Over the last five years, sales in the category are down 32% by units sold and 43% by revenue. Some authors and titles, especially romances and mysteries, have moved to trade paperbacks; a bigger issue is the rise of very cheap self-published ebooks in a highly price-sensitive category. - Publishers Weekly
The Internet dealt a major blow by creating a massive single market for used books, undercutting the bread-and-butter lower end of the secondhand market. Amazon, in turn, depressed the prices of new books. And then there are rising rents, which have devastated small businesses of all kinds. - The New Yorker
I know how deep people’s relationship to grammar runs, because I’ve been teaching adults of all socioeconomic and educational backgrounds for thirty years. Language is connected to people’s sense of self and their sense of power. There is a lot of grammar insecurity. - LitHub
No, it's not just Book TikTok. "While Hoover might just be the ideal author to preside over TikTok, the platform is only the latest online vehicle she had ridden to fame and fortune." And then there's writing skill. - Slate
Carmen Giménez is a poet who co-founded Noemi Press in 2002. One of Noemi's co-publishers says that Giménez "really helped pull the curtain back and allow people to see how publishing works ... and demystify some of what, historically, has been gatekept." - The New York Times
That includes Stephen King, who testified at an antitrust trial against the merger. Industry insiders agree. The president of the Authors Guild said, "Reduced competition will likely make the sector even less diverse, and that's bad not just for authors, but also for readers." - NPR
"Enjoying a book alfresco is one of summer’s simple, iconic joys, right up there with running through a sprinkler, spotting the evening’s first firefly or scraping a flat wooden spoon across a freezer-burned cup of Italian ice." - The New York Times
Outdated terminology such as “Indians of North America” has remained in these term lists despite changing use in society and no longer matches the language used in the books themselves. - The Conversation
Said one of them, "This is about a legacy white employee who was in danger of losing her job for performance reasons, so she cynically appropriated the language of diversity and inclusion to try and hold onto that job — which if she lost it might have actually gone to a person of color." - Gawker
Today, critics can almost take for granted that we have emotional relationships with literary works—notably, ones of attachment. But if the literary work is “an object of the affections,” does it love critics back?4 Do critics rely on such a fiction? - Public Books
The age of the Tudors in England is when words about sexuality and scatology started to be considered profane rather than simply matter-of-fact. Yet the most seriously offensive words were still those tied up with religious faith. - History Today
Elena Bulgakova preserved her late husband's manuscript for 20 years, retyped it, got it published first in translation in Soviet-occupied Estonia, then, in Russian, abroad. An uncensored version of the novel finally appeared in the USSR in 1973 — and Soviet readers couldn't quite make sense of it. - JSTOR Daily
During 45 minutes of testimony, King laid out the changes he’s witnessed over a half-century career in collaboration with a number of different publishers. He described independent publishers becoming increasingly “squeezed” by conglomerates. - Los Angeles Times
At the risk of offending most believers, it is necessary to state a simple but unacknowledged truth: It is impossible to understand the full glory of Christianity without understanding its poetry. - First Things
A win for the government would not appear to bode well for Simon & Schuster. Penguin Random House is already a giant and will be just fine either way. But S&S finds itself in a tricky position that belies its mojo over the past two years. - Vanity Fair
