It's the little things

by Rachel S.

I agree with Michael’s post yesterday. Barnes and Noble and Borders are intimidating. Not to say that I won’t spend an afternoon there with a giant stack of books from a myriad of genres and the biggest cup of coffee they have to offer (which is pretty big), but on the days when I actually want to browse for a book I intend to buy, I head to smaller locations. I get overwhelmed by the rows and rows of shelves within shelves and soon realize I’m not even reading the bindings anymore, but just skimming the colors and shapes of each book—only picking up ones that stand out in that respect regardless of the title.

Smaller bookshops, whether they house used books, are devoted to a single genre, or are just mini versions of the massive box stores have an appeal that cannot be rivaled. My two favorite places to spend my book money in the city are the Housing Works Bookstore Café in Soho and WORD Books in Brooklyn. They both have their own unique feel—a sort of atmosphere that is lacking in the impersonal, albeit well-stocked shelves of the giant bookstore chains.

The selection is smaller, sure, but unless I’m looking for something absolutely specific, I find that doesn’t matter. I’ll still always find something I want and I feel that my choice is much better made. If I’m having trouble, the staff in a small bookstore will more likely know each book they do stock and will often have certain opinions and recommendations, which is an undeniable advantage of a smaller selection. In fact, both Housing Works and WORD pepper their shelves with little handwritten index cards from members of the staff praising their most recent literary loves. Because they can’t just sell every book that comes out, there has to be some level of thought and selection put into stocking the independent bookshops.

Smaller stores foster a sense of community—there even used to be a corkboard in WORD that served as a sort of personals section. Anyone could fill out a slip of paper with their name, age and email address followed by books and authors they loved as well as those they hated and then pin it up on the board, in the hopes that some book-reading match made in heaven would soon emerge.

As the holiday season is upon us, gift-buying must be as well. Shopping in an environment that fosters conversation and comfort as opposed to impersonal abundance, I feel, gives the gift itself greater meaning. Sure, the person you so carefully chose that book for might not know where it was bought, but the sense of thought and care that went into it is surely palpable.

I don’t want to come off totally disparaging the bookstore giants—I love them, too. If you’re looking for something specific, either they’ll have it or will almost certainly have the resources to order it for you. Nowadays there’s near a guarantee that they have a café attached, so there’s no end to the hours you can spend there poring over books you might actually have no intention of buying (okay, so there is an end, as the only times I’ve ever been in a Borders past closing time were for crucial Harry Potter book purchases). Living in the city, it’s easy to forget that oftentimes independent bookstores can’t survive elsewhere and it’s nice to know that the big places are still accessible to the vast majority of the population.

I have a specific experience in mind when I consider entering these havens I call smaller bookstores. When I go book shopping, I want to enjoy it, take my time and truly feel as if I picked the perfect book to read next. I know the next time I go into WORD, the girl behind the desk will be familiar and friendly. I’ll read the lists of updated favorites they tack to the walls as well as the new recommendations on the shelves. There might not be miles and miles of selection, but I’ll hardly miss it once I find the next book I have to have.

Let's do some shopping!

by Michael

I have a love/hate relationship with holiday shopping. On the one hand, holiday shopping is a pain: the crowds, the traffic (that one's new to moving to LA!), the same five Christmas songs in every store, etc. On the other, I really like buying gifts for other people, and I still much prefer going to the store to do it. I don't often have specific things in mind for specific people, but instead I really love to browse and see what's on offer.

Amongst other things, every year I buy books for people. And yes, I do actually pay for them. Rarely do I get someone a big bestseller or literary must-read (though there was the year I got my father The DaVinci Code), but more often than not it's titles I've found while browsing books at non-bookstores. Being an agent, I'm pretty familiar with what's on the tables at Barnes & Noble or the front page of Amazon. But the books that tend to get me most excited at the holidays are those little gift books or ridiculous coffee table books. The other day at a small boutique here in LA, I found Concorde by Frederic Beniada and Michel Fraile, a book that's a few years old but still remarkable in its detail, scope and beauty, and All My Friends Are Dead, a morbidly funny little picture book for adults by Avery Monsen and Jory John. Two gifts accounted for!

Clearly, it's a very hip store to carry both of these books, but it reminded me that an awful lot of my book buying happens outside of the major book outlets. In a big bookstore, I admit that I sometimes get overwhelmed by the selection and tend to gravitate towards what I already know. I really appreciate those times when I can savor very curated environments, whether it's a quirky selection (like the store I mentioned here) or the focus of a cookware or gardening store. I tend to spend more time with the books, and I while I can often leave Barnes & Noble without a book, I never leave a speciality store empty-handed.

