To learn more about Scandals, you can check out an elaborate Web site about the novel and the history behind it, such as a powerful, respected Senator’s hidden investment in a CIA-occupied high-rise, as well as a deadly building collapse. The Washington City Paper recommended Scandals and made nice Chandler and Hammett comparisons, and the book has drawn some preliminary Hollywood interest. But the daily press—possibly because I have a small publisher, and possibly because Scandals mocks the media—has yet to publish a single review. This is a great opportunity for stores to experiment with a media bypass, then hone the technique for other titles.

Scandals’ most likely readers: People in the D.C. area, Jewish readers, progressive activists and others, suspense and thriller readers, those interested in historical fiction and people everywhere who are simply interested in the causes of corruption in Washington.

Daily Beast Editor Tina Brown asked esteemed author Philip Roth, in this Vimeo video, about the future of the novel.

Basically, Roth says, the novel is screwed.  Not even the Kindle can save the novel, because it has to compete against all those screens: first the movie screen, the TV screen, and now the computer screen.  Now all three of those are out there, and the book just doesn’t measure up.

Roth predicts that in 25 years the novel will have a "cultic" following, perhaps slightly larger than the group of people who now read Latin poetry.  What do you think, TeleReaders?  Is he right?  Or will the novel carry on as it has these last centuries?

It does occur to me that as recently as a century or two ago, the reading public for a novel was perhaps at what Roth might call a cultic level.  Then came the Golden Age of Reading, from perhaps the late 1800s through, say, the 1930s.  Now novel-reading is in an inevitable decline, soon to return to being the pastime of a small group of hobbyists?
But perhaps Roth is speaking only of the literary novel, which already could be said to have largely a cultic following, big prizes and splashy headlines aside.  People line up for Dan Brown’s pulp, but how many will read Roth’s latest offering, The Humbling? And he is among the biggest names among contemporary literary novelists.  What hope, then, for those as-yet unknown writers?

Have a look at the video, and then have your say in our comment area.

But where to draw the line? Do we really want the feds policing the free press, and I don’t just mean “free” in the freebies sense? Aren’t free review copies part of the game? Don’t recipients still feel free to pan titles?

Well, we worrywarts are in luck, going by our friends at GalleyCat, which, via the GalleySmith blog, picked up info from a kidlit converntion.

The FTC’s Mary Engle now seems to be saying that if you’re an independent reviewer, as opposed to the participant in a marketing program or someone otherwise compromised, you’ll be safe. Not to stretch things. If you’re an Amazon affiliate and you hotlink to a page of a reviewed book and you get revenue from this arrangement, then you might not be so safe. I’m not sure. But at least this malarkey about bloggers opening up used bookstores or whatever isn’t going to apply. Thanks, FTC!

Barnes and Noble’s forthcoming rival to the Kindle will feature an E Ink screen as expected. But it will be monochrome only.

Gizmodo is running all kinds of photos but does not reveal the price of the unit expected to be unveiled officially this month.

Intriguing detail: There’ll be “a multitouch display like an iPhone underneath.” What do you think of that, folks?  Wish we had more details on the uses of the multitouch display. Perhaps even for some non-e-book apps? And in color? Yes, if you go by the photo to the left.

Just as B&N’s e-book software allows, the new hardware will let you read thousands of public domain books from Google.

I’m curious what’s ahead from B&N next spring. B&N denied that it would sell a color E Inker from Plastic Logic, but could something else be in store for us? I’m also curious about B&N’s possible use of the ePub format, with or without DRM. The company’s Fictionwise subsidiary is plans to unveil an ePub-capable version of eReader, although the format will come wrapped in proprietary DRM, at least when publishers insist on it.

Other links of interest today:

–Former HarperCollins CEO Jane Friedman’s new e-publisher has unveiled more details, according to the New York Times. Among the authors included: William Styron, Iris Murdoch, Joseph Heller and Pat Conroy. Hooray!

–The territorial rights controversy rages on. As reported in PW via booktrade.info, an Amazon spokesman “said the e-tailer has worked with publishers to build a database that knows the correct territory where each of the 200,000 English-language titles available for sale through the international Kindle can be sold.” Robert Gottlieb, however, a powerful literary, is still concerned.

It notes that the Federal Trade Commission will hear out proposals in such areas as “copyright law and doctrine, including the ‘fair use’ of news stories."

