Self-Published Books to Be Sold in Barnes & Noble
Barnes & Noble has been sort of slow to get in the self-publishing game, but they have an ace that other players don’t: a whole bunch of physical bookstores. In a bid to make themselves more attractive to self-published authors, B & N is going to make shelf space available to a limited number of self-published authors who have sold more than 500 ebooks of a title via Nook and submit a print copy for review. Now, this clearly would be interesting to the authors, but will customers be interested? I guess we’ll find out.
Book Vending Machines in “Book Deserts”
JetBlue held a competition to place a number of book vending machines that will give away free books to kids with limited access to books and Detroit came out the winner, with more than 48% of the vote. Aimed to serve kids in “book deserts,” the Soar with Reading program is a partnership with Random House and allows kids take as many books as they want. Interested in having next year’s round of book machines in your city? Voting is already open.
Amazon to De-emphasize Online Discounts
Deep discounting, especially in books, has been Amazon’s most enticing, and most controversial, strategy from day one. Now, Amazon seems to be interested in making discounts, or at least the prominence of discounts, less a part of what makes Amazon, well, Amazon. The familiar practice of showing the list price struck through and the Amazon price presented as a discount is already starting to go away for some products.
Why might Amazon do this? Two reasons. First and most practically, Amazon has gotten into trouble with claims of misleading discounts. Second, as Amazon reaches something like market saturation, they have the leverage to increase prices and make the Amazon shopping experience more about convenience, service, and selection than about cheap stuff.
The Best Books of 2016…So Far
We’ve crossed the half-way point for 2016, so it’s a good time to pause and take a look at how the year in books is shaping up. On the most recent edition of the Book Riot Podcast, Lisa Lucas, Executive Editor at the National Book Foundation, and Kevin Ngyuen, deputy editor at GQ, joined our own Rebecca Schinsky to talk about their favorite books of the year. If you like podcasts and books, I highly suggest you check it out.
This Week in Books is sponsored by Slade House by David Mitchell.
Down the road from a working-class British pub, along the brick wall of a narrow alley, if the conditions are exactly right, you’ll find the entrance to Slade House. A stranger will greet you by name and invite you inside. At first, you won’t want to leave. Later, you’ll find that you can’t. Every nine years, the residents extend a unique invitation to someone. But what really goes on inside Slade House?. . . From David Mitchell, bestselling author of The Bone Clocks and Cloud Atlas, this intricately woven novel will enchant readers with a blend of mystery, realism and the supernatural.
