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Ebooks, International Part 2: In Russia, Amazon Readies Kindle. Can Harvard/Goldman Alum Make It Work?

Posted April 26, 2013

Earlier, we reported on ebook developments in Brazil. Now, on to Russia.

Ingrid Lunden of TechCrunch reports that Amazon appears to be getting ready open ebook operations in Russia. Although Amazon hasn’t confirmed the report, on April 19 Forbes posted news at its Russian website that Amazon had hired Arkady Vitrouk to head its Russian office. Vitrouk is the former CEO of ABC-Atticus, a Russian publishing conglomerate owned by Alexander Mamut, which Forbes says is one of Russia’s 50 wealthiest people.

Lunden of TechCrunch confirmed Forbes’ report through Vitrouk’s LinkedIn profile, which lists him as director of Kindle Content for Russia. (It also shows that he attended Harvard Business School and worked at Goldman Sachs before joining Atticus Publishing Group and now Amazon.) Lunden dug further, finding that Amazon is seeking to hire two content acquisition managers for Kindle Russia, and a senior manager for Kindle content pricing in Russia.

Ebook pricing may prove to be particularly tricky in Russia, where digital piracy is rampant. One commenter on Forbes’ Russian site seems to think so, asking what sense it made for Amazon to enter the Russian market, “if the books on the Internet [I] will not be buying one.” (Translated by Google.)

The Russian Federation has been on the U.S. Trade Representative’s Priority Watch List for years. (Brazil, which we discussed in an earlier post, lags Russia as a haven for piracy in our government’s estimation. The USTR places it on its Watch List — without priority.) Perhaps things in Russia will soon improve, however. On December 21st, the USTR announced that it had reached an agreement with Russia on an Intellectual Property Rights Action Plan. The IPR Action Plan calls for Russia to take various steps to combat online piracy.

Then again, maybe not. The new IPR Action Plan was announced shortly after the 6-year anniversary of a US-Russia bilateral agreement (referred to here, p. 23) on the protection and enforcement of intellectual property rights. Russia’s been on the US Trade Representative’s Priority Watch List ever since.

Arkady Vitrouk has his work cut out for him.

Ebooks, International Part 1: In Brazil, a Publishers’ Consortium and an Early Lead for Apple

Posted April 26, 2013

The U.S. has a strong lead over other countries in ebook adoption. How are things going elsewhere? Recent news from Brazil and Russia shed some light on the state of the ebook market in two key emerging economies. We’ll present these in two bite-sized reports.

First, Brazil.

Edward Nawotka reports in Publishing Perspectives that ebook sales have lept an order of magnitude in Brazil in recent months. December 5, 2012, was “D-Day” (digital day) for the Brazilian book world  — Kobo, Google, and Amazon all launched their ebookstores that day. Apple had begun selling Brazilian titles in October.

Six large Brazilian publishers had been preparing for their D-Day for more than two years. In March 2010, just as the first iPads were scheduled to ship in the U.S., the publishers announced plans to distribute ebooks through a jointly developed platform known as DLD. That platform accounts for an estimated 30% of Brazilian ebook sales at the moment, Nawotka reports. Apple, Amazon, Google, and Kobo all distribute through DLD, through nonexclusive arrangements.

The early ebook market leader? Apple, according to DLD’s figures, with 29% of sales in March, followed by Amazon with 22%, Google 18%, Saraiva (a Brazilian bookseller) 15%, and Kobo 12%.

These sales amount to little, so far: ebooks are a tiny portion of the Brazilian book market. That’s changing fast. DLD’s sales have increased nearly tenfold since Apple’s October 2012 entry into the market, reaching nearly 44,500 units in March.

Bulletin Board

Posted April 25, 2013

This week’s handful of contests include both short fiction and nonfiction, with May 31 deadlines. Check them out.

Butler University’s Booth Journal Story Prize is now accepting submissions. Stories ranging from 500 to 7,500 words are eligible. The winner will receive $1,000 and publication. The runner up will receive $250 and publication. Entry fee: $20, but includes a 1-year subscription to Booth Journal. Deadline: May 31, 2013. For more information, visit the website.

The University of Georgia Press is offering their annual Flannery O’Connor Award for Short Fiction. The award is open to short story collections written in English by published and unpublished writers. Winners receive a cash award of $1,000, and their collections will be published by the University of Georgia Press. Manuscripts should be 40,000-75,000 words in length. Entry Fee: $25. Deadline: May 31, 2013. For complete guidelines, visit their website.

