Do you have to go to New York City to get published?

At the turn of the 21st century that was a dead certainty. You came to The City (it had no other name nor needed one) to shmooze with your agent and noodle with your editor and you went home not just refreshed, not just energized, but electrified by the intensity concentrated in the Manhattan heartland. You came in confusion and uncertainty but returned confident that you were back on track, having drunk from the source waters of editorial truth.It was as if faith healers had touched your brow and zapped you with enough received enlightenment to drive you for a year or two before it was time to return to The City for another laying on of hands.

Is that still true? Guy LeCharles Gonzalez, who bills himself as “Chief Executive Optimist” of Digital Book World, says so and in no uncertain terms: “For all the talk of disintermediation, real and exaggerated, New York City is still the metaphorical heart, if no longer the primary physical home, of the publishing industry. All of the major publishers and myriad smaller ones are based here, and despite the increasing amount of influence intermediaries like Amazon and their Silicon Valley competitors have, they’re no strangers to NYC airports.”

Thus spake Gonzales as Digital Book World today opened the doors on last Friday to two back to back conferences sponsored by his company FW Media. “Starting today and running through next Wednesday, more than 1,500 authors, publishing professionals, booksellers, librarians and technologists will be gathered at the Sheraton Hotel & Towers in Manhattan for the 2011 Writer’s Digest Conference and Digital Book World 2011. While I may be a little biased, few could argue that the attendee lists for both events are as impressive as their respective speaker lists. I have the great fortune of participating in both events, giving a couple of presentations and moderating a couple of panels, all with one common thread: engaging readers.”

So, authors? Do you take Manhattan? Or can you take it or leave it?

Read details in Publishing Takes Over NYC

Richard Curtis

Don’t start the e-book revolution without us. That seems to be the message coming out of the literary agent community as reflected in their response to invitations to a major conference taking place in New York City’s Sheraton Hotel and Towers at the end of January and presented by F+W Media (publisher of Writer’s Digest and Writer’s Market)

The revolution has overcome countless obstacles on the road to the tipping point, but one stubborn source of resistance has been the agents. Their intransigence has not been so much a matter of hostility as uncertainty. Caught flat-footed by developments that went from zero to warp-drive speed in the blink of an eye, agents have struggled to get a handle on their role in the new e-world order. Though they take pride in being ahead of their clients, in the case of e-books many of their authors are way ahead of them, doing things or at least thinking thoughts that do not involve services commissionable by their agents such as self-publication of unsold books. Other agents simply want to be able to answer author questions or help their clients find a place in a universe that seems to be hurtling out of control. One wag described it as “Agents on the verge of a nervous breakdown.” (See Why Don’t Agents Want to Play?)

Mike Shatzkin, chairing Digital Book World on January 26th-27th, is determined to draw agents into the e-book process by designing a number of programs specifically to interest them. “The Changing Agent-Author Relationship: How It Will Affect the Business Model,” chaired by Oprah’s Book Club’s Sara Nelson, is one such. Another, “Tomorrow’s Book Contract,” chaired by yours truly, features several agents, a lawyer and a publishing company rights manager presenting wish lists of contract language and provisions reflecting changes in the publishing landscape.

Other panels and speeches will address non-e-book topics of concern to agents such as “Back-Loaded Book Deals: No (and Low) Advance Contracts, Profit-Sharing and Other Innovative Business Models”.

With its glittering roster of publishing industry star speakers and panelists, we’re told that the conference is almost sold out, but if you’re a literary agent you can be sure Mike Shatzkin will do his best to squeeze you in.

For complete information, visit Digital Book World.

Richard Curtis