I'm curious if there are other book people who also enjoy shopping and browsing in these environments. And what good discoveries have you made in them? Because I'm still looking for some gifts!

Go Blue!

by Jane

This weekend I went to my very first tailgate party and college football game. Both took place at the University of Michigan where my son is a freshman.

The party started at 9:30 on Saturday morning and continued until the game began at noon. There was absolutely no food served during the gaiety (much to my surprise) but we did have lots of fun and so I decided that I would share some pictures with our readers.

 

The game experience was truly amazing. The stadium holds about 120,000 people and it was almost filled on Saturday. Fortunately, after three overtimes, the Michigan Wolverines won 67 to 65, the highest score in Michigan’s history, I believe.





Still, being me I had to check out the bookstores. Since Ann Arbor is the home of Borders, I visited that and a couple more. (Can’t stay away from the biz!) Next time I go back, I will make sure to turn our clients’ books so that they face forward on the shelves.

For now, though, Go Blue!

Books on food

by Stacey

I've been really into food and cookbooks lately, as I've mentioned, both because I represent a lot of them and because I love to eat (plus I'm trying to cook more, in my dreams at least). There is a lovely little indie bookstore in San Francisco, Omnivore, that a couple of my clients have done events at, and that I visited when I was in SF last spring. It's totally adorable and they have a wonderful, eclectic, well-curated selection of classic and contemporary books about all things food and wine. They get great authors to visit, even though the store doesn't hold more than a couple of dozen people and even then it's tight quarters. It's worth checking out if you're in SF, or even if you're not, you can subscribe to their newsletter, which is always a lot of fun to read. Enjoy!

New look for teens at B&N

by Michael

Though I think it's a fantastic idea, one built around the concept of merchandising (a word people hate to use with books), B&N's rearranging of their teen book section is already pulling in derisive comments from the web.

I don't think this is any way the sign of the apocalypse, but rather an admission that readers of certain genres stick to those genres. They also buy a lot of books. And if this makes it easier for them to buy more books, I'm all for it.

What do you think?

The return of the independents

by Jane

When Barnes & Noble announced a couple of weeks ago that they were for sale, the incredible irony of the potential results of such a move struck me. Almost immediately, I saw the very positive ramifications for our industry.

The incredible proliferation of the chain bookstores over the last twenty or so years has wreaked havoc on our business. The chains first and in a very dramatic way caused some of the greatest independent bookstores in our country to go out of business. It was in these individual stores that word of mouth about first time authors and their books would begin to build and spread outward. Many of these independent stores were responsible for creating bestsellers and successful writing careers.

But then the chains came in and knocked the independents out with their discounting and other mass merchandising methods. And these same chains because of their tremendous influence also dictated to publishers which books they should publish. When a chain “passed” on ordering a book, that title died—there was simply no place for it to go.

And then came Amazon, first slowly and then it exploded. Ordering electronically definitely put a crimp in the chains’ style and cost them dearly.

And this, of course, was followed by the development of e-readers and the new era of electronic publishing; the chains were becoming more and more irrelevant as places for books to be bought.

Now, Borders is barely surviving—they just laid off a bunch of staff at their headquarters in Ann Arbor, Michigan. And, Barnes & Noble might just be bought by its former owner Len Riggio who, undoubtedly, will take it back to being a much smaller, simpler operation—and continue to sell many items other than books simply because for a chain of any size, books are not as economically attractive to carry as they once were.

But the corner bookstore—and I actually have a wonderful one a block away from my home in New York City—is going to become more of a force. I don’t know yet whether the independents will multiply and grow as they once did—but I am counting on them wielding far more influence on what their customers read than they have in recent years. If this happens, then reading will benefit greatly whether books are sold in hard copy or electronically.

I am really rooting for the return of the independents and look forward to hearing what you think of all of this.

Big boxes and buzz

by Jim

I was out for dinner with a friend and her sister recently, and I mentioned that I had finally read The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo.

“Oh, I’ve been meaning to read that,” said friend’s sister. “I keep seeing it at WalMart.”

“I know! It’s everywhere!” I replied, at this point still enjoying the conversation.

“Well, I just don’t buy books until they’re in the WalMart,” she commented. “Once they’re there, I just know they’re good.”

After briefly choking on my tongue, I asked her to explain. Her theory, which in fairness does make some sense, was that WalMart only carries the most popular books, so once they’re there, they’ve essentially been pre-screened by the public. And okay, that makes a good degree of sense. But in a market where so much great new fiction doesn’t really have a chance to break out, it made me worried about how people choose what to read.

Have we created a system in which only books pre-ordained to bestsellerdom even have a chance? Is there such a thing as a word of mouth bestseller anymore?

