10 Ways Book Publishers Are Fighting Back
Against piracy! Against the digital encroach! Against illiteracy! Against each other! Publishing, that cheeky teaser of mind, body, and soul, enjoys the same level of excitement and drama as other fields, if not more. As with every industry out there, it plays host to a crazy ensemble cast of heroes, villains, threats, challenges, underdogs, and other archetypes. Then conflict happens — or at least publishers come across a conflict that needs addressing. What follows are just some of the few exciting adventures that go down in the publishing world.
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Partnering with news outlets
E-book developers pose a threat to their more traditional predecessors, and their recent team-ups with periodicals and blogs make things even harder for them. In order to fight fire with napalm, some publishers have decided to fight the encroaching competition with a good old-fashioned team-up. For example, Politico and Random House are now working together on a series of e-books relevant to the 2012 presidential cycle. Both benefit from this deal when it comes to profits and producing quick content and may very well set the precedent for future collaborations between different media outlets.
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Launching self-publishing departments
2011 saw a major publishing house launch its own services catering to the desires of promising authors seeking self-guided options. Penguin's Book Country initiative embraces all the very same tenets making self-publishing such an attractive option, charging between $99 and $549 for various printing and promotions services. Unlike many other similar offerings, the major publishing house provides far more resources and opportunities for aspiring writers — not to mention easy access to some great talents who might very well work in more traditional outlets. Some members in the Book Country bullpens have sold upwards of 1 million units, making them prime candidates for moving on up Penguin's talent ladder.
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Restricting e-book lending to libraries
When publishers and Amazon put up their dukes over e-books and e-book lending, innocent libraries suffer more than anyone else. In an attempt to eke out an edge over their digital competition, Penguin ditched its lending services on the Kindle, pulling all but some very old titles, which will still only last until the end of the year. The American Library Association understandably finds this move distasteful, as it greatly lessens their opportunities to provide free e-books to the community. Many cite the publisher's decision as a slap in the face to Amazon over "'copyright security' concerns" that struck the ALA instead, when the real issue should've been over lending rights on the front end.
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Making readers pay for floundering ad sales
Cash-strapped sponsors have been slowly pulling out of periodicals, leaving the publishers without the revenue needed to stay afloat. But soft! What solution through yonder conference room breaks? To make up for lost cash flow, consumers are the ones doling out the dollars for subscriptions, exclusive content, and other offerings. Some estimates believe advertising fell by around 35% over the past three years, which places quite a financial burden on readers, who themselves might not have the money to pay for the information they need.
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iPad-exclusive content
Penguin and Amazon's not-so-little Kindle tiff isn't the only rumble happening over e-book readers and devices (such as the iPad) enabled to act like them. Apple's notoriously restrictive content policies mean some magazines don't reach the readership they want — a sad prospect when one considers the tablet an ideal technological makeover for the medium. Some enterprising publishers, however, have decided to hook up with the tech juggernaut and offer their most popular reads at a dollar less than the cover price. Hearst Magazines (Seventeen, O, Esquire, Popular Mechanics, and Marie Claire) and Conde Nast (The New Yorker, GQ, and Vanity Fair) stand as the most notable examples of businesses working with the system that so often works against its contemporaries.
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Keeping digital royalty rates the same, if not lowering them
Piracy remains a concern across most media, but each must respond to it in its own beautiful and unique snowflake way. In order to address the problem on a digital front, many publishing companies such as Faber and Little, Brown delegate more and more money to combating it. But consistently mounting legal and technical costs mean the money has to come from somewhere — and digital royalties frequently end up the most likely candidate for redistribution. So the authors themselves end up the most fiscally screwed over in piracy situations, though many publishers feel as if they have no other choice.
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Promoting discourse
Rather than raging against serious business within the publishing machine, Atticus Books turns its fighting spirits to something more societal in nature. Believing polite, intellectual discourse currently experiences a squelching, agonizing death at the hands of insult-hurling, condescension, and closed-mindedness, it debuted the Six Degrees Left initiative in 2011. The series brings together writers across multiple industries and mindsets in order to strip away controversies to the barest facts. Atticus Books prides itself on offering straightforward talks entirely devoid of the eye-rolling rhetoric of hate found on most political talking heads programs.
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Partnering with nonprofits
As with the previous example, it's entirely possible for publishers to "fight back" far outside inherent industry issues and do things that DON'T make them appear silly and/or greedy. Establishing productive partnerships with charitable causes — particularly those promoting literacy, naturally — does nothing but help all participating organizations. A few, such as the relatively new PUBSLUSH Press, take some admirably creative routes towards combating social ills. Its innovative structure allows readers rather than editors to decide what books end up published, and every one printed means one donated to a charitable literary cause. Impoverished children the world over especially benefit from their work with nonprofits like Flying Kites Leadership Academy, a Kenyan school desiring a fabulous library.
