How Brexit hit the book world

Has fact become stranger than fiction? Book sales, publishing contracts and even whole writing genres may be affected by the fallout from the referendum “Feel as if I’m living in a bad dystopian political thriller,” tweeted the writer Robert Harris at 8.50am on 24 June, a response echoed 10 minutes later by the agent Jonny Geller’s “don’t need to read dystopian novels anymore”. Their reaction was shared by other leading figures from the book world, with prominent independent publishers – Canongate’s Jamie Byng, Faber’s Stephen Page, Bloomsbury’s Alexandra Pringle – joining authors such as Malorie Blackman, Philip Pullman, Michael Rosen and JK Rowling in voicing or retweeting horror and alarm on the morning after. Dismayed executives from the big conglomerates were less visible, but Gail Rebuck, chair of Penguin Random House UK, called it “a disastrous night” and Hachette UK boss Tim Hely Hutchinson was “disappointed”.Even harder to spot were publishers thrilled by the Leave vote (a pre-poll Bookseller survey of the book trade found 78% planning to vote Remain v 18% for Leave), although Biteback’s Iain Dale – publisher of Nigel Farage and the unauthorised Cameron biography Call Me Dave – could predictably be found tweeting enthusiastically. HarperCollins’s chief executive Charlie Redmayne has yet to make a public comment since the result but was reported during April’s London Book Fair to be “equivocal” on the issue, as well he might be since his company is part of... Continue reading at 'The Guardian'

[ The Guardian | 2016-06-30 00:00:00 UTC ]
News tagged with: #gail rebuck #iain dale #nigel farage #public comment

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