Ugh. I hate this business right now. [The publishing industry-still love the fashion/handbag industry, but give me time.] Every report is worse than the last, especially those that hit close to home.

This business isn't for quitters. I'm not a quitter, but I may change my stance at any time. Being bipolar, people expect me to make irrational decisions. No, clients, don't panic. This isn't another "I'm-as-mad-as-H-E-Double Hockey Sticks, and-I'm-not-gonna-take-it-anymore" speech. [Is it legal to use the word 'Hell' in my newsletter? What the hell, I'll haveta think on that one.]

This business isn't for the impatient. I'm impatient. I thoughtfully make a plan, reach a decision, then plunge. Don't like plunging when there ain't no water in the pool. Right now, there ain't no water in the ocean. [Continuing the ordeal is a testament to my faith, of which I have in spades, clubs, diamonds, and hearts.]

This business is for fighters, 'cause if you aren't persistent, don't push, don't ask yet another time, you're doing your clients a disservice. I don't like doing my clients a disservice. They aren't just my clients, but my extended family. Actually, I like them better than I like some of the members of my family. [Whichever family member just read that, I wasn't talkin' about you.]

Ever been tired? I think I might be. Yeah, I know-shocking! I haven't slept well lately. At least a few uninterrupted hours a night must be beneficial. I'll let ya know when I experience the phenomenon. [Yawn. Stretch.] Mayhap I'm simply tired of the way the business seems like it's crumbling. Since I'm an optimist, I refuse to believe the darkest rumors, the worst news. This business will turn around and regain momentum. How do I know this? Ah, well, ah-I'll leave that up to God to figure out, as I'm too busy down here. Got two contracts in today, so it ain't all bad. Now if I could just find the time to read 'em. [Yes, clients, I will. Promise.]

Yesterday, I told a couple of editors I was gonna drown my sorrows in Trader Joe's Reduced Fat Cheese Puffs [I did], Trader Joe's Rice Krispy Treats [I did], and might even get really rebellious and stop working for an hour to watch a rerun of Project Runway. [I came close; I watched Top Chef.] There are several editors I'm afraid to call, as I have no idea if they're still at work. And what's to become of their authors? No, they aren't my clients, but I care about all writers. I don't know why I feel like any of this is my fault, [Good thing my next psych appointment is Friday morning.] but my heart hurts. Dunno how else to say it.

What does all this mean? I have no idea. I'm babbling. Well, technically, I'm not talking, so I can't be babbling. I guess I'm rambling? Oh, sheesh, enough with the editing

already! Who cares?

I guess this is my way of saying I'm sorry if this business dealt ya a bad hand, or a great hand, but someone had a better one. Or ya had a bad hand and bluffed, but someone called your bluff, or ... sorry, rememberin' my old poker days. I was sic! [Sigh.] I know some brilliant editors who are outta work, some brilliant writers who've never had a contract, or lost the one(s) they had, and I think it stinks. [I refrained from using other words I thought of. I have quite a vocab in that area....]

Unfortunately, it doesn't matter what I think, or how I feel. This is a time when we gotta help each other in whatever way possible. This is a time we need to stick together, not stick a knife in someone's back. This is a time when the tough gotta get tougher. I'm tough. I'll be tougher. [I know, I'll take more meds! Double Sigh.]

Welcome to My Worlds.

P.S. Okay, I didn't give ya the entire story. But I just found out today. My client had some bad news on Monday, explained in a story below. I've been [insert intensifier] down for a week, and wondered what was up.

But Tuesday was different. Tuesday, I couldn't function. I called my client as scheduled, but told her I couldn't read her synopsis that day. I thought it was leftover sadness from Monday, but deep inside, I knew it wasn't. I had The Feeling.

The Feeling only comes when someone I know, or someone close to someone I know, is going to get hurt. Suffocating dread crushes me. Tuesday, I had to stop myself from calling all my family members and close friends to tell them to be careful Tuesday and Wednesday [The Feeling comes the day before, or the day of]. I wanted to call a friend whose daughter has cancer and make sure she was okay. I wanted to pray over my hubby [he's such a sweet man] and the Genius Child before they left.

