By Edward Nawotka Do you think you are literary guru? Do you read more than all your friends put together? Can you tell truth from fiction? Test your literary knowledge with Adam Langer’s quiz, featured today on Publishing Perspectives. Langer’s novel, The Thieves of Manhattan, was published this week by Spiegel & Grau. Publishers Weekly praised it as “an über-hip …
Getting NOOKy: B&N Encourages Students to Study with E-textbooks
By Helen Gregg Just in time for back-to-college, Barnes & Noble announced today the August 2010 release of NOOKstudy, a free software application designed to help students use and manage all of their electronic resources and study aids. Despite the name, the application is for computers -– no Nook required. The new NOOKstudy will allow students to organize their class …
My Novel: There’s An App for That!
By David Carnoy • David Carnoy, executive editor at CNET.com, originally released his mystery/thriller Knife Music as an iPhone app, which was first rejected on grounds of obscenity. It eventually went on to sell 30,000 copies as e-books for the Kindle and Sony Reader, and paperbacks from Amazon’s BookSurge. • The book’s success attracted the attention of Peter Mayer at …
Steve Ross, Ex-HarperCollins and RH Exec, Joins Abrams Artists Agency
By Edward Nawotka Steve Ross, most recently President and Group Publisher of the Collins Division of HarperCollins and former Publisher of Random House’s Crown Division, is joining Abrams Artists Agency as the director of their newly formed Book Division. He starts Monday. Ross left HarperCollins in February 2009 when the Collins division was folded into Harper after a major restructuring …
The Dawn of Digital Book Philanthropy
Editorial by Dusty Sang • Stay Thirsty Press, a digital first publisher, is donating 50 cents from the sale of two of its most recent titles to the Pennsylvania Innocence Project and ProLiteracy. • Charity, argues Sang — whose own publishing house was inspired by a personal tragedy — should be part of every business strategy. CHICAGO: In the darkest …
Ripple E-Reader Enables Recordable, Read-Along Children’s E-Books
By Jaye Kephart, owner of Ripple Reader, www.ripplereader.com • Ripple provides a free e-reader for children’s picture books and allows parents to record themselves reading the text • Instead of just following along, children increasingly want to read and record the stories for themselves My sister died of cancer when her grandkids were only one and two years old. She …
Toshiba to Launch an E-book Store
By Helen Gregg Toshiba is set to launch a new e-book store in the next few weeks, reported TeleRead. Powered by Blio, the new Book Place site will offer current bestsellers, along with cookbooks, travel guides, children’s books, and textbooks. From the press release: “Toshiba Book Place will offer you a full-color, 3-D, interactive reading experience – powered by Blio, …
Catching up with Open Letter’s Chad Post re: Paper-Over-Board
By Edward Nawotka Last year at this time on Publishing Perspectives friend and contributor Chad Post, director of Open Letter Press at the University of Rochester, wrote a paean to paper-over-board book bindings — you know, those hardcovers without the book jackets. At the time, Chad revealed that despite his dedication to the format, both consumers and booksellers were often …
Is Spanish Language Publishing in the US an Untapped Market?
By Edward Nawotka Today’s lead article by Emily Williams describes how even as demand for Spanish language books in the US continues to rise, libraries struggle to meet the demand. Not only are their budgets for book acquisitions being slashed, increasingly they can’t find the types and quality of books they need. We’ve asked before, “Whatever Happened to Spanish Language …
The Death of “Submit-Wait-Pray”: Self Publishing as a Cottage Industry
By Angela K. Durden ATLANTA: As late as the start of the twentieth century, cottage industries supported many families. When automation arrived, “cottage industry” became an undeserved term for substandard work. But the cottage industry has made a comeback. I know, because I am one. So are my co-authors — Marla Brown, Eleanor Morgan, and Peggy Parks. After meeting through …