Notes: Podpublishing; B&N College Accepted at Indiana
Today's New York Times
offers another example of the loud effect of podcasting on
audiobook publishing. In this case, Mignon Fogarty, host of a podcast
called Grammar Girl, whipped up an audio version of her forthcoming
Holt book that Audio Renaissance was able to put on Audible.com just
before her appearance on Oprah. The $4.95, hour-long title quickly became
No. 1 on iTunes's home page--and she was able to take advantage of the
publicity hit despite not having a book yet.
Audible.com's Beth Anderson noted that more and more audios are helping
sell the print version they're based on and that "it helps to have a
steady stream of product from major authors so we have something to
sell between their big books."
Holt president and publisher John Sterling commented: "Traditionally we
would see the audiobook as the tail on the dog, and here the tail is
wagging the dog."
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In June 2009, Barnes & Noble will open a store in Houston, Tex.,
in the River Oaks Shopping Center at West Gray and Shepherd Drive.
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Effective
July 1, Barnes & Noble College becomes big bookseller on campus at
Indiana University, taking over management of all 16 bookstores at the
university's seven campuses, according to the South Bend Tribune.
B&N will pay a $5.5 million "signing bonus" and another $2 million
bonus after eight years; it guarantees $850,000 a year to the school
during the 10-year deal. B&N will reimburse IU for bookstore
inventory, equipment and capital improvements. B&N will also spend
$1.4 million for a new Varsity Shop on the South Bend campus.
The change met opposition--some 6,000 people signed an anti-outsourcing petition.
Under
the deal, current full-time bookstore employees will be offered jobs at
the same level of pay and benefits they receive from the university,
the paper said.
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Harry Potter and the Deathly Marketing Strategy?
Saying price wars had left it with little choice, Waterstone's owner HMV defended the company's decision to offer Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows at half price and to give buyers a free copy of Wizardology: A Guide to Wizards of the World, the Guardian
reported. The company hopes to capitalize "on strong shopper numbers
during the expected Harry Potter rush in July, when most stores will
open at midnight."
Like other U.K. bookstore chains, Waterstone's has been struggling and could use some retail magic.
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Visible Voice bookstore, Cleveland, Ohio, is "a warm, pristine space with an intensely personal selection of books about rock music, cinema, art, modern poetry, liberal politics, new journalists and contemporary fiction that runs heavily toward the Beat canon and angry young writers," according to a Cleveland Plain Dealer profile of the bookshop and its owner, Dave Ferrante.
Modeled after San Francisco's City Lights bookstore, Visible Voice is a bricks-and-mortar realization of Ferrante's literary passion, but he hasn't given up his day job as president of Kaplan Trucking, the family business. "Some people go on vacation in Florida," said Ferrante. "I go to a bookstore in Tremont."
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Lacey, Wash., is looking for a good bookstore. The Olympian reported that many residents of this city with "plenty of new homes and a booming retail sector" are wondering why it has not attracted a full-service bookstore. The city is currently served by a Paperback Exchange used bookstore.
Jerry Litt, Lacey's community development director, said he had been fielding requests for a bookstore from residents for more than a decade. Although none of the major bookstore chains had expressed interest, Litt said, “I personally feel they would do great here.”
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The Indianapolis Star interviewed Elizabeth Houghton Barden, owner of Big Hat Books and wife of novelist Dan Barden. Saying she "wants to grow old in this narrow, crowded bookstore," Barden spoke of her transition two years ago to a bookseller's life in the Midwest after "working for fashion designer Giorgio Armani, slumming with pop culture guru Andy Warhol and working for NBC and Universal Studios in New York City in the 1980s." How does she compete with big box bookstores? "We're more fun," said Barden.
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The Daily Pilot
profiles Lido Village Books, Newport Beach, Calif., owned by Dan
Schmenk, who was an employee and retired English teacher when it closed
suddenly in 2001--and who brought it back to life. The store depends
"on our ability to know books and . . . we continue to really select
the books ourselves," Schmenk told the paper. "We handpick everything."
Lido Village Books has "an expansive nautical selection, with an emphasis on sailing adventures."
Books of Wonder (18 W. 18th St., between Fifth and Sixth Aves.;
212-989-3270; 
At Third Place Books, Lake Forest Park, Wash., last week: Patrick
Carman with fans of Atherton next to the revolving sculpture of the
world he created in his new series, Atherton, the first title of which
is The House of Power (Little, Brown). He had also visited the store to promote his first series, The Dark Hills Divide.
Bad Luck and Trouble opens with the classic Lee Child touch: hardware descriptions and pain. "The man was called Calvin Franz and the helicopter was a Bell 222. Franz had two broken legs, so he had to be loaded on board strapped to a stretcher . . . The Bell was a roomy aircraft, [with] plenty of room for Franz on the floor." He won't be taking up space much longer, as he discovers 3,000 feet above the California desert.