Around the Horn in Hellish Weather

Hell Around the Horn

I was going to wait until the print edition came out before posting a review of RICK SPILMAN's tension-fraught seafaring novel, but the recent hellish weather makes it appropriate to post it now.

Readers -- maritime readers, in particular -- are probably already well aware of Rick's great site, OldSaltBlog (link to the right). If so, they will also know that he has recently published his first novel. A couple of months ago I was privileged to read an advance copy on Kindle -- and believe me, the "pages" flew by.

Ringing with authenticity, this nail-biter is a tale of battling wind and weather to sail from the Atlantic to the Pacific via the most dreaded landmark in the sailor's lexicon, Cape Horn.

Stories of ships in the Age of Sail are usually told from the quarterdeck, and the fight is against other ships. Rick Spilman's novel, by contrast, revisits the windjammer era when men fought the elements with just rope and canvas, using muscle and willpower to get a freight to a destination. In the tradition of old salts who once wrote hugely popular stories of life under sail -- men like "Shalimar" (F. C. Hendry), Captain F. Coffin, Jan de Hartog and Alexander Bone -- Hell Around the Horn tells it like it was for the ordinary people who lived unthinkably dangerous lives at sea, from the point of view of the foc'sle and the half-deck, as well as the cabin.

Based on real events, this is the story of one captain's struggle to get his ship to port, with just his seafaring knowledge and his increasingly weary crew to help, and with the added problem of a bloodyminded mate. A detail I particularly liked was that he had his wife and family with him. Spilman reveals her experiences through her letters, which are as convincingly written as the rest of the book.

 

Highly recommended.

NZ book industry split over publishing merger

Predictably, there is a lot of angst in the New Zealand book world

According to a Fairfax survey, the bookselling industry is divided over the benefits or drawbacks of the merger of Penguin and Random House, which is confidently expected to go ahead.

Here, the reports of the two houses are remarkably similar. Publisher and distributor Random House reported revenues of $24 million for the 2011 calendar year, and a profit of $2 million.

Erstwhile rival Penguin reported revenues of $36.5 million, with profits of $2.5 million.

Graham Beattie, former managing director of Penguin New Zealand, and now New Zealand's premier book blogger (see link to the right), said he doubted that the merger would be good for the publishing sector here. "I don't go for this big is beautiful thing," he said. He anticipates big job losses from the merger. Distribution could well be run from Penguin's outlet in Australia, rather than Random House's operation on Auckland's North Shore. "Instead of having two warehouses, they will have one. Instead of having two senior editors of fiction, they will have one."

On the other hand, Lincoln Gould, CEO of Booksellers New Zealand, thought the merger could lead to lower prices, benefiting the book-buying public. "We would hope there would be efficiency gains in the supply chain, which is based on an outdated modeal and means consumers in New Zealand are faced with high book prices compared with other countries," he said.

On the wider front, Jeremy Greenfield of Digital Book World asks, "What is the point of the merger?"

It just might be that a larger publishing company will have more leverage to negotiate with its largest trading partner, Amazon.

That said, the combined revenues of Penguin and Random House in 2011 were about $4 billion; in that same year, Amazon took in about $48 billion.

The Merger: Press release from Random House

Bertelsmann and Pearson to Combine Book Businesses

• Thomas Rabe implements new Bertelsmann strategy in the book publishing business
• Bertelsmann to hold 53 percent of new publishing group, Pearson 47 percent
• Markus Dohle (Random House) appointed as CEO, John Makinson (Penguin) as Chairman of the Board of Directors
• Bertelsmann to appoint five representatives to the Board of Directors, Pearson four

Gütersloh / New York / London, October 29, 2012 – The international media groups Bertelsmann and Pearson announced today that they will combine the activities of their respective trade-book publishing companies, Random House and Penguin Group. Bertelsmann will own 53 percent, Pearson 47 percent. The closing of the transaction is scheduled to take place in the second half of 2013, following regulatory approval.

The announcement of the combination was made today in Gütersloh, Germany by
Thomas Rabe, Chairman and CEO of Bertelsmann, and in London by Marjorie Scardino, Chief Executive of Pearson.

Upon closing, Markus Dohle, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Random House worldwide, will be CEO of the new group. John Makinson, Chairman and CEO of Penguin, will become Chairman of the Board of Directors. Additional senior executive appointments will be announced in due course. Bertelsmann will appoint five representatives to the group's Board of Directors, Pearson four. The new name will be Penguin Random House. Until the closing, the companies will maintain their current separate operations and continue conducting business independently.

The new publishing group will include all the publishing divisions and imprints of Random House and Penguin in the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom, Australia, New Zealand, India, South Africa, as well as Penguin's publishing company in China, and Random House's Spanish-language publishing operations in Spain and Latin America. Random House's Munich-based German-language publishing company, Verlagsgruppe Random House, will not be part of the Group and will remain at Bertelsmann. In the new company, the publishing imprints of Random House and Penguin will continue to publish their books with the autonomy they presently enjoy, and retain their distinct editorial identities.

Bertelsmann Chairman & CEO Thomas Rabe says: “With this planned combination, Bertelsmann and Pearson create the best course for the future of our world-renowned trade-book publishers, Random House and Penguin, by enabling them to publish even more effectively across traditional and emerging formats and distribution channels. It will build on our publishing tradition, offering an extraordinary diversity of publishing opportunities for authors, agents, booksellers, and readers, together with unequalled support and resources.”

Mr. Rabe also observed, “Today's announcement is a milestone not only for Random House, but also for the entire Bertelsmann group, with its 177-year publishing history. Its significance for our business and for the cultural resonance of our book publishing operations worldwide is on a par with such momentous agreements as the takeover of Goldmann Verlag in 1977; the acquisition of a stake in Bantam Books, our first-ever U.S. investment, that same year; the purchase of Doubleday in 1986; and especially that of Random House in 1998. Each of these steps was aimed at increasing the breadth and quality of Bertelsmann's publishing operations, as our new company will.”

