Bologna by Day and Night

March 30, 2009 | Link This | Email this | Comments (2)

Have been thinking a bit about Bologna. Part of me agrees with the photographer I went around with for an afternoon. He's been photographing the Fair for 30 years. (translating) "Year after year, everything the same, everything boring." A bit harsh, but the sameness was there. It's too bad we can't avoid the sea of books and just run into interesting people. It's very hard, I think, to spot great titles; it's much easier to share someone else's insight.

That is unless you're trying to write a blog. Then the people who ARE willing to talk to you will only do so OFF the record. Sorry I can't share some of those tidbits.

Here are some impressions, in no particular order:

It's about branding, and Twilight is the series people love to hate. (Of course that won't stop anyone from trying to come up with the next one.) It has the first four...Read More
Industries: Childrens Book News, Events, International, Trends In Books

March 26, 2009 | Link This | Email this | Comments (5)

Many of you know that this is Linda Summers' last Bologna, as she retires at the end of June. I will miss her company, her courage under fire and her common sense. She has

Summers, at her last Bologna Fair.

become a beloved friend to many of us, and she is in every way the consummate professional.

Of course we will see her in London and in Perpingan, but Mary Cash spoke for all of us, I think, when she said, “It really won’t BE Bologna without Linda....”

 

QED.

March 26, 2009 | Link This | Email this | Comments (5)

There appears to be some interest in what I've had to eat and where I ate it.

This requires a small confession.  I have been walking with two canes this week (I have rheumatoid arthritis and a bad back -- nothing life-threatening, but pretty painful), and after being mostly on my feet all day, I have given up table dancing.

There is a new (to me) a place called Hosteria degli Usberti. Food is good and the pasta is excellente! Tortelli alla panna to die from. Best of all, it's around the corner from the Palace. Been there twice, once with Tim D and Nancy and once with Ulrich Stoeriko-Blume, a pal from RH days. I ate by myself one night, a pizza capriciosa and a bottle of acqua frizzante, while I reviewed notes and did some blogging.

...Read More

March 26, 2009 | Link This | Email this | Comments (2)

Except instead of wandering through Athens looking for an honest man, I was looking for an editor and/or rights person who had either bought or sold a book.

A number of option books sold before the Fair, and Simon Boughton and Mary Cash are probably going to close deals after the fair. Ginger Clark of Curtis Brown made a two-book deal for a property called Generation Ghost in Germany and Brazil. Emily van Beek of Pippin Properties has two auctions going.

Perhaps this seems a bit paltry, but the fact is that not since Sebastian Walker held publishers hostage by forcing auctions at the fair have too many deals actually been done on the floor here.

March 25, 2009 | Link This | Email this | Comments (0)

I promised a blog post about electronic publishing and — haven’t delivered. It’s not for lack of trying, it’s just that I can’t really anyone here who seems interested or who wants to talk on the record. Here’s what I have so far.

There is no one here from Scholastic to discuss the issue. Ditto RH. Susan Katz of HarperCollins and I keep missing one another. I did have a conversation with Jean Feiwel and Simon Boughton, who said they were still working through their recent changes and would have to wait until they had the infrastructure for electronic and multi-platform publishing. Clearly it’s part of their long-term vision. 

In France, there seems to be a somewhat organized approach to ebooks in that the big players, Gallimard/La Martinière and Hachette want to maintain the integrity of...Read More