When my hubby [he's such a sweet man] called, I babbled I couldn't talk to him, and hung up. When he called back, I didn't answer. When my beloved mom-in-law called and the Genius Child said she only wanted to tell me one thing, I pushed the phone away and ground out, "I can't talk to anyone."

Nothing happened that I knew of on Tuesday, but Wednesday, another 'tell.' The dynamo crawled back into bed. [Ugh. It's painful to see that in print.] Still, no word. The Feeling finally dissipated toward mid-day, and I started working on the newsletter. While working, I checked my e-mail. There it was.

"Many of you know and respect our friend and literary agent Chip MacGregor. This morning, Chip was traveling to Tyndale House, where my husband works, with a group of 14 Taylor U. students (where Chip teaches.) When stopped at a stoplight, their van was struck by a semi truck. Chip is in the hospital, where he is under observation for internal injuries, but he is going to be okay. Apparently, he was sitting in such a way (sideways in the front passenger seat) that prevented him from serious injury when the front of the car smashed in on him, for which we praise the Lord. The students, though brought to the hospital, are all going to be okay as well, and not seriously injured, although quite banged up. Please join me in thanking God for his miraculous protection over Chip and his students, and keep them all in your prayers."

Thank God, is right. Chip is a wonderful person, a savvy agent, he's funny, helpful, and man enough to wear a kilt, which, BTW, he's looks great in. I'm relieved he'll be okay, as well as the kids. Still, The Feeling is maddening. I have 100% accuracy. When I get it, someone gets hurt. Yet, I have no idea who. Can you imagine how upsetting that is? Okay, enough. I have work to do, and I'm more than a day behind. Have mercy, y'all.

Welcome to My Worlds ... again.

Yes, I know I haven't posted the new initials on the Boo-Yahs page at my site. I will tomorrow. Deal with it. [Just call me Jackie Bauer.]

Client Raz Steel had his first book signing last Friday night at B&N, where he presented a talk first. The signing was a huge success; much bigger than B&N anticipated. Standing room only crowd of 50+, approximately, and they sold over 40 books. This pleased me, my client, and B&N. Hope it pleased Raz's editor, as we're ready to sell book two....

Want me? Ya Gotta Pay Up...

Want me to do a content/line edit of your first three chapters within 3 weeks of receipt? EBay me! Find out all the details at the end of my interview with Marcher Lord Press publisher and editor, Jeff Gerke, in my On the Hot Seat column.

Barbourus!

Say it ain't so. Sigh. I'm afraid it is. Barbour has cut their Heartsong Presents: Mysteries! line, citing a drop in the book club membership. So sorry to hear about this. My heart goes out to the authors, editors, and everyone this horrid situation affects. Chin up! God is in control. [As I said, I'm too busy....]

2008 Sales: Meyer the New Rowling

-- Publishers Weekly, 1/14/2009

[I skipped the boring stuff. Well, it's boring to me, and this is my newsletter. Oh, the power....]

Drake said a "small number" of jobs were eliminated across different functions in the reorganization. That is in addition to the 16 jobs that were cut in early December, plus another round of cuts that followed just before the end of the year. Drake said no more cuts are planned "at this time." [Hope not, those scissors already need sharpening.] He said today's announcement was intended to show how the new Crown divisions have been integrated in the existing group.

Below is the letter from Jenny Frost.

January 14, 2009

TO EVERYONE AT THE CROWN PUBLISHING GROUP [I edited this, as it ran long, and I didn't wanna read who reports to whom, so I figured y'all might not as well. This thing practically went down to who the janitors report to.]

