On History

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Probably I did when I started. But then ultimately you go into your office every day and you do your job and you don’t think a whole lot about that. Except to the extent that it’s—except for the “wow” factor, where you say, Wow, I work with Roger Angell whose mother was the first fiction editor of the magazine and whose stepfather was E. B. White, and he comes to the fiction meetings and argues with me about stories every day. So you have that factor. Or, Wow, I grew up reading Don DeLillo and now I’m arguing with him […]

Quote of the Week

Self-Publishing: For The Informed Only

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It is the BS policy to remain perplexed until someone explains every little detail, in detail. For example, we are not surprised by the idea that a self-published author might land a deal with a traditional print publisher. Happens all the time. What makes no sense to us (and, admittedly, the caffeine hasn’t reached the brain yet) is this: Now Billingsley, who will speak at the Miami Book Fair International next Sunday, has a contract with Simon & Schuster to release nine books in the next two years. A nine-book deal, nine of those books to apparently be written by

Books/Mags/Blogs, The Future of Publishing

Looking To The Future

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Last week, we were shopping for a book, and noticed that our local Borders had something unusual on the shelves: lots of print versions of books published by electronic publisher Ellora’s Cave. While the fact that print publishers are creating electronic versions of their books isn’t news, it’s interesting that a publisher that started exclusively in the online realm is in the financial position to offer print books. Yeah, the covers are still bad, but these aren’t the kind of books you read for the covers, if you know what we mean. Yesterday, we banned the Death of Literature. Today

The Future of Publishing

Today’s Homework: Lobbying Congress

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We admit we don’t follow the minutiae of amendments to tax bills closely — which is a shame because we nearly missed this one: Living writers, musicians, artists and scholars who donate their work to a museum or other charitable cause would earn a tax deduction based on full fair market value under a bill just passed by the Senate. Current law makes it economically unrealistic for artists to donate their works. At present, only the cost of materials can be deducted. While we’re certain that the art of appraising fair market value will require considerable fine-tuning, this is a

Square Pegs

It’s Not The Death of Literature, It’s The Death of Time

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If we recall correctly (and when one is under the influence of the magical Alka-Seltzer Plus, no guarantees can be made), last year, we declared a ban on all stories relating to the so-called “Death of the Novel”. We have met with limited success on this ban, mostly because sheer laziness prevented us from enforcing said ban. Also, the thought of going to Boston. Now we must expand the ban to include “The Death of Literature”. While the notion may make for sexy headlines* and hand-wringing angst, literature will not die. Literature will evolve. Home taping didn’t kill the music

The Business of Publishing

Controversy du Week

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Turning our attention from world news, we now bring you a look at the latest Jane Austen controversy. For a dead woman, she has alarming power to raise ire. Admirable, if you think about it. As it turns out, the latest filmed version of Pride & Prejudice has a romantic ending. It’s cute, if sappy. But, until just days ago, the ending was available only in America. This unfaithful-to-the-text ending is described as It was as if NASA had prepared an international mission to Mars and felt a need to lace the Russians’ Tang with vodka. Maybe it’s us, but

Square Pegs

This Week In Digital Libraries

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We have become devotees of the latest game in town: My Scanning Donation is Bigger Than Yours. The rules are simple. Major corporations with aspirations of becoming stars in the digital book market vie for prizes, headlines, and market share. Along the way, they face obstacles such as lawsuits, public confusion, and the knowledge that no matter how much they do, there will always be a chance that a younger, brighter, richer company will enter the game. But at the least the Library of Congress will get a head start on scanning its vast trove treasures. Google has announced a

The Future of Publishing

Rejection: The Other Side of the Story

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We know writers who analyze rejections more carefully than they do their horoscopes. Every word is turned upside-down. Every comma is considered. Does the lack of a hyphen here mean she hated it? It must. Woe to the agent or editor who spills a drop of coffee on an otherwise pristine rejection. That people have strata for rejections should be clue enough that it’s a system run amok. Agent Jennifer Jackson tackles rejection from another perspective — hers. First she sets the scene: She spends the next couple hours, reading and sorting through various submissions. Many of them are competently

Agents

Now 60% Geekier, Or, A Holiday Shopping List For the Nerds in Your Family

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It is either with pride or shame that we admit we are not a full-fledged geek. We’re thinking pride, but we also feel we should have read more Philip K. Dick. If only to say we’ve read Philip K. Dick. The books certainly sat on the coffee table long enough. Then again, if osmosis really does work as a learning process, surely we absorbed most of the texts during rare house-cleaning moments. Check the list to see where you fall on the geek scale. Top 20 Geek Novels – The Results

Books/Mags/Blogs

Desperately Rankling Susan

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Susan Gable is worked up and wanted us to know in no uncertain terms. We’d paraphrase what she said, but, ever lazy, figure a direct quote will work just as well: “ACK! It’s a travesty! Text on cell phones is one thing, translating “literature” into text messaging-speak is just WRONG!” She is correct. It is wrong. We realize that we long ago lost the battle against “thru”. We cannot lose to “2b”. It would be disheartening. Also, what if text mores change? Do they have to retranslate? Won’t this get confusing for the masses? Now, pretending we like to offer

The Future of Publishing
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