The once-staid Kirkus is launching an iPad-centered initiative; BlueInk Reviews is helping the industry find the best self-published titles; and a mysterious startup based on a Rotten Tomatoes-like site for books is crashing in the Simon & Schuster building. This is the book review in 2011.
Kirkus Reviews
Kirkus (which was acquired a year ago by mall developer Herb Simon) recently began reviewing kids’ iPad book apps. “We heard from our friends and from librarians and booksellers what a gaping hole there was for someone to curate and review all these apps,” Bob Carlton, VP and Publisher, says, especially since the Apple App Store is so difficult to navigate.
Though Children’s & YA Books Editor Vicky Smith didn’t have experience reviewing apps, she found it easier to adapt to the new environment than she’d expected: “After passing drafts of reviews back and forth [with Kirkus’s first app reviewer, technology reporter Omar Gallaga], we settled into a pretty comfortable meld of looking at an app from both the narrative and art perspectives and the interactive game elements. A lot of apps are taken from very recognizable properties like Dr. Seuss, but others are taken from much less well-known paper books or are completely new, so you have to contextualize the whole story and picture experience as well as the interactive experience. Each individual app determines our approach.”
Obtaining apps to review is different from obtaining galleys. Last fall, Kirkus canvassed over 300 individuals and companies creating storybook iPad apps. “We sent a request to them as we’d do with traditional publishers,” Carlton says, “and they provided us with download codes.” Unlike books, Kirkus generally reviews apps after publication, though a few developers have come forward with the opportunity to test apps earlier. Kirkus is also in discussion with Barnes & Noble to review its upcoming Nook picture books. Carlton says storybook apps for Android are “lagging.”
Kirkus plans to launch an app discovery engine this month. (Check here for updates.) Carlton says it’s surprisingly difficult to preview apps online. “Wesaw an opportunity to do video reviews and complement them with a top-ten list,” he says, and parents, teachers, and librarians embraced the idea—as did many app developers. Since users are already reading Kirkus’s app reviews from their iPads, Kirkus chose to make its app discovery engine a web-based application instead of a traditional app. It is also designed as a widget that can be integrated into partner sites.
For now, book apps are primarily aimed at children ten and under. “There doesn’t seem to be as much for later elementary and teens,” Smith says. “I think developers are still getting their heads around the paradigms. If you are looking at a picture book and trying to figure out how to translate that experience into an app, you’ve got a model based on 32 pages, a short story and lots of graphics. [But] doing a full-blown app that is novel-length is quite a challenge.” Carlton says many book apps now are based around “pass back”: “You’re in the minivan, you’re about to go on a trip and you pass the iPad back to your child. That’s very different from how a 14-year-old immerses herself in a 200-page book.”
In addition, Smith says, rights are driving many development choices; her unscientific analysis reveals “more 3 Little Pigs apps than anything else, because nobody has to pay royalties for the 3 Little Pigs and you don’t have to explain the story to anybody.” Public domain titles present a lower barrier to entry to the app market. Smith is excited about “people developing original stories. I really see an opportunity for inventive storytelling that is completely original and organic to the iPad.” Read More
In anticipation of January’s Digital Book World, where one panel was entitled “Skills Sets Publishers Don’t Have: How Do We Get Them or Deal with It?”, Publishing Trends sent a survey to a range of publishers, agents and industry insiders, asking them about this increasingly urgent issue. 