With the addition of Broadway Books, Doubleday Business, Doubleday Religion, and Waterbrook Multnomah, the singularly broad scope of the Crown Publishing Group has been enriched and expanded. The new imprints joining our group each have their own distinct publishing identities and will continue to function with their own editorial, marketing, and publicity staffs.[Ah, so, then, what's new about 'em?] While maintaining their unique character and editorial vision, these imprints will complement the core strengths of our existing program, which is without peer in the diversity of its editorial offerings and formats. With this expansion [Fancy wording. Didn't Random House just wipe out/consolidate two of their five divisions?] of our publishing operations and the integration of a new set of talents and skills to our leadership team, [So, they hired new talented people, or fired some, then jiggled the rest around? Sounds like what writers do. Same old plots, just jiggle them characters around.... Sorry.] I am announcing [Not me, the gal at the top.] several changes to the organizational and reporting structure of our group, effective immediately.

Newly reporting to me [Not me, the gal at the top.] are [yada, yada...]

Newly reporting to Michael are [yada, yada...]

PETE MULLER retains [yada, yada...], reporting to me. [Not me, the gal at the top.]

Newly reporting to Pete [yada, yada...]

Continuing to report to Pete [As opposed to the newly reporting ... didn't want to confuse ya.] [yada, yada...]

David Drake will take on [yada, yada...]

KATIE WAINWRIGHT continues to [yada, yada...], reporting to me. [Not me, the gal at the top.]

Also continuing to report to me [Not me, the gal at the top.] [yada, yada...], reporting to me. [Didn't she already say that?]

Newly reporting to Philip are [yada, yada...]

In addition to her Broadway duties, Catherine will [yada, yada...]

Please join me [Not me, the gal at the top.] in welcoming our new colleagues to the Crown Publishing Group. [Welcome, y'all!]

On the Knopf/Doubleday Side...

On the editorial side of Doubleday [yada, yada, and yada...] report to group chairman [comma] Sonny Mehta.

Reporting to Thomas are [yada, yada, yada, yada, yada, and yada...]

[Yada] reports to Mehta, who says in the closing of his memo, "the year ahead promises to be a challenging one, but with our spectacular list and publishing team--and maybe just a little luck--I am confident our books will find the readerships they so deserve." [If they're countin' on luck....]

In a separate note [comma] Knopf group president Tony Chirico strikes a slightly different note: "I know everyone has been affected in some way by the restructuring. Now that it is behind us, however, we can focus on the year ahead. And what a year it promises to be." [Publishing industry ... Promises? The only thing similar is that both words start with a 'P'.]

Yada reports to Chirico--and she continues [yada, yada.] Yada's reports include [yada, yada, and yada...]

Pat Johnson will lead [yada, yada...], reporting to Chirico.

Pantheon's separate art director position was eliminated [What, did they sic the Governator on the person? Oh, I forgot, he's too busy destroying my state to eliminate anything other than my spare change. Sorry.] [Yada] and [yada, yada...], will continue to publish their books with vigor. [Thanks for clarifyin'.]

[Yada, plus...] all reporting to Chirico. Doubleday's Jeff Yamaguchi [yada, yada], Yada moves up to [Yada], [I'm sorry, I can't go on. It's taking too much outta me. Can someone tell me why everyone wants everyone else to know who reports to them? Sheesh!]

Simon Says Time for a New Website

-- Publishers Weekly

November bookstore sales were as bad as people thought they were. Preliminary figures from the U.S. Census Bureau show that sales dropped 13% in the month, falling to $1.05 billion. Sales for all of retail were off 10%. For the 11 [hyphen] month period, bookstore sales were flat at $14.8 billion, while sales for the entire retail segment fell 0.7%. [Stop buyin' Starbucks; start buyin' books ... retail!]

Barnes & Noble Holiday Comps Down Only 7.7 Percent

Sales for the nine-week holiday period ending January 3 declined 7.7 percent on a same-store basis at Barnes & Noble, and fell 5.2 percent overall compared to a year ago. With store sales of $1.1 billion, BN says they "experienced diminished traffic, and as a result, diminished sales, due to the unprecedented fall-off of retail shopping during the last quarter of the year."