It reminds me of when Jonathan Franzen turned down the Oprah book club back in 2001 and made comments alluding to his own discomfort that we trust so few people to tell us what to read and are so willing to jump on board with whatever they point us to. For me, so much of the thrill is in finding something unexpected or something no one else has talked to me about so I can go in with no expectations.

That brings me back to The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo which I loved more than most folks I know who have read or tried to read it and which does seem like an honest to goodness word of mouth bestseller. It did get a huge push from its publisher, but as folks have dived in and the rest of the trilogy came out, it has expanded hugely. So the chance for books to break out is there, but…I’m still concerned about the nature of big box retail and its effect on book buying habits.

What about you guys? Do you prefer books you know other people love, or would you rather uncover an unexpected gem? And how do you decide what to read?

I won’t pretend I’m uninfluenced by buzz. I just bought Justin Cronin’s doorstop The Passage this weekend because I’ve heard so many great things. But then I started something else…

To BEA or not to BEA

by Jane

So, as we've already mentioned, last week was Book Expo, and it took place mid-week for the first time in its history (I believe) and was shortened from three and a half to two days of exhibits with an additional meeting day. The question this raises for me is how relevant is BEA anymore; is it necessary and will it continue?

Historically this annual meeting was known as the American Books Sellers Association (ABA) meeting. It began in the basement of the Shoreham Hotel in Washington, D.C., and was held annually—initially over Memorial Day Weekend. The convention’s purpose was for book publishers to present their fall publishing lists to bookstore owners who would actually place their orders on the floor. Those in attendance from the publishing companies were mainly sales people with some executives making an appearance now and then; editors weren’t included.

Over the years, the ABA convention grew larger and larger. More and more publishers added more and more staff and they began to build larger and larger exhibits. The ABA outgrew the Shoreham and was moved to a convention center in Washington and then began traveling to a different city in different parts of the country each year.

The convention has been held everywhere in the continental U.S. from Chicago, to Los Angeles and Anaheim, to San Francisco, Las Vegas, New Orleans and even Miami (I remember that ABA well—for many reasons, it was a disaster). And each year it grew, with publishers spending more and more money on their exhibits, and having hugely lavish parties to entertain booksellers, authors and agents.

Slowly but surely foreign publishers began to participate and the ABA became a rights fair as well, sort of a mini-Frankfurt (before the London Book Fair grew as large as it now is).

Then as the chains became all powerful and publishers took orders on fall books from these huge accounts before the ABA (or at least outside of the convention), that reason for the meeting became irrelevant. Smaller accounts also started to order less at the meeting and more in other ways and at other times.

Publishers began to realize that the enormous sums of money spent on exhibits, on parties and on travel could not be justified. Displays began to get smaller; some publishers skipped years coming and eventually the exhibit was sold to an organization that became Book Expo. Now, it is a truncated and less interesting event.

My question is what really happens at BEA nowadays? Sure, it is wonderful to see old friends, but the individual exhibits are so small now that one can’t even find the fall books one is looking for. Last week I saw very little activity at the parts of the convention occupied by foreign publishers and the exhibits were downsized from two floors to one in the Javits Center. Very little actual business in terms of the initial book ordering is done anymore and with the other rights fairs around the world, those sold at BEA for the most part are also insignificant.

As I wandered around the floor last week at BEA 2010, I honestly thought to myself that the money still being spent by publishers on this meeting could be much better allocated toward finding new and effective ways to sell books in an age when our business is changing enormously and very quickly.

I would love to know what those of you who have participated in BEA in the past think about all of this.

Where will all the bookstores go?

by Jane

Last week, I was chatting with a client who was visiting from out of town and who I hadn’t seen for a while. We talked about all of the changes in publishing, especially in the area of electronic publishing, that had occurred since we had last seen each other.

One of the things he asked, and which I thought was a very interesting question, was what will happen to the brick and mortar bookstores now that electronic books are gaining such a foothold, to say nothing about the increased market share that Amazon and the other on-line booksellers have. What will this mean for the large chains – Barnes & Noble and, especially, Borders.

Then on Friday, the 21st, there was a piece on the front page of the Wall Street Journal, “E-Books Rewrite Bookselling,” discussing just this topic.

And Mike Shatzkin, industry pundit, estimates that by the end of 2012, digital books will be 20%-25% of unit sales with another 25% of books sold online. That’s 50% of all books sold and it would seem to me that losing that volume of business will cause the large chains, at least, to shutter a significant number of stores.

The only way I can imagine they could survive is by carrying an even greater variety of products other than books than they already do. And, because these changes are happening so quickly, they would have to begin carrying this additional merchandise immediately so as to build up customers before their book business deteriorates any further.

