Notes: Kindle 2.0 to Debut Today?; Ackman Off Target?
The Wall Street Journal reports that Amazon will announce that it is making a work by Stephen King available exclusively on the new Kindle, at least for a time.
King is a veteran of such deals: in 2000, the horror author's short story "Riding the Bullet" came out at first exclusively as an e-book, but back then the main device for which it was garnering headlines was the Rocket eBook, a product that long ago drifted out of orbit.
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Pershing Square Management, the hedge fund that is the single-largest shareholder of Borders and which recently sold its stake in Barnes & Noble, said that it counted the two booksellers among the companies it had lost money on last year, Reuters reported.
In other Pershing news, the Pershing fund that bet exclusively on Target lost about 40% in value in January and has lost "nearly all of the $2 billion that [fund manager William] Ackman raised in 2007."
Ackman said that he believes the Target investment will pay off, but not in the time period he had anticipated. He has waived management and incentive fees for the fund and is committing $25 million of his own money to it. That fund is separate from the one that has invested in Borders.
Ackman had proposed Target form a trust that owns the land under its stores and then spin off a portion of the trust in an IPO, Reuters said. Target declined.
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Cool idea of the day: with the slogan "beat the recession blues," on Saturday, Valentine's Day, the Annapolis Bookstore, Annapolis, Md., will host a 24-hour Read-in-Bedathon. As the store described it: "Spend time in bed with a good book--and come see some of our customers and town personalities indulging in this favorite pastime in bed in our window."
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Bookselling This Week profiled Book 'n' Brush, Chehalis, Wash., which is preparing to celebrate its 40th anniversary in June. The 5,000-sq.-ft. store, owned by Beverly and David Hartz, recent transplants from southern California, offers a range of new and used books, art supplies, custom framing and other sidelines. Book 'n' Brush also offers art classes.
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A crane fell Saturday near Brattle Book Shop, Boston,
Mass., killing one worker who had been inspecting a nearby roof and
seriously injuring another. The crane "fell shortly before 10:30, shaving the Brattle
Book Shop's outdoor book display and hitting the back of a building on
Temple Place," the Boston Globe
reported. "As the fallen arm of the crane skimmed the side of
the [bookstore], it sent hundreds of paperbacks displayed on shelves
outdoors fluttering and sent people running."
Ken Gloss, the bookshop's owner, told the Globe
that "six or seven people" had been browsing for books in his outdoor
book fair when the accident occurred. "They're all fine," he said.
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Shaman
Drum Bookshop, Ann Arbor, Mich., is looking for investors "to give the
South State Street shop the cash it needs to survive while it waits for
its application to become a nonprofit to be processed by the
government," Ann Arbor News reported.
"We
are in trouble, as are many stores in
downtown, a lot of small, locally-owned businesses," said owner Karl Pohrt. "I suddenly
find myself in this unenviable position of having run out of money."
Pohrt submitted paperwork to the IRS last summer to turn Shaman Drum
into a nonprofit organization, "but in November, he got a letter
telling him it would be a while longer before the application was
reviewed--the agency is overwhelmed with such requests."
Added
Steve Gillis, author, founder of the local 826michigan writing
nonprofit and co-founder of nonprofit publisher Dzanc Books: "It is
imperative that Ann Arbor have an independent bookstore like Shaman
Drum. It is a wonderful store, and to think that Ann Arbor would not
have Shaman Drum as part of its community would be tragic."
