The wonderful English novelist Joanna Trollope is the first guest author in the DLR Library Voices series which starts next month. Trollope is the author of 16 highly acclaimed best-selling novels, the latest of which, The Soldiers Wife, deals with the difficulties facing a military wife awaiting her husbands return from a tour of duty in Afghanistan.

via Trollope is star guest of Gleeson – Books, Entertainment – Independent.ie.

But at the same time as Apple is working with incumbents, it is also encouraging others to attack them. Much like the App Store democratised the creation of software and blogging platforms spawned new media companies, the iBook Author and Apple’s online bookstore will open up educational publishing to new companies and to individual academics who want to create their own texts. This will lead to an explosion of new textbooks, many of which will compete with those of existing publishers.

via Apple and digital publishing: A textbook manoeuvre | The Economist.

In a slight departure from past Christmas suggestions we’ve asked only one bookseller, Louisa Cameron from Raven Books,  to suggest some books for the season, I think you’ll agree she knocks it out of the park.

A sumptuous gift book, The Horse & Irish Society (The History Press Ireland), displays David O’Flynn’s insightful photography into the many, many ways in which horses are integrated into Irish society – from the rich breeding grounds in Kildare to racing bareback across the cobblestones in Smithfield. David has an excellent eye for picking out the subtle interactions between equine and human, and has carefully curated the presentation of the photographs with a gentle humour.

Another notable gift book is Glorious Galway: Hookers, Curachs, Lake & River Boats by Donal Lynch (Meitheal Mara & Galway County Council). The bi-lingual text is accompanied by photographs, paintings, drawings, charts and maps, with a helpful glossary of nautical terms as well as a thorough bibliography for further reading. Though the book does take a historical look at maritime activity in the area, it brings readers right up to the present day giving perspective on what has and hasn’t changed in the role boats play in Connemara.

There is a plethora of picture books for young children with wonderful illustrations and seasonal stories – P.J. Lynch is well-known to Irish readers but less well know is Jan Brett whose detailed drawings evoke the northern European folk tales filled with mischievous trolls, ice bears and reindeer, and the importance of a simple celebration with family at the darkest time of the year. Each page has a border with a second story – elves counting down the days to Christmas, or a hedgehog making a nest from a lost mitten.

With his fourth book Gangsta Granny (HarperCollins), David Walliams has catapulted into the “must read” category for confident readers (approx. 9+). His Dahlesque humour and sense of whimsy is a welcome addition to shelves lined with dark, deeply perilous, violent tales. In Raven Books, he is being bought with a mischievous grin by many grannies!

For those who have had enough of cold, grisly Scandinavian crime, Daniel Woodrell’s The Bayou Trilogy (Mulholland Books) was released this year in a single volume (and chosen by Barak Obama for his summer reading!). Set in the fictional southern town of St. Bruno, detective Rene Shade is pitted against gangsters and politicians, as well as his own ghosts from the past. Beautifully written, well crafted noir where nothing is black & white.

And finally, Irène Némirovsky maintains her appeal with the most recent of her novels in translation, The Wine of Solitude (Chatto & Windus), selling well alongside her biography by Olivier Philipponnat and Patrick Lienhardt (Vintage), and a book by her daughter Élisabeth Gille, The Mirador (NYRB). Though Élisabeth was only five when Irène was taken away by the Gestapo, she has pieced together her mother’s short life in what she calls ‘dreamed memories’, a haunting tribute to a remarkable person.

Irish author Tom Duddy is the only Irish poet to make the short list for the Seamus Heaney Centre Prize for Poetry with his debut poetry collection, The Hiding Place.

The Hiding Place, which is published by Arlen House, has also recently been shortlisted for the Aldeburgh First Collection Award in the UK.

The winner pf the prize will be announced on 25 November 2011 at a presentation with John Montague. The Chair of the judges is Professor Harry Clifton, Ireland Chair of Poetry.

The full shortlist for the prize is:
Tom Duddy, The Hiding Place (Arlen House)
Valerie Duff, To the New World (Salmon Poetry)
Anna Robinson, The Finders of London (Enitharmon Press)
Victor Tapner, Flatlands (Salt Publishing)
Katherine Towers, The Floating Man (Picador)

Trident Media Group will become the latest literary agency to directly distribute e-books from its authors, announcing plans to launch Trident E-Book Operations, a full service e-book publishing program that will distribute Trident author e-books directly to both domestic and international e-book retailers.

Trident chairman Robert Gottlieb will oversee the e-book operations and said the new e-book venture is an effort to give authors more “flexibility” in managing potential domestic and foreign digital revenue streams. “We will continue to manage all facets of our clients businesses by the extension of our services into the ever-changing e-book publishing business around the world. Trident Media Group will devise strategies to maximize value for its authors in the new and complex e-book publishing field,” Gottlieb said in a prepared statement.

via Trident Media Launches E-Book Program for its Clients.

Perhaps the greatest flaw in the Agent-Publisher construct is one of imagination—as the Tragedy of the Commons always is. Needless imprints, muddied brands, mediocre design, ad hoc title management, author mistrust, Big Publishing distrust—these possible by-products of pro-am Agent-Publishing contribute to the very problems that threaten the sustainability of agenting and authoring. By further fragmenting ourselves into our private ghettos, we do little for our authors and nothing for the industry or its customers. We agents would serve better by finding creative ways to enhance author brands and exploit author rights without sacrificing the load-bearing planks in our ship.

via The Rise Of Agent-Publishers Is Bad For The Book Business | paidContent.