I think the independent stores that are left—after the chains took over a huge part of the market and put many of them out of business years ago—will be less affected and, in fact, could thrive. For them, selling more varied merchandise will be less of a “leap” than their much larger, more corporate cousins and their customers are truly the most loyal of book lovers. How ironic, considering what happened to the bulk of the independent booksellers when the chains descended over a decade ago.

I am still convinced that electronic book publishing will increase readership as opposed to destroying it. It is up to the big retailers to figure out how to keep up with this new world in order to stay in business.

What do you think? Will the chain bookstores survive and if so, how?

You like “i,” you really like “i!” *

by Michael

Depending on your feelings about the Apple iBookstore and iPad, this may or may not come as a surprise. According to a report on Publisher’s Marketplace (subscription required), ebook sales through the iBookstore have been robust, comprising “12 to 15 percent of all ebook sales.” This makes the iBookstore the #2 ebook retailer only a month after opening, and with Random House still holding out. (And, if you ask me, a terrible, terrible user interface in the iBookstore—it’s a wonder you can find anything.) As the report notes, with income lower on a per-book basis under the agency model, ebook sales need to increase 20 – 30 percent in order to make up the difference. It looks like that may just be happening.

The report also notes: “At least two publishers were certain that iBook sales so far have been incremental, growing the overall ebook market rather than taking share from other accounts.” This is even better news, as there was worry that ebook sales would just shift from one store to the other. Growth is good — especially with the news of declines in print book sales.

Publishers have to be thrilled with this news, as moving to the agency model was definitely a short-term gamble. They sacrificed the money they were making from Amazon off loss-leaders for the chance to open the market to another major player. And it looks as though that might be paying off. That said, it’s only a month out, and it remains to be seen if people will continue to purchase their books through the iBookstore.

So does anyone else have an iPad? Anyone buying books with it? So far, I’ve read Lowboy on it, along with many, many submissions, and while I hate the iBookstore, I love the reading experience. How about you?



*For the record, I know this isn’t the correct Sally Field quote, but it’s how most people remember it!

Publish or perish

by Jane

With all of the sturm und drang going on in the publishing business over the last few months with regard to Amazon, Apple and Google, there is an enormous amount of confusion—understandably.

I found this article in this week’s New Yorker to be quite enlightening. Even if it will “date” quickly because of the speed at which things are changing, I highly recommend that all published and unpublished writers read it. There is much to learn and absorb here.

I would be interested in hearing what you think.

Fixing the business

by Jessica

Publishers Marketplace ran a link to the Harvard Business School Working Knowledge interview with former Random House CEO Peter Olson, whose class at HBS uses the publishing industry’s hype/hate relationship with the e-book as a semester-long case study.

The whole article is worth a read, but one passage struck me as particularly noteworthy. With regard to the price skirmishes over e-book pricing, Olson points out that the customer has not been given much of a say. He continues: "I don't know of many successful examples of pricing a product based not on what it costs or what people want to pay for it, but based on another format that is completely different, just because you want to keep that format alive." Youch.

Publishing is a peculiar, and some might say, poorly conceived business. I’ve often thought it would be interesting to issue an invitation to assorted big-thinkers, (economists, management consultants, authors, agents, editors, plus all the students in Peter Olson’s class) for their plans to “fix” publishing—redesigning this ad-hoc business into something self-sustaining, or at least, an industry whose death is not forecast on a daily basis. Of course, I realize such schemes might or might not have any bearing on reality. Back when I worked at a publishing house that was part of a larger entertainment conglomerate, the sleekly suited management consultants from McKinsey and Co. favored us with several visits; in each case our role was to answer their questions, then speculate among ourselves how much they were being paid.

I was flat out amazed at how little our well-compensated interlocutors seemed to know about publishing. Perhaps their ignorance was in fact their strength, and they could see, de-Toqueville style, the assets and liabilities we local yokels failed to perceive. Without knowing how things are done, how things have always been done, they were free to critique our ways, and offer comprehensive recommendations. My favorite being “Publish more bestsellers.” I recall that one consultant asked me what I could tell him about market testing. My mouth hung open for a moment before I replied “only that publishers don’t do it.” So far as I know, focus groups are not convened on behalf of books. What might this look like? AOne could create one easily enough on-line, and indeed, the book-to-blog phenomenon is the closest that publishers come to “market testing,” ascertaining that there is some quantifiable readership for a given subject.

Now that Harper Studio has been shuttered, I wonder if their innovative idea of attempting to do away with returns will vanish along with it. Returns are, of course, a prime example of the way in which how things are done seldom reflect best practices. As you probably know, booksellers can, at pretty much any time, return unsold stock for a full refund from the publisher. The return system was dreamt up during the Great Depression to entice booksellers to stock shelves that might otherwise have remained empty; knowing that the books came with a money back guarantee lowered retailer’s risk and essentially propped up their business. Now, however, some 70 years later, the same system is in place. Abolishing it makes good common sense, but it would send shockwaves through the industry. Booksellers would certainly reduce their buys, and likely demand a deeper discount. But we might move closer to a tenable model…

So, I’m throwing open the doors to the big thinker among you. Any ideas to reform the whole (or even a part?).

