Australian book industry orgs pledge to attend climate strike
Wednesday, 18 September 2019
'Lost sales pale in significance against the threat global warming poses to our future. Candelo Books has never closed its doors on a whim … We are a small store...
The Children’s Bookshop owner Paul Macdonald on Sydney’s retail environment
Wednesday, 11 September 2019
‘Running a bookshop in Sydney is just becoming too difficult ... People are using retail space as a showroom to explore purchasing options and more and more are shopping online...
Adler on her new role at Hachette
Wednesday, 4 September 2019
‘I see an audience and I see books. Other people see an audience. For me it’s that business of engaged writing by engaged writers. People who are interested in the...
Tension between libraries and publishers in the ebook market
Wednesday, 28 August 2019
‘There are dark hints that the hand of Amazon is at work in the current tensions over library ebook lending, including reports that Amazon reps have been showing publishers data...
The era of throwaway arts
Wednesday, 21 August 2019
‘The four-year model is supposed to invest in the arts and organisations long-term, but now it seems more like it’s reinforcing the project model: prioritising new programs that are disposable,...
Diversity lacking in the Australian arts sector
Wednesday, 14 August 2019
‘The data is unequivocal: Australia’s cultural leaders are simply not representative of our richly diverse Australian community. The question now is, what are we going to do about it?’—Jackie Bailey,...
The shortcomings of literary awards
Wednesday, 7 August 2019
‘Yes, prizes generate income for a few authors and publishers, but I am hard-pressed to think of any other aspect of literary culture that has been genuinely enriched by literary...
ALA denounces Macmillan’s new ebook lending restrictions
Wednesday, 31 July 2019
‘When a library serving many thousands has only a single copy of a new title in ebook format, it’s the library, not the publisher, that feels the heat. It’s the...
UK Booksellers Association urges shops to go green
Wednesday, 24 July 2019
‘Booksellers can take the lead in their communities, and in the trade—where there is already a high awareness of the challenge—and the green manifesto is designed as a key step...
Jane Curry: Editing has become a gendered profession
Wednesday, 17 July 2019
'[Editing] is now seen as a female profession and, like nursing and teaching, it is undervalued as a result. Editors may ‘lean in’ in terms of commitment and skill but...
Walkley-Pascall winner Jeff Sparrow on literary criticism in Australia
Wednesday, 10 July 2019
'There is something of a crisis of criticism in Australia and it’s connected to broader declines in media. You only have to look at the book pages that used to...
Nathan Hollier on the future of MUP
Wednesday, 3 July 2019
‘To thrive and indeed survive as humans we need to develop our capacity to make rational decisions based on evidence, logic, and an open, imaginative, empathetic engagement with each other,...
Africa Rising summit: ‘African publishing is the new frontier’
Wednesday, 26 June 2019
‘If Iceland, with 300,000 people, can sustain literary culture, why not Africa, where there are 40 million speakers of Yoruba, or 60 million Hausa, and 100 million speaking Swahili?’—In the...
Jon Page on the retail recession
Wednesday, 19 June 2019
'I call it a retail recession. We spoke to retailers on the strip where we are and some of them have already closed and got out, and some are having...
James Daunt: Barnes & Noble stores ‘need a little botox’
Thursday, 13 June 2019
‘Elliott expects, at some point, to sell B&N for a lot more than they bought it for—they expect to make tons and tons of money. But they also know that...
Bonnier and Storytel go to war over audiobook fees
Wednesday, 5 June 2019
‘There are some for whom subscription represents a holy grail, as if books must always follow other media sectors. The truth is somewhat thornier ... beneath the veneer of the...
Bruce Pascoe on the reception to ‘Dark Emu’
Wednesday, 29 May 2019
'I had a feeling this book would reach a wider audience. It just goes to show that Australia is changing its mind about its own history—there’s a conversation going on,...
The value of sensitivity readers
Wednesday, 22 May 2019
‘A science fiction writer needs to know how an object moves in zero gravity, or what a black hole looks like ... a cis, white, able bodied writer should be...
The Vogel should have been awarded, argues Jane Rawson
Wednesday, 15 May 2019
'How about setting up a prize for emerging writers over forty? How about one for an emerging writer whose career has been delayed by raising children, caring for parents, making...
Writing in danger of becoming ‘elitist’ says UK Society of Authors CEO
Wednesday, 8 May 2019
‘There is a danger of writing becoming an elitist profession which excludes new and diverse voices. This report should act as a wake-up call for the industry.’—UK Society of Authors...
Morris Gleitzman on school libraries
Wednesday, 1 May 2019
‘Even if your library has only a limited number of books, most kids will find one that will do it for them. But once that connection is made, their thirst...
Book buyer spotlight
Wednesday, 24 April 2019
'Store events with visiting authors not only help book sales but if done well, can take a bookshop from just a retail outlet to a central part of the community,...
A love letter to the Centre for Youth Literature
Wednesday, 17 April 2019
‘Love for reading not only should—but needs—to be kept alive, especially with us teenagers. YA literature and books in general are a way to relax, calm down and chill out...
Tony Birch on identity and storytelling
Wednesday, 10 April 2019
'What has changed in the last decade, a remarkable shift that critics of festivals ignore, is that Aboriginal writers now appear in greater numbers, and we get to speak for...
Waterstones staffers agitate for wage increases
Wednesday, 3 April 2019
‘Waterstones’ much-celebrated return to profitability has been engineered by Daunt, but built on the labour of booksellers, much of it inadequately remunerated and unrecognised ... Theirs is the tireless effort...
Young people speak out about the closure of SLV’s Centre for Youth Literature
Wednesday, 27 March 2019
'Even if everything does continue on as usual ... it denies teenage and youth leaders having their own independent organisation. It's like saying YA literature isn't important enough to have...
Faber CEO calls on publishers to ‘have courage’ in face of Brexit
Wednesday, 20 March 2019
‘I fear there are those who believe that global English language markets are in their interests, both retailers and publishers. They are not.’—In his keynote at the London Book Fair’s...
Mike Shuttleworth on the Centre for Youth Literature
Thursday, 14 March 2019
'Driven more by passion than by planning, the promotion and support of children’s and teenage literature is currently piecemeal and under stress. It is urgently in need of a politically...
PRH agrees to collectively bargain with editorial and publicity staff
Wednesday, 6 March 2019
'An Enterprise Bargaining Agreement (EBA) will enshrine clearer processes, improve job satisfaction and job security, and allow editors and publicists to do what they love best: working on and promoting...
On reading, publishing and being working class
Wednesday, 27 February 2019
‘Reading is not a given for all. It is a tenuous product of years of nurturing that the more working class you are, the less likely you are to receive...
