Authors

GalleyCat contributor Jeff Rivera interviewed erotica author Zane for mediabistro.com’s So What Do You Do? feature today.

In the interview, Zane (pictured, via) tackled a tough question: “What are your thoughts on bookstores shelving books in the African-American section instead of alongside other fiction works?”

Zane replied: “They sell better. That’s been documented. There’s no question about that. When someone goes into a bookstore and they’re looking for African-American books, they’re going to look for the African-American section. If they dig mystery books, they’re going to look at the mystery section. I’ve done my research and seen the figures; I’ve met with the owners and heads of bookstore chains. I used to sit in a Borders bookstore, bring my manuscript submissions with me to read, and for hours on the weekends I’d watch how people selected books, what caught their attention, what made some people look at books more, and what they actually took to the register.”

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Create a social media strategy, launch your campaign, and track the results in our Social Media Marketing Boot Camp starting February 16. The online event and workshop will feature speakers including The Onion‘s Baratunde Thurston (left), Facebook’s Morin Oluwole, and bitly’s Tim Devane. Register now.

Google has created a Google Doodle in honor of beloved author Charles Dickens’ 200th birthday.

The image embedded above features several of Dickens’ most iconic characters, including Ebeneezer Scrooge from A Christmas Carol and Pip from Great Expectations. When users click on the image at the Google homepage, they are taken to a page with Google Books listings for Dickens’ works including A Tale of Two Cities, Oliver Twist and David Copperfield.

Here’s more about the birthday from The Washington Post: “Prince Charles [is] expected to visit London’s Dickens Museum. Actors who reportedly are scheduled to give readings Tuesday in Britain include Ralph Fiennes (who will play Abel Magwitch in the upcoming film of Dickens’s Great Expectations), Gillian Anderson (TV’s Great Expectations) and Sheila Hancock (Bleak House), as well as Simon Callow (Christmas Carol: The Movie) performing in Dickens’s birthplace of Portsmouth, Hampshire.”

HBO has released a new trailer to promote the second season of Game of Thrones. What do you think?

In the video embedded above, fans can catch a glimpse of some of the series popular characters, including Princess Daenerys, King Joffrey and Jon Snow. The show’s official YouTube channel contains nine other videos about the second season.

The first episode, titled “The North Remembers,” will premiere on April 1st. 

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Romance author Kresley Cole has landed a deal with Simon & Schuster Books for Young Readers for her first young adult novel.

Entitled Poison Princess, the first book will launch The Arcana Chronicles series. Publication is set for October 12th. Writers House literary agent Robin Rue represented Cole on this deal.

Here’s more from the release: “Poison Princess centers on sixteen-year-old Evangeline “Evie” Greene, a privileged teenager from Louisiana. When an apocalyptic event decimates her hometown, killing everyone she loves, Evie realizes the hallucinations she’d been having for the past year were actually visions of the future—and they’re still happening. Fighting for her life and desperate for answers, she must turn to her wrong-side-of-the-bayou classmate: Jack Deveaux. As Jack and Evie race to find the source of her visions, they meet others who have gotten the same call.” (Photo Credit: Deanna Meredith Studios)

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Author Maggie Stiefvater has landed a deal with Scholastic for a four-book epic fantasy series.

The first book, The Raven Boys, is slated for release in September. The Raven Boys stars Richard Campbell Gansey, III (a boy who “has it all”) and Blue Sargent (daughter of the town psychic).

Stiefvater (pictured, via) had this statement in the release: “I grew up on a diet of exceptional fantasy series for children— The Dark Is Rising, The Black Cauldron, A Wrinkle in Time, The Chronicles of Narnia — and I’ve always wanted to write one of those sprawling epic sagas built from intimate moments. I sat on a draft of The Raven Boys for a decade, but it wasn’t until I had the tools I learned from writing the Shiver trilogy and The Scorpio Races that I knew how to do it.”