Will we see the FTC recommending copyright-law changes and tax breaks?

The mainstream media tend to be wimps as it as. Imagine what’ll happen if they’re granted even more special favors. I want newspapers to thrive, not just survive. But this isn’t the way to do it.

For a good look at what can happen when news monopolies rule, check out The Brass Check. TeleRead was the first to get this Upton Sinclair classic on the Web.

Related FTC documents: From Town Crier to Blogger: How  Will Journalism Survive the Internet Age? and a discussion of “fundamental financial challenges to many news organizations.”

No, people aren’t caught up in some romance novel, a thrilling mystery, a somber story, a dark satire, or a new novella. Rather, just one library user is in this vast empty space.

What can we do to encourage more people to enjoy books?

Here are two ideas—one pertaining to young people in general, and one for students with vision problems.

Why Johnny doesn’t want to read

A major reason why kids in my school won’t read books is that they think they are all written in old English, and that’s a shame. We could be using some good, modern books in the classroom.

A perfect example would be The Giver, or possibly The Fountainhead. I understand that teachers love all the literary elements used in Shakespeare works, and symbols behind everything, and I love them as well, but to the average reader, they are a tad hard to follow. By shoving them down our throats, aren’t educators creating a subtle hatred for the written word? Why not switch to modern literature, such as Sharon Draper books, Lois Lowery books, Margaret Peterson Haddix books, or possibly even some good old Dorothy Parker?

They all have literary elements to study, and some even have more than that. Great study guides could be derived from the books and be made into tests that most kids would be eager to pass. Is it so wrong to change a little with the times? Then maybe more literature lovers would blossom and bloom.

Another reason for apathy toward books—and one solution

Another reason for lack of interest in books, though this relates more to us blind and near-blind people, is that most English teachers have a massive fear of audio books. What if you had eye impairment and there weren’t any large print books in sight? I would pick up an audio book, but all my teachers, even at a blind school, would frown disapprovingly and scold me about how I can read so I don’t need or shouldn’t need audio.

Well, what if I’m an auditory learner and can retain things better that way? Why be afraid of a different medium? Open your heart and mind. Try having your class listen to Shakespeare rather than reading the text. You’re still getting the same information.

Related:  Why recreational reading counts, too—not just the kid for school and ‘A new assignment: Pick books you like.’

Editor’s note: These are Robert’s personal opinions. What do you think about them? I myself believe that we need a mix of classics and modern books. Good literature should challenge readers. But first get ‘em interested in books, period. Robert’s big concerns are right on the mark. – D.R.

In American Fever: A Tale of Romance and Pestilence, Peter Christian Hall does, and doesn’t stop there. The story of a flu-obsessed blogger who predicts a flu pandemic and then records its ravages, Hall taps into a deep literary vein of paranoia. Having previously ventured into the epidemic-as-apocalypse genre myself, my expectations were high. True to form, this novel-as-blog soon had me wiping down every surface in reach with disinfectant. 

Hall grapples with a thorny problem: how to create a live novel. The “hypernovels” of the 90s were dismal failures, I’m not sold on e-book chapter mashups, and Vooks manage to be both unreadable and unwatchable. American Fever is by far the best stab at the future of the novel I’ve seen. It also makes clear that live novels (livels?) have a ways to go. Someday when we’re reminiscing fondly on the dawn of e-books, American Fever may very well occupy pride of place among the original innovators. Its sophisticated approach, however, is not is not always backed by prose equal to its packaging. 

American Fever’s hero is a blogger-turned-“flugitive.”  Observing the pandemic’s progression from his Brooklyn apartment with growing disbelief and anger as the sickness cuts down friends and strangers alike, he caustically comments:

“All I ever do is google.  What else is there to do … pray?”

A self-taught influenza expert, the Ayn Rand-loving blogger operates a “personal protection” business out of his apartment, selling masks and gloves and the like. Gradually he becomes something of an online hero, calling out an increasingly totalitarian American government for its misdeeds. Arrested and tortured on trumped-up charges, he flees the country with his socialist girlfriend and fellow flu survivor, but not before watching his beloved metropolis descend into barbarity.

