Reactions

Publishers Weekly - May 16, 2011

• Shout-out to Blue Elephant Book Shop in Decatur, GA, which I've never actually been to despite proximity and my affinity for independent book stores. (They had an employee (owner?) write up something for The Return of Captain John Emmett, a book about returning home after WWI.)
  
  
• This issue has a big focus on audiobooks (June is apparently some sort of marketer-created audiobook month, so I guess it's nice that I'm reading this May issue in June). An interview with a narrator that was interesting (to give the characters voices, or not?) and a big section on The Pale King by David Foster Wallace, which clued me in to the existence of audiobooks for a lot of his previous works. (Though not Infinite Jest, which would have been VERY helpful earlier this year.)

Publishers Weekly - May 9, 2011

• Credit Crunch is pushing publishers to bully indy bookstores for payments. Death of the people's voice, we're all going to stupid hell, etc.
  
  
• Apparently Nancy Pearl is going to write a library-themed column for PW, starting May 30, so...I guess that happened. Be interesting to see what it's like.
  
  
• Should dictionaries be printed or digital? Houghton Mifflin wondered as it prepared to publish 5th edition of American Heritage Dictionary. But only 49% for those 18-30, with percentages rising as the age section rises. For reference books, problems can occur when trying to render graphics, diagrams, etc. But publishers say the internet has not eroded reference sales.