I'm Going to Vegas In 2hrs 26 mins!!

Therefore this summary of my crazy busy publishing week will be short:

BK meetings - Linkedin is the way forward. I don't think it's quite taken off in the UK yet to the same extent as over here in the US...but it's a networking essential and I'm going to keep working on my Linkedin profile until it's up to scratch.

Book Builders West Crash Course - This was an all day (literally 8am-4pm) workshop where 6 guest speakers spoke for an hour each about their role in the production side of publishing. The key message from the workshop overall was communication, communication, communication. To get things done, communication with clients and amongst different departments is essential. For me a highlight was also when Bill Ralph (speaking on printing and paper) used cut up potatoes to demonstrate how letter pressing worked. 

PGW educational session and cocktail party: I disappointingly learned that even though it may be a 'cocktail' party this does not guarantee that 'cocktails' will actually be served. However it was valuable experience in how to juggle a drink and a plate of free food in your left hand, so that your right hand is available to shake hands with all the new people you meet. Tricky business.

"I'm Not A Very Good Business Person"

Says the man who has opened a book (singular) shop.


That's right, the book shop only has lots of copies of one book.


An interesting concept that made me laugh, read the full article below:


http://cityroom.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/04/28/a-bookstore-thats-book-singular/

Oh Kindle, Where Were You During My Degree?

I had an interesting thought today, which I thought I'd share.

During my three-year History degree I always found the weeks leading up to the Easter holidays very stressful, as during out Easter break we always had essays to write at home, using a minimum of 15 books. 

This is all fair enough as I was doing a History degree after all. However, problems arose due to the fact that my parents lived in Guernsey, and I had to somehow figure out a way of transporting the required material home on a plane from Bristol (whilst avoiding crazy airport excess luggage fees).

Usually I would phone my parents and request once again that they just stop faffing about on a silly Island, move back to England and come pick me up (plus all my books) in a car like normal (loving) parents.

This never went down too well, so I was always forced to run around photocopying material, scanning articles and checking online whether books I needed were held in Guernsey (they never were, just incase you were wondering) (Seriously, not even once).

I fear that writing this blog entry is stirring up old feelings of resentment towards the lovely Isle of Guernsey and it's widely inadequate library service, so I'll move swiftly onto the pubishing/book industry point I want to make...My life would have been so much easier with the Kindle. 

I always used to laugh when my mother told me how, when she was at university, she used to queue up in the corridor (along with dozens of other girls) to use the one payphone in the building to call her parents once a week. I used to listen to this smugly holding my mobile phone.

I have a strong feeling that one day, if I have children, they will almost certainly laugh incredulously at my tales of having to lug real books home to complete essays, no doubt smugly holding devices of the future from which they can access every book ever published. I'm jealous already...! 

Why A Free Lunch Is Good For My Career

I’m going to be honest with you now. The days I choose to work at BK are generally dictated by the days when a free lunch is on offer. This is the sad, but very real truth about the thought process of an unpaid intern.

The upside of this for my fledgling publishing career, however, is that the free lunches generally coincide with Author Days. So, as a result of my free lunch scheduling habits, I've had some great opportunities to closely observe/interact with various authors. 

This experience has led me to understand what it means to be a BK author today. This differs greatly from the author I had pictured in my head: shy, reclusive, happiest tucked away writing in a darkened room (maybe with one little window high up on the ceiling), and generally preferring to avoid human contact at all cost. With this in mind I did wonder why on earth BK made the author present his book to the entire company? (Pretty cruel, I thought).

It didn't take me long to realize how mistaken I'd been however. All BK authors I've met so far (over a lovely free lunch, of course), have been self-confident, charismatic, successful, interesting, and friendly individuals. Also, they love to talk about their books (in fact, I have heard many requests to go on Oprah).

This taught me that today reclusive authors just don't cut it. This may seem harsh, but publishers must be able to guarantee book sales (especially with today's economy). Hence authors generally need to have followers in place already, people who are going to buy the book. I guess this explains why there are so many celebrity novels/autobiographies published today.  

So there you go, my quest for free lunches has helped increase my knowledge of the publishing world. Lovely.

Does Anyone Work Fridays in Publishing?

I have sent out three emails to three different BK staff members at various points today to try to arrange meetings with them. It really amused me that I got three out of office replies. I had heard that people in publishing don't really work mornings or Fridays, and I'm quite excited to find that there may be some truth in that statement. 

