Chronicle: My week in bookselling; NAIBA-Con Approacheth!
I'm still reeling from the amazing Fort Greene bookstore party on Tuesday (look, ma, I'm in the New York Times! ) Much follow-up to be done with the wonderful booklovers who put their support in writing, which Rebecca and I are furiously working on. But bookselling life goes on, and how. Wednesday morning I spoke on a panel with Lance Fensterman and Ruth Liebman at the Association of American Publishers ' Intro to Publishing course. It was a cool conversation about selling books all the way through to the consumer (i.e. through editorial, publicity, marketing, sales rep, etc.) and what that implies for cover design, flap copy, blurbs, etc. Lance is the most self-deprecating, energetic powerhouse of a book person I know, and Ruth is incredibly gracious and one of the reasons indie bookstores get the cred and attention they do; I was humbled by both of them. Hope the assembled young and eager publishing folks got something out of it; they're the emerging leaders of t...