Once you become your client’s publisher, you then become a principal in the transaction.  This means you can no longer function as the client’s agent.

Agency law makes it clear that an agent must not engage in self-dealing, or otherwise unduly enrich himself from the agency.  Nor must an agent usurp an opportunity from the principal by taking it for himself.

I really doubt whether any agent can legitimately claim that it is in the author’s best interests to be published by their literary agent.  It’s like the ref in a game of footie being paid by one of the teams playing.  It raises huge issues – and it just doesn’t feel right – does it?

via Your Agent Should Not Be Your Publisher « Redhammer.

If last week was the story of Kate McCann’s book then this week is once again the story of that book. Sales of that title are up 23.07% week-on-week. The flip side of that is that the rest of the top ten suffered a drop in sales, whereas last week the other nine titles accounted for some 7,285 units, this week the other nine clocked up only 6,538 a 747 or 10.25% drop in their share.

What’s more the week also save the dropping out of the top ten of several Irish authors and one (or two depending on your view) Irish publishers. Not a fantastic week for Irish writers then as only one remains in the top ten.

side from the McCann book the overriding theme is the continued strength of fiction which accounts of nine of the top ten titles.

1: Madeleine: Our Daughter’s Disappearance and the Continuing Search for Her, Kate McCann, 4,433
2: Stand by Me, Sheila O’Flanagan, 1,061
3: Water for Elephants, Sara Gruen, 917
4: The Family, Martina Cole, 839
5: The Distant Hours, Kate Morton, 708
6: The Moment, Douglas Kennedy, 673
7: A Game Of Thrones, George RR Martin, 617
8: Port Mortuary, Patricia Cornwell, 598
9: The Fifth Witness, Michael Connelly, 563
10: The Slap, Christos Tsiolkas, 562

Top Ten Dynamics
IPN is running a top ten dynamics section looking at the top ten with some data drawn out. Nothing too dramatic, but useful nonetheless.

Volume: 10,971 Units
Increase since last week: 84 units
% decrease since last week: .77%
Average Units Per Title: 1097

~~
Fiction: 9 titles, 6,538 units or 59.59%, RRP £8.99
Non-Fiction: 1 titles, 4,433 units or 40.41%, RRP £14.99

~~
Authors: 10
Irish Authors: 1, 10%
Irish Published Books: 0, 0%

~~
Average RRP: £9.59
Increase in RRP since last week: £0.40
% Increase in RRP since last week: -4.00%*
*It is important to note that RRP does not reflect actually selling price.

Data Supplied by Nielsen BookScan taken from the Irish Consumer Market week ending 21st May 2011
Image Credits
Some rights reserved by mt 23

A remarkable sale this week of Kate McCann’s book on her daughter’s disappearance. IT marks a stunning rebound for non-fictions sales in the top ten. It isn’t however the vanguard of a new field of non-fiction titles being the only title to make the top ten. It also represents a huge chunk of the top ten and flatters the results in our Dynamics tracking.

It was an okay week for Irish authors, with four making the list and a decent week for Irish publishers with Poolbeg claiming yet another top ten title and Penguin Ireland (at least Irish based and employing Irish editors and staff) clocked a number three for debut author Sarah Harte.

If you take out the massive impact of Kate McCann’s book, the week looks a lot less impressive. In fact it’s more of less flat.

1: Madeleine: Our Daughter’s Disappearance and the Continuing Search for Her, Kate McCann, 3,602
2: Stand by Me, Sheila O’Flanagan, 1,222
3: The Better Half, Sarah Harte, 973
4: Water for Elephants, Sara Gruen, 942
5: Port Mortuary, Patricia Cornwell, 823
6: The Moment, Douglas Kennedy, 753
7: The Fifth Witness, Michael Connelly, 717
8: Casa Clara, Kate McCabe, 643
9: Ghost Light, Joseph O’Conor, 608
10: A Game Of Thrones, George RR Martin, 604

Top Ten Dynamics
IPN is running a top ten dynamics section looking at the top ten with some data drawn out. Nothing too dramatic, but useful nonetheless.

Volume: 10,887 Units
Increase since last week: 3,028 units
% Increase since last week: 38.53%
Average Units Per Title: 1089

~~
Fiction: 9 titles, 7,285 units or 66.91%, RRP £9.43
Non-Fiction: 1 titles, 3,602 units or 33.09%, RRP £14.99

~~
Authors: 10
Irish Authors: 4, 40%
Irish Published Books: 1, 10%
OR (if you include Penguin Ireland) 2, 20%

~~
Average RRP: £9.99
Increase in RRP since last week: £0.20
% Increase in RRP since last week: +2.04%*
*It is important to note that RRP does not reflect actually selling price.

Data Supplied by Nielsen BookScan taken from the Irish Consumer Market week ending 14th May 2011
Image Credits

Inis, the children’s books magazine published by Children’s Books Ireland and edited by David Maybury and Patricia Kennon, has undergone a radical redesign of its print edition and has launched a radical new website. The magazine which has been published under the Inis brand since 2002, was first published in 1989 as Children’s Books in Ireland.

The website currently offers a free  archive of the magazine  from 2002 to the present and will add the rest of the magazine’s archive (going back to 1989) very soon. The site will also feature exclusive interviews, articles and reviews in the weeks and months ahead starting with coverage later today of the Bisto Book of the Year with reactions to the shortlist and award winner.

The new look print edition is available now – featuring Terry Deary, Patrick Ness, Siobhan Parkinson and much more. A preview of the latest edition is available by clicking this link.