German Buch News: Libri, KNV End Distribution Agreement; Salt is Cookbook of the Year

By Siobhan O’Leary

German book wholesalers Libri and KNV are ending their year-long experiment in combined distribution on December 31st. According to Buchreport, the fact that the two wholesalers had very different systems and procedures prevented them from realizing the cost savings they’d anticipated. In addition, certain regions lacked infrastructure for distribution leading to further problems.

LitVideo and Lübbe are working together on a web campaign for the book Ein König für Deutschland by Andreas Eschbach (A King for Germany), about hackers who try to sabotage a federal election. The book’s microsite, www.ein-koenig-fuer-deutschland.de, includes a personality test that categorizes readers as kings, dictators, revolutionaries, or diplomats, the results of which they can then post on Facebook or Twitter. BookMarkt reports that a trailer for the book will also be shown on more than 80 LitVideo displays in bookstores throughout Germany.

Publishers Ingo Holland’s book Salt, published by Tre Torri, Germany’s reigning authority on spices, has been selected as Cookbook of the Year by the Deutsches Institut für Koch- und Lebenskunst (German Institute for the Art of Cooking and Living). It offers up more than 200 pages about different types of salt and salt mixtures along with 50 recipes, some of which will be included in the October issue of BuckMarkt.