Creative Nonfiction and Arizona State University’s Global Institute of Sustainability are looking for essays that illuminate and present the human side of environmental, economic, ethical, and/or social challenges related to the state of the planet and our future for their Walton Sustainability Solutions Best Creative Nonfiction Essay Award. The winner will be awarded $10,000. Essays must be previously unpublished and no longer than 4,000 words. Entry fee: $20 (or $25 for a subscription to Creative Nonfiction). Deadline: May 31, 2013. For more information, visit the website.

The Winning Writers Sports Fiction & Essay Contest is looking for the best short stories and essays on sports-related themes. The first place winner in each category will receive $1000 each. Five honorable mentions in each category will receive $100 each. Winning entries will also be published online. Entries should be no longer than 6,000 words. Entry fee: $15 per entry. You may submit as many entries as you like. Deadline: May 31, 2013. For more information, visit their website.

 

Audio of Authors Guild Seminar on Book Contracts — Traditional, Ebook & POD

Posted April 24, 2013

Here’s a clip from last week’s phone-in seminar with Anita Fore, Authors Guild Director of Legal Services, on the basics of understanding and negotiating contracts with both traditional book publishers and stand-alone ebook/POD publishers. The clip (about 15 minutes) focuses on traditional book contracts:

Members are welcome to contact us for a link to the full-length audio of the 60-minute seminar and a handout that accompanies Anita’s talk. (Not a member? Join up! You must be a published author to join, but many self-published authors now qualify for membership.)

The Guild is hosting additional phone-in seminars for members this week and next:

Magazine Contract Issues (Wednesday, April 24th)
Anita Fore will discuss several clauses freelancers should be aware of when negotiating magazine agreements. Sign up here.

Authors’ Statutory Right to Terminate Publishing Contracts After 35 Years (Wednesday, May 1st)
Paul Aiken, Authors Guild Executive Director, will explain the rules governing publishing contract terminations under Section 203 of the Copyright Act. Sign up here.

Amazon’s Kindle Singles a Win for Readers, Authors

Posted April 23, 2013

We’ve been frequent critics of Amazon’s tactics in conquering established book markets, but credit is due to the company for doing what many would have considered impossible: creating a genuine market for novellas and novella-length nonfiction. In the New York Times this morning, Leslie Kaufman profiles Kindle Singles editor David Blum and cites Amazon’s statistic that about 28 percent of the 345 Singles published since January 2011 have sold more than 10,000 copies. Kindle Singles are a curated list of short e-books (5,000 to 30,000 words in length) available through Amazon’s Kindle Store.

Though publishing arrangements vary — some Kindle Singles are published by traditional publishers, others are self-published or put out by an emerging group of new publishers, such as Byliner — authors may earn as much as 70% of the proceeds from sales. Since bestselling Kindle Singles sell for an average price of $1.50 or so, a self-published author selling 10,000 or more Singles would likely earn revenues of $10,000 or more.

Read More…

Along Publishers Row

Posted April 23, 2013

by Campbell Geeslin

In 2012, booksellers and publishers “were surprised and angered” when Pulitzer Prize officials, for the first time in decades, failed to award a fiction prize, depriving them of the bump in sales the award has guaranteed for decades.

This week, booksellers and publishers are sighing in relief. The 2013 fiction prize went to The Orphan Master’s Son by Adam Johnson.  It is set in North Korea, where today’s young dictator, very much in the news, threatens an atomic blast.

Other promising payoffs in the letters division included winners of the history prize: Embers of War: The Fall of an Empire and the Making of America’s Vietnam by Fredrik Logevall; biography: The Black Count: Glory, Revolution, Betrayal, and the Real Count of Monte Cristo by Tom Reiss; nonfiction: Devil in the Grove: Thurgood Marshall, the Groveland Boys, and the Dawn of a New America by Gilbert King, and poetry: Stag’s Leap by Sharon Olds.

Publishers of the all the above ran advertisements. Four of the five winners were published by Random House divisions.

LECTURE: At least one successful author is being treated like a great cello soloist. Da Vinci Code writer Dan Brown will talk of “symbols and secrets” at Lincoln Center’s Avery Fisher Hall on May 15. Ticket buyers will get a copy of his next book, Inferno. Fans at cello concerts go ungifted.