For Bertelsmann, the planned combination also marks a significant step in the implementation of its four new strategic priorities under Thomas Rabe, which it recently adopted and announced: strengthening the core, digital transformation, the establishment of growth platforms, and the development of growth regions. The Chairman & CEO comments: “The combination of Random House and Penguin, first of all, significantly strengthens book publishing, one of our core businesses. Second, it advances the digital transformation on an even greater scale, and third, it increases our presence in the target growth markets Brazil, India and China.”

Marjorie Scardino, chief executive of Pearson, said: “Penguin is a successful, highly-respected and much-loved part of Pearson. This combination with Random House - a company with an almost perfect match of Penguin's culture, standards and commitment to publishing excellence - will greatly enhance its fortunes and its opportunities. Together, the two publishers will be able to share a large part of their costs, to invest more for their author and reader constituencies and to be more adventurous in trying new models in this exciting, fast-moving world of digital books and digital readers.”

Markus Dohle, Chairman & CEO of Random House, adds: “Our new company will bring together the publishing expertise, experience, and skill sets of two of the world's most successful, enduring trade book publishers. In doing so, we will create a publishing home that gives employees, authors, agents, and booksellers access to unprecedented resources. I deeply believe that the support and services that we will be able to offer, coupled with the creative and editorial independence that we will continue to maintain, will benefit everyone in the book publishing environment, especially our passionate readers from today's generation to the next.”

Hurricane force Romney

Tom Scott, cartoonist, Dominion-Post, Wellington, 31 October 2012

The demise of the Bounty replica

Moment woman crew member is plucked to safety after replica of HMS Bounty is sunk by Sandy

• 15 of the 16 crew members have now been found
• The coast guard said 42-year-old Claudene Christian was found this evening and is being taken to hospital
• Captain Robin Walbridge, 63, is still missing at sea
• The Bounty starred in Hollywood blockbusters Mutiny on the Bounty, starring Marlon Brando, and Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest
• The Canadian-made replica vessel got caught in storms near Hatteras, N.C.

By Matt Blake and Anthony Bond

The HMS Bounty sinks as rescue teams save one crew member while the ship's captain remains missing at sea.
The U.S. Coast Guard said 42-year-old Claudene Christian was found unresponsive this evening and has been taken to hospital in a critical condition.
It now means 15 of the 16 crew members of the iconic boat are accounted for - with 63-year-old captain Robin Walbridge yet to be found.

Abandon ship: Six metre waves and ferocious gales forced the crew to abandon ship as the 180-foot three-masted ship sinks in the Atlantic Ocean

Sinking ship: The world-famous replica became stranded on Sunday night about 90 miles southeast of Hatteras, North Carolina on Sunday

One of the Bounty missing found

Unconscious, but alive

One of the two crew members of the (Marlo Brandon) Bounty replica, which was tragically lost in the current hurricane, has been rescued after nine hours in the water.

Her name, believe it or not, is Claudene Christian

Maybe that is what inspired her to sign onto the crewlist of the doomed ship in May.

Sadly, the captain is still missing.

Update: Claudene was the many-times great-granddaughter of Fletcher Christian.  Sadly, she was pronounced dead after taken to hospital.

Apparently, she was knocked off the ship as life-rafts were being lowered. Captain Robin Walbridge dived in after her, in an illfated act of heroism.

Penguin and Random House agree on merger

The News Corp approach has been spurned by Pearson in favor of the Bertelsmann offer

Pearson and Bertelsmann agree consumer publishing partnership: Penguin and Random House to combine, creating the world's leading trade publisher

 

October 29, 2012

 

Pearson and Bertelsmann today announce an agreement to create the world’s leading consumer publishing organisation by combining Penguin and Random House.

 

The combination brings together two of the world’s leading English language publishers, with highly complementary skills and strengths. Random House is the leading English language publisher in the US and the UK, while Penguin is the world’s most famous publishing brand and has a strong presence in fast-growing developing markets. Both companies have a long history of publishing excellence, and both have been pioneers in the dramatic industry transformation towards digital publishing and bookselling.

 

Under the terms of the agreement, Penguin and Random House will combine their businesses in a newly-created joint venture named Penguin Random House. Bertelsmann will own 53% of the joint venture and Pearson will own 47%. The joint venture will exclude Bertelsmann’s trade publishing business in Germany and Pearson will retain rights to use the Penguin brand in education markets worldwide.

 

Bertelsmann will nominate five directors to the Board of Penguin Random House and Pearson will nominate four. John Makinson, currently chairman and chief executive of Penguin, will be chairman of Penguin Random House and Markus Dohle, currently chief executive of Random House, will be its chief executive

 

In reviewing the long-term trends and considerable change affecting the consumer publishing industry, Pearson and Bertelsmann both concluded that the publishing and commercial success of Penguin and Random House can best be sustained and enhanced through a partnership with another major international publishing house. They believe that the combined organisation will have a stronger platform and greater resources to invest in rich content, new digital publishing models and high-growth emerging markets. The organisation will generate synergies from shared resources such as warehousing, distribution, printing and central functions. Pearson and Bertelsmann intend that the combined organisation’s level of organic investment in authors and new product models will exceed the total investment of Penguin and Random House as independent publishing houses.

Pearson News Release.

Bounty replica abandoned

Hurricane forces crew to abandon HMS Bounty replica

New Zealand Herald, 5:30 AM Tuesday Oct 30

2010 file photo of the tall ship HMS Bounty. The crew had to abandon her to the waves as Hurricane Sandy hit them off the coast of North Carolina. Photo / AP

 

A monster hurricane off the US coast forced the 17-member crew of the HMS Bounty to abandon the famed three-mast tall ship and lower lifeboats into stormy seas, a Coast Guard statement said.
The crew donned cold water survival suits and life jackets before launching in two 25-man lifeboats with canopies after getting caught up in stormy seas144 kilometres southeast of Hatteras, North Carolina.

The owner of the vessel, which was built for the 1962 movie Mutiny on the Bounty with Marlon Brando and has also featured in Pirates of the Caribbean with Johnny Depp, said he lost contact with the crew late Sunday.

The US Coast Guard command center in Portsmouth subsequently received a distress signal, confirming that the ship was in distress and locating its position.

"The vessel was reportedly taking on water and was without propulsion," the statement said, noting that weather at the scene consisted of 40 miles-per-hour (65 kilometers-per-hour) winds and 18-foot (five meter) waves.