Like Borders, they say holiday sales improved towards the end: "After a slow start to the holiday season, our store performance improved and we were able to post comparable store sales increases during the last two weeks of the season, enabling us to meet our sales guidance for the period to date."

BN.com suffered more, with comparable sales falling 11 percent for the holiday period, at $114 million in all. For the 48 weeks of the fiscal year, total store sales of $4.2 billion are down 2.6 percent overall (and 5.4 percent on a same-store basis), while BN.com sales of $423 million are down 0.4 percent.
Release [Pub Lunch]

No More Multiple Offers from Random House Canada Imprints

Quill & Quire says that "Random House of Canada will no longer allow its individual imprints - namely Random House Canada, Knopf Canada, and Doubleday Canada - to make offers on the same titles." Now "only one division will be given the go-ahead to pursue a book."

RH Canada president Brad Martin says he will be joined by executive publisher of Knopf Canada Louise Dennys and Doubleday Canada publisher Maya Mavjee on a committee that will decide which imprint gets to bid based on "who needs [the book], who wants it, and who can bring the best possible focus to it given the publishing schedule they have." [Pub Lunch]

by Jim Milliot -- Publishers Weekly,

Hachette Book Group CEO David Young provided a long list of reasons why he has become an enthusiastic supporter of using XML to produce Hachette's titles. Young was the keynote speaker at Tuesday's StartwithXML conference held in New York. For Young, the reason to use XML is simple--it allows Hachette to develop and deliver content to readers in the formats they want. It also saves money on production costs and can lead to new revenue streams. Young noted there are some estimates that put the number of handheld devices in the world at 3 billion, which, he said, equates to "3 billion blank pages." To reach that audience, content needs to be flexible enough to be delivered in a variety of ways, Young said. Since XML uses a content-centric, design-agnostic approach to production, an XML file is uniquely suited to deliver content as an e-book or through print-on-demand, he said.

A benefit for using XML at the beginning of the production process, Young said, is that it allows publishers to get their digital files earlier to help in the preparation of a host of pre-pub materials ranging from galleys to promotional materials. He noted that Hachette spends about $2 million annually on ARCs and galleys, but that that number is being reduced since Hachette began distributing Sony Readers to a large segment of its employees last year. The move to delivering galleys and other material digitally "has been an unqualified success," Young said, noting that the company has saved 500,000 pages of copying paper, and that "nobody has given their Readers back."

XML files also make it easier for publishers to create better search terms that connect to its content, and to collect better rights information," Young said.

The effective use of XML, however, requires cooperation and commitment throughout the production process, beginning with editors and authors, Young said. By using XML to tag content, editors are in a position to help shape how that content will be delivered, Young said, predicting that "tagging will become as ingrained as the blue pencil." Young acknowledged that editors will need to be trained on how to tag and that they will need to develop new skills and have new tools. "It will be a sea change" about who does what, Young said, but ultimately the changes will open up new revenue opportunities. 

Speakers on the rest of the morning's panels expanded on various themes introduced by Young. Brian O' Leary of Magellan Media Consulting Partners, said that publishers will only be able to fully capitalize n XML if they adopt a discipline approach to using it, which begins with editors tagging the information. He noted that some types of books will work benefit more from XML than others (a point made by one of the conference organizers, Mike Shatzkin in his What the Hell is XML piece which appeared in the Dec. 15 PW). Rebecca Goldthwaite of Cengage Learning noted that among the lessons learned in implementing XML there was the need for a "culture change," and for XML to be used consistently throughout. Simon & Schuster's Steve Kotrch emphasized the ability using XML gives a publisher to create more robust rights databases that can be hooked to other databases to exchange information.

