In connection with our posting (see Repjep) about the endangered species called traveling sales reps, we’ve just come across a moving open letter to publishers on the subject, issued by the New Atlantic IndependentBooksellers Association (NAIBA). We feel it’s worth reprinting in full.

An Open Letter to Publishers from NAIBA

We are alarmed with what appears to be a trend in the sales division of publishers – the removal of field sales reps to independent bookstores. This draconian move against our bookselling segment will be responsible for the disappearance of book culture.

Field sales reps are a crucial part of our business. Each regional independent booksellers association and Publishers Weekly honors an outstanding field rep each year. We can’t think of another publisher position that gets this recognition. We devote countless hours at conferences refining the sales rep/bookseller relationship. They are that crucial to us. Restricting field reps to large stores will give publishers a skewed view of what is a very diverse world –independent bookselling.

Sales reps take the time to know our stores, what our customers like, and what is on our shelves. They are the industry worker-bees, travelling the region, taking ideas and trends and pollinating other stores. We learn about other stores from them, what others are reading and loving; what is selling; marketing tips; event ideas; what the publisher is doing; and what authors have books coming out in the next season. They make fans for authors out of our frontline booksellers. They cut through the catalogs to make sure we carry what we’ll be able to sell, and their endorsements are why we buy what we might have ignored. These reasons are why cuts in field sales reps devastate us. Have you really thought about what this stricture will mean to you? Fewer books sales.

Without a doubt, we are not ordering as much through telemarketing. We are definitely not focusing on your backlist through tele-sales, and we definitely miss titles from the frontlist. We also don’t buy as much direct, which makes independent bookselling a less profitable business. The vicious cycle is that we buy less because we don’t have sales reps, and then you devalue our business because we aren’t buying as much as we used to.

We understand the corporate need to save money. There are more efficacious and less exclusionary ways to cut your budgets. You know what they are because independent bookstores have been telling you what they are for years. Cut multiple ARC mailings. Do away with promotional gimmicks that go from mailbox to garbage can. Consider publishing fewer titles, fewer hard covers, fewer copies. Take a hard look at celebrity advances.

We exist to sell your books, those unique and hard to place titles, not just the established authors. Field sales reps are the tools we need to do that for you. As much as you would like to think a tele-salesperson is doing the same job, you are sadly mistaken. A field sales rep is far more than a person filling in an order form. Don’t cut our lifeline to your books.

Sincerely,

The NAIBA Board of Directors

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Meet Kate Jasper, Marin County, California’s own, organically grown, amateur sleuth.

In Jaqueline Girdner’s first Kate Jasper novel, Adjusted to Death, the heroine plunges into her career when she visits her chiropractor for a simple spinal adjustment, but instead finds a dead man on one of the tables…dead of a broken neck. And it seems everyone in the chiropractor’s office knew the victim, Scott Younger, in one way or another, except for Kate herself. Maggie, Kate’s friend and chiropractor, has known Scott for years, as has her staff. Her receptionist, Renee, even dated him. Devi knew Scott from college. Guru-follower, Valerie, accuses Scott of being a drug pusher! And Wayne, Scott’s now unnecessary bodyguard, a shy, homely man who almost makes Kate forget her husband has left her, knew him the best of all. But Kate can’t forget murder, especially since Wayne is the main suspect. And there’s the pesky matter of Kate’s fingerprints on the metal bar that broke Scott Younger’s neck. Kate Jasper’s in for a spine-tingling, bone-chilling adventure.

The Kate Jasper novels have been in e-book format for a while but now you can snuggle up with paperback editions. For a complete listing, click here. And read the author’s fascinating dossier on her heroine. Researching real people is hard enough, but researching your own fictional ones – that takes some clever doing!

RC

Before rescuing Susanna from a fire consuming Ammonville’s Fallen Angel brothel, Aaron Court takes this intoxicating beauty, mistaking her for one of the professionals plying their trade. Now he is in a heap of trouble. How much trouble? Well, it happens that she was not only an innocent maiden, but the young sister of the establishment’s owner.