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CrossCheck
Bibliophiles make the best editors. With their vast knowledge of the written word, they're far better equipped to catch plagiarized submissions than most. But even the most ardent individuals adherent to all things literary can't read every book, pamphlet, and cereal box out there. As such, some ne'er-do-wells out there slip through the cracks and unjustly end up hogging shelf space. Whether they print journals, books, or other formats entirely, some publishing companies have started relying on services like CrossCheck to widen the traps. Run by the nonprofit CrossRef, it allows them to compare submissions with others in the database and check for plagiarism before acceptance. And it's been working. As Nature noted in its article on the subject, around 10% of Taylor & Francis' 216 checked submissions proved sketchy over the span of six months; findings they may not have otherwise noticed.
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Creative, engaging promotions
Innovative tactics meant to tantalize readers toward exciting new reads weren't even new when they were new, but they do grant publishers an advantage when trying to fight the Amazons and the Apples and the other hoopla the kids are into these days. Smaller, independent printers like Melville House must compete not only with the digital "menaces," but the Big Six businesses to boot, which requires extra creativity. Their fight against humdrum advertising sees them providing copies to independent booksellers earmarked as free giveaways when customers utter given code words. On the social media front, they drop prices for every 10 tweets sporting a specific hashtag. Melville House used both these strategies when drumming up interest in Gianni Rodani's Lamberto, Lamberto, Lamberto, which earned it some Publishers Weekly love.
Gaiman is one of the most recent authors to appear on The Simpsons. Famous for his sci-fi and fantasy books, the author was appropriately helping Homer, Bart, and a host of other characters to write a young adult novel about vampires, trolls, and other monsters-of-the-minute that are all over pop culture. An award-winning author of the children's fantasy novel The Graveyard Book, Gaiman uses his expertise to help the team crack the code for creating the perfect best-selling YA novel (hint: it involves mixing elements of Twilight, Harry Potter, and a few trolls), but success in the publishing world isn't quite what they expected, nor is Gaiman the ally in their quest for millions they thought he was.
Stephen King is one of the most prolific and popular authors today, publishing numerous best-selling novels during his long career, so it only makes sense that'd he show up in an episode of The Simpsons. King appears comes into an episode when the family decides to take in a book festival, repayment to Lisa for the destruction of her room in a VCR repair gone wrong. When they meet the iconic author, Marge tells him to, "Call me when you start writing horror again," a jab at the author for getting away from his core audience, perhaps. King dutifully notes her request, however, with no hard feelings.
Like King, Amy Tan also appears on The Simpsons in the book fair episode. Lisa, excited to meet the author of The Joy Luck Club, participates in a panel with the authors, telling her that she loved the book and that "It really showed me how the mother-daughter bond can triumph over adversity." Tan responds that that's not what she meant at all with the book and that Lisa should just sit down as she's embarrassing the both of them. Not a flattering portrait, perhaps, but one might imagine that after months of promoting a book that's what authors would like to say.
He may be a Pulitzer Prize winner, but that didn't stop this famous author from appearing on The Simpsons. Updike is also hanging out at the book fair, but for a different reason than Tan or King. It's revealed that he's the ghost writer behind Krusty's new autobiography Your Shoes Are Too Big to Kickbox with God. Clearly not an awards contender like Updike's Rabbit series, Krusty is at the fair promoting it nonetheless. Updike has few lines and reflected later that he struggled with the small chuckle he was supposed to deliver (which promoted Krusty to tell him to shut up), hoping to make it perfect for the show.
Thomas Pynchon is a famous recluse, a lifestyle that is perhaps well-suited for crafting the dense and complex novels he writes. While Pynchon hasn't appeared in pretty much any media for decades, he has been featured in not one, not two, but three Simpsons episodes. In the first, called "Diatribe of a Mad Housewife" (an episode rife with literary references, and perfect for any bibliophile) he plays himself, though with a bag over his head. He also writes a blurb for the novel Marge has penned that says, "Thomas Pynchon loved this book, almost as much as he loves cameras!" In his second appearance, his lines consist entirely of puns made off of the titles of his novels (example: "These wings are 'V'-licious! I'll put this recipe in 'The Gravity's Rainbow Cookbook', right next to 'The Frying of Latke 49'"), which are sure to elicit more than a few groans from literature lovers. In his third and final appearance, he takes on a non-speaking role, appearing at the Word Loaf convention along with host of other famous authors.