Evan Schnittman of Oxford University Press touched on the benefits of using XML in terms of improving search results on Google. The ability to put books (and other content) into "chunks"enhances the chances that those books will be discovered through traditional Google searches rather than only through Google Book Search, Schnittman said. He noted that OUP has created a "significant revenue stream"as a result of its books being discovered through Google. OUP has 15,564 titles in Google Book Search, which have generated more than 143 million page views, Schnittman said which in turn has led to more than 734,000 clicks on a buy link or 47.2 buy clicks per book. Bill O'Brien of the Copyright Clearance Center also brought up chunking, noting that chunking leads to "micro commerce," which can accumulate late into a significant sum. (CCC has dispersed $1 billion to publishers since it was launched 30 years ago, he said).

Leslie Hulse of HarperCollins related how HC is using XML to develop e-books. She noted that HC's philosophy regarding e-books has changed from one of caution to one where now all HC titles are also made available as e-books. Accompanying that change in strategy, Hulse said HC has dropped its attempts to load e-books with lots of extras (although there are some video and audio additions), in favor of making as many e-books available in as many formats as possible. Including extra material means developing different pricing and business models, Hulse said, something that could slow down the release of e-books. She said HC is looking at ways to price e-book specials and is also developing some video products. Lightning Source's David Taylor emphasized that the use of XML and his company's print-on-demand capabilities could result in virtually all titles be made available in large print, a market that Taylor believes is ripe for expansion given the aging of the baby boomer generation. [How do the words 'baby' and 'aging' fit? I do know my rear-end is 'booming,' or is that 'blooming'?]

By Craig Morgan Teicher -- Publishers Weekly, 1/12/2009 2:07:00 PM

Dorchester, a leading independent publisher of romance, horror, thriller and western mass-market paperbacks, announced today that LibreDigtial will handle the distribution of its content through digital channels, making all of Dochester's frontlist and selected backlist titles available as e-books on a wide array of devices and formats. Dorchester president and CEO John Prebich said that HarperCollins-which distributes Dorchester's print titles-introduced him to LibreDigital. Signing with LibreDigital "is a real giant step forward, and we're really excited," Prebich said. When nailing down the deal with LibreDigital, Prebich said he asked for "the same capabilities that HarperCollins has, and that's what we got."

Prebich feel confident about Dorchester's business, and about his audience's willingness to embrace e-books: "60% of our business is romance. That audience has a voracious appetite and reads a lot." For 2008, he said, "our units are about 2% less than last year, but our revenue's up 3%. We had a decent year. We're happy about the numbers. The concern for me as a CEO is how to get growth. We have been working with Amazon-we've given them close to 1,000 books that they've made Kindle-friendly. We've seen very impressive numbers. Now, we're taking the leap and going with LibreDigital.  We're expecting nothing but good things and the opportunity to sell more books less expensively."

Courier to Close Short-Run Plant

Courier announced this morning that it will close short-run manufacturing subsidiary Book-mart Press in North Bergen, New Jersey, and consolidate its operations into other Courier plants. Book-mart Press has 72 employees and approximately $7 million in annual sales. "Between a weak economy and a changing competitive environment, Book-mart's capabilities had become increasingly redundant with those of other Courier plants," the company said. The facility should close within the next 60 days, which the company estimates will cost about $2 million. Release [Pub Lunch]

Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Disputes Credit Rating Downgrade

Moody's downgraded Houghton Mifflin Harcourt's substantial debt in late December, concluding that "shortfalls in HMH's business plan" and cutbacks in US education budgets would keep the company from bringing its debt down to their target of 9 times ebitda. The agency "estimated that HMH's debt stood at 10.5 times ebitda at the end of September, and warned of liquidity pressures and 'a likely default' under its senior secured loan covenants unless these were amended," the FT reports.

Additionally, HMH's parent company Education Media & Publishing "was named as one of the European companies at highest risk of default by Standard & Poor's," the rival ratings agency.

HMH tells the FT "we take issue with the comments Moody's made regarding our financial position," and a spokesperson says debt is below 9 times ebitda and the company is within its covenants. They repeat the silly take-my-trade-division-please idea that "the group was open to a sale of its consumer publishing arm," as if a sale will come without their preparing an offering.FT [Pub Lunch]

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