Bookselling
- CEO James Daunt comments on how things are going at Barnes & Noble. He characterizes book sales as “average” or “fine.” Proceeds from the sale of Union Square (a publisher formerly owned by Barnes & Noble) will go toward opening new stores. Also, like most other publishing leaders, he is not worried about a TikTok ban. Read Jim Milliot in Publishers Weekly.
- WH Smith is selling its bookstore business. The UK-based chain consists of 500 outlets and has been declining for some time. Read Nicholas Clee in Publishers Weekly.
Trends
- Who will be most popular this year—according to BookTok influencers? Authors mentioned include Emily Henry, Suzanne Collins, and ML Wang. Read Katie Fraser in The Bookseller.
- BookTok influencers also speak out on publishing trends in 2025. The first trend? Influencers will dominate, of course! However, you’ll find some other observations that aren’t nearly as self-serving. Read Lauren Puckett-Pope at Elle.
- Five trends to watch in the comics business. They include tariffs, distribution woes, and small comics shows. Read Heidi MacDonald in Publishers Weekly.
Traditional Publishing
- Amazon and Bloomsbury UK come to a last-minute agreement. It’s been a long time since Amazon threatened to pull the buy buttons from a publisher, but it did so with Bloomsbury UK, which publishes bestsellers like Sarah J. Maas and JK Rowling. Usually a disagreement like this relates to publishers refusing to pay Amazon a bigger merchandising fee or discount. Read Jim Milliot in Publishers Weekly.
- International book markets saw mixed results in 2024. Brazil is doing great; Europe, not so much. Read Ed Nawotka in Publishers Weekly.
Amazon
- Amazon is trying to salvage Alexa using an AI model. The big stumbling block? It can’t be allowed to hallucinate. Good luck! Read Victor Tangermann at Futurism.
- Amazon sells its adtech to other retailers. Soon your favorite retailers may be using Amazon technology to show advertising or sponsored results. Apparently demand has outstripped available inventory for Amazon ads (over $50 billion of revenue in the last 12 months). Tech industry analyst Benedict Evans commented in a recent newsletter, “If you were a retailer would you want Amazon to have that kind of data about behaviour on your own website?” Read Lauren Johnson at AdWeek.
- Over half of top Amazon marketplace sellers are based in China. US sellers represent 45 percent of Amazon sellers. Read Juozas Kaziukėnas at Marketplace Pulse.
Legal
- There’s another romantasy lawsuit. Two sisters who write on Wattpad have accused Rebecca Yarros and her publisher Entangled of copying their work on Wattpad. Read Aruni Soni at Bloomberg Law (sub required).
Media & the Creator Economy
- Some Substack creators are earning a lot of money on ads in their newsletters. The Wall Street Journal unearths one Substack creator charging $20,000 for a single placement. It’s hard to imagine Substack execs (or anyone funding Substack) merely celebrating and saying, “Wow, that’s great for our creators—go get that money!” without figuring out a way to take a cut of the action. Will Substack start creating tools for creators to sell ad space? This is a growing problem they will have to address. Notably, no one from Substack is quoted in the piece, but competitor Beehiiv is. Read Katie Deighton at the Wall Street Journal.
- Charts that show the decline of traditional media: If you’re not convinced creators are gaining in power, a review of these slides will be eye opening. Generative AI will only fan the flames. Read Doug Shapiro at The Mediator.
- As usual, the best movies are based on books. Seven out of the 10 Oscar-nominated pictures are book adaptations. Review the list at Book Riot.
AI
- Penguin Random House parent company Bertelsmann announces a strategic partnership with OpenAI. The implications of this agreement to use ChatGPT, as well as other tools “to develop new ways of creating and distributing video, audio, and text content,” remain hazy. PRH is already using OpenAI tools as part of its operations but has not yet signed a licensing deal with any AI company for training. So the question right now is how much Bertelsmann might be pushing PRH to use OpenAI for greater operational efficiencies or cost savings, particularly in sales and marketing, audiobook narration, and lower-level editing. If I were a PRH author, I’d keep my eyes open. Read Jim Milliot at Publishers Weekly.
Culture & Politics
- How will a second Trump presidency affect the book publishing business? Various industry figures comment on how their businesses may be affected. Read at Publishers Weekly.
- How are publishers and agents handling the accusations against Neil Gaiman? Norton has pledged not to publish new works by him, and so has Dark Horse Comics. Read Sophia Stewart at Publishers Weekly. Related, Jessa Crispin writes that Neil Gaiman is an industry problem.
Jane Friedman has spent her entire career working in the publishing industry, with a focus on business reporting and author education. Established in 2015, her newsletter The Bottom Line provides nuanced market intelligence to thousands of authors and industry professionals; in 2023, she was named Publishing Commentator of the Year by Digital Book World.
Jane’s expertise regularly features in major media outlets such as The New York Times, The Atlantic, NPR, The Today Show, Wired, The Guardian, Fox News, and BBC. Her book, The Business of Being a Writer, Second Edition (The University of Chicago Press), is used as a classroom text by many writing and publishing degree programs. She reaches thousands through speaking engagements and workshops at diverse venues worldwide, including NYU’s Advanced Publishing Institute, Frankfurt Book Fair, and numerous MFA programs.