Anyone, anyone?

Making bookstore magic

by Chasya

It’s no secret that one of the most delicate debates between an author and their publisher happens to be over the book jacket (and we’ve been in the middle of many of these disagreements). Sometimes the author has a particular vision, or they just don’t like the cover they’re presented with. The publisher, meanwhile, is getting feedback from many various departments, including the sales team, and there is input coming from everywhere as to how the jacket will most likely appeal to the audience it targets. Overall it takes a lot of hard work to come up with a jacket that will ultimately do what it’s supposed to do – and that’s sell books. Key in this process is the art, the cover copy, the title and various other factors. That’s why I really enjoyed this guest blog by Lindsay Carmichael at The Intern. It’s an insightful look at how all of these factors come together to move a book.

Whether or not you agree with her that it’s a “sad fact” that jacket art is what draws us to books, this is a solid explanation from a bookstore insider.

What do you think, authors? Any disagreements with Ms. Carmichael’s list of how to make “Brick and Mortar Magic”?

Genre, part II

by Stacey

 

I received so many great responses last week when I posted about different genres that it made me want to answer some questions, and offer some thoughts that might be helpful to all of you aspiring authors out there as you think about your writing future. Many of the questions you have about pitching your book effectively, finding the right genre for your writing style, and creating a work that is commercially viable are the same ones that we have when we consider a new project. Will editors know where it fits, will booksellers know where to shelve it, and will it be able to stand out in an increasingly difficult and competitive marketplace? I wanted to ruminate a bit about this, and answer a couple of specific questions posted by readers, so here goes.

 

First, I wanted to talk a bit about nonfiction since my post only referred to fiction categories, and I personally handle a ton of nonfiction across many categories. My list has changed a bit over my eleven years at DGLM, beginning with a love of food and cookbooks and quirky, fun how-tos, and then moving into various practical areas of nonfiction, from health and fitness to sports (especially baseball) to crafting, and finally finding some nice success with narrative nonfiction. The key thing to consider for pitching nonfiction is who your reader is and how you will target that reader. If it's a craft book, a popular category over the last few years, and you have the right credentials and platform, you'll be able to illustrate where your readers are and how you will find them. Same goes for any other category of nonfiction. Identify your reader and then clearly go on to explain why you are the person most qualified to write the book, and to market and promote it. Seems simpler than it is, of course, but if you aren't able to clearly and concisely do this, then you should focus on building your credentials and platform until you are at a level where it's an easier pitch to make.

 

 

Moving on to fiction, there were a number of questions about what constitutes literary versus commercial fiction, so I wanted to share a couple of comments and then respond with a few thoughts.

 

Anonymous said...
I would love to see somebody post about what "Literary Fiction" really means. It seems to me that when writers use it in queries to describe their work, they label themselves as amateurs. Is that true? Is it something that agents put on their lists because many writers think of themselves that way, though they may really be writing, say, commercial/upmarket or women's fiction?

Empty Refrigerator said...
 Exact same question as Anonymous! How do you tell the difference between lit fiction and commerical/upmarket? And if this is subjective as it seems, what would you, as agents, suggest using as a default? Does "lit fiction" make an author seem like a snob?

 

To go into this a bit, I often ask myself the same questions and when a project presents itself that I can’t find the answers to, I know it meant it wasn't for me. We always talk about this being a subjective business, and it can't be reiterated enough that our rejecting a project in many cases is not so much a reflection of the quality of the project, but where it fits on our list, or whether we are able to see pitching it effectively to editors whose job it is to say no more than yes. To speak specifically to the question about literary fiction, I once got a great piece of advice from a very well-known and well-respected editor who has been around a long time. We were talking about literary fiction and she told me the term she used to describe books that work was "literary accessible". I thought this was a great way to think about the difference between literary and commercial, and know that there are ways to present a literary work that still feels accessible to a wide audience. That's what editors want to find. Beautifully written, well crafted novels that will find a large readership. It's not always about the book itself, but about how a publisher envisions publishing it, and how they will position it in the marketplace. A book like The Help, a huge breakaway hit, isn't an obviously commercial book on the surface, but it has found an eager and enthusiastic audience and I think falls into that "literary accessible" category. Years ago when chick lit was popular, I sold a ton of it, and before long, it became over published and you couldn't get anyone to buy a chick lit novel. But the books that were working were still arguably the same, just positioned as commercial women's fiction, a very broad but generous category where many kinds of literary and commercial novels can peacefully coexist. Lorrie Moore's recent award-winning A Gate at the Stars, a literary novel, will still be shelved in the same section with Jodi Picoult, a more commercial writer, and Sophie Kinsella, a very commercial writer, whose books managed to stay a notch above chick lit and continue to survive and thrive.

