The Publishing Sea Change

 

In Publishing News this week,

We are nearly six months out from the London Book Fair and announcements about the expansion of the fair are happening. As well as hosting The Futurebook conference inside the fair, LBF are now partnering with the Children’s Media Conference. This brings a whole lot of film and TV people inside the London Book Fair for their conference. Children’s publishers who usually head to Bologna might want to make this fair a stop on the way.

 

This year publishers have been trying to play both sides of the AI coin. They are demanding that no AI be used while using AI themselves in their business. You can call it hypocritical or be kinder and decide that AI is changing the publishing world rapidly and last week’s decisions will be different to this weeks. 

Publishers Weekly recently published an article by Ed Nowatka, Publishing’s AI Reckoning, which I think everyone should read. Ed interviews several publishers on AI and how they are using it. One line stopped me in my tracks. A publisher stated that they have added into their contract that if the author cannot revise their AI generated text it then becomes the property of the publisher. 

Meanwhile, over at Pan Macmillan they announced a forthcoming book, The Everything Code, a "human originated, AI facilitated" book. This was announced as a Trade Publishing first. A commentator called it the beginning of the third big change in publishing, after Gutenberg and The Kindle.

 

Occasionally I highlight instances around the world where writers or booksellers have been detained over their writing or books that they sell. I was surprised to read in Publishers Weekly that some bookstores have penned an open letter over the excessive jail terms (50 years?) given to some of their number for protesting and running a printing press and book club in Texas.

 

The Alliance of Independent Authors run a few free virtual conferences ever year. Their next one is on the theme of the Future of Self Publishing: What’s working now and what’s coming next, in October. As always, they have a great line up of speakers. Go and register. It's Free.

 

I try to listen or read Joanna Penns interviews every week. Her guests are excellent and often thought provoking in various ways. Recently she interviewed J Daniel Sawyer, a fiction writer and podcaster on his new book. Reclaiming Your Mind: An Autodidacts Bible. An autodidact is someone who teaches themselves things rather than taking a course. This is a great interview on thinking differently about research.

Another recent interview which piqued my interest was Anna McPhee on What Machines Can’t Replace: Why AI Makes Us More Human.

 

Mark Lefebvere has a new book for authors coming out A Book In Hand- Strategies for Optimizing Print Book Sales via Signings and Other In Person Events. He has a Kickstarter to help publicise it with some great  deals. Mark is well known in the Indie and Horror book world and he has done every job in publishing so he knows what he talks about.

 

Writing craft teacher James Scott Bell has an interesting post on novellas and how to use them to try out an idea. He also comments on Hachette new imprint which is all about novellas. If one of the big 5 are committing to the format there must be money in it.

When you are deep in the weeds of your novel it can be hard to remember important character details or backstory. That’s where a story bible comes in. Wendy van Camp has tips for creating a good story bible to save your sanity.

 

In The Craft Section,

Grammar errors you could be making- Rachel Thompson

Antihero vs Antagonist vs Villain- Lucy Hay- Bookmark

Character impact- K M Weilkand- Bookmark

The secret to raising Tension- Janice Hardy- Bookmark

Writing lessons learned the hard way- Alison Hammer

 

In The Marketing Section,

7 killer fiction marketing tips- Sandra Beckwith- Bookmark

2 great posts from Dale Evans- Book Marketing resources and Building a website without coding- Bookmark both

Goodreads Book Marketing Strategy- Kris Maze

Is the author website dead- Cassie Mannes Murray- Interesting

 

To Finish,

Lisa Norman has an interesting article on Writers In The Storm : What Ten Years Did To My Publishing Process. Lisa talks about the changes in her own business. As she says, the publishing geology is the same, the equipment has changed. 

Publishing is changing. What used to be hard to do is easier now. However, writing the stories remains the same rewarding creative endeavor it always was. 

 

Maureen

@craicer

 

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Photo by Verstappen Photography on Unsplash