When murder messes up your book launch

Sometimes writing the book, getting it agented, getting it published and getting to press isn't the problem. No, sometimes your co-author get accused of attempted murder just as the book comes out, and that really tanks the whole thing.

The prince has read Dystopia!

As the world is clearly headed for a zombie apocalypse, I think other people's dreams of dystopian futures are quaint and sadly misinformed (except for the ones that involve surviving said zombie apocalypse). But, if you are so inclined, check out these top 16 dystopian novels. Enjoy the creepy creep-ness, friends.

Also, extra hugs to whoever can tell me the inspiration for the post title.

A preemptive bookshelf eulogy

Woe to the world, reader types--the bookshelf is dead! Well, not actually, but it's coming. Ok, not really soon, but eventually. Russell Smith writes:

People come to see my minuscule new living room and say, hmm, you could have another foot and a half without that wall of bookshelves. True, but then you would never be able to distract yourself, while waiting for me to dress, by pulling down, at random, Weapons of World War II and 100 Erotic Drawings.

But you’d probably have brought your own e-reader with you, which you’d be looking at anyway (checking Facebook, updating: “I am so mad right now”). Book-walls are just aesthetic now, just an unusually dense wallpaper: We don’t really need them for consultation....And all our books will be invisible, like our music: The sum total of our literary experience will be a list of file names on a grey plastic machine in a briefcase.

After careful consideration, I think Smith is overreacting a little here. There will always been a need for secret bookcase passages, and a place to store trophies.

The answers are at the tips of your fingers

There's an article at Salon about braille dying out in favor of text to speech and audiobooks. It says:

In this New York Times article, we find that many blind people, including the governor of New York, don't read braille. Instead they rely on audiobooks, recordings of newspapers and magazines, and human assistants to orally brief them on the business of the day. Text-to-speech technology allows people to hear their e-mails and other documents.

And in this Canadian Broadcasting Corp. article, we find that the major provider of books in braille in Canada is about to go out of business if it can't get government funding or some other source of revenue. They are having a hard time convincing people that braille is even necessary anymore.

Thoughts?

Macmillan and Amazon: Not friends

I'm sure this has already reached your ears, reader types, but in case not, Amazon gave Macmillan the proverbial Facebook unfriend (defriend?), delisting all Macmillan titles from the bookseller's site. Galleycat has a great round-up of events and coverage, and John Sargent, CEO of Macmillan, issued a response, which outlines the proposed system that Amazon rejected:

Under the agency model, we will sell the digital editions of our books to consumers through our retailers. Our retailers will act as our agents and will take a 30% commission (the standard split today for many digital media businesses). The price will be set for each book individually....Our disagreement is not about short term profitability but rather about the long-term viability and stability of the digital book market.

So, interesting so far. Then Amazon released a statement, that says:

We want you to know that ultimately, however, we will have to capitulate and accept Macmillan's terms because Macmillan has a monopoly over their own titles, and we will want to offer them to you even at prices we believe are needlessly high for e-books.

For a little perspective on Amazon's stance, Amazon UK delisted Hachette in May of 2008 during a fight over discounting, and it doesn't appear that things were settled until June of 2009, if Bookseller's dates are accurate (props if anyone can tell me if that's right). In the Hachette situation, while titles were not removed from Amazon whole hog, the option to "buy now" by clicking one button was gone, and instead of buying from Hachette the consumer had to go through through a third party seller. So, while there is a precedent for delisting publishers for extended periods of time, I'm going to have to assume that Amazon's need to capitulate so quickly is at least in part because, as Sargent says, "The agency model would allow Amazon to make more money selling our books, not less."

I'm not a sales type (although a little birdie has told me that a sales type will be discussing this topic today), so I can only make guesses and assumptions, but I would assume that Amazon a) doesn't want e-book prices dictated by publishers (dur) and is taking an aggressive stand on it now, and b) will fold for money after taking what Cory Doctorow is calling a farcical stance on consumer rights.

Avast, book piracy!

An Attributor study has found that, in the past year, publishing has probably list $3 million to book piracy. PW says:

From the four sites that make digital download data available--4shared.com, scribd.com, wattpad.com, and docstoc.com--Attributor found 3 million illegal downloads in the final quarter of 2009 of the 913 books followed. The company estimates those four sites represent about one-third of all book piracy. (Attributor calculated the share of piracy based on 53,000 book takedown notices sent out to various Web sites in the second half of 2009).

While most of these titles were in the business and investing area (very ethical, investors), there was still a considerable fiction contingent. Read the full PDF of the study here, and start to panic: the end is nigh!

Crotch bomber may work for traditional publishing, is also a dick

As we all know, the crotch bomber tried to ruin America and Christmas by exploding a plane, but only succeeded in burning his testicles (one hopes very, very badly) before being jumped by a Dutch film director. The director subsequently made a ton of money off of his story, thus earning his American citizenship through a love of capitalism.

As a result, the TSA, known for its sanity and non-reactionary decisions, discussed banning anything vaguely electronic and standing during the last hour of international flights to the US (and then subpoenaed the bloggers who published the potential policy leak. Class. Act). So what isn't electronic, and can keep someone sitting and entertained for at least an hour? Clearly books!

Thus, books are the result of stopping terrorism. QED, folks.

Fox News smacks down your e-reader dreams

Yesterday, I said that buying an e-reader is an American, patriotic duty. It turns out (and it pains me to admit it) that I may have been wrong. Why? Because Fox News says not to buy e-readers.

Now, we all know Fox News is never wrong, and they are more American than an apple pie covered in peanut butter wrapped in an American flag smashed with a baseball bat. (For those of you of a non-American persuasion, that is very, very American.) Plus, your e-reader might be spying on you. Back to the traditional paper book and writing on papyrus!

Eggo shortage is a sign of the apocalypse

Over at Pimp My Novel, Kate pointed out the Eggo shortage ravaging the country. Thank goodness, Stephen Colbert has addressed the issue:

The Colbert Report	Mon - Thurs 11:30pm / 10:30c
Eggo Waffles Shortage Alert
www.colbertnation.com
Colbert Report Full Episodes Political Humor U.S. Speedskating

This is yet another reason to buy a waffle iron. That, plus waffle iron pizza pockets.

Octogenarians authors don't feel the love

Robert McCrum hates on older authors, saying their work starts to take a nosedive with age. He writes:

If most writers' reputations are made, or at least begun, before the age of 40, then very few novelists put many runs on the scoreboard after 70. Arguably, they can even start to damage their reputations, as anguished fans concede that their idols have feet of clay.

I think the argument McCrum is trying to make is that a lot of great authors have great first works, and after that pretty much everyone tanks. That perhaps "people run out of ideas eventually, especially after three decades as a writer."

I don't think an 80 year old is any more likely to write something terrible than a 20 year old (which is to say, most people's books are terrible regardless of age. Except for your novel, reader. That one is great. That guy you hate? His is terrible). Thoughts?

Apocalyptic fiction: It has gotten more messed up

About twenty years ago we went bananas and stopped being able to blame the apocalypse on robots and/or sin. Because apparently we don't care any more about why the world ends—we just want to see what happens after the cool explosions and burning and what have you.

Perhaps the most important part, though, is this:

I recently finished a thesis project on post-apocalyptic genre fiction, and in my research I made a list of 423 books, poems, and short stories about the apocalypse, published between 1826-2007, and charted them by the way their earth met its demise (humans, nature, god, etc.) to see the trends over time.

Someone got a degree for reading about how we imagine the world ending. Please. Sign. Me. Up.

There's also a great graph. Clicky clicky.