Royalties

For the first time, British publishers will form the biggest contingent at the upcoming Beijing International Book Fair. There will be 33 companies on the collective stand and 56 firms in all represented at the Fair, reports the Bookseller.  Read more

This has been one of those weeks when there’s been so much happening that it’s difficult to cover it in a single column. Apple has broken the news of its iPad and, amidst the focus on that, Amazon has already started to fight back. This could be a turning-point and how publishing, books and authors come out of all this is hard to predict.  Read more

Authors' advances are being cut radically as a result of the recession. Together with the cancelling of contracts because a delivered manuscript is 'not good enough' or is late, this is all part of publishers' attempts to cut their costs. The cutting of publishing lists to reduce investment in books has been the main feature of the recession to date, so far as far as authors are c  Read more

The stand-off between the Internet retailing giant, Amazon, and the biggest trade (general) publisher in the UK, Hachette, is continuing. It's a full seven weeks since News Review looked at Amazon's massive growth and huge ambitions (News Review 26 May) but in all this time, to the amazement of observers, Hachette titles appearing on Amazon's pages   Read more

Writers' income is under increasing pressure. The recent meanness of the British government in cutting the amount paid to authors whose books are borrowed from libraries as part of the Public Lending Right scheme has highlighted this trend.  Read more