The current HMS Bounty is a replica of the eponymous British vessel known for the mutiny that took place in Tahiti in 1789.

The Coast Guard's latest statement said they were monitoring the situation to "determine the soonest" time that aircraft or boats can be deployed to make a rescue.
- AFP 

Update:  14 crew members have been rescued from life rafts in the midst of the stormy sea. The coast guard is searching for the two men who are still missing.   One of the two lost men is Captain Robin Walbridge.

Also see the yahoo news item on the loss of this replica of the iconic ship.

News Corp offers for Penguin

Penguin authors and agents 'terrified' at prospect of News Corp takeover

 

News Corp deal would leave Penguin's reputation in tatters, says co-author of book on downfall of News of the World

 

Simon Neville in The Guardian comments that in one of the more bizarre twists in the story of modern publishing, Rupert Murdoch's News Corporation, described by Labour MP Tom Watson as a "toxic institution", could find itself publishing his book on phone hacking as the publisher considers a bid for Penguin.

The reported £1bn offer from News Corp's publishing arm, HarperCollins could be put to the board of parent company Pearson as early as Wednesday, the Sunday Times said. Any approach could spark a bidding war, as Pearson is already in talks with Europe's biggest publisher, Bertelsmann, which owns Random House.

A deal with Random House would create a publishing house responsible for a quarter of English language books worldwide. A HarperCollins linkup would give the firm a market share of about 20%. Both are likely to face inquiries from the competition commission before a deal is finalised.

However, it is unsurprising that it is predicted that the Bertelsmann/Pearson talks will be finalizing within a couple of weeks.

Author and agent reaction to the possibility of an acquisition of Penguin by News Corp is unreservedly horrified.  According to Neville, an agent who represents authors across all three publishing houses said: "Authors have told me they are frightened by a Random House takeover, but terrified by a HarperCollins one."

 

MUTINY ON THE BOUNTY

It is four in the morning on April 28, 1789, and Fletcher Christian, smarting and bitter, takes over the deck. Now, as he paces back and forth through the calm, serene hours, he plans an escape from the degrading tongue-lashings.

 

He plans to float away on a raft. But Midshipman George Stewart has a better idea. He comes close to Christian's ear, and whispers, "Take the ship!"

 

"Shall I?" says Christian to one of the seamen, Matthew Quintal.

 

"Too dangerous," says the seaman.

 

"What? Are you afraid? If we succeed, we return to that happy island." Christian turns to another sailor, Isaac Martin. "Shall we take the ship?"

 

"By God, I'm for it!" Martin swears ...

 

This is my retelling of the infamous Mutiny on the Bounty, when a desperate crew, led by senior officer Fletcher Christian, seized the ship. It is Monday, 15th October 2012, and I am on the top deck of the P&O cruise ship Pacific Jewel, which is lying in the exact spot of the Pacific where the mutiny took place.  Inspired by an hour-long lecture about the characters and events of the Bounty voyage that was given in the packed lecture theatre that same morning, nearly 2000 passengers, mostly Australian, are crowded at the rail, watching and listening as my tale unfolds.

 

 

  ... Captain Bligh is asleep, his door open and unlocked. At five in the morning his room is invaded. Startled awake, he recognizes Christian, the master at arms, Charles Churchill, the guner's mate, John Mills, and Thomas Burket, seaman. Roughly seizing him, they tie his hands behind his back. "Say a word, and death will be instant," they threaten. Nevertheless, Bligh cries, "Murder! Murder!" Too late. All the loyal officers have been restrained already.

 

Up on deck he is shoved, half-naked, wearing only his nightshirt. There, in the light of the rising sun, he sees chaos on his ship. Christian orders a boat to be lowered, but confusion reigns. It takes two and a half hours to get the launch into the water. Bligh is hoarse with shouting, while Christian holds the rope that binds him, and points a beyonet at his chest.

 

Twenty-two men remain loyal to the captain. Bligh sees that Christian is taken aback by the number, and asks him to think again. "Is this treatment a proper return for my friendship? Consider, Mr. Christian, I have a wife and four children in England, and you have danced my children on my knee."

 

"That, Captain Bligh, is the thing," Christian replies. "I am in hell, I am in hell."

 

The launch, just 23 feet long and 7 feet wide, is by now a fearful sight, packed with 18 loyal men and a few provisions, and with only seven inches of freeboard. Their chances of survival are very slim, but it is too late for Fletcher Christian to relent. Captain Bligh is shoved down to join the rest in the launch, while the four loyal men who are forced to remain on the ship cry out to him.

 

"Never fear, my lads, I'll do you justice if I ever get to England," he shouts as the boat is pushed away. And so the epic voyage of the Bounty launch begins.

 

Silence. One can almost hear the sighs from all about the ship. Then the spell breaks, as Captain Graham Goodway takes over the microphone to announce that the story will be continued two hours later, as the Pacific Jewel lies off Bligh's first landfall, Tofua.

 

 

So far, the day has been a stunning success, testified by wide smiles from Cruise Director, Gemma, her deputy, Alun, and Production Manager, Ros.  Everyone relaxes, while the ship glides on in the wake of the Bounty launch. And then we are lying off the island of Tofua, and it is time for my story to continue.

 

Night falls. The Bounty launch is bobbing in the surf of the island of Tofua, at the end of the first day of her voyage. The Bounty has long since vanished into the mists of the horizon. The 19 men crammed into the 23-foot launch try to snatch what sleep they can. At daybreak, they sail slowly along the coast, landing where they can, scavenging for coconuts and fresh water, trying to trade buttons from their jackets for breadfruit from the natives.

It becomes a routine over the next few days. But the natives are gathering in greater and greater numbers, friendly at first, but increasingly more menacing. Then the day comes when warriors are pressing in from all sides. Each warlike native holds two stones, and taps them together as he slowly advances. No words are spoken. There is just the ominous clack, clack, clack of the stones.

Bligh orders a quiet, orderly retreat to the boat, while he remains on the beach, casually writing up his log. Two chiefs approach, and ask him why he doesn't sleep on shore. "I never sleep out of my boat," he replies. "Then we will kill you," they boast.

