Tag Archives: Publishers

The PW Morning Report: Wednesday, Aug. 4, 2010

Craig Morgan Teicher -- August 4th, 2010

All the news that’s fit to link:

Is Justin Bieber Really Old Enough for A Memoir?: Is that really the question? From the Guardian.

The Big Read Gets Smaller: The NEA is severely reducing the budget for the Big Read, a national reading initiative, once among its flagship projects.

Bookstores in Pittsburgh: Popcity Media takes us on a little tour.

Haruki Murakami Movie Trailer: Murakami’s Norwegian Wood is being made into a film (not in English), and here’s a teaser vid.

Sean Penn to Star As Legendary Editor: An imperiled bid to make a film about famed literary editor Max Perkins is on firmer ground now that Sean Penn has expressed interest in resurrecting the project.

A Man on a Qwest for Typos: Salon reviews a new book about a man who traveled across America fixing spelling errors.

Newsweek on Self-Publishing: This is a few days old, but relevant that such a major media outlet should discuss the self-publishing book biz.

The PW Morning Report: Wednesday, July 21, 2010

Craig Morgan Teicher -- July 21st, 2010

5 Replies

Here’s today’s Morning Report, featuring the oil spill and Woody Allen.

Oil Spill Books: the New York Times runs down all the books on the Gulf Oil Spill that publisher already have in the works.

‘Tome Raider’ Jailed: That rare book thief who’s been in the news has been sentenced and is going to prison. From The Guardian.

Hear Woody Allen: He’s recorded audiobook versions of his essay collections, according to the New York Times.

Boys, Reading and Fart Jokes: the AP wonders how boys can catch up to girls in reading achievement, and whether books about farts can help. Seriously.

Looking Forward: In England they really care about poetry. The Bookseller has the shortlists for the Forward Prize, one of England’s biggest poetry prizes.

Is “I Write Like” Boosting Thomas Nelson?

Rose Fox -- July 19th, 2010

4 Replies

Jim Macdonald of Making Light thinks so:

So I went to the I Write Like site, subject of the post just below, and entered this text:

asdp0o pvpm eropms spe pebps.

And it told me I write like James Joyce.

Not even trying? Not even rational! Therefore, I asked myself, what’s the scam? So I looked at the rest of the text on the results page:

Great job! Do you want to get your book published?

“I have personally read through thousands of book proposals in my career as a publisher and agent. I know what these professionals are looking for—and what they are not looking for.”
— Michael Hyatt, Chairman and CEO of Thomas Nelson Publishers.

Learn how to secure a book publishing contract!

In the comments he adds: “What I’m seeing is a site that tells newbie authors, ‘You write like Ernest Hemingway,’ tries to snaffle their email addresses, then offers them an overpriced e-book on how to query their novel, offered by a vanity publisher.”

And author Charles Stross chimes in:

I believe someone on a mailing list (which shall remain nameless) mentioned [the creator of the meme]‘d been on Hacker News, asking for ideas about monetizing his unexpectedly successful site.

Ah… initial announcement here. And the follow-up clarifies:

It’s spreading just like a perfect meme should E.g. http://search.twitter.com/search?q=iwl.me

My question is, what should I do with it: (a) for monetary gain (It already achieved the SEO effect I planned, not sure what to do now). (b) for a good cause. I’m already thrilled to notice that people discover and re-discover writers and say “Oh, I write like [writer], I must read more of his works.” What can I do to get more of this effect? What do you think? I’m open to ideas or deals. Thank you!

The text Macdonald describes no longer appears anywhere on the IWL results page. Nonetheless, between these concerns and anger over the overwhelming predominance of white men in the IWL author database, this meme may be about to lose its popularity–and may already have other publishers thinking about harnessing the power of memes to boost their own visibility and that of their authors.

RWA Dings Dorchester Over Unpaid Bills

Rose Fox -- July 14th, 2010

14 Replies

On the Romance Divas forum (visible only to registered members, but anyone can register), author Debora Dennis reports that Romance Writers of America has canceled all official Dorchester events at the upcoming RWA conference:

Since I was scheduled for an editor appointment with Leah Hultenschmidt of Dorchester and had also volunteered to moderate the “spotlight on dorchester” – I was informed by email last night from the RWA that all editor appointments, workshops and spotlights on Dorchester Publisher have been cancelled.

Agents and authors have verified to RWA that Dorchester is past due in fulfilling contractual obligations to some of their authors at this time. Dorchester has confirmed and while making every effort to fulfill their financial obligations to their authors, those obligations will not be met before the conference.

RWA is hopeful Dorchester will be back in 2011.

Six months ago, Dorchester sold several major titles to Avon. Whatever cash that generated for them may not have been enough. We await confirmation from RWA and Dorchester, but this doesn’t sound good.

Hat tip to @dearauthor.

UPDATE, 3 p.m. on 5/15: A Dorchester rep sends in an official “no comment”. Still waiting on RWA.

The PW Morning Report: Monday, July 12, 2010

Craig Morgan Teicher -- July 12th, 2010

2 Replies

First off, please welcome the PW Morning Report to its now home on the PWxyz blog–we can have a little more fun with it if we tuck it in here. Hope you had a good weekend, but it’s time to head back to the office. Now, onto today’s links.

It’s a season for lists, though what season isn’t. But this is a season for summer reading lists. If you want to know what a handful of prominent artists, writers, historians and other smart people will be taking to the beach this summer, check out The Brooklyn Rail‘s summer reading list.

Are you worried about how to explain Sarah Palin to your kids? For some, that conversation may be tougher than The Birds and the Bees. Zondervan, the Christian publisher, hopes to come to your aid with a Palin biography for the 9 to 12 year old set, according to The New York Times.

Here’s a little history from The Washington Post about why To Kill a Mockingbird has been banned and otherwise challenged over the years. Did you know the book was banned at one point for its use of the words “damn” and “whore lady”?

And here’s a heartwarming tale from The Consumerist blog about a man who bought a book from a thrift store, found out it was missing the last 30 pages, and wrote to Macmillan complaining. Turns out the publishers was happy to send this man a new copy of the book–ending and all!

Finally, we leave you to start your week with a bit of video–Marilynne Robinson was on The Daily Show with John Stewart last week. Here’s the clip in case you missed it.

Check back on this blog later today, and every day, for more news, info, and fun stuff from Publishers Weekly. And we hope you’ll follow PWxyz on Twitter: @PWxyz.