Running for the closing doors
A quick note of congrats first to WW client Hugh Hunter,
whose Our Man in Orlando is coming out with Monday Books
this autumn. Hooray for him - a huge achievement that - and well
done too to Craig Taylor, his WW editorial guru. Champers all
round.
But now to the main event. This blog does, I know, sometimes feel repetitive at the moment. I go on and on about change in the industry which has affected none of us directly yet, but which is about to cause upheaval on an unprecedented scale.
Over the last couple of days, I've had conversations with someone from an independent publisher and a senior figure at one of the big international publishers. The first person told me that they thought Waterstones - for so long a fixture on British high streets - may be gone completely in a few years time. The second person said to me that the emerging industry wouldn't have room for agents, publishers and retailers - at least one of those functions would disappear and she didn't know if publishers themselves would be left standing. She asked me what I thought would happen, and I said truthfully that I had no idea.
What is certain, however, is that these are interesting times. Some agents are starting to encroach on publishers' turf. Some publishers are looking again at taking unsolicited submissions - which is to say, they're looking at taking over functions traditionally handled by agents. And all this begs the questions, what are agents really for? What value added do they bring? What are publishers really for? And what is their value added?
In the past, those questions have been easy enough to answer. You need an agent, because you can't get a publisher otherwise. You need a publisher, because you don't get access to limited bricks-n-mortar shelfspace otherwise. In the new world, however, you may not need an agent to get a publisher and it may well be that physical bookshops become as rare and lovely as steam trains, in which case there's no limit on the amount of bookshelves available. The old answers, in short, are starting to collapse, and the most we can say for now is that the shape of the questions is becoming ever clearer.
And if this blog sounds a bit repetitive at times - well, so be it. We are in the midst of the biggest revolution in publishing since movable type and it's happening very fast indeed. The future is on its way and it knows where you live.
Oh, and just had an email saying that Caroline Clough, who came to the Festival of Writing this spring, has just won the Scottish Kelpies Prize for kids' writing, and her book is coming out with Floris Publishers. Monster congrats to her. We can't claim a whole bundle of credit for her success - she'd already submitted her work by the time she met Val Tyler at the Festival - but she tells me she did find Val's comments useful when it came to getting the MS ready for final publication, so more champers all round anyway. The book is called Red Fever and it's out this autumn.
But now to the main event. This blog does, I know, sometimes feel repetitive at the moment. I go on and on about change in the industry which has affected none of us directly yet, but which is about to cause upheaval on an unprecedented scale.
Over the last couple of days, I've had conversations with someone from an independent publisher and a senior figure at one of the big international publishers. The first person told me that they thought Waterstones - for so long a fixture on British high streets - may be gone completely in a few years time. The second person said to me that the emerging industry wouldn't have room for agents, publishers and retailers - at least one of those functions would disappear and she didn't know if publishers themselves would be left standing. She asked me what I thought would happen, and I said truthfully that I had no idea.
What is certain, however, is that these are interesting times. Some agents are starting to encroach on publishers' turf. Some publishers are looking again at taking unsolicited submissions - which is to say, they're looking at taking over functions traditionally handled by agents. And all this begs the questions, what are agents really for? What value added do they bring? What are publishers really for? And what is their value added?
In the past, those questions have been easy enough to answer. You need an agent, because you can't get a publisher otherwise. You need a publisher, because you don't get access to limited bricks-n-mortar shelfspace otherwise. In the new world, however, you may not need an agent to get a publisher and it may well be that physical bookshops become as rare and lovely as steam trains, in which case there's no limit on the amount of bookshelves available. The old answers, in short, are starting to collapse, and the most we can say for now is that the shape of the questions is becoming ever clearer.
And if this blog sounds a bit repetitive at times - well, so be it. We are in the midst of the biggest revolution in publishing since movable type and it's happening very fast indeed. The future is on its way and it knows where you live.
Oh, and just had an email saying that Caroline Clough, who came to the Festival of Writing this spring, has just won the Scottish Kelpies Prize for kids' writing, and her book is coming out with Floris Publishers. Monster congrats to her. We can't claim a whole bundle of credit for her success - she'd already submitted her work by the time she met Val Tyler at the Festival - but she tells me she did find Val's comments useful when it came to getting the MS ready for final publication, so more champers all round anyway. The book is called Red Fever and it's out this autumn.
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We need some damn good books to come out and get everyone reading again. Anyone out there ready for the challenge?!
In regards to agents, I feel it would be a shame if they faded out of the industry. They, to me, seem very much a part of the whole publishing system. Maybe this is because I am new to all of this, but I am incredibly traditional and like to keep things as traditional as possible. I don't hold particularly well with modern change.
It may well be that libraries as we know them will go, but 'Google' is a business and not a public service and exists to make a profit for it's shareholders.
The motivation for the library service had been education for the masses, and arose out the the mechanical institutes of the early nineteenth century. The 'London library' came from this movement.
A free press emerged at the same time. Novels 'as we know them' developed of Victorian periodicals - their cost of a 'penny' allowed a wider readership at a time when a book cost 30s.
All this might well go - all sacrificed for the profit motive and damn the public good! Shelley where are you? Come back, all is forgiven!
And, Mike, I'd say that in fact the price of books is almost certain to come down, and the range of books available to an ordinary buyer has shot up since the the advent of Amazon. Whatever else may be going on, it's certainly not putting books beyond the reach of the ordinary punter.
Childrens book sales have increased tremendously in the last 10 years, as have other genres. The book shop will never disappear altogether (unless there is a holocaust of some description). I understand that in business you need to complete a three year forecast minimum (extrememly difficult in publishing) but if you presented a negative forecast, you would have no investers / no clients and no nice bank manager. I work in education finance.
Noone could have predicted what would happen with ebook sales and the same goes for agents / publishers. We just have to ride the tide, and crest the waves of new market potential. :)
I think agents will keep going, because as authors we need an expert batting for us in selling our work. Whether that's sold to book publishers, or individually as different kinds of rights to different kinds of publishers (e-book, etc.), in a sense doesn't matter to us, as long as someone who knows more about it than we do can keep up to speed.
I think bookshops will keep going, but niche-ify, either going down the supermarket road with piles of bestsellers at heavy discounts, or becoming the equivalent of the deli at the other, with helpful, knowledgeable specialist staff and a delightful atmosphere, where you pay full price for books you're unlikely to find out about any other way. Indeed, Waterstones' recent re-vamp has seen it to some degree giving up on chasing the supermarkets, and going that way. Whether it's too late, remains to be seen.
Fundamentally, I think it's publishers who are most at risk: everything they do COULD be done by non-traditional specialists of other sorts. But they do have a huge experience of selling stories to humans, from editorial to design, compared to anyone in love with e-book technology or soap-powder shelving strategies, and they just might be quick enough on their feet to work out what to do. As ever, the quick on the feet and deep-pocketed will succeed, and the weaker bretheren won't...
The rapidly changing events in the book world will continue to squeeze the margins on the product. This means that current models of operation cannot be sustained in the long term. Therefore, the most unnecessary part of the literary process will be the first to decline. My prediction is that we will see the demise of the literary agent who continues to operate in the same "traditional" manner. The number of high street book stores will dwindle. Some publishers will go out of business. The only certainty is that there will always be writers... good, bad and ugly.
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