Still, Bligh remains calm. Taking one of the chiefs by the hand, he leads him to the launch, through the press of warriors. There is no noise, apart from the clack of stones. The Bounty men watch numbly, with silent horror.

Bligh reaches the launch. The chief breaks away. "Pile into the boat!" shouts Bligh. All the men obey except the big quartermaster, John Norton. Dutiful to the end, he wades out to where the boat's painter is tied, ready to release it.

Frantically, the others shout at Norton to leave it, and jump into the boat. He begins to respond -- too late. A shower of stones fells him to the ground. The warriors take the line from his slack grip. They start to haul the launch up the beach. Through the surf and across the shingle they drag it, while other warriors rain stones on the men in the boat. Fumbling with his knife, Bligh somehow manages to cut the line. Pushing with their oars, raising the sail, the Bounty men flee.

The natives leap into canoes and make chase. Bligh and his companions take off jackets and hats and thrown them into the water. The warriors in the canoes stop for the plunder, and so the men in the Bounty launch escape. Their last sight of the beach is of John Norton's head being beaten in, while other natives pull off the murdered man's clothes.

Bruised and bleeding from the hail of stones, shaking with the aftermath of fear, the men in the launch make a historic decision. They will stop at no more islands. Instead, they will make the 3,618-mile voyage to Timor, in the East Indies, skirting Fiji, Vanuatu, and the Great Barrier Reef, and then negotiating the scarcely charted Torres Strait. Living on one ounce of bread and a quarter pint of water each day, somehow they will do it -- and without the loss of even one more man.

It is the start of the most remarkable small boat voyage in history.

 



Ray Bradbury's rejected stories

A cautionary tale about SF great, Ray Bradbury, contains the hint to never throw out those stories that linger in the bottom drawer of the desk.

Like all newbie writers, Bradbury collected his share of rejections.

But then he enjoyed sudden fame and success, with the publication of his collection, The Martian Chronicles.    So he contacted an editor of a well-paying New York magazine, and asked if they had any files about submissions that had been turned down.  The editor obliged, and he wrote down the titles of the stories that particular magazine had rejected.

And he went home to California, changed the titles, resubmitted the stories . . . and sold the lot.

Was the magazine The New Yorker?  It's hard to tell -- but that magazine published a memoir of Ray Bradbury's love affair with science fiction, written the day before he died.

Called "Take Me Home," you can read it HERE.

Random House/Penguin merger overview

As the whole publishing world knows, Bertelsmann (Random House) and Pearson (Penguin) are engaged in talks about a merger.



A scan through the internet (with particular attention to the Guardian, The Bookseller, and the Financial Times), elicited the following interesting points:

The tie-up would result in Bertelsmann having a stake of more than 50%, which could stymie the deal.

And there are other possible hitches, it seems. Pearson, which owns the Financial Times, confirms that talks are in progress, but warns that several issues remain unresolved.

Bertelsmann's seniors are in China (!?) and have declined to comment. However, a source at Random House said that the outcome was "promising."

The talks have followed the announcement of Pearson's chief executive, Dame Marjorie Scardino, that she intended to stand down after 15 years at the helm.  She has previously gone on record as saying that the Financial Times would be sold "over my dead body."

If the merger happens, the cash inflow could mean that the FT is less likely to be sold.  However, Pearson's new CEO, John Fallon (who lacks a publishing background), is in favor of selling not just the FT, but Penguin, too. His vision is to make Pearson a leader in the education sector.

The regulators, obviously, would be interested in a merger of such major players. However, Lorna Tilbian, head media analyst at Numis, pointed out that the music industry was pared down to just three big players without any fuss.

If the merger is successful, no one at the very top will suffer -- Markus Dohle, CEO of Random house, and John Makinson, CEO of Penguin, are both expected to keep senior executive jobs. Obviously, this reprieve would not apply to the general rank and file.

And the reasoning behind it all? Fear of the dominance of Amazon.com, whose market share in the UK is reaching for 40%, and getting there fast. As The Bookseller points out, Amazon's only real competitors, right now, are Apple and Google. Creating the publishing giant that would result from the merger is a response to the need for "greater muscle."

Authors and agents should be biting their nails.  Not only does it cut down the number of prospective publishers, but it takes out two competitors.  It also calls the future of other publishers, who will be suddenly downsized, into question.

Is this "the first hint of what the future shape of publishing will be," as The Bookseller predicts? We can only wait and see.  In my own personal opinion, it is a desperate attempt at catch-up with what is already happening.

Moby-Dick in pictures

"I’ve read the book eight or nine times […] Each and every reading has revealed more and more to me and hinted tantalizingly at even greater truths and revelations that I have yet to reach. Friends often question my obsession with the novel, especially since I am not a scholar or even an educator any longer, and the best explanation I have been able to come up with is that, to me, Moby-Dick is a book about everything. God. Love. Hate. Identity. Race. Sex. Humor. Obsession. History. Work. Capitalism […] I see every aspect of life reflected in the bizarre mosaic of this book.” ~ Matt Kish

Since 2009, former high school English teacher and self-taught artist Matt Kish has been drawing every page of the 552-page Signet Classics paperback edition of Herman Melville’s iconic Moby-Dick, and posting the results on his blog. Every day, for 552 days he has produced one obsessive drawing, using pages from discarded books and a variety of drawing tools, from ballpoint pen to crayon to ink and watercolor.

And, as we all know, publishers are scanning the blogs for publishable material, producing a stunning range of books on a mind-bending range of topics. Now, thanks to Tin House Books, Kish’s unusual project joins the throng.

 Moby-Dick in Pictures: One Drawing for Every Page gathers his eclectic set of eye-catching drawings into a 600-page "comic" -- which is certainly an innovative way to appreciate the Herman Melville classic.

See a selection of the illustrations HERE

 

Monkish dissatisfaction

Manuscript-copying monks were not entirely happy with their job of producing beautiful illuminated documents.

And they scribbled about it in the margins.

Lapham's Quarterly quotes a few. "Thank God, it will soon be dark," wrote one.

"Oh, my hand!" a discontented fellow complained. "I am very cold. I've written the whole thing -- for Christ's sake, give me a drink!"

Another was even more explicit. "Writing is excessive drudgery," he griped. "It crooks your back, it dims your sight, it twists your stomach and your sides."