Mitch Albom has written several books, but he's perhaps most famous for his true life story Tuesdays with Morrie. Naturally, the episode on which he appears is a parody of that book, and is called "Thursdays with Abie." Unlike many of the other authors on this list, Albom doesn't only appear on the show as himself, instead also voicing the character of Marshall, a journalist who follows Grandpa Simpson around to record his life stories. Albom also shows up as himself, however, entering the nursing home as a journalist competing to record Grandpa's stories, but is told to take a hike, as Grandpa already has his journalist.
Tom Clancy appears in a couple of episodes of The Simpsons, but only has a speaking role, actually voiced by the author, in one. Like Pynchon, Clancy also appears in the episode where Marge decides to become an author. Asked to give a sound bite about Marge's book, Clancy comes up with the groan-inducing, "Hello this is Tom Clancy. Would I say, 'if you're hunting for a good read this October, Marge Simpson's book is a clear and present danger to your free time?' Hell no I wouldn't! Whaddya mean I just said it. That doesn't count. Hello? Hello?" Classic Simpsons humor with a literary twist!
If you're not much into non-fiction reading, you might not be familiar with Stephen Jay Gould, but when it comes to writing on evolution, paleontology, and popular science, he was one of the biggest names in the business. Before he passed away in 2002, Gould appeared on an episode of The Simpsons called "Lisa the Skeptic," in which the town discovers a skeleton that they believe to be from an angel. Lisa brings a sample of the angel to Gould to test, while the rest of the town goes gaga over the so-called angel. Gould isn't painted in the best light in the episode, however, never actually doing the tests, but telling Lisa the results were inconclusive.
Given the fervent following Rowling's Harry Potter series has generated around the world, it would have been difficult for such a pop culture-focused show like The Simpsons to have ignored her influence. When the Simpson family makes a quick hop across the pond to England for a vacation, they run into Rowling as she's coming out of a bookstore. Lisa thanks her for turning a generation of young kids onto reading and asks what happens at the end of the Harry Potter series (the episode was aired in 2003). Rowling replies, "He grows up and marries you. Is that what you want to hear?", much to Lisa's delight.
Michael Chabon appears as part of a literary power foursome that includes authors Jonathan Franzen, Gore Vidal, and Tom Wolfe appearing at the satirical Word Loaf Literary Conference. All of the authors have some great lines that poke fun at their work while they praise Moe for his surprisingly inspired poetry (created with the help of Lisa, of course). The episode includes a literary shunning and a great fight between Chabon and Franzen, where Chabon declares, "That's it, Franzen! I think your nose needs some Corrections!" Originally, the episode was to end with the authors being crushed by a boulder, but the show took pity on the authors and let them escape with only mild injuries.
Many cinephiles consider this baby boomer classic the quintessential American reunion film, partly because of the rockin' soundtrack and partly because of the butt-kicking cast with Jeff Goldblum, Glenn Close, William Hurt, Kevin Kline, and more. Following the suicide of a close college friend 15 years after graduation, the now-thirty-somethings convene at his funeral, reminiscing on good times and how everything changed once school finally ended. Despite some potentially damaging secrets and lies popping to the forefront of their reunion, they ultimately come together in some unexpected ways.
Not every reunion, unfortunately, proves as warm and fuzzy as The Big Chill. Known in English as Tokyo Story, this sad, quiet film from 1953 stands as one of director Yasujiro Ozu's most embraced masterpieces. It follows the story of an elderly couple traveling to the eponymous metropolis, joyous at the prospect of sharing time with their beloved children. Once they reach their destination, however, their reality begins splintering when they find themselves largely neglected. Their daughter-in-law Noriko, a widow, shows them the kindness and respect they expected, but it doesn't serve as a balm for their own biologicals' stinging rejection.
One doesn't have to watch Before Sunrise to appreciate eclectic director Richard Linklater's gorgeously romantic sequel, but it certainly helps. Taking place nine years after the first movie, protagonists Celine and Jesse run into one another while the latter stops in Paris on a book tour. Both still carry pretty heavy emotions from their earlier Vienna rendezvous, spending this much-anticipated second chance exchanging dissatisfaction with their love lives. Despite successes in other (particularly professional) areas, they just can't quit each other.
In this belly-bursting comedy, a pair of doltish but endearingly upbeat women prepare for their 10-year high school reunion. Terrified over the prospect of being perceived as loser as they were back in those awkward teenage years, they brew up an elaborate (and hilarious) lie about inventing Post-It Notes and special adhesives. In the end, though, all they have to do to show up the bullies what once terrorized them is simply act like their own quirky, bubbly selves.