On that note, time for the weekend :-D

YouTube + Cat Videos = Never A Dull Moment At BK

Giggling and cackling can often be heard from the BK editorial team as staff members regularly share their favourite 'funny cat videos' on YouTube. 

I don't completely understand this (but then again, I don't understand a lot of things about America: like why does everyone insist on leaving the letter 'u' out of so many words, and why is 11.30am considered a normal time to eat lunch?). 

Anyway, regardless of my slight confusion, I am happy to get involved in the fun, and thought I'd share with you some of my favourites so far, enjoy!

Surprise Kitty (adorable)

Sleeping Kitten 

Winston is somewhat of a celebrity on the YouTube cat circuit. In this clip he takes a bath.  

Cute Roulette

Maybe I Should Become A Janitor?

At a recent Author Day two soon-to-be published authors showed the true importance of the lunch time author presentation. The authors told an 'inspirational' story of how a CEO, realising money was not the answer to life, wished he could trade places with his friend who was a janitor, and only earning $6,000 a month (so nothing to be jealous of, the authors told us).

Woops. This clearly wasn't the right thing to say to a room full of people working in the publishing industry (which is famous for it's scandalously low pay). Whispers went round the room 'that's more than I earn'...'me too!'...'I wonder where the janitor works?'...'do you think they have any vacancies?'

Quick calculations on my phone allowed me to convert that this would be an annual earning of 44,000 pounds a year in England (apologies, pesky American computer doesn't have a pound sign) (this amount of money is more than the national average earned in England). 

In all seriousness though, mistakes like this are good to make within the safety of BK's boardroom. The author day presentation to BK staff is the author's first attempt at pitching the book to an audience, and the marketing/publicity meeting straight afterwards begins with feedback on the author's pitch. In this instance, the faux-pas will be mentioned, the pitch straightened out, and all will be right in the world again thanks to a BK Author Day. Hurrah! 

My Favourite Article

Following on from my last post in which I mentioned the media's obsession with analyzing the current changes in the publishing industry, I thought I'd post my favourite article so far. This is an interview with Margaret Atwood in the Globe and Mail. In the chaos people seem to be whipping up around the publishing industry at the moment, I find her to be reassuringly calm on the topic.
 
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/national/time-to-lead/no-e-books-without-authors-atwood-reminds-us/article1943785/page1/
 
I also like the quotation below about how the publishing industry differs from other businesses:
 
"When people say publishing is a business--actually it's not quite a business. It's part gambling and part arts and crafts, with a business component. It's not like any other business, and that's why when standard businessmen go into publishing and think, 'Right, I'm going to clean this up, rationalize it and make it work like a real business,' two years later you find they're bald because they've torn out all their hair. And then you say to them, 'It's not like selling beer. It's not like selling a case of this and a case of that and doing a campaign that works for all of the beer.' You're selling one book--not even one author any more. Those days are gone, when you sold, let's say, 'Graham Greene' almost like a brand. You're selling one book, and each copy of that book has to be bought by one reader and each reading of that book is by one unique individual. It's very specific."

The Publishing Industry - Sick, Dying, Dead?

No one with any interest in the publishing industry could have failed to notice the amount of media coverage that has, over the last few years, discussed the decline of (or even the anticipated death of) the book publishing industry.

There is obviously no doubt that the publishing industry is changing rapidly. David Marshall, the VP of Digital and Editorial at BK, said in a recent meeting that people are anticipating 25% of book sales to be digital by 2012, and 80% to be digital by 2020. Observing the amount of people already replacing newspapers/books with digital devices on public transport today, this prediction seems entirely plausible. I myself managed to complete an entire MA degree in History by only once venturing into the library to read an actual book, the journals I required were always available online.

Yet I don’t really understand how people go as far as to equate the rise of e-books with the ‘death’ of the publishing industry? People are still reading content written by authors and edited by publishers, it just so happens that this content is presented in a different format.

I admit that I still find some aspects of how the publishing industry relates to the new digital wave fairly confusing, and it is a topic I want to talk to more BK staff members about during my placement. Those I have spoken to so far have left me feeling less anxious about the industry’s future however, as they have unanimously said they are 'excited' about changes in the industry.

This is reassuring. It has also led me to understand that those who try to fight the digital changes in publishing will be left behind. Therefore, if I want any chance of entry into/survival in the book publishing world then I will have to become 'excited' about the digital changes too!