The New Publishing Landscape

Since my last post a full year has passed.  If "blogging" infers regular postings, then I must doing something different–and "different" is a good metaphor for the world of publishing right now.  In twelve months the worm has turned still more, and faster.  Notably, the Big Six, print publishers are even further back on their heels.  Their reaction is to devote more and more resources to fewer and fewer, big-name authors.  Extrapolated to the extreme, soon Stephen King, Stephanie Meyers and Neil Gaiman get all of the money available for print books.  The rest of us will be left to fight it out in the chaos of e-books and self-publication.

Mid-list authors especially (I include myself) are having an increasingly hard time placing new books.  A new novel I worked a full year on has been rejected three times, and things don't look hopeful for it.   I was also struck, recently, by the comments of a third-novel woman author who felt "grateful" for a small contract for "an actual print book."  I found that really sad.

The goal in life, however, is to remain positive, and I see opportunities in this new, harsh landscape of publishing.  On the Young Adult side of my writing, I'm working on a E-outreach to bring some of my shorter work and that of other YA authors directly to schools.  Nothing not to like about that, teachers tell me.  In short, it's up to each of us involved in literary life to find ways to grow and thrive in this new environment.  And that requires us to be energetic, creative and positive.