Reporting results for their fiscal third quarter, ending right after Chrismas, Canada’s dominant bookseller Indigo recorded sales of $330 million, up $7.4 million from a year ago. The Indigo and Chapters superstores rose 2.2 percent on a same-store basis, while the small format Coles store comps rose 3.2 percent. Online sales fell 2.6 percent to $30 million. The plunging Canadian dollar helped sales themselves hold up, but it hurt the company’s margins. Pre-tax earnings fell 3.6 percent to $40.1 million, while net income dropped considerably at $26.8 million, down from $49.2 million last year due to various tax line items. […]
Barry Wins Overall Costa
Irish writer Sebastian Barry missed out on the Booker, but now he has won the overall Costa Award for THE SECRET SCRIPTURE. Chairman of the judges’ panel Matthew Parris cited “a narrator had been created of such a transcendence that that redeemed all the other structural weaknesses in the book.”Wire
John Updike, 76, Dies of Lung Cancer
The writer died yesterday morning, first announced with “great sadness” in a brief statement from his publisher, Knopf. “John was one of our greatest writers. He was a part of the Knopf family for over fifty years. We will all miss him terribly.” His longtime editor Judith Jones told USA Today that he was diagnosed after Thanksgiving. Coverage, obituaries, and testimonials abound. Among them:AP obitUSA Today storyChristopher Lehmann-Haupt’s NYT obitKakutani‘s appraisalDavid Ulin in the LATAnd The New Yorker has a number of reminiscences from other staff writers posted on their books blog
Durham's 'Book Ex' to Close February 14
The Book Exchange, aka The Book Ex, a “downtown Durham, NC institution,” will close after 75 years in business. Co-owner Fran Feinberg says, “It’s a terrible loss to the community. It’s not a decision we made lightly. If we thought we could make it we would, but I don’t see that happening. I guess the writing is on the wall.” Feinberg adds, “It’s becoming harder and harder to make a profit,” Feinberg said. “You’re working with a very small profit margin and then you’re looking at a very bad economy.”News Observer
NYT Beats on Publishers, Again
The NYT has a “trend” piece on self-publishing that only got published because it’s pitched–speciously–as a contrast-to-the-death-of-regular-publishing story. Which leads to such unprovable stretches as “during an economic downturn, books tailored to such narrow audiences may fare better than titles from traditional publishers that depend on a more general appeal.” POD-driven self-publishing has indeed been a steady growth story for about eight years now that has little or nothing to do with the rest of the business. As they note, “self-publishing is still a fraction of the wider publishing industry. Author Solutions, for example, sold a total of 2.5 million […]
Let's Go Travels to New Home
Let’s Go, the Harvard Student Agencies travel guide book line, has announced a new “publishing and distribution partnership” with Perseus Books Group’s Avalon Travel imprint and their distributor Publishers Group West. (We reported in September 2007 that longtime partner St. Martin’s Press had decided not to renew their contract with Let’s Go when it expired in fall 2009, after 25 years together.) Avalon will print and market the guides, with PGW handling sales and distribution, beginning with the 2010 series. Twenty-six guides will initiate the relationship in November 2009, coinciding with Let’s Go’s 50th anniversary.