Now that he’s rescued her he has to rescue her reputation as well, which is about as easy as restoring a girl’s virginity. As if that’s not difficult enough, the memory of her yearning body fills him with an irresistible desire to be with her again. A case of out of the fire and into the frying pan.

Read Elizabeth Chadwick’s Wanton Angel to learn if the lovers will be able to squeeze through the horns of this dilemma.

Elizabeth Chadwick is a penname for romantic mystery novelist Nancy Herndon. E-Reads carries novels under both names.

- Richard Curtis

Sirloin? Or puppy?

Do you trust me? I’m holding a bag with meat in it and I’m telling you it’s choice sirloin. But it could be dog. It’s yours for twenty dollars. No, I won’t show it to you until you’ve paid me. I’ve always leveled with you and I’m leveling with you now. So? How about it?

This odd offer is actually the basis for the expression “a pig in a poke.” It’s “a confidence trick originating in the Late Middle Ages, when meat was scarce, but cats and dogs (puppies) were not,” Wikipedia informs us. “The idiom pig in a poke can also simply refer to someone buying a low-quality pig in a bag because he or she did not carefully check what was in the bag.” (“Poke” is related to the French poche, a bag.)

The reason we bring this up is that Little, Brown is offering bookstores the equivalent of a sealed bag, promising “the inside story of life with one of the most controversial figures of our time” but won’t tell whom it’s about or who wrote it.  They want the stores to trust them that it’s prime stuff, but all they will tell you for now is that the title is Untitled and the author is Anonymous.

“In its e-mail the publisher promised a ‘massive media rollout’ with a confirmed ’60 Minutes’ appearance,” writes New York Times book beat reporter Julie Bosman. “Bookstores were instructed to comply with a highly orchestrated release on Nov. 14, with no sales permitted until then, an embargo arrangement typically reserved for splashy debuts of political memoirs or Bob Woodward books.”

Little, Brown is the furthest thing from a fly-by-night bunco operation, and if there is any publisher whose word I would trust it’s they. Which is why I’m happy to fully disclose that I do lots of business with them. But they’re really pushing credence to the limit in asking store buyers to accept a sealed bag containing an object shaped like a blockbuster bestseller but could be a penny dreadful.

Bosman reports that at least one bookstore owner “reluctantly ordered 10 copies of the book after receiving the publisher’s e-mail. ‘I hate these books,’” the proprietor was quoted as saying. “‘But you cannot not buy it.’”

I never thought a day would come when I said it’s a good thing that books are returnable, but in this case stores can take advantage of that option if Untitled turns out to be la viande de chien.

Okay, your turn to guess what’s in the poke. Read A Publisher Plays Coy With Book Release

Richard Curtis

For Americans and their lawmakers the looming financial and government crisis is terra incognita.  But not for Dan Simmons, whose just-published Flashback projects a dystopian future launched by a collapse identical to the one that is unfolding in our nation today.

In the author’s words, “Flashback posits the possibility that the United States of America, if it continues accruing debt without rethinking its spending and social welfare programs, could implode in sudden and total bankruptcy, losing not only its position in the world but its own sense of self for hundreds of millions of its citizens. In Flashback, this canary also imagines a cheap and available drug called flashback; a drug that allows hundreds of millions of Americans to find an escape hatch from life in such a damned and dismal future simply by reliving the good parts of their former lives. Over and over. And over.”

Simmons’s dark view of the world around the corner from today is controversial and has raised some hackles among fans and critics who like their futures to be politically correct. They obviously have confused dystopian and utopian. Simmons hasn’t.

But, taken for what it also is, a futuristic thriller packed with beautifully limned characters and a mystery that can only be solved by drug-induced time-travel, it is another triumph by the author of The Terror, Hyperion, Carrion Comfort and Summer of Night.

In a starred review Publishers Weekly says “Simmons makes some logical if depressing extrapolations from current political and economic developments in this outstanding mystery thriller set in a near-future dystopic United States.” Booklist calls it “Another winner from Simmons, whose imagination seems to know no bounds.”

