Tag Archives: Michael Meller

The Big Fix: European Book Markets Experiment with Pricing Policies

“Due to fixed book prices, we Germans have 25 spaghetti cookbooks, and you poor Americans only have three,” jokes Christian Sprang, lawyer for Börsenverein des Deutschen Buchhandels (the Association of German Publishers and Booksellers). Even though US publishers might quibble, there’s no doubt that book pricing methods are controversial around the world, and will probably…Continue Reading

Trendspotting 2004: Surviving the Spin Cycle

The conventional press rarely covers them, but these days the action is with the literary agencies more than publishers. And oh, the changes we’ll see. Small shops will partner up in all kinds of unexpected combinations, creating a whole new landscape of mid-sized agencies. More British shops will follow the lead of PFD in planting…Continue Reading

International Fiction Bestsellers

She’s Got Game Gablé’s Bold Move in Germany, Forest Fling in Holland, And Spain’s Answer to Umberto Eco Move over, Monopoly. Board game junkies worldwide are in for a surprise this month as author and former university lecturer in Medieval Studies Rebecca Gablé’s quirky novel The Settlers of Catan hits stores and the German bestseller…Continue Reading

Forsaken Frankfurt?

Amid Post-Book-Fair Grumbling, London Gains on the Buchmesse “Deplorable, but not lethal” was the official word on southbound exhibitor numbers at this year’s Frankfurt Book Fair — they tumbled 4%, a figure direly reported to the trade as “the biggest decline in the fair’s 54-year history” — and it made for a condign summation of…Continue Reading

Discounts on the Danube

Battle Over Price Maintenance Roils The European Book Trade In case there was any doubt about it, German culture minister Michael Naumann will not go gently into his country’s cultural good night. Portraying himself to the media as a lonely lookout on the prow of the Titanic, scanning for the iceberg that will plunge German…Continue Reading