It’s been a busy week for me at the store, what with our having had an Educators’ Open House last Thursday plus a WONDERFUL event with Richard Peck at the Wellesley Free Library last Saturday. (Be sure to read his new book On the Wings of Heroes.) For the past couple days I’ve been attempting to fill several school orders; finalize the details of upcoming events with Mo Willems, Jacqueline Davies and Rick Riordan; and shelve, shelve, shelve the plethora of new books arriving at the store daily and begging for face-out space.

As I was doing the latter I was reminded of a few of my publishing pet peeves, which seemed like an excellent topic to explore in this blog entry. I can see a few of you publishers shifting nervously in your seats, but you needn’t worry too much. Most of you aren’t doing these annoying things, and those of you who are aren’t doing them with any consistency. Nevertheless, if you’re doing them at all this is where you’ll find me asking you politely to STOP DOING THEM. Please.

In no particular order, here are 3 of my publishing pet peeves:

1. Absence of a plot summary anywhere on the book’s cover or dust jacket.
Just because a new book is by, say, Laurie Halse Anderson does not mean every customer knows Laurie Halse Anderson’s name. And even if a customer does know Laurie Halse Anderson’s name, that does not mean they’ll absolutely positively want to read her new book without knowing a lick of what it’s about. Not to mention the fact that less-well-informed booksellers and librarians who sell or circulate a book like Twisted won’t have any clue as to the content of the book they are putting in their customers’/patrons’ hands, which puts them in a very tricky position. PLEASE, PLEASE, PLEASE, give the people selling and buying your books the opportunity to know what it is they are selling and buying. Printing “EVERYBODY TOLD ME TO BE A MAN. NOBODY TOLD ME HOW,” on the inside jacket flap is not enough. Nor are quotes that espouse the book’s virtues without telling us what happens in the plot. Give us a plot summary. Please. Thank you.

2. Half jackets and die-cut covers.
Sometimes when publishers feel a whole lot of excitement about a new book, they decide to put half a dust jacket around it, believing that this looks somehow different and original enough to entice an extra cadre of readers. NEWSFLASH: it results in damaged book covers. Always. Period. Let’s suppose for a moment that you’ve just published a book called Atherton #1: The House of Power by, say… Patrick Carman. You think it will draw more readers to wrap half a jacket around the book, so you do. Trouble is, when customers handle that book roughly (which they will), that jacket will rip. I guarantee it. And the bookseller carrying that book will get frustrated and return those books to you as damaged. They might choose to replace those returned copies with new, undamaged copies or they might say, “To heck with it!” and never put the book on the shelf again.

The same thing can happen when you cut cleverly shaped holes in the covers of your paperback books. Frustrated booksellers will find themselves regretfully returning otherwise great books like Love Among the Walnuts by Jean Ferris, on which the chicken-shaped die-cut never fails to rip in multiple places, making new copies of the book look anything but.

Once upon a time my boyfriend came home from a meeting at Candlewick Press in which the creative-powers-that-be discussed putting a half jacket around their beautiful, beautiful new edition of his Beowulf graphic novel. These same intelligent powers-that-be later decided (perhaps swayed in part by the objections of a certain girlfriend, but perhaps not) to do a full jacket that has the appearance of a half jacket, for which I suspect booksellers, librarians, and Beowulf readers are much better off.

3. Lack of publication dates on the covers of Advance Reading Copies.
Believe it or not, some of us booksellers pay close attention to the publication dates printed on our galleys, in part because we receive so very, VERY many of them every season and we have to weed our galley shelves on a regular basis in order to make room for the newest arrivals. Some of you are printing the publication dates of your books on the inside pages of your ARCs. This is not in booksellers’ best interest, as it creates more work for us. It’s not in your best interest, as it makes us annoyed with you. A few wonderful, thoughtful, generous publishers have adopted the practice of printing publication dates on the spines of their ARCs, and to them I say, “Bless you.” To the rest of you I say, “PLEASE print the publication dates of your books on the spines of your ARCs.” The booksellers of the world will thank you.