STATE OF THE INDUSTRY REPORT

Publishers and agents on the panel Writing Matters event at Watchung Booksellers, Montclair, N.J., a week ago Friday--where the subject was Brave New World: Publishing a Book in 2010... and Beyond--agreed that the book business is in "a great time of transition," as Reagan Arthur, publisher of Reagan Arthur Books at Little, Brown, put it. "We're all feeling the shift dramatically."

Aaron Talwar, publisher of Dark Coast Press, said: ""My generation wants everything now and fast, which will dictate the kinds of books that come out in the future. Readers of the future will be the people who text."

Janet Reid, an agent at FinePrint Literary Management, said, "There are avenues for writers to be published that are vast compared to before, when the only alternative to established houses were vanity presses. Now there are lots of ways to be published." These changes help some hard-to-place books.

Technology now allows for direct conversations between authors, readers and publishers. "It's rich but it can be exhausting sometimes."

The battered economy and technological change have led "publishers to pull out their hair," Delbourgo said. "They're more selective. They're buying less. They're less liable to take risks." (NOTE: Oak Tree Press believes in its authors. We feel it's a “calculated” risk.)

Book reviewing is going through a sea change. Reagan Arthur noted: "I feel very acutely this year the complete collapse of the review community." Slowly replacing that are online reviewers, who in five or 10 years will be as "vibrant" as those in the print world.

Janet Reid confessed that she never reads the New York Times Book Review and said "readers buy books based on what their friends say." She was supportive of online reviewing, noting that now "a hundred million people across the country are talking about books."

Amy Gash agreed with a statement that there are fewer author tours paid for by publishers. More of that money is going to other ways of promoting authors, such as video trailers, websites and video chats.

Janet Reid emphasized the importance of having a "compelling voice and compelling first line" in any submission. Since her areas of interest include mystery and crime, this can mean that "if you set someone on fire on page 1 and do it well," she'll want to read more.

Amy Gash said she looked for a voice, "and it has to be original."

For her part, Joelle Delbourgo said, "If I don't like the first sentence, I won't read the second." She advised writers to work hard on their manuscripts and query letters. (NOTE: This is NOT how I select manuscripts.)

Delbourgo also provided some perspective on the current state of the book world, quoting longtime editor Michael Korda, who observed that "every decade the industry believes it is the end of the book and the end of publishing. But people are still reading books."--John Mutter