American Fever is the first novel I’m aware of that is written entirely in a blogged epistolary style, complete with rabbit-hole references, pop culture innuendo and cutting sarcasm: 

“For the sake of innocent readers I’ve acquired, I’ll explain that I don’t want to have to monitor the site for abuse. Nor will I host debates about what politician would make a worse president, or which movie star or pop singer is doing more to fight bird flu (“I feel stupid and contagious/here we are now/ entertain us”).”

The epistolary style has a built-in weakness: nothing can be experienced directly by the characters, only described afterwards. It’s a tough hurdle to leap, and Hall doesn’t always clear it.  The very structure of the book keeps us out of the heat of the action: the main character always has to return to his laptop. So we get secondhand reports, emotional recountings, snatches of scenes. 

“Disorder has turned universal. Armed hospital invasions are common in blue states, red states, border states, states of anxiety, hopeless states. Is the State itself in danger?”

A single taut, well-written description of an armed hospital invasion would suffice for any number of notifications of such. Replete with Googled Wikipedic tidbits, the chatty tone and truncated sentences take American Fever dangerously close to pedestrian blog territory: 

“So far my ‘hood merely looks like a police state war zone. We all still love one another. I didn’t feel afraid when I went out. The worst thing that happened was that I seem to have exacerbated my back injury climbing over debris on B. It hurts like heck. No, worse: It feels unprintable. 

The East Village can survive this. It survived crack and yuppies.”

The end of American civilization witnessed via the witticisms of your neighborhood blogspotter: it rings a little hollow. I’m not sure this is the best vessel for a novel. I’m not saying it isn’t, either.  But the net effect is, when Hall does reach for more sophisticated language, he strikes a tinny note:

“Time melds itself like freshly bruised enamel paint, smoothes my days. I could run down the street naked and no one would remember, so long as I was back in my perch tomorrow.” 

Nonetheless, American Fever gives us some tantalizing hints as to what a blogged novel could be, and to my mind represents a real advance in e-lit. The blog is chock full of lit savvy, which serves to further blur fiction and reality with links to Hall’s flu blog on the Huffington Post.  He also sells personal protection gear and “Cultural Merchandise.”  Add in the fact that the book has an RSS feed to subscribe to, and what you have is a novel direction for the novel.

Books are meant to be finished, permanent projects; American Fever bristles with links (though these thin out as the plot progresses). How to keep the links current, and relevant?  Today’s fascinating article on Avian Influenza Age Distribution is tomorrow’s 404 Error. Should the effort even be made? I mean, I can imagine that in the near future aggregator bots will automatically update e-book links. (Which brings up another question: can you really be said to “own” an e-book if its links are constantly changing?) But if a book relies on constant link updates, or links at all, is it a book? And if not, what is it? American Fever doesn’t answer these questions. But it certainly puts them out there in a fascinating way.

For now, American Fever is live online. As of this writing, it’s on Day 156, of 220. I do wonder why you can only subscribe to the novel in-progress. Why not adopt an asynchronous approach, as in DailyLit?  How many readers are likely to read 156 blog entries to catch up with the story?  Not this one—I read American Fever on my Kindle via a PDF advance copy. (Which, in keeping with the FTC’s new book-reviewing guidelines, I hereby note is extant in my email, two computers, and my Kindle, so it is thereby safe to say I intend to keep it.)

All gripes aside, you’re missing something if you miss American Fever.  Start your reading here. 

American Fever will be complete by December 2009.  The print / e-book release date is as yet undetermined, but the blog project will remain online indefinitely. 

We’ve written oodles of items about the Espresso. And now we wondered if a Wall Street Journal writer was on the mark in raising questions about the Espresso’s reliability.

Well, based on a Q&A with the gung-ho Chris Morrow, manager of Northshire Bookstore in Manchester Center, Vermont, the Espresso is worth all the attention. But, yes, for now at least, it does break down more than he’d like.

Slightly edited, here’s our e-mail interview with Chris, who expects that the next model will be more reliable, and meanwhile says the quality of the books themselves is excellent:

D.R.: What’s your experience in the real world? How often per year, per month, whatever, does your Espresso break down?

CM: We have the 1.5 which is a beta machine. It has, like any machine, broken down. But the machine was made to learn from. The real test will be with the 2.0 which is now out. We plan on getting it this winter.  

DR: When your 1.5 model breaks down, do your people quickly get it going again?

CM: The response of On Demand has been excellent.