Luckily, none of them could see into the lamplit, computer driven future.

Digital zooms, yet profits decline

Well, that is the news from Bloomsbury, including the astounding tidbit that over the past six months e-book sales have increased eighty-nine percent.

Bloomsbury reported results for the six months ending August 31, with continuing pre-tax profits falling 40 percent to £0.9 million, even as sales rose 2 percent to £43.5 million. With recent acquisitions the academic and professional division now comprises 28 percent of company sales, though "academic sales peak at the beginning of the academic year, in September and October."

And the Harry Potter fall-out has had a dire effect on children's book sales.

 

Sales at the adult division were flat (and down 5 percent before acquisitions), while children's and educational sales fell 23 percent and operating profit in that segment disappeared, blamed on the comparison to last year's Harry Potter sales tying in to the final movie.

BUT eBook sales for the period grew 89 percent to £4.5 million, comprising 10 percent of all sales and 15% of adult sales.

 

Read the release to see what the company has to say.  An upbeat quote: "With our Academic acquisitions over the last 16 months, our global restructuring in 2011, our ongoing innovation in digital and our continuing strong balance sheet, the Group continues to progress with its strategy and is well positioned for the future."

 

The market, it seems, isn't listening. Bloomsbury's stock is down over 5 percent today on the earnings decline.

Is a combined Random House/Penguin the publishing future?

A combination of two powerful publishing houses?

GalleyCat and Beattie's Bookblog (link to the right), discuss news that is going to shake the global publishing industry to the core.

Today Pearson (the corporate parent of Penguin) confirmed that the publishing company is considering “a possible combination of Penguin and Random House.”

Pearson had this statement: “Pearson confirms that it is discussing with Bertelsmann a possible combination of Penguin and Random House. The two companies have not reached agreement and there is no certainty that the discussions will lead to a transaction. A further announcement will be made if and when appropriate.

So what has impelled this sudden revolution in thought? The strategic challenges of the booming e-book business, apparently. Together, the two publishers would have enormous clout, holding sway over a quarter of the US market.

According to early analysis, Bertelsmann (the corporate parent of Random House) would end up with a bigger than 50% share.  Is this enough to give Penguin cold feet?

Only time will tell -- but that time is likely to be soon.

And when ... if ... it happens, how will it effect New Zealand? Bertelsmann have a special interest in our beautiful and very literate little country, and so when ... if ... the merger goes ahead, I predict that something noticeable is very likely to happen to our local industry.

Nora Roberts ... and her 200th novel

This girl must be swimming in money

A full-page ad in the NYT?

Why?

Because it was the NRoberts novel # 200

Mind you, that is counting the ones with the author's name rendered as "J.D. Robb".

According to the advert, there are 400 million copies of her books in print ... and at 10% of whatever the cover price may be, that is a helluva lot of moolah.  She is definitely a millionaire.

Apparently, writing several books a year doesn't use up all her time and energy. In 2009 she and her husband opened a B&B in Boonsboro, MD.

It has eight rooms.  Each is named after a famous loving couple.  Rochester and ... ?  I guess you all guessed Jane. But Percy and Marguerite?  You have to be pretty ancient to remember The Scarlet Pimpernel, perhaps -- but it is an indication of Ms. Roberts's bookshelf. And then there is Eve and ... WHO? A couple of characters in a Roberts novel, apparently.

There's an interesting NYT story about the romantic inn.  It includes the tidbit that -- oh, dear lord -- it was opened on St. Valentine's Day.  But, as it also indicates, it's a lot more affordable than you might expect-- $220-300 a night.

And children under 12 aren't welcome. 

The booming self-publishing industry

Respectability works:  There are more Indie Authors than ever

Digital Book World quotes facts and figures from the Bowker market report that testify to a self-publishing boom

In 2011, there were about 235,000 self-published titles in the U.S., and about 87,000 of them were e-books.

While most self-published titles are still print books (some 63%), the e-book category is growing faster. E-book self-publishing production is up 129% since 2006, versus a gain of 33% for print over the same period.

So, where are the Indie authors heading to produce all these books?

It seems that a few larger players dominate the e-book self-publishing market, according to the report. Author Solutions (47,094 titles, now owned by Penguin) and Smashwords (40,608 titles) led the way but Lulu wasn’t far behind (38,005). Outside of these three and Amazon’s CreateSpace, which dominates the print side of self-publishing, no other company has more than 10% market-share.

And authors are winning. In the past year, these self-publishing operations and smaller competitors have been battling for the favor of authors, offering lower prices, better services and other goodies to lure them to their platform.

FastPencil, one of these smaller competitors, just announced that it would offer some of its authors the opportunity to be printed and distributed via Barnes & Noble. Author Solutions offers authors 100% royalties on books published and distributed through the site, making its primary service free for many of its customers – this promotion was to end on July 4 but was extended indefinitely due to its success. The company also recently launched BookStub, a service where authors can sell their e-books in person using a credit-card sized voucher with a picture of the book cover on one side and a product code on the other. A new company called Your Ebook Team just launched and says that it offers authors “360 degree” service, from editorial to distribution. Lulu recently launched an “author advice” tool.

Digital rights

Digital pitfalls in your publishing contract

More people than ever are reading books on dedicated e-readers.

On the latest two Sydney-Wellington flights and the intervening cruise, I noted far more people reading on tablets and Kindles (Kindles in particular) than on actual books.  At a rough estimate, e-readers outnumbered print books and magazines two-to-one, but any error would be on the e-reader side.

People just love their e-readers (again, Kindles in particular), and the plus side of it, for both publishers and authors, is that it means that more books are being read. This digital development also means, however, that for authors there are new hazards to watch out for before signing that contract.

In the current New Zealand Author there is an excellent article by MAGGIE TARVER, discussing these pitfalls.  Point by point, this is what she covers:

TERM. It's a rapidly changing environment, and no one knows what the digital publishing scene will be like in two or three years. Don't sign away your digital rights for the full term of the contract. They might be worth a lot more money (ie., a bigger royalty share) next year.

ROYALTIES. Publishers typically offer about 20%. Don't take less than 25%. And specify the term.