 

 

Another couple of questions came up about YA versus adult fiction, and this is another point that we've all thought a lot about and discussed ad nauseam in our publishing circles. Questions below and my responses to follow.

 

Nicole L Rivera said...
I had trouble with this myself. The specific question which has kind of been answered is: Is twenty-something YA or adult? I have received mixed reviews but they all come with the same pained expression and a not so clear answer.

  

Anonymous said...

Nicole I thought 20 something facing first time independence events (like moving out, first job, etc) was New Adult. I am still not sure though whether a coming of age novel should be marketed as YA or literary fiction or commercial fiction. It has romantic elements but not the predictable happy ending. What do you call that? Protagonist is 17 and there are a lot of ideas as well as plot.



  With the success of Harry Potter and Twilight, middle grade and young adult books have become the movie equivalent of a blockbuster series franchise, and we all aspire to find the next big thing. So it's no surprise that plenty of adult authors are writing into this category. For some interesting insight, check out this video interview with Rebecca Stead, author of this year's Newberry-winning When You Reach Me. I've recently sold several books for younger readers by clients who had only previously written for adults. In some cases, the differences in writing and plot are subtle, and the real differentiating factor is how the book is positioned and marketed. An ideal to strive for is a middle grade or YA book that has crossover appeal, or the ability to reach an older audience as well as a younger one. These books are hard to find, but when they work, they can work big. Books written for a younger audience often have protagonists whose voices speak directly to that reader, and the themes are often handled in a way that is more sensitive to a younger reader. I think it would be challenging to make a book with a 20-something protagonist work as a YA novel. I recently considered something that crossed this line and I wound up passing because it read like YA, but the themes were too adult, and the protagonist was in her 20s and I just felt like it fell into that dead zone between YA and adult, a very difficult audience to find. A coming-of-age with a 17 year-old protagonist would likely be a YA if the voice and themes support the market. For example, while The Lovely Bones is narrated by a teenager, it clearly is intended for an adult audience. Literary accessible rules apply to younger audiences as well.

 

 

I hope this genre talk has been helpful, and has answered some questions about the many ways in which a book can be written, pitched, sold, positioned, and marketed. As is always the case, there is a lot of grey area in categorizing your work, but it's worth taking the extra time to research the market and other projects that speak to your intended audience, and to keep a clear focus on pitching your work effectively. If there's anything I've missed, as I'm sure there is in this big discussion, please let us know and we'll try to get to it soon!

What's your genre?

by Stacey

I am often pitched projects where an author will describe the book as a cross between several different categories. I usually find this problematic for the simple reason that a book that is described this way often suffers from an identity crisis, and publishers want to be able to clearly identify how a book will be positioned, marketed, promoted, and at its most basic level, where it will "live" in the bookstores (this despite the fact that authors often complain that their books are not available at bookstores anyway, since they can't possibly carry everything, and there are so many outlets now outside of traditional stores to buy books, but that conversation is for another blog post). For the most part, at the chain bookstores, books are shelved in one place and one place only, and it's not always where the publisher or author want it to go. If it's a cookbook that's also a self-help book that's also a memoir, or a literary historical romantic mystery, well, that makes it a lot more difficult to place.

I recently found this piece that talks about the different genre categories in fiction. It doesn't address nonfiction, which has its own language of categories, but it does serve as a good basic summary of the major fiction categories. There are always subcategories within each of these, and she leaves out thriller, which is often confused with mystery, and which I see as a subset, but really is its own category. The takeaway here for me is that whatever category your book falls into, you need to do your research into the best books of that category, where you can find them in the bookstores, and also which agents represent those books. That's who you should target first, and your pitch letter should be clear about which category your book falls under because if it's not, or it's a mix of too many genres, it's easy for the book to get lost before the reader even gets to page 1.

Browsing the aisles

by Lauren

Some recent posts on the future of bookstores made me consider my attachment to strolling the aisles, even though I do plenty of book buying online these days. I try to wholeheartedly embrace the digital future and am not inherently afraid of large corporations (I hope Blogger-owner Google will flag that statement for future proof they should give me one of the plum jobs after they take over the world). But if Amazon puts Barnes & Noble out of business--that one will hit right where it hurts.