DR: Any worry about repair costs or lost business?

CM: Yes, it is difficult when the machine breaks. But I anticipate this being negligible with the 2.0.

DR: How long do typical repairs take?

CM: Varies greatly… often handled on the phone.

DR: While we’re in touch, what do you think of the quality of books from the Espresso? How close to paper? Biggest kinds of flaws? Progress expected in overcoming them?

CM: The quality is quite good—virtually indistinguishable from a regular paperback book.  The is/will be a non issue.

DR: How about the Espresso in regard to e-books? I see the two technologies as potentially complementing each other. Have you ever thought  about offering discounts to people who try out a book in E, then decide to have a POD version run off for them? 

CM: Haven’t tried this yet—good idea.

DR: On another topic, I’m curious if you’re interested in some out-of-town business from people interested in repros of Google books in the public domain?

CM: Yes, please!  Please direct them here.

Editor’s note: Northshire isn’t doing Google books now, but expects to very shortly. You could email Debra Wraga or call the store at 802-362-3565 to ask about an update. The store also offers POD services for writers, and I love the idea of an indie betting the business. Here are existing titles. Northshire will also print repros of copyrighted titles as authorized by publishers.

Today, worries about vanishing newspaper book review sections—and vanishing newspapers—have only accelerated the pace of gloomy headlines. But it’s unclear whether a golden age of book reviewing ever existed.

Then again, with the emergence of sophisticated online book reviews, the golden age could be yet to come.

These reviews aren’t like Amazon customer recommendations. “The best advertisement for a book has always been word of mouth,” says Steve Wasserman, Managing Director of the Kneerim & Williams New York office and a former editor of the Los Angeles Times Book Review. “The internet only makes more formal the rumor mill that had always served to spread the good news about this or that book. [But] that isn’t exactly criticism, it’s the enthusiastic acclamation of ordinary readers who don’t want to keep the news of something worth reading to themselves.”

We’ll know that e-books have well and truly arrived on the day an e-reader evokes a similar response.

Even better, I now have access to a state-wide network of libraries and, better still, the entire University of Wyoming collection.  Currently a couple obscure and expensive biographies are winging their way to me: Nabokov: The Russian Years ($43 on Amazon) and Kafu the Scribbler ($66). Been wanting to read both for several years each. Neither exists in e-book format that I’m aware of. They’ll be here in 3 to 5 days, for free.  In my biblio-centric universe, it doesn’t get much better than that.

Some people look up at the starry cosmos and feel paradoxically puny and connected to something larger than themselves.  Me, I go into a library.

Image: CC-licensed image of Trinity College Library in Ireland. Art by 18th century watercolorist James Malton.

Don’t bail out newspapers—Let them die and get out of the way, Daniel Lyons’ essay in Newsweek. Thanks for the pointer from Felix Torres, who adds: “Substitute ‘major publishers’ for ‘newspapers’ and his arguments ring even more true.”

Related: War of the publishing models: Sarah Palin’s pub dreads e-books, while Tina Brown’s news partner gets nimble with E.

Image: From Wikipedia.

So I won’t even say which book chain it was—just that this little chat happened recently at a store in a liberal city in the D.C. area.

Employees were gracious and apologetic in saying why they probably couldn’t carry even a few copies of my Washington novel.

The trade paperback wasn’t on The List from the headquarters of their chain. Why? My very legitimate publisher had used print-on-demand-technology, and apparently I was up against the hoary old returns issue.

Praised by the same newspaper distributed in the store—but still shut out by the MBAs

Here’s the big kicker. The Washington City Paper had recommended my debut novel in March, even working in the holy names of Chandler and Hammett. Imagine: the same newspaper given away for free in the chain store.

Meanwhile a stand at the front was loaded with copies of books by Glenn Beck, the conservative broadcaster—this in a hugely Democratic city of Volvos and Obama bumper stickers!

Sorry to use a personal example in the TeleBlog for a second time today, but I can’t resist, given all it says about the lunacy of certain people in the book trade. Oh, to think of the thousands of good local writers whom the bookstore chains are dissing. I’m hardly the sole victim. Are chains outside the U.S. as obtuse as in the States? I’d love to hear from TeleRead community members in Canada, the EU countries, Australia, Japan and elsewhere.