Read More…

NYT’s Report on David Mamet’s Self-Published Book Heightens Debate

Posted April 22, 2013

David Mamet’s decision to self-publish his latest book through a new service offered by his literary agency, ICM Partners, adds fuel to the debate raging over whether authors will do better on their own than with a traditional publishing house.

“The announcement by ICM and Mr. Mamet suggests that self-publishing will begin to widen its net and become attractive also to more established authors.” Leslie Kaufman wrote last week in the New York Times.

The news has drawn hundreds of responses from bloggers, authors and others, including bookseller Marion Abbott, who in the Sunday edition of the Times warned about the perils of self-publishing.

The latest post by Huffpo blogger Julie Gerstenblatt offers a cautionary tale that echoes Abbott’s sentiments.

A far more optimistic picture comes from Jon R. Anderson of the Navy Times, who on Friday urged service members to get their story out, writing, “While self-publishing used to bear the vanity press stigma… independent publishing is quickly becoming the preferred road to readers for many authors.”

Self-publishing has indeed borne a stigma, even though it has a history to be proud of. Walt Whitman’s “Leaves of Grass,” Irma S. Rombauer’s “Joy of Cooking,” and Christopher Paolini’s “Eragon” are prominent examples of self-published works from the 19th, 20th and 21st Centuries. Is that stigma now gone? Maybe not, but the stigma seems to be fading as the economics of self-publishing improve for some authors.

New Books by Members

Posted April 22, 2013

Check out this week’s batch of new and recent releases by our members:

Mary Higgins Clark: Daddy’s Gone A Hunting

Pat Lowery Collins: The Deer Watch

Lulu Delacre: How Far Do You Love Me?

Eric Jerome Dickey: Decadence

Tom Dunkel: Color Blind: The Forgotten Team That Broke Baseball’s Color Line

Patrick A. Durantou: Communs Vertiges

Peter Eichstaedt: Above the Din of War: Afghans Speak About Their Lives, Their Country, and Their Future-and Why America Should Listen

Ginger Fogelsong Gibson: Tiptoe Joe

Bernette Ford: Little Red Riding Hood

Kristin Hannah: Fly Away

Marissa Moss: Barbed Wire Baseball

Walter Dean Myers: Darius & Twig

Michael Northrop: Rotten

Tracy Thompson: The New Mind of the South

Susan Wiggs: The Apple Orchard

Wallis Wilde-Menozzi: The Other Side of the Tiber: Reflections on Time in Italy

Have a new book? Submit here to be listed online and in the Bulletin.

User Discussion and Privacy Policies

Posted April 18, 2013

Now that we’re posting to our blog more regularly, we’ve been grappling with user discussion guidelines. We’ve looked to newspapers for useful models, and The Washington Post seems to have a good one. We’ll use that as a starting point (though we have no plans to implement the “badge” system the Post uses) and assign a staff member to oversee that. Our general privacy policy applies to user comments.

Bulletin Board

Posted April 18, 2013

Each week, we’ll post a handful of contests, fellowships, and residencies our members might be interested in. This week we’re serving up two short story and two poetry contests, each with May 15th application deadlines

The James Laughlin Award is given to honor a second book of original poetry, in English, by a citizen of the United States. To be eligible, a book must have come under contract with a United States publisher between May 1, 2012, and April 30, 2013. Suggested length is between 40 and 75 pages. The Academy of American Poets will award the winning poet $5,000 and will purchase copies of the book for distribution to its members. Deadline: May 15, 2013. For more information, visit their website.

The Lorian Hemingway Short Story Competition honors emerging short fiction writers. The winner receives $1,500 and publication in Cutthroat: A Journal of the Arts. The runners up receive $500 each. Entries must not exceed 3,500 words in length. The entry fee is $15 for stories submitted early and $20 for those submitted by the deadline. Deadline: May 15, 2013. For more information, visit their website.

The Montreal International Poetry Prize is offering $20,000 for one original, unpublished poem of no longer than 40 lines written in English. Entry fees range from $15 to $25. Deadline: May 15, 2013. For more information, visit their website.

Carve Magazine’s annual Raymond Carver Short Story Prize is now accepting submissions. The contest is open to US and international residents but submitted stories must be written in English and should not exceed 6,000 words. The winner receives $1,000; second place receives $750; third place receives $500. Two editors’ choices picks will be selected and will win $250 each. All winners will be published in the Fall 2013 issue. Entry Fee: $17 online / $15 mailed, per entry. Deadline: May 15, 2013. For more information, visit their website.