I'm a Barnes & Noble girl, having worked there for 3 1/2 years in college. Every day I witnessed firsthand that people at large corporate bookstores do care about, know about, and enjoy books. It's been years since I worked at the store on 8th St and 6th Ave, but my coworkers were nearly all readers who cared about what they did. There was a reason they worked there instead of the GAP and most that I'm in touch with 7 years later still work in book retail and are passionate about what they do.

I've also had the pleasure of working for an independent, Dubray Books on Shop Street in Galway, Ireland. Dubray is a small chain (though even a large chain in Ireland is only so big), owned by a family from Bray all the way over on the opposite coast from Galway. As a consequence, the Galway store is the only one not on the Dublin side of the country, a whole 3 hours away. My boss was the store manager, who ran the place with the dedication and pride of an owner. And he was as passionate about books as my managers at B&N had been. An American who'd learned the trade at Borders, he certainly significantly preferred essentially running his own shop, but there was no way he'd only learned to love storytelling once he had no corporate oversight.

It’s true that you’ll always have some duds--I did work with a woman at B&N who was totally unfazed when I showed her the three shelves of Hemingway books she'd told a customer we didn't have because she couldn't spell it and didn't know who he was--but I also worked with people who could find you any book in the children's section without a database or could recommend you a romance novel for your mother based on sketchily remembered details of the cover of the last one she read. I firmly believe that if you can't find a book lover in a bookstore, you must not be looking very hard.

Wherever the smart money might be in the debate on the future, I can’t help but be optimistic that bookstores are here to stay and desperately hope that if they do fall by the wayside, it won’t be in my lifetime. However, I’ve met people who work for Amazon and BN.com, and I can say with confidence that if we do end up solely in their hands, we’ll still be dealing with people who care about, know about, and enjoy books. My problem with Amazon and its online brethren displacing bookstores is not that they’re not passionate about books but that we don't meet them so they can share that with us. Some of the joy of sharing great books with strangers would disappear if brick and mortar stores disappear, and that does feel like a genuine loss to me. I can't guess at the future, but I do hope that the e-book and the bookstore can happily co-exist for a long time to come.

What was Jeff Bezos thinking, or John Sargent is my hero

by Jane

Amazon’s recent move to remove the “buy” buttons for nearly all of Macmillan’s books including bestsellers, top releases, and Kindle editions was in my opinion incredibly short-sighted and could in the end really hurt the retailer. And now it seems it has backfired.

This move occurred during the same week that Steve Jobs and Apple launched the iPad which could compete head to head with the Kindle. Apple has met with at least five of the six major publishing giants with regard to pricing (of the Big Six, only Random House’s logo was missing from the iPad announcement, though they’re said to be in discussion with Apple). In this model, publishers will be able to set their own prices for books and pay a commission to Amazon, as opposed to the Kindle model where Amazon sets the price.

Now, John Sargent’s strategy has succeeded and Amazon has acknowledged that “ultimately, we will have to capitulate and accept Macmillan's terms.” At the time of posting, they have not reinstated the “buy” buttons, but Amazon and Macmillan are in discussion. Certainly, the other publishers will follow suit here, which in my opinion is as it should be.

Hopefully, a lesson has been learned here. Amazon should not be bullying publishers. Rather we should all be working together in this electronic age to keep the publishing industry alive and healthy. There are too many people predicting the death of book publishing these days. We all need to work together to make sure this is far from the truth.

If you subscribe to Publishers Lunch Deluxe, you can see the whole story as it developed here.

Cover controversies

by Michael

Nothing causes author duress like the unveiling of the book cover. In my experience, it’s one of the most stressful parts of the publishing process, and there are days when I wish we could go back to the days of unjacketed books, when the only thing to get fired up about would be the font type! I’m sure Bloomsbury Children’s Books is wishing the same thing right about now.

This past summer, Bloomsbury had a big controversy on their hands when people noticed that the cover model for the book Liar by Justine Larbalestier didn’t exactly match the description of Micah, the protagonist in the book. At first, Bloomsbury tried to explain away the decision, saying that this was somehow a reflection of the character’s compulsive lying. They eventually relented, and a new jacket was prepared in time for publication. Though there was some residual blogger anger, things simmered down.

Until Bloomsbury did the same thing again. This time with Jaclyn Dalmore’s Magic Under Glass (a great book, by the way). This time, there were no liars to blame. While the book describes the protagonist, Nimira, as “dark-skinned,” the cover depicts a fair-skinned, corseted girl. While people were upset about Liar, the reaction to this cover was scathing. Jezebel’s (linked above) headline read “The White-Washing of Young Adult Fiction Continues.” Some bloggers went so far as to call for a boycott of Bloomsbury, though they realized they’d be hurting the authors as much, if not more, than the publishing company. And there’s much more to read on the subject at Reading in Color, Bookshelves of Doom, and Chasing Ray, as well as many others (you could spend all day linking between the blogs—and I hope you do).

