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Penguin Group recently unveiled a new portion of its Web site called From the Publisher's Office that presents a range of multimedia features promoting the publisher's titles. The new "Web network" contains content that was created, recorded and produced by Penguin editors and staff specifically for the site.
Two months after Markus Dohle announced a dramatic restructuring of Random House imprints, a move that eliminated Stephen Rubin's position as publisher of Doubleday Publishing Group, the Random House chairman yesterday named Rubin publisher at large.
Publishing giant HarperCollins joined the industry-wide restructuring movement on Tuesday, announcing the closing of an imprint and the dismissal of two of its top executives.
Book sales rose slightly in 2007 over the previous year, but the upward trend seen over the past few years may not continue, the New York Times reported today.
Last year's book sales rose slightly over 2005, the New York Times reports today. According to a study by the Book Industry Study Group, publishers sold 3.1 billion books in 2006, up just 0.5 percent from 2005, when 3.09 billion were published.
Taking their cue from the film industry, in which a well-produced trailer is infinitely more valuable than a print advertisement or press release, commercial publishers such as HarperCollins and Houghton Mifflin are taking advantage of new technology to offer promotional videos on their Web sites to augment their traditional publicity campaigns.
Michael Stephen Fuchs doesn't seem particularly naive or susceptible to exploitation. The fast-talking writer has a successful day job as an Internet consultant, peppers his conversation with literary aphorisms, and, like many debut authors, can talk with an eloquence borne from personal experience about the iniquities of the publishing business. But according to some in the book trade, Fuchs has been suckered.
Not unlike European explorers five hundred years ago, the United States publishing industry is looking for a route to China. And, like those explorers, each company seems to be setting a different course.
At some point every writer must turn her attention from the art of creating to the business of selling. And while many authors would like to avoid the industry altogether, a basic understanding of it—from the top five houses to the independents—is an unavoidable necessity.