Simmons has addressed a long letter to his fans detailing the thinking processes behind a book that will be debated for a long time to come. You can read his message here.

In an age of young superheroes, a 72 year old Laotian coroner is not at first glance the most promising selection for protagonist of a mystery series. That’s why Colin Cotterill’s Dr. Siri Paiboun deserves a second glance, and believe me, that’s all you’ll need to fall in love with one of the most engaging characters in the mystery field today.

E-Reads has e-books of the first two volumes in the series, The Coroner’s Lunch and Thirty-Three Teeth, and if you have a taste for faraway settings, they just don’t come further away than Colin Cotterill’s.

In The Coroner’s Lunch, Dr. Siri, one of the last doctors left in Laos after the Communist takeover, has been drafted to be national coroner. He is untrained for the job, but this independent 72-year-old has an outstanding qualification for it: curiosity. He has survived thirty years as a revolutionary and doesn’t mind incurring the wrath of the Party hierarchy as he unravels mysterious murders, because the spirits of the dead are on his side. When he performs an autopsy on the wife of a government official and on an unidentified body fished out of the river, it’s clear that all is not calm in the new Communist paradise of Laos.

In Thirty-Three Teeth, Dr. Siri investigates a series of deaths by what seem to be bear bites, to explain why the government official ran at full speed through a seventh story window and fell to his death, and to discover the origins of the two charred bodies from a crashed helicopter in the temple at Luang Prabang.

Some full-throated praise for The Coroner’s Lunch

”A wonderfully fresh and exotic mystery.”
–The New York Times Book Review

”The sights, smells and colors of Laos practically jump off the pages of this inspired, often wryly witty first novel.”
–Denver Post

”If Cotterill…had done nothing more than treat us to Siri’s views on the dramatic, even comic crises that mark periods of government upheaval, his debut mystery would still be fascinating. But the multiple cases spread out on Siri’s examining table…are not cozy entrtainments, but substantial crimes that take us into the thick of political intrigue,”
–The New York Times Book Review

And here’s what reviewers had to say about Thirty-Three Teeth:

”A crack storyteller and an impressive guide to a little-known culture.”
–Washington Post Book World

”The quasi-mystical story keeps a perfect balance between the modern mysteries of forensic science and the ancient secrets of the spirit world”
–The New York Times Book Review

”Readers who were charmed by Cotterill’s first novel, last year’s The Coroner’s Lunch, will be delighted to hear that his hero, the witty seventy-something Dr. Siri Paiboun, is back again.”
”Day to Day,” NPR

We posted this item discussing the most stolen books a while ago but the topic has become hot again, so we reprint it – with an update.
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Book theft just isn’t what it used to be.  Thieves are neither as selective as they once were, nor as imaginative.

That seems to be the conclusion reached by author Margo Rabb (Cures for Heartbreak) in an article she wrote for the New York Times Sunday Book Review, Steal These Books.

From all she is able to learn, the most purloined title is The Bible. “Apparently,” Rabb writes, “the thieves have not yet read the ‘Thou shalt not steal’ part — or maybe they believe that Bibles don’t need to be paid for. ‘Some people think the word of God should be free,’” an Austin, Texas bookstore owner tells her, and for a Springfield, Oregon bookstore manager, it is free. “If a person asks for a Bible,” says Rabb, “they’ll be given a copy without charge.”

New Yorkers are more secular in their shoplifting tastes. A Manhattan bookshop reports the disappearance of fiction masters like Martin Amis, Charles Bukowski, William S. Burroughs, Raymond Carver, Don DeLillo and Jack Kerouac.

Note that no female authors are on the hit-list. “’It’s mostly younger men stealing the books,’” a Brooklyn store owner told Rabb. “They think it’s an existential rite of passage to steal their homeboy.’” The manager of operations of the famous Tattered Cover in Denver reported the same thing. “’Our arrest record is very male.’”

