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Blogs by Steven Maus
Sigh 6/14/2008 6:46:32 PM
I went to Barnes and Noble today. Typically such a visit is cheering and fun. You get to see lots of different books, so many different covers, such a vast array of words. But today's visit was a little bit of a downer. I did get the new issue of Poets & Writers, I ordered a copy of Branchwater, and I picked up The Golden Compass, eager to see if it's all that it's cracked up to be.
But on a few shelves and tables I saw evidence of the condition of the industry. Empty places on tables that were once piled high with dozens of books, shelves on which every single book is placed with front cover in full view; book sellers trying to fill the empty shelf space. I passed one B&N worker who was talking with a customer, saying how their store - like so many others - are carrying less and less in stock. And when new books do come in, of what manner are these new tomes? I paused to take in a New Teen Fiction display. Ten books. All of them were about vampires.
How do writers flourish in such a supply and demand industry? How do you tell a story from your heart and then hope to supply it to world that demands only teenage vampires and wizards? How do you convince those that have influence in the industry that your one book deserves a place among the regularly stocked and shipped?
These days the business is just as difficult - if not more so - as it has been in years past. The very act of writing weeds out those who are not commited and hardworking, but those who are tenacious can still get by. They are those that watch the market, and that jump on the next new theme as it becomes popular. They are those that supply the large publishers with the newest flood of spin-offs and copycats. They are those that write for money.
Perhaps these people have their uses though. Madeline knows that somebody has to provide the industry with its lifeblood, and as people read less and less and as booksales continue to drop, it looks like it'll be the fate of readers to wallow in the sea of real-life vampire and "children discover an alternate world" stories.
Sometimes, I pity the world. Madeline help us before it's too late.
