A heart-warming love letter to books and bookshops, by an amenable fellow turned antisocial old misanthrope“I was in here two years ago and you had a book by Roger Penrose. Do you know what happened to it?” Shaun Bythell – owner of the Book Shop in Wigtown, Galloway – has 100,000 books in stock, sells 20,000 a year, and has handled nearly 1m second-hand books since he bought the shop in 2001. Unsurprisingly, the Roger Penrose volume had not stuck in his mind.Before he entered the book trade at the tender age of 31, he was “amenable and friendly”. Now, after many years of fielding bizarre questions, constant haggling over prices (why is it “acceptable to try to screw the profit out of struggling small businesses” but not supermarkets?), and struggling to survive despite Amazon’s “icy grip” on bookselling, he has been forced to embrace the stereotype of the “impatient, intolerant, antisocial proprietor”. Continue reading... Continue reading at 'The Guardian'
[ The Guardian | 2019-08-24 10:58:38 UTC ]
In the 1980s and 1990s The Bookseller produced a regular article called “Who Owns Whom”, which charted the ongoing agglomeration of British publishing. Continue reading at The Bookseller
[ The Bookseller | 2021-11-06 11:55:21 UTC ]
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Manchester United and England forward Marcus Rashford MBE, who published his first book and launched a book club with Macmillan Children’s Books this year, talks to The Bookseller after being named FutureBook Person of the Year. Continue reading at The Bookseller
[ The Bookseller | 2021-11-05 19:06:34 UTC ]
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The Bookseller has announced the shortlist for the 2021 Diagram Prize for the Oddest Book of Title of the Year, and for the first time, all six shortlisted titles come from university presses. This December, The Bookseller will announce which title has overtaken last year’s A Dog Pissing at the... Continue reading at Literrary Hub
[ Literrary Hub | 2021-11-05 17:53:02 UTC ]
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The New Futures Initiative - launched at the end of September and announced in The Bookseller - is a scheme to reach out to individuals from underrepresented groups and encourage them - through mentoring and tangible support - to open a bricks and mortar bookshop. Continue reading at The Bookseller
[ The Bookseller | 2021-10-07 16:15:45 UTC ]
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While exhibitor and visitor numbers are expected to be well down on pre-pandemic figures, a number of trade professionals have indicated to The Bookseller that they will return to the Frankfurt Book Fair. But what will the new hybrid fair look like? Continue reading at The Bookseller
[ The Bookseller | 2021-10-01 09:11:26 UTC ]
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Pan Macmillan has hailed the success of its bookseller mentorship pilot scheme, which has now come to an end after 14 weeks. Continue reading at The Bookseller
[ The Bookseller | 2021-09-28 15:20:46 UTC ]
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Shah Muhammad Rais, who was made famous in The Bookseller of Kabul, has vowed to keep his bookshop open, despite having had only two customers since the Taliban retook the country in the middle of August. Founded in 1974 Rais’s store has seen regimes (along with foreign powers) come and go, and... Continue reading at Literrary Hub
[ Literrary Hub | 2021-09-28 15:00:23 UTC ]
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The New Atlantic and Southern Independent Booksellers Associations (NAIBA and SIBA) kicked off a combined virtual fall conference on September 27, marking the second year in a row that the two organizations have joined forces to offer educational programming, author readings, and editor buzz picks. Continue reading at Publishers Weekly
[ Publishers Weekly | 2021-09-28 04:00:00 UTC ]
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'Publishers tried, but it really didn't work,' says one Paris bookseller about the question of pandemic-related books this year. The post France’s Rentrée Littéraire: Books About COVID? Not Interested appeared first on Publishing Perspectives. Continue reading at Publishing Perspectives
[ Publishing Perspectives | 2021-09-27 11:31:21 UTC ]
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The Covid-19 lockdowns have drastically altered book trade events and made a number of them more accessible, but how can we ensure they remain so in the years to come? Continue reading at The Bookseller
[ The Bookseller | 2021-09-26 16:12:25 UTC ]
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An in-depth report into the publishing industry, and how accessible it is to those with disabilities, shows there is much work to do to make the book trade truly reflective of society Continue reading at The Bookseller
[ The Bookseller | 2021-09-26 08:40:19 UTC ]
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Quercus has rebranded with a new logo to reflect its “independence, dynamism, warmth, creativity and ambition”, celebrating the move by visiting 85 bookshops across the UK. Continue reading at The Bookseller
[ The Bookseller | 2021-09-15 22:54:54 UTC ]
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A newly launched professional bookseller certification program aims to boost indie bookselling skills. Continue reading at Publishers Weekly
[ Publishers Weekly | 2021-09-03 04:00:00 UTC ]
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Zoey Dixon, named a Bookseller Rising Star in 2020, has been a leading light in making libraries more accessible, both before and during Covid, in her development role at Lambeth Libraries. Continue reading at The Bookseller
[ The Bookseller | 2021-09-03 01:24:28 UTC ]
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Former publisher and bookseller John Hitchin died in August, aged 88. He is remembered by Tim Godfray and Dotti Irving. Continue reading at The Bookseller
[ The Bookseller | 2021-09-02 19:38:30 UTC ]
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This morning, in a press release, Sarah McNally of McNally Jackson announced the launch of McNally Editions, a new paperback reprint series “devoted to hidden gems.” “As any bookseller knows, recommending books is the most rewarding part of our job—especially when you get to take the reader off... Continue reading at Literrary Hub
[ Literrary Hub | 2021-08-26 14:41:45 UTC ]
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Jack Covert, founder of the business book bookseller and distributor Porchlight Book Company (originally known as 800-CEO READ), died on August 13. He was 77. Continue reading at Publishers Weekly
[ Publishers Weekly | 2021-08-18 04:00:00 UTC ]
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David Whitaker, a former editor of The Bookseller, has died. Whitaker died peacefully in his sleep overnight on 4th August, his widow Maggie Van Reenan has confirmed. Continue reading at The Bookseller
[ The Bookseller | 2021-08-05 11:21:27 UTC ]
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UCLan Publishing has acquired the “funny and heart-warming” first teen novel from author and bookseller Katie Clapham. Continue reading at The Bookseller
[ The Bookseller | 2021-08-01 09:31:26 UTC ]
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Over the weekend, the Los Angeles Review of Books published a fairly wild essay by Miguel Esteban who, at the tender age of 14, commissioned a now-famous essay on race in science fiction from Octavia Butler. The whole piece is worth a read (the gall of teenage boys! the grace of Octavia!) but... Continue reading at Literrary Hub
[ Literrary Hub | 2021-07-26 13:40:52 UTC ]
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