Question for the MBAs

Along the way, will the MBAs in the book business take a little time out from their spreadsheets and please explain such flagrant disregard—not only of local customers and writers, but also of shareholders?

I love p-books, not just e-books,  but the big chains are apparently doing their part to hasten their demise. Small wonder that Amazon is eating the chains’ lunch.

Physical bookstores can’t compete on price. But how about little details such as service and locally appropriate inventory? And hiring? Are the chains’ MBAs so dumb that they can’t find unemployed but savvy English majors to staff the stores and choose suitable titles?

Actually I suspect that many intelligent adults already work in the chain stores; why can’t top management let them do their jobs? I know that profits on items like book markers can be higher than on actual books. But still…

The phrase to use here?

Yes, I’m happy to see certain chains selling e-readers from Sony and other companies and trying to adjust to new technology in other ways, such as with online bookstores; but that’s no replacement for old-fashioned sanity in the executive suites.

I’d rather not be rude to possible sellers of my novel; and I know the world abounds with brilliant MBAs, too, not just morons. But in writing this post, I keep thinking of the title of Beck’s new book: Arguing with Idiots.

Print on demand: No panacea—and perhaps a major complication ahead

Maybe the efficiencies and capabilities of print on demand at local stores can eventually save the chains. But for how long? What happens when copying shops and coffee joints offer similar products and services?

Of course, the book chains might say, “But they don’t know books.”

Exactly. Then again, if the chains keep treating employees and customers like morons, just how credible will that response be in the end?

Our friends at GalleyCat have the story, following up on SmartBitches, Trashy Books.

Somebody at one publisher is even said to have emailed writers: “I’m not exaggerating when I say they WILL NOT ORDER the book unless their site is listed.” Ouch!

Now here’s a special e-book angle. When happens when interbook linking is common? Will B&N—and Amazon!—seek special favors? And do some very nasty things to avoid disintermediation?

In fairness to B&N: GalleyCat reports: “One editor writes in to say the message she’s seen from B&N hasn’t been quite so stark: ‘What I’ve heard is B&N requesting that if you are linking to Amazon to please link to them as well.’”

How I’m currently handling this for The Solomon Scandals: I avoid displaying any particular store logo and instead offer detailed buying information, with many options. What do you think, gang? Am I doing the right thing?

Related: ‘The Solomon Scandals vs. Dan Brown’s latest, ‘The Lost Symbol’: Same city, different books.

(Thanks to Paul Berinstein of The Writing Show.)

The Book Industry Study Group will hold a webinar on the future of the ISBN and identifiers. It will take place on Tuesday September 15, from 11 a.m. to 12:00 p.m. Eastern time. I encourage you or your staff to register for this session—it is free. Following is the session description to be run by Mark Bide:

The book industry has had the ISBN for nearly 40 years; there has been little cause for excitement. Now, suddenly the whole subject of “identifiers” has become a hot topic, particularly when it comes to digital books and other online resources. This BISG Webcast will explore why the book industry has standard identifiers, and consider the future of the ISBN (International Standard Book Number), as well as the role of newer identification standards like ISTC (International Standard Text Code) and ISNI (International Standard Name Identifier). What do you need to know to make informed decisions about how—and whether—to use them?"

Mark Bide is Executive Director of EDItEUR, the global trade standards organization for the book and serial publishing industries. He is also the Project Director for the ACAP Project, and a Director of Rightscom, the specialist media consultancy. 

Registration information is here.

In addition, background to this seminar can be found in a blog post I wrote, The ISBN is Dead, where I raise some of the critical issues regarding the future of ISBN that Mark will address in his session.

Lastly, consider subscribing to my blog posts, where you will find a post I wrote last week estimating the number of Google Orphans, which is a critical aspect of the Google Book Settlement agreement.

Editor’s note: Michael is former president of Bowker, which among other things handles U.S. ISBNs.

On the Book Industry Study Group: The address is bisg.org. However, at least from my location, I couldn’t reach the site just now.

For a free preview of virtually everything in the forthcoming book, just go to Kottke.org’s collection of annotated links. Samples:

–The title article on canine behavior specialist Cesar Millan.

–The Talent Myth, which tells how Enron’s rampant credentialism prevailed over commonsense.

–Late Bloomers, or “Why do we equate genius with precocity?”

For latecomers, Gladwell is famous for such books as as The Tipping Point, Blink and Outliers.