AUDIO E-BOOKS. Watch that the digital rights clause doesn't impact on your audio book rights, which are typically worth a 75% royalty.

E-PUB AND MOBI. Make sure your contract stipulates that the digital format will be compatible with all e-readers. PDF just doesn't hack it, these days.

DIGITAL PUBLICATION DEADLINE. Give your publisher a deadline for putting out your book in e-format. As I know to my cost with the Wiki Coffin mysteries, you can wait, and wait ... and wait for your book to be available on Kindle et al, while the fans agitate and the publisher pays no attention.

OUT OF PRINT. Make sure that your book is officially OP (and therefore ready for you to reclaim) when the PRINT edition is no longer being issued. Don't find yourself in an Island of the Lost-type trap, where the publisher still deems it in print even though only the digital version is available. And, of course, just as in the old days, make sure that you have the right to reclaim the book as soon as it is deemed OP.

APPS. I still find this rather mysterious, but Maggie Tarver recommends that you make sure that all apps are negotiated separately. As far as I can tell, it's rather like the clause covering comic book rights in the old days.

Do you want to lend your e-book?

One of the frustrations of buying e-books is that you can't lend them to friends -- or borrow theirs.

Because of the DRM restrictions advised by Amazon when publishing on Kindle, this is usually impossible.

Now, according to this report from Digital Book World, DRM might be coming to an end.

Amazon Customer Inspires Wave of Anti-DRM Sentiment An Amazon customer who has not identified herself has alleged that Amazon has shuttered her account and removed access to her content without a good explanation. In response to the buzz on the Web, Amazon posted a short statement on its customer forum that casts some doubt on the original story. (Update: Reportedly, access to the account has been mysteriously restored. No word on that from Amazon yet.) Either way, the incident fomented some anti-digital-rights-management sentiment on the Web, with many on Twitter and email lists discussing how DRM makes the alleged action by Amazon a possibility and ways of getting around it. Some even went so far as to advocate breaking DRM and taking the files out of the Amazon ecosystem. Major publishers have been slowly taking steps in recent months to test what their business would look like without DRM. Macmillan has opened a DRM-free e-bookstore with its Tor imprint and HarperCollins recently launched a social-reading app that pushes customers toward a DRM-free e-bookstore. The incidence and effect of piracy on the e-book market is thought to be lower than in other digital media; expect to see more experiments like this from large publishers soon.

Bronze age writing to be deciphered

Breakthrough in world's oldest undeciphered writing

By Sean Coughlan

BBC News education correspondent

Experts working on proto-Elamite hope they are on the point of 'a breakthrough'

The world's oldest undeciphered writing system, which has so far defied attempts to uncover its 5,000-year-old secrets, could be about to be decoded by Oxford University academics.

This international research project is already casting light on a lost bronze age middle eastern society where enslaved workers lived on rations close to the starvation level.

"I think we are finally on the point of making a breakthrough," says Jacob Dahl, fellow of Wolfson College, Oxford and director of the Ancient World Research Cluster.

Dr Dahl's secret weapon is being able to see this writing more clearly than ever before.

In a room high up in the Ashmolean Museum in Oxford, above the Egyptian mummies and fragments of early civilisations, a big black dome is clicking away and flashing out light.

This device, part sci-fi, part-DIY, is providing the most detailed and high quality images ever taken of these elusive symbols cut into clay tablets. This is Indiana Jones with software.

It's being used to help decode a writing system called proto-Elamite, used between around 3200BC and 2900BC in a region now in the south west of modern Iran.

And the Oxford team think that they could be on the brink of understanding this last great remaining cache of undeciphered texts from the ancient world.

READ MORE

Amazon's next project

From Wired.com...

Facebook knows who your friends are. Google knows what you’re interested in finding on the internet. Amazon knows what you’ve bought, and has a pretty good idea of what you might want to buy next.


If you were an advertiser, which company’s data sounds most valuable to you? If you had a product you wanted to sell, which of those things would you most want to know?

In a digital economy where some of the internet’s biggest companies and the country’s richest people have built their fortunes on the ability to more precisely target ads, one company sits on a trove of data it has barely started to exploit. In internet advertising-speak, visitors to Amazon.com are further down the purchasing funnel than visitors to Google or Facebook. “The opportunity is huge,” says Marcus Pratt, director of insights and technologies for Mediasmith, a San Francisco digital ad agency. “With rich data on its users, Amazon is uniquely positioned to match advertisers with shoppers.”

In a recent note to investors, analysts at Baird Equity Research said they estimated Amazon would generate anywhere from $500 million to $1 billion in advertising revenue this year. Amazon won’t break out those numbers, and the estimate doesn’t put Amazon anywhere near the tens of billions Google makes from ads every year. But for a company whose main business isn’t selling ads but selling stuff, a billion dollars is far from nothing. And Amazon is just getting started.

READ ON

Obama learns from Julia

Or so it seems.

President Barack Obama “hammered” Mitt Romney in the second debate, as Julia Gillard famously did to her opposite number in the Australian Parliament last week.

Even pro-Obama commentators were very unhappy with his previous lack-luster performance, wishing aloud that he would take a few hints from the fiery Aussie Prime Minister.

And that is what he did, attacking Romney on his corporate past, presenting a different appearance entirely on stage at New York’s Hofstra University.

Philip K. Dick-inspired SF movie a hit

It’s all action in the theaters

Action, SF and outlaw thrillers have dominated the box office this week.

Liam Neeson’s action film “Taken 2” – the sequeal to his 2008 hit – is zooming to the top, closely followed by SF-action film “Looper,” which has earned over a million in Australia alone.

Aussie-dominated film “Lawless” is not doing badly, either.

South Koren YouTube hit

Park Jae Sang, who sings under the name of “Psy,” admits that he is gobsmacked by his abrupt global fame. The 34-year old rocketed up the YouTube ratings when his song “Gangnam Style” and the accompanying “horse dance” went viral, notching up almost five hundred million views.

Asked how he felt to have topped music charts throughout the world, he said, “Well, this is unbelievable. I was not ready for this.”

Who would be?

Three Aussie authors nominated for premier children’s book award

Australian children’s book author Jackie French, who has published over 100 books, including the classic Diary of a Wombat, has been shortlisted yet again for the world’s largest children’s literature award.

