More Surviving and Enjoying BEA

Starting tomorrow I will have the BEA live Streaming video up so, even if I get you nothing else, you can see what I am seeing.  Actually, like a ball game the video on here may be more and better than what I am able to see.
We're on our way to NYC, here's the last of my advice for the event plus some pictures.

Jana Oliver 2011

Hoping to run into Chris Bohjalian as he Signs his
new book Tuesday at Random House's booth.
I used to help Chris moderate his online forum.

Lauren Oliver 2011

The end of a busy BEA day 2011

Sniffly Kitty and I meet at Random House 2011
Day 1 & I'm already tired

• RESOLVED: This year I will only take home books I am pretty sure I will want to read.  I will quash book lust and swag greed. 
•  An Ipad is a fun toy, but unless you have 3G don't bother as WIFI is ludicrously expensive at the Javitts. I didn't use mine on the non-blog conference days. There's not much time to sit and type on it either. If you bring a lap top you will be so sorry by the end of the day.
  
  
• Coat Check is the great equalizer—of weight distribution across your shoulders. Especially for older bloggers like me paying attention to your body is important.  Go up to the coat check often to jettison books and swag into the rollerboard.
  
• You don't need or want all the books and swag. I have a PILE of books I haven't and probably won't read.  I found that if I missed a book at the show a publisher would send it to me later. The Red Cap who carted my suitcases around would have appreciated my having pickled up fewer books.
  
• Use the BEA Mobile planner. It even has GPS.
  
  
• Rest as much as possible, eat and drink enough.  Last year I got really dehydrated. 
  
• See something of the city other than the interior of the Javitts.
  
• Comfy shoes are a must but obvious.  Compeed (a blister pad that you can wear several days) is a brilliant addition to your toiletries. Some Advil, aspirin or Tylenol.
  



Lissa See at Random House 2011

• When you get a business card, write something on it or somehow make a note of who the person is and what your circumstances of meeting were.
  
• Last year I stayed at my sister's condo down in Battery City (by the WTC). It was lovely and free but after walking for five hours and carting a 100 books back each day  the last thing I wanted to do was go anywhere else at night. I made my husband go get take out and I missed several publisher events.  My point is that you should have real expectations based on your own energy levels, where you are staying.  Friends who stayed in NJ to pay less for hotel had a hard time finding transport home. This year we are staying Mid-town.
  
• Focus on connections.
  
• Take pictures with authors.
  
• Enjoy yourself but also remember this is business serious for publishers.  Publishers are questioning bloggers' place in the industry. Know why you blog and your numbers.  Maybe even have an elevator speech.
  
• Recognize that you can't be in every line and everywhere. You will miss one thing to pick up another. I am skipping big celebrity events like the breakfasts. I couldn't even see the panelists.

  

  What a BEA breakfast is like

IT'S ALL HOW YOU LOOK AT IT

PENGUIN, which publishes some of my favorite writers put out this really brilliant video via DK in the UK: 

http://youtu.be/Weq_sHxghcg

I think, since YOUTUBE has put them together that it was based on this piece or maybe another.  It's sort of a take on palindromes. Like most wisdom it is at once simple and profound.

http://youtu.be/eKkfYH2l_hc






Look for more cool videos from Penguin tomorrow!

Is the Bookstore Going the way of the Dinosaur?

www.foodclipart.com

Amazon and E-Readers are like Delivered take-out.  Bookstores are like  grocery stores.  In one, you go online order stuff and it arrives, for the other you have to get in the car and go to the store.  Some days you don't want to do the getting dressed and going to the store routine. But does that mean you're never going to buy groceries? No?  

However,  it would seem that many of us no longer think of the brick and mortar bookstore as the "go to" for a book.  Is that Amazon's fault, our fault, or just change?

When I first had a Kindle, people at airports always wanted to talk about it.  At one point another passenger and I discussed the possibility of E-Readers seriously changing the landscape of the book industry from writing to publishing to sales.  The woman looked at me and said that the automobile had changed the landscape of the transportation industry.  All types of businesses had to evolve or dissolve: saddleries, inns, blacksmiths, feed sales.  Some saddlers went on to make other small leather goods.  Some made the upholstery for cars or repaired car upholstery. Inns became motels.  Feed companies started putting corn in everything we eat (tongue in cheek).

The question isn't whether bookstores will change—they must to survive. The question is whether they can  evolve and adopt a business model elastic enough to change constantly?  

Despite the holiday hijinks this past December when Amazon offered a kickback shopping with them, I doubt that Amazon's Jeff Bezos has it out for the publishing and retail book sales industries.  I haven't ever heard that he had been an aspiring writer with one too many rejection slips who swore vengeance on the publishing industry.  Nor have I learned that he was turned down for jobs at any retail chains.

Bezos may not be waging a campaign against the publishing industry on purpose.  The primary job of a CEO is to make a company profitable and to position it for future profitability.  If you consider the rest of the industry you are not putting your stockholders first.  Our system doesn't allow for moral issues.

This is all thought arising from an article in today's NYT: The Bookstore's Last Stand (permalink below) by Julie Bosman.  As usual the article is really long and tells us all kinds of interesting but extraneous information, like what kind of accent Barnes and Nobel's CEO has.  But it also discusses how the publishing industry has looked at a world without brick and mortar bookstores and it's not a  pretty picture.  Bookstores offer the best marketing tool for books and are a big part of backlist sales. One statistic cited is that only one-third of people who purchased a book in a bookstore went in with the intention of buying one. 