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Suzanne Droppert, owner of Liberty Bay Books, Poulsbo, Wash., is "keeping the independent bookstore spirit alive," the Kitsap Peninsula Business Journal
reported. A dozen years after buying the former Shotwell's bookshop,
Droppert said she "is still enjoying her new 'career' as an independent
bookstore owner. She's expanded the hours and the inventory, added a
coffee shop and a reading area, and has worked on proving her belief
that 'a bookstore is always a community center.' "
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All the book world's a stage for Joel Eis, owner of Rebound Bookstore, San Rafael, Calif. The Marin Independent Journal interviewed
Eis, who, in addition to be being a bookseller, holds a graduate degree
in theater and has "designed, directed and taught in the field since
the late '70s. Eis, 62, is props master for the Marin Shakespeare
Company, directs and teaches theater at Bay Area schools and is an
author of books on American and Greek theater. In December, he
presented a Readers Theater production of Dylan Thomas's A Child's Christmas in Wales and has plans for more events."
Why
did he open a bookshop? "We felt a bookstore would serve as a locus for
cultural and idea exchange, not just be a business," he said. "I was
working around the country as a professional theater designer, but the
bottom dropped out of that in the '90s--and we missed the Bay Area. My
mom's health was declining as well. We moved Mom down, bought the
bookstore in 2005 and went at it."
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Despite its
celebrated literary history, Hartford, Conn., "has no general-interest
bookstore. It hasn't for years, and isn't likely to get one soon,"
according to the Courant,
which observed that "it's possible to find books for sale in Hartford,
of course. . . . But specialty bookstores serving the narrow interests
of a specific segment of book buyers don't do much for the
general-interest reader. The person looking to drift in from the street
and get lost in a wonderland of books has nowhere to go, except out of
town or online. Without a general-interest bookstore, Hartford lacks a
certain vitalizing commercial experience that helps create a sense of
community and attracts people and other businesses."
The Courant
reported that Roxanne Coady, owner of R.J. Julia Booksellers, Madison,
"was asked to consider opening a store downtown. Coady said she was
glad for the invitation, but didn't bite. . . . Attracting a
general-interest bookstore to Hartford is not unthinkable, Coady said.
But it would require a major investment and probably a store that is
equal parts cultural center and book retailer, 'something like the 92nd
Street Y with a bookstore.' "
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In the continued ad agency controversy (Friday's issue): M.J. Rose, founder of AuthorBuzz.com, noted that in addition to the other agencies devoted to publishers, hers was the first created to take advantage of the Internet. Authorbuzz.com is not just for publishers but for authors, too. She added proudly that she has experience advertising more than books: she did ad work in some 20 industries for clients such as McDonald's and Maidenform when she was the creative director of Rosenfeld, Sirowitz and Lawson in New York City. She believes that understanding advertising as a whole is a valuable asset.
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In a shift at Ingram Digital, Frank Daniels, formerly chief operating officer, has become chief commercial officer, and Kent Freeman, formerly chief technology officer, has become chief operating officer.
Daniels joined Ingram in 2006, when VitalSource Technologies, of which he was president and CEO, was acquired by Ingram.
Freeman has worked for Ingram since 1983 and has held several technology and business positions at Ingram Book Group.
In a statement, Ingram Digital CEO Michael F. Lovett said that the moves were made to address developments in the industry: "The digital content landscape continues to change very rapidly--and is in fact picking up speed--as new ways of creating, storing, distributing, accessing and using digital content are being developed."
Two weeks ago in New York City, Jack Covert and Todd Sattersten of 800-CEO-READ celebrated both the 2008 800-CEO-READ Business Book Awards (
The bags and stickers had their origin at the Arches Book Company, Moab, Utah, a store that annually prints up a special T-shirt. More than two years ago, during one brainstorming session, the staff of eight women came up with the Reading Is Sexy idea, featuring "the mudflap girl" reading a book with a cup of coffee (or perhaps tea) nearby. Arches owner Andy Nettell said he grew up "in a conservative household" so he decided against the idea. Laughing, he said, "They went ahead anyway and came up with a design." Reaction was mixed: men were "not too intrigued," he said, but women liked it and the staff kept saying it would sell. In the first year, the store sold many T-shirts and more than 1,000 of the stickers at $1 each. Nettell estimated that "90% of the buyers were women, and the men who bought them were buying them for women." Librarians especially liked them, he added.