She is joined by two compatriots, Ursula Dubosarsky and Melina Mrchetta, who are among the 207 candidates from 67 countries shortlisted for the 2013 Astrid Lindgren Memorial Award.

The list of nominees was announced at the Frankfurt Book Fair on Thursday.

Julia Gillard's misogyny rant goes viral

US bloggers are saying, “GO JULIA!”

And prominent social media are saying the same.

On Tuesday, Aussie PM Julia Gillard launched herself into an “impassioned 15-minute smackdown” of opposition leader Tony Abbott, during a fiery parliamentary debate.

She accused Abbott of a history of misogyny and sexism that dates back to his student days. The ABC video of her tirade, posted on the ABC news website and YouTube, has had more than 300,000 views, trending up and upwards under the hashtag #smackdown

And it is getting huge applause from bloggers in America, who say that US politics in general – and the presidential campaign in particular – would benefit hugely from a similar dose of vitriol.

Everyone, it seems, agrees that US politicians are too damn polite. Indeed, US entertainment site Salon says that the US should borrow Australia’s Julia, “to take on Congress’s misogynist caucus” after she “skewered” Abbott for “a career’s worth of patriarchal comments.”

Amelia Lester, in the New Yorker, said she wished Barack Obama had displayed the same temper and tenacity in last week’s presidential debate.

“Supporters of President Obama, watching Gillard cut through the disingenuousness and feigned moral outrage of the opponent to call him out for his own personal prejudice, hypocrisy, and aversion to facts, might be wishing their man would take a lesson from Australia,” she wrote.

How many books have to sell to make a profit?

An item from Digital Book World I cannot resist reposting, as I find it so pertinent and amusing.

Dunham's $3.7M Payday and What It Means


Even when self-published works can climb to the top of best-sellers lists, we're still in the era of the big book. Despite there being more manuscripts up for grabs than ever (at discount prices), publishers are still making big bets for certain titles.

Random House paid a reported $3.7 million for the U.S. and Canada rights to Lena Dunham's upcoming book, Not That Kind of Girl: A Young Woman Tells You What She's Learned. At, 26, Dunham is a relatively new member of the New York glitterati but already has several impressive credits to her name, including the feature film Tiny Furniture and the HBO series Girls, both of which she created and stars in.
How many copies of the confessional will RH have to sell to make a healthy profit? The math is complicated but the simple answer is "a lot."
How many copies of On Dublin Street, the self-published hit, does Samantha Young have to sell to make a profit? Well, it's not a completely fair comparison, but you get the idea.

Aussie radio personality condemned to go ad-free

Face book, 1, Aussie radio shock-jock, zero



It began when controversial radio personality Alan Jones blamed “female leaders” for political mess-ups. Females were “destroying the joint,” he claimed.

Listener Joanna Price didn’t like what she heard, so she started up a Facebook page to complain about it, called “Destroy the Joint.”

Then Alan Jones remarked at a Sydney University Liberal Club fundraiser that the father of recently bereaved Australian Prime Minster Julia Gillard “died of shame” because of her lies.

In common parlance, the fertilizer hit the fan. There was a huge and immediate public backlash, fanned, of course, by “Destroy the Joint.” Panic in the corridors of Mr. Jones’s employers, The Macquarie Radio Network, led to a press conference where the radio personality apologized for having misspoken in such an outrageous fashion, followed by an “unambiguous and unconditional” apology on air.

It didn’t work. 85,000 people signed a petition calling for him to be fired, while the “Destroy the Joint” Facebook page urged its 11,000+ followers to write to advertisers and “destroy Alan’s joint.”

More than a dozen (“Destroy the Joint” say 74) sponsors, including Woolworths, Coles, Mercedes-Benz and ING Direct, paid attention, and pulled advertising worth about two million Aussie dollars a month. The network’s share price dropped 14%.

The network has responded by making the Alan Jones breakfast program advert-free. They’re not happy about it, of course – a spokesman said that the Network had been subject to “21st century censorship, via cyber-bullying.”

Joanna Price, on the other hand, is delighted. “We are ordinary people speaking back to the big guys who have never had anyone speak back to them before,” she said.

Go Facebook.

James Bond tops music charts

Moody theme tune wins bigtime

From the BBC

Skyfall, the new Bond theme sung by Adele, has topped the iTunes chart after being released online in the early hours of Friday morning.
It was number one within 10 hours of being released, overtaking last week's official UK number one Gangnam Style.
The full single was released at 00:07 BST, after a 90 second clip was apparently leaked online this week.

The 23rd Bond film, Skyfall - Daniel Craig's third outing as 007 - is released in UK cinemas on 26 October.

Adele ended months of speculation over her involvement on Monday, when she posted a picture on Twitter, featuring the cover page of the sheet music for the Skyfall theme, bearing her name alongside that of longtime producer and co-writer Paul Epworth.

Epworth told BBC 6 Music that the "dark and moody" theme was intended to echo the narrative of the film.

"The [Bond theme] songs seem to fall into groups, in terms of subject matter," said Epworth. "Some of them have a romanticism to them, and some of them are very much about the narrative of the film.

"We went very much with the narrative of the film. We talk a lot about Bond's relationship to the country... and to MI6.

"There's a little bit of that in the lyrics, and I guess we were trying to find a way to almost make that romantic, you know?

Facebook counts its billionth user

And Mark Zuckerberg had this to say:

Facebook isn’t the first thing people have made to help us connect. We belong to a rich tradition of people making things that bring us together. Today, we honor this tradition. We honor the humanity of the people we serve. We honor the everyday things people have always made to bring us together: Chairs, doorbells, airplanes, bridges, games. These are all things that connect us. And now Facebook is a part of this tradition of things that connect us too.

With a string of metaphors like that, he should write a 50-shades-style book...

Damon Runyon, born October 4

The short story writer who defined the Prohibition Era

Distinct and idiosyncratic, Runyon's New York underworld characters will live forever.

He spun humorous tales of gamblers, hustlers, actors, and gangsters, few of whom went by "square" names, preferring instead colorful monikers such as "Nathan Detroit," "Benny Southstreet," "Big Jule," "Harry the Horse," "Good Time Charley," "Dave the Dude," or "The Seldom Seen Kid."