I know some people shop online for e-books, some for print, and some people find their way to  a bookshop. Do you think the bookstore will survive?

permalink to NYT article if the linked text above doesn't work: http://www.nytimes.com/2012/01/29/business/barnes-noble-taking-on-amazon-in-the-fight-of-its-life.html


My friend Julia had a guest post on this a while back:
 JuliaRachelBarrett.net

Money for Nothing And Your Chicks for Free

Image by TheCreativePenn via Flickr

In July of 2010 on my other blog, Fangs, Wands and Fairy Dust, I asked my readers, "what should I read?"  I had a list of books.  I got a comment from one Amanda Hocking who, in a demonstration of why she was successful at self-publishing, said "Well, I think you should read my book My Blood Approves," which I had on that list.  I did and I recall that I was immediately struck by how true her dialogue was.

I saw this Guardian article, noted on Facebook by my friend Dana of Readaholics Anonymous:
Amanda Hocking, the writer who made millions by self-publishing online
People were upset by Amanda's success for three reasons I think:

• She was successful.  They imagined she "swanned" about and her books  magically jumped onto people's Kindles. No, she spent hours and days, possibly week, self-marketing by talking to bloggers.  Oh, and her books were good. 
• Then, she signed a contract with a publisher. People responded, "A ha! I knew it, she was a fake all along! She sold out. " Huh? I never got this. After writing and successfully marketing four-plus books she wanted to take more time writing and less time selling. Go figure.
• Finally, people were upset because she succeeded. Her books had achieved the double whammy of both selling and attracting the notice of a publisher.

I remember people saying the same thing about Anne Rice's late eighties or early nineties multi-million dollar contract. 

There is nothing we hate more than people who are a success and smart and who work hard.  You can do one of those things and be okay, two is putting you on thin ice and three, well three will send you right to Hell in the proverbial hand-basket.  When, like the song says, you get money for nothing and the chicks (checks, chicks?) for free, we are consumed by fear and jealousy. We do not really value artists or any creative, mental work because deep inside we each think, "I could do that, it's easy."

I have noticed this in politics, in business and elsewhere.  Not SO much on a personal level, but that gang-up and beat on the smart guy mindset is more a function of a clannish mentality that must somehow go back to the cave. You know, That guy is a hard working, smart success and our partners might like him or her more than they do us. Let's beat him up before he gets the chicks or guys and the better cave. I think we need to evolve past this fear that someone  else is going to be a success and leave us in the dust. We won't run out of mastodons and starve to death.

People seem to have calmed down about Amanda's success.  Personally, I hope she does get the better cave and I think she already has a guy, but I wish her all the best. Hard work and talent as a recipe for success. Who'd a thunk it?

I am hoping today for no less than great success shoveling snow.  But, I am not going to work that hard at it and would be thrilled were someone to surpass me in the field.

Related articles

• Amanda Hocking: The Author Who Made Millions by Self-Publishing Her Novels (booktopia.com.au)
• The writer who made millions by self-publishing online (guardian.co.uk)
• The Amanda Hocking Phenomenon Comes to Forbidden Planet (geeksyndicate.wordpress.com)
• Dynamite Enters Into Agreement With Literary Phenom Amanda Hocking! (graphicpolicy.com)
• Dream of Being a Rich & Famous Writer? Read Amanda's Story (freedomyear.com)
• A Self-Published Author's $2-Million Cinderella Story (npr.org)
• Attention, Self-Publishers: Edit, Edit, Edit! (makingbabygrand.com)

TRENDING #Book_Covers

THREE more days to enter the Gratitude Giveaway!

What trends are you seeing in book cover art? Any favorites anything that totally bugs you??

So, Day in and day out most book bloggers see  book covers of new books, old books, unreleased books, you get the idea.  

We always hear the admonition about books and covers but covers must be really important because when one comes out with a design that gets attention and the book sells we suddenly drown in covers with that theme.  I have been noticing that a lot lately, especially, but not limited to YA books.  First we had the ubiquitous prom gown; present even without a formal occasion. Finally! A use for those old bridesmaids dresses!

I'm told it is rare that an author has much input into the cover.   Today I am looking at gowns then those gowns merging with a water theme then becoming more Opheliaesque and then some have a physical reason for water: mermaids.  Here is a montage I constructed from Amazon or author websites.

Top to Bottom, Left to right:
Shift, Jeri Smith Ready ● Hallowed: An Unearthly Novel, Cynthia Hand
Carrier of The Mark, Leigh Fallon ● Paranormalcy, Kiersten White ● Unbecoming of Mara Dyer, Michelle Hodkin ● Wake, Amanda Hocking ●
Poseidon, Anna Banks ● All These Lives, Sarah Wylie ● Haunting Violet, Alyxandra Harvey ● The Unquiet, Jeannine Garsee ● Lies Beneath, Anne Greenwood Brown

This is by no means exhaustive; there are so many more.  Other trends I am looking at: wings and angels, and cosmetics/features, hooded characters, girls or women with weapons.

Please, I would love to know what you think.