Bookstores may inadvertently be accessories to these crimes. For an Austin store called BookPeople, the books promoted by the store are the ones most likely to be nicked. “I feel like our staff recommendation cards should read: ‘BookPeople Bookseller recommends that you steal ________.’” the head book buyer told Rabb.

You can get arrested for stealing a book from a store, but that’s not as bad as stealing an e-book, for which you can possibly be sued.

Of all the titles you would imagine are most likely to be stolen, Abbie Hoffman’s 1971 classic Steal This Book is the most obvious. At this writing a mint copy can cost you over $50.00. Stealing that copy of Steal This Book would be considered a felony in many states.

Publishers Weekly recently updated the Most Stolen list but some familiar candidates, like Jack Kerouac, are still there. New on the list is Paul Auster, whose New York Trilogy seems to get lifted wholesale. One bookstore owner reported “I had a whole stack once of about 20 or 30 copies of The New York Trilogy that somebody just came in and took the whole stack.”

Richard Curtis

Ultimately, the boss

Which is more effective, an autocracy or a democracy? A monarchy or a republic? A fiat by one person or decision by committee?

That’s the question raised by Randall Stross in the “Digital Domain” feature of the New York Times.  He was referring to opposing business models governing two colossi of the tech world, Apple and Google.  Apple’s model is clearly autocratic, a hierarchy topped by its founding genius Steve Jobs. Google on the other hand operates on more democratic principles where decisions are reached by something like consensus.

“One person is the Decider for final design choices,” Stross writes about Apple. “Not focus groups. Not data crunchers. Not committee consensus-builders. The decisions reflect the sensibility of just one person: Steven P. Jobs, the C.E.O. By contrast, Google has followed the conventional approach, with lots of people playing a role. That group prefers to rely on experimental data, not designers, to guide its decisions.”

Though his analysis is fairly balanced, Stross clearly favors the Apple model for its efficiency in converting its boss’s brainstorms into beautifully modeled, handsomely packaged, brilliantly marketed products, and it would be hard to quarrel with that assessment.  But he has omitted one downside factor that balances, and maybe outweighs, all the flaws in Google’s groupthink approach to decision-making.  If – when – something happens to Jobs, what will become of Apple?

Early in 2009, when the indispensable Jobs’ was forced to temporarily give up leadership to combat pancreatic cancer, we reminded our readers of Charles De Gaulle’s grim remark: “The graveyards are full of indispensable men.”

“Every business captain,” we said, “needs to post that quotation on the wall in front of his or her desk as a reminder that great leaders must be great delegators. Steve Jobs, CEO of Apple, is as indispensable as corporate heads can possibly be, but adverse health has forced him, as it did De Gaulle, to look at his mortality and relinquish to others tasks that threaten to sap the energy he needs to restore his health.” (See My Irreplaceable You.) Jobs’s medical leave in ’09 was enough to depress the value of Apple’s shares by 2% in the domestic stock market and as much as 7.9% overseas.

We need to look at the Apple strongman’s mortality and see beyond today. Though he has populated his company with gifted managers, Apple’s fate might well be encapsulated in the bon mot uttered by another brilliant and indispensable autocrat, choreographer Georges Ballanchine: “Après moi le board”.

“At Apple,” says stross, “one is the magic number.” But one is succeeded by an infinite string of numbers, and whether all of them add up to the effectiveness of Apple’s Number One in creating and producing astounding technical wonders, we will inevitably find out.

The Auteur vs. the Committee by Randall Stross.

Richard Curtis

Ray Garton’s Ravenous does for werewolves what Live Girls did for vampires.

When Emily Crane’s car breaks down on a dark, lonely road at night, she is attacked and raped by a man she kills in self defense. That night, the dead rapist walks out of the morgue. Later, Emily begins to experience strange cravings and her body undergoes terrifying changes.

When brutal killings leave victims partially eaten in the northern California coastal town of Big Rock, Sheriff Arlin Hurley scoffs at the talk of werewolves…until a tuft of wolf’s fur is found on a victim. It soon becomes clear that whatever is responsible for the killings, it’s not alone. There are more than one. And they are doing something much worse than killing and eating people.