Never heard of him?  He was the guy behind Guys and Dolls.

Born 1880 in a family of newspapermen, Runyon (originally "Runyan" until a newspaper report misspelled it) had a flamboyance of his own.

At the age of 18 he enlisted in the US Army to fight in the Spanish-American war.  Somehow, he emerged as a newspaper columnist, specializing in covering baseball matches for several papers, starting 1911. His knack for spotting the eccentric and the unusual, on the field or in the stands, is credited with revolutionizing the way baseball was covered.

One year, while covering spring training in Texas, he met Pancho Villa in a bar in Texas and later accompanied the unsuccessful American expedition into Mexico searching for Villa. It was while he was in Mexico that he met the little girl he eventually married.

Gambling, particularly on craps or horse races, was a common theme of Runyon's works, and he was a notorious gambler himself. One of his paraphrases from a well-known line in Ecclesiastes ran: "The race is not always to the swift, nor the battle to the strong, but that's how the smart money bets."

A heavy drinker as a young man, he seems to have quit the bottle soon after arriving in New York, after his drinking nearly cost him the courtship of the woman who became his first wife, Ellen Egan (who was NOT the girl he'd met in Mexico). He remained a heavy smoker.

His best friend was mobster accountant Otto Berman, and he incorporated Berman into several of his stories under the alias "Regret, the horse player." When Berman was killed in a hit on Berman's boss, Dutch Schultz, Runyon quickly assumed the role of damage control for his deceased friend, correcting erroneous press releases, including one that stated Berman was one of Schultz's gunmen, to which Runyon replied, "Otto would have been as effective a bodyguard as a two-year-old."

I guess you're wondering about that Mexican girl. She resurfaced in New York about 1928, when she called the American seeking him out. Her intention was to take him up on a promise he had made -- to find her a dancing job in New York, once she had finished the education he had paid for back in 1916.  He was instantly infatuated, leading to the break-up of his marriage.

Her name was Patrice Amati del Grande, and she became his companion after he and Ellen separated. After Ellen Runyon died of the effects of her own drinking problems, Runyon and Patrice married, but that had a sad ending too, when Patrice left Runyon for a younger man.

Runyon died in New York City from throat cancer in late 1946, at age 66. His body was cremated, and his ashes were scattered from an airplane over Broadway in Manhattan by Captain Eddie Rickenbacker on December 18, 1946.

October 3 is James Herriot's day

Those of you who are old enough will remember the hours of fun that animal-chronicler JAMES HERRIOT gave the world

He found both animals and humans funny, but displayed a wonderful tolerance and understanding, too.

James Herriot was the pen name of James Alfred Wight, also known as Alf Wight. Born 3 October 1916, he was a British veterinary surgeon who wrote a bestselling series of semi-authobiographical books of stories about animals and their owners, notably All Creatures Great and Small.

He always wanted to write a book, but his practice in Yorkshire kept him so busy that he didn't sit down at a typewriter until the age of fifty.  Like most new writers, he collected rejection slips for a while, then realized that he had to focus on something he knew really well--life as a rural vet.  If Only They Could Talk was the result, and was published in 1970, under a penname he chose after watching a Scottish football goalkeeper, Jim Herriot, on TV.

Sales were slow, but his publishers, Michael Joseph, accepted a second book, which didn't look promising, either, until the New York publisher, St Martin's Press, published both books in a single volume, called All Creatures Great and Small.  It was an instant success, leading to many sequels, and movie and TV adaptations.

James Herriot passed away in 1995, at the age of seventy-eight.

Romance still wins in the Indie stakes

Amazon Self-Published Bestsellers for the Week of Monday, October 1, 2012
(Listed by GalleyCat.  Last week’s rank in parentheses)

1. On Dublin Street by Samantha Young: “Burying the grief, ignoring her demons, and forging ahead without any real attachments has worked well for her so far but when Joss moves into a fantastic apartment on Dublin Street, her carefully guarded world is shaken to its core by her new roommate’s sexy older brother.” (1)

2. Down to You by M. Leighton: “Olivia Townsend is nothing special. She’s just a girl working her way through college so she can return home to help her father run his business. She’s determined not to be the second woman in his life to abandon him.”

3. Naked by Raine Miller: “An American art student at the University of London and part-time photographic model, Brynne Bennett’s putting her life back on track with school and lots of hard work. When ultra successful London businessman, Ethan Blackstone, buys her nude portrait, he isn’t taking ‘no’ for an answer.” (4)

4. Better Off Without Him by Dee Ernst: “Mona Berman is a best-selling Romance writer and happy endings are what she does best. So when her husband of twenty years leaves her for somebody 15 years younger, 20 pounds lighter, and French, she’s got a lot of adjusting to do.” (3)

5. Blindfold Innocence by Alessandra Torre: “Brad De Luca is incorrigible. The premier divorce attorney in town, he is a forty-year old walking hunk of sex, bedding half the town, including his own clients. Brad is used to getting whatever, and whomever, he wants.”

6. Our Husband by Stephanie Bond: “Three women from different walks of life–a doctor, a socialite, and a stripper–find out they have one thing in common: a husband!” (1)

7. The Mighty Storm by Samantha Towle: “It’s been twelve years since Tru Bennett last saw Jake Wethers, her former best friend and boy she once loved. Jake Wethers, sexy, tattooed and deliciously bad lead singer, and brains behind The Mighty Storm, one of biggest bands in the world, left Tru with a broken heart.” (6)

8. White Trash Beautiful by Teresa Mummert: “Cass lives a depressing life in a small trailer park in Eddington, Ga with her mother and abusive boyfriend Jackson. She works hard to barely make ends meet. One day Tucker White, the lead singer in the band Damaged, walks into her diner.”

9. Beyond the Veil by Quinn Loftis: “Though the Serbian pack has been brought to heel thanks to the downfall of their Alpha, the war is far from over. Desdemona, a witch of unfathomable power, has escaped the wolves’ wrath, but she will not go quietly into the night.”

10. License to Thrill by Stephanie Bond: “He wasn’t the man she wanted to trust…but when the stakes turn deadly, it’s nice to have a hard body between her and trouble!”