.com/penguin-random-house-acquires-figment/
Amazon’s Kindle Countdown Deals makes it easy to sell your ebooks for a limited-time discount
Amazon has announced a new Kindle Countdown Deals initiative, allowing publishers and authors to offer short-term discount on their ebooks.
The price promotions are designed to help authors reach more people with significantly cheaper prices, and a countdown clock displaying the remaining time for each deal. Publishers can control how long the book is discounted for and the level of discount (at least $1 off the regular price).
http://thenextweb.com/media/2013/10/31/amazons-kindle-countdown-deals-makes-easier-sell-ebooks-limited-time-discount/
‘A new kind of paradigm in publishing’
BRATTLEBORO — Somewhere, at the junction of experience and epiphany, Dede Cummings decided to launch a new business.
A writer and veteran of many facets of the publishing world, Cummings knew the ins and outs of a struggling industry. Still, she jumped in, discarding much of the old for a new business model, which makes Green Writers Press as much a reflection of our times as it is another book publishing business.
With one title out, two more imminent and several in the pipeline, the Brattleboro-based Green Writers Press is already launched as a publishing company whose mission is “giving voice to writers and artists who will make the world a better place.”
This Friday marks the official launch of Green Writers Press, when the Next Stage Arts Project presents a reading and book signing at 6 p.m., at Next Stage, 15 Kimball Hill, Putney. The event will feature authors Brian D. Cohen (of Putney), Patti Smith, Greg Delanty, Robin MacArthur, Claire Willis, Hollie McNish, Dede Cummings, Howard Frank Mosher and fifth generation Vermont poet, Leland Kinsey, and photographers John Willis, Catherine Dianich, Zachary Stephens, Evie Lovett and Lynne Weinstein, and more.
http://www.reformer.com/localnews/ci_24414520/green-writers-press-rsquo-new-kind-paradigm-publishing