By Edward Nawotka Brazilian book publishing is full of surprises –- one of them being that many classics of Western literature have never been translated into Portuguese. Stephen Morrison, Associate Publisher and Editor-in-Chief of Penguin Books in the United States saw the opportunity to bring his company’s long line of classics to this emerging market and last month penned a …
Global Trade Talk: Russia Over-Publishes, 1M Cool-er Sales, Brazil Book Fair Begins
By Hannah Johnson Publishing Trends reports that the Russian publishers are struggling, not only because of the economy, but also from the effects of over-publishing. Coping with bookstore returns and warehousing the unsold inventory, distributors are having trouble paying publishers, which financially impacts agents and authors as well. The growth of foreign investments in Russia’s publishing sector could mean a …
Global Trade Talk: Author Advances Suffer in the UK; Frankfurt’s Biz Survey
By Edward Nawotka Publishers are cutting author advances by as much as 80% in the UK, reports Benedicte Page in The Bookseller. Clare Alexander of Aitken Alexander said: “For an established author who is not a bestseller, the advance may be down by as much as 50%, or books may not be being bought at all. The decline has been …
Weekly Recap: UKs Myebook, Caribbean Fiction, Tokyo Book Fair
Earlier this week Publishing Perspectives offered you stories you’re not likely to read anywhere else. If you missed any of them, please click on any of the links below. And then, if you like what you read, please forward the link to a friend and encourage them to sign up for our daily newsletter. (Read the recap in Chinese and …
Clarice Lispector’s Biographer on the Thrill of the Hunt
By Benjamin Moser UTRECHT, THE NETHERLANDS — Nobody’s ugly at two a.m., so the t-shirt slogan goes. One evening a few years ago, I was sitting in my Dutch garden, talking to some friends about Clarice Lispector, the Jewish-Brazilian mystic writer. Having recently left the security of my publishing job in order to devote myself full-time to writing, I’d been …
Bonus Material: Don’t You Wish Your Book Fest Was Hot Like Me
By Edward Nawotka Where would you rather hear authors read: In a fluorescent-lit lecture hall in some damp college town or on the beach in Brazil? Known colloquially as FLIP, the Festa Literaria Internacional de Parati has been taking place since 2003 in the colonial seaside town of Paraty – a place so beautiful it is in the running to …