Nearly 25 years ago, Ray Garton reinvented the vampire mythos with his erotic novel Live Girls. Now he has updated the curse of the werewolf in Ravenous.

Here’s what Publishers Weekly said about Ravenous:

“For Garton, lycanthropy is a sexually transmitted diseas, spread mostly through rape, that runs rampant through a small town fraught with affairs and intrigues. His werewolf is a terrifying creature: not a remorseful, helpless cursed human but a homicidal beast driven by a dual urge to breed and feed. Hurley is a sheriff to root for, and Garton’s well-paced horror novel reworks the werewolf myth to great effect.”

To learn what was on Ray Garton’s mind when he wrote Ravenous, and for an expert comparison of vampires to werewolves Click here.

Permed to Death introduces sassy salon owner Marla Shore, and what an introduction it is! Here’s Marla giving grumpy Mrs. Kravitz a perm when the old lady croaks in the shampoo chair. If that isn’t enough to give her a bad hair day, handsome Detective Vail suspects Marla of poisoning the woman’s coffee creamer! Figuring she’d better expose the real killer before the next victim frizzes out, Marla sets on the trail of a wave of wacky suspects.

Looks like Marla’s heading for a bad hair day, but you’re heading for some delicious reading as E-Reads publishes nine delightful whodunnits in the Bad Hair Day series by one of America’s most beloved women’s novelists. The rave reviews will absolutely curl your hair. Oops! Bad hair pun. The thrills will stand your hair up on end. Um, no, not that one either. Well, read all nine books and see how many plays on words you can make up. E-Reads offers them both as e-books and paperbacks.

Read the first chapter of Permed to Death.

RC
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PRAISE FOR PERMED TO DEATH

Sun-Sentinel: “…an amusing tale, buoyed by a likable amateur sleuth and enhanced by the South Florida atmosphere.”

I Love a Mystery: “PERMED TO DEATH is a beauty of a read. The characters are believable,
the mystery is well-plotted, and the suspense is a real manicure ruiner.”

Kirkus Reviews: “…a plot with more tangles than an uncombed perm…”

Mysterious Women: “…a fascinating story, with intriguing, sometimes quirky characters, a touch of humor,
a hint of romantic possibilities, and a look at a profession we don’t often see in mysteries.”

GO Riverwalk Magazine: “Cohen fills her book not only with a close look at the South Florida scene, but a rash of well delineated murders, which keeps the reader’s attention right to the end.”

Murder on Miami Beach: “A pleasing and interesting cozy that will keep you entertained all evening…The atmosphere is definitely South Florida, the heat, the crazy drivers, the Santeria, but with none of the Miami overtones.”

Under the Covers: “PERMED TO DEATH is propelled by strong characters set in a plot full of interesting kinks.” (Highly recommended)

Cozies, Capers, & Crimes: “…a funny, suspenseful story…PERMED TO DEATH is a good book to start reading while waiting at your favorite salon for your hair appointment. Just the title alone, ought to get you great service.”

MyShelf.com: “Nancy Cohen has styled a novel that is to curl up and die for. A permanent solution to the doldrums.”

The Mystery Reader: “…exceptionally clever, amusing, and lively…”

Crescent Blues: “Cohen captures Marla’s voice perfectly and makes the Cut ‘N Dye salon so real
I could swear I’ve sat in its chairs.”

About.com: “Even if you don’t like your current hairstyle, you will love PERMED TO DEATH.”

BookBrowser: “PERMED TO DEATH is an entertaining amateur sleuth tale that sub-genre fans will fully enjoy.”

Southern Scribe: “…a nail-biting adventure, so schedule a manicure. PERMED TO DEATH is a witty and a well-crafted mystery that will have you guessing till the intense end.”

Romantic Times: “…a nicely woven story…” (4 stars)

Fort Myers Life Magazine: “This is a very successful mystery in a new series.”