So why do I bring this up? I think it’s important that we’re all paying attention to the issues involved here, and by linking to these other smart people and their opinions, I hope to generate more good, healthy discussion. As Justine Larbalestier pointed out when the controversy erupted around her book, the reason this happens is that booksellers believe that books with people of color on the cover don’t sell. Yikes. I really don’t think that’s true, despite what people tell me. The publishing industry has neglected people of color in the past, claiming there was no audience for books by and for people of color. Can you imagine? They learned their lesson when authors started self-publishing and selling hundreds of thousands of copies of the books that the publishers turned down. And now those same authors do big business with New York publishers, making them millions.

I hope some progressive, enterprising publishers start to prove these booksellers wrong by designing covers that prominently feature people of color. And when one breaks out and becomes a huge bestseller, maybe we can stop being so cynical. I’m curious to hear your thoughts on this, and as always, let’s keep the conversation respectful and positive.

The art of hand-selling

by Jessica

Just before the Thanksgiving holiday, I attended the Middle East Studies Association conference, which is the yearly gathering of scholars of the Middle East. With its panels and papers, receptions and speeches, it is probably not unlike academic conferences of other disciplines, except that the music at the Sunday night dance party was Arab pop (if you’ve never heard the Middle East’s answer to Madonna, she’s worth a listen: check out Nancy Ajram on youtube) and among the post-docs getting down were a daunting number of accomplished belly dancers.

I go to MESA to get a sense of the ideas percolating in the field, sit in on assorted lectures, and meet with potential and existing clients whose research crosses over from an academic to a mainstream readership. This year, while helping out friends and former colleagues, I also had the memorable opportunity to moonlight as a bookseller. I have limited experience in the retail end of publishing; as an agent I’m in the business of selling books, but I’ve never tried it on a copy-by-copy basis. The experience was instructive, and I emerged from my adventure with a renewed sense of respect for the business of hand-selling.

It quickly became obvious that matchmaking between book and customer is both art and science—in this case I happened to know the books I was selling quite well, but to occupy that sweet spot between helpful and obtrusive was a wholly different challenge. When I convinced a browsing professor to purchase a novel I’d particularly loved, I was immoderately pleased. That she was already very likely interested in the subject I was peddling in no way diminished my sense of accomplishment. Other artisanal processes, like making cheese or crafting small batch whisky seem to be enjoying a renaissance, but hand-selling books, and the people who do it, ably and for real, are faring less well. Perhaps the book industry needs its own answer to the locovore movement. (Perhaps it’s out there—if yes, let me know).

Programs like B&N Discover and Borders Original Voices are efforts to scale up the hand-sell, and I like these programs immensely, but I note them professionally perhaps more than I respond to them personally. I’m curious to know how you all respond to them—ditto Amazon recommendations. Amazon’s ability to target my interests is undermined by the fact that I use the site as a research tool more often than I do to make purchases, but maybe you have better luck. Shelf talkers are great, but for me, nothing beats interested, widely read booksellers with whom I can speak; not only are they brilliant at suggesting books, they see the publishing industry from a perspective of the buyers who keep it alive. These days I’m particularly fond of New York’s Idlewild bookstore, which specializes in books on international themes—travel, world lit, etc.

But as I suspect is the case with many of you, indie bookshops have always had a special place in my heart. When I was growing up, each year, probably right about this time, my parents (both inveterate readers of nonfiction) would report to our local bookshop, where the owner would recommend a raft of novels that were just right for me. The stack that ended up beneath the tree, selected by Santa Claus, never disappointed. When, eventually I figured out that it was the bookstore owner and not St. Nick doing the selecting, it did not render the achievement any less magical. I was, however, crushed when the store closed (take that Virginia). Imaginary though he is, Santa’s position seems more secure than that of the independent bookseller, a figure whom I hope will not become a ghost of holidays past, as Jane touched on recently.

Jane's dream

The Wall Street Journal on Friday the 6th reported that Borders was going to close 200 of its Waldenbooks stores. True these are mall stores only, but it seems to me it was only yesterday that the chains were springing up every where. It appears that one of the reasons this is happening is that internet sales of books have greatly increased over the last several years taking buyers from the mall bookstores. The Journal also postulates that another reason for the move is the deep discounting of the bestselling books that has been announced.

My dream is that the closing of these mall stores might encourage one or two--or hopefully many more--entrepreneurial souls to open new independent bookstores. With the new readers that I hope are being created by books available electronically and by this deep discounting, perhaps there can be a big enough market to once again support these wonderful outlets for reading.

Do any of you have a favorite independent bookstore?


-Jane