As other trade shows have faltered in their outreach to indie authors, London Book Fair has grown and refined its Author HQ events
We’ll be at London Book Fair (LBF) next week, and once again we are struck with how faithfully the organizers have included and produced programming for authors—particularly for self-publishing authors, whom other trade shows have had trouble serving.
While there’s plenty of emphasis on major trade authors who are brought to the show by their publishers, LBF’s director Jacks Thomas has continued to encourage non-aligned authors to attend the fair. And she does it by understanding that sponsors, not authors, can be expected to pay for it. A London Book Fair ticket costs only £45 (US$59) and covers all three days. It allows a writer to attend not only the 21 events planned in the Author HQ space but also the rest of the Insights Seminars program of more than 200 sessions, many of which draw from the 25,000 trade visitors who are holding meetings and trading rights all week.
The Authors tab at the top of the fair’s home page takes you to the offerings for the self-publishing community. The cavernous space at the Olympia London venue is usually teeming with authors taking part in the programming. Author HQ itself is one venue, with roughly 200 chairs and a stage. Another large enclosure immediately adjacent to Author HQ is named Writer’s Block, and it’s where vendors buy access to mingle with authors going to and from the HQ for programs. Here’s where the business model shows up: those vendors pay £1,766 (US$2,321) for the least expensive packages, which gives you some idea of how valuable a pool of potential clients the authors at LBF have become. All of this adds up to a successful format that has grown rapidly since Orna Ross went to London Book Fair in 2012 to announce that she was forming the Alliance of Independent Authors (ALLi).
The programming on tap reveals more of the sponsorship. For example, Robin Cutler of IngramSpark will be talking with Jo Henry of BookBrunch about the new Selfies Award, the first winner of which will be announced on Tuesday afternoon. And Darren Hardy, the UK manager for KDP, offers a daily introduction to self-publishing through Amazon; he’s joined by writers each time. Nicola Solomon, the executive director of the Society of Authors (the UK counterpart to the Authors Guild in the States), is offering a session called How to Make a Living from Writing. More session topics include getting an agent; submissions and querying; and Publishing Trends in 2018 with Nielsen’s Hazel Kenyon (we strongly recommend this session for the Nielsen data you’ll get—and we’ll bring everyone coverage in the next issue).
Here are a couple of especially useful technical sessions to consider: Can I Quote This?, presented by Amy Ellis of Publishers’ Licensing Services, will go over the tricky business of getting permission for using third-party content. Kingston University’s Alison Baverstock will lead The Art of Commissioning Debut Books, bringing in editors from some of the biggest houses.
Bottom line: The fact that Ross is returning to lead her own session in self-publishing as part of Author HQ—having founded ALLi as something of an act of defiance—indicates that London Book Fair is continuing to be seen by the robust UK indie community as a supportive partner for authors. It’s a model for other major industry events that want to draw the writing community, and Author HQ is always one of the noisiest, most high-spirited parts of the fair.
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.