Real events in director Mohsen Makhmalbaf inspired his deeply personal tale of twenty years between a confrontation and an attempted resolution. A teenage boy stabs a policeman during a rally protesting the shah, ending up jailed for half a decade. Over time, his ratcheting regret and guilt lead him to seek out his victim and forge peace between them. English-speaking audiences will likely find this heavy, emotional example of Iranian new wave cinema under the title A Moment of Innocence.
Highly controversial and thoroughly decorated, Slumdog Millionaire exists as both a brutally visceral look at Indian poverty and charming story of rekindling lost love. Police interrogate a young man for his Who Wants to be a Millionaire? acumen, startled that a "simple" street kid could possess such knowledge, and the narrative flashes back to how his squalid, inhumane surroundings made it happen. All hero Jamal Malik wants is a reunion with his beloved childhood friend and love interest Latika, realizing that down such a road lay death and despair.
American troops returning home from World War II must adjust to their brand new lives following violent experiences. Long before Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder received recognition as a serious condition plaguing so many servicemen and women, the Best Picture winner dissected the wrenching difficulties associated with acclimating to home after knowing war. Reunited with friends and family — and making new ones — leads them in directions they never anticipated.
Fans of quiet, ponderous science fiction films in the Kubrickian tradition might want to check out Steven Soderbergh's adaptation of Stanislaw Lem's novel of the same name. Here, a bizarre celestial entity grants astronauts a second chance at establishing closure with loved ones. In the case of the central psychologist played by George Clooney, this means falling for a replica of his wife, dead by suicide. He believes their reunion, however shallow and suspicious his peers find the situation, offers him an opportunity to reconcile where everything went wrong.
While returning to his native Denmark chasing funds for the near-bankrupt Indian orphanage in which he works, a harried manager encounters a cheating ex after 20 years apart. Both attend the wedding of a manipulative CEO's daughter — alleged daughter, anyways. It certainly raises questions regarding whether or not one can reunite with someone he or she never even knew existed. The English-speaking audiences out there can find this film under the title After the Wedding.
Although primarily about redemption and identity reclamation, Darren Aronofsky's intense masterpiece frequently peers into the awkward loneliness of filial estrangement. Disgraced wrestler Robin Razminski (also known as Randy "The Ram" Robinson) wants to establish a connection with the adult daughter he ditched while she was still very young. Their reunion, as one can easily imagine, involves numerous serious fissures, and what ultimately transpires showcases the tragic possibilities behind earnest reconciliation attempts.
OK, so it was a little safe for Oprah to recommend works by one of the best-known novelists of all time. But only those with hearts as cold as Estella's will not be moved by these characters' tales of unrequited love, written in easy-to-read prose by the beloved Dickens.
Solitude is like a trip through a 
In his own words, Steinbeck called his previous works — including the classic The Grapes of Wrath —
No one conveys the heroism and strength of everyday wives and mothers better than Pearl S. Buck. As the fortunes of the Wang family rise and fall, Buck weaves a tapestry of old versus new, rich versus poor, and authentic life in China at the turn of the 20th century.
Oprah went out on another limb here by appointing to the Club the 
When Jonathan Franzen learned his novel had been selected for Oprah's Book Club, he said, "I didn't want that logo of corporate ownership on it." Right there's reason enough to check out this dark comedy about the messed-up members of a messed-up American family trying to pull it together long enough to have one last family Christmas. Be warned: 
In a story that features incest, borderline-necrophilia, flying characters, and children in pants breastfeeding, even more takes place beneath the surface. The Dead family and their friends leap off the page in what many consider Pulitzer- and Nobel Prize-winning Morrison's best work.
Dr. Huxtable teaches us about peer pressure and the power of words in the best entry in the "Little Bill" line of children's books, with great illustrations the kiddos will love. And no, the meanest thing to say is not, "
If you are already depressed, this is not the one to pick up: a young girl struggles to find love after becoming obese, after being raped. But if you have some happy thoughts to spare, this first novel by Wally Lamb is extremely well-written and moving.
Ever imagine what Hamlet would be like if it was set in rural Wisconsin? Well, wonder no longer (and get a life). Wrobleski takes some risks, like narrating some of the story from dogs' point of view, but for the most part, it works.
Before the racy Showtime mini-series, there was the book. Use your imagination to revel in the drama and intrigue of knights, kings, and castles in medieval England. Then go watch the show and tell your friends how much better the book is.
Unlike Matt Damon’s attempt at a South African accent in the film 
Another Oprah pick, another dysfunctional family. Harley Altmyer raises his three sisters after his mama goes to jail for killin' his daddy. Humor and a quick pace keep it from being a Debbie Downer.
Tademy left a successful corporate gig to investigate her roots — this novel is the fictionalized result of that search. This insightful book follows the lives of four generations of black women in her family, starting with her great-great-great-great grandmother in pre-Civil War America.
Call it the 
