Keeping up with the ever-changing publishing world

by J.R. Wagner

click for original photo source

Whether you're an author, reader, librarian, publisher, editor, human, android or alien, most of us have seen or heard of the changes happening with the book publishing industry.  Ebooks are a game changer for publishers and writers alike. 

Much like the music industry, the publishing industry is powerless to fight against the digital age.  While several years behind, the publishing industry is going through the same growing pains the music industry fought through.

Nearly every day, I see things in the news, on blogs and on the internet about the future of the publishing industry. There is one source in particular that was surprising at first because I wasn't expecting to hear about it on the radio.  The first time I heard a story about the future of digital publishing on NPR, I thought perhaps it would be the last.  I was wrong.

NPR, for those of you who don't know, stands for National Public Radio.

They have a page dedicated to books alone, which in this age for a radio station, is a hard thing to come by. Check it out.

Here are a handful of great stories on the future of the publishing industry, the future of libraries and the future of physical books themselves; all from NPR. The great thing about them coming from a radio station: you can listen to or read the stories!

Libraries Grapple With The Downside Of E-Books

E-Books Destroying Traditional Publishing? The Story's Not That Simple

No More E-Books Vs. Print Books Arguments, OK?

Will Your Children Inherit Your E-Books?

At Last, They See: E-Books 'Democratize' Publishing

In The E-Book World, Are Book Covers A Dying Art?

To find more great articles about the industry, E-Books or most things book related, visit their website, npr.org/books

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 To purchase Exiled, option the movie rights, hire me as a writer for the next Blade Runner film, the next Star Wars film...any film! For updates on the soon-to-be-released novella(pictured below), book 2 updates, for videos, fan art, contests and more awesomeness, visit my website (click on the website tab)

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A tale of perseverance, strength and redemption.

Coming soon.

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An Invaluable writing tool

Not long ago (actually October 5, 2010 according to the interview date) I was sitting in my car listening to the radio and stumbled upon an interview by NPR with author Bill Bryson.  The interview was about his new book, At Home.  You can find the interview HERE. 

Despite the potential to be quite possibly one of the most boring interviews imaginable, I was completely captivated.  At that point in my writing career, I was up to my eyeballs in writing Exiled and  was greedily seeking resources to add realism to the time period I was writing.

If you're a writer and your writing ever takes you inside a home, you MUST read this book.  Genius in its layout, the book takes you through the history of the house, room-by-room.  Exiled takes place in the late 1800's. In Bryson's book, I was able to find what a home from that time period would contain, how it would be laid out as well as background on the era. 




Even with my description, the book may sound boring but trust me, it isn't.  No it isn't a fantasy story that takes you to far off places.  What makes At Home great is the flow, the content and the readability.  This is not a textbook but, like most fiction (which it is not) it transports you to the time period he is describing. It transports you into the room he is explaining.  In the end, you have a better understanding of how things were in the home and why they are the way they are today.  This insight is invaluable to any writer.


Take this excerpt, for example: 

We forget just how painfully dim the world was before electricity. A candle, a good candle, provides barely a hundredth of the illumination of a single 100 watt lightbulb. Open your refrigerator door, and you summon forth more light than the total amount enjoyed by most households in the 18th century. The world at night, for much of history, was a very dark place indeed.

My copy is loaded with those multi-colored post-it notes marking pages of interest so I could go back and pull out the things I thought could be usable in my story.  I still flip back through the book as I work on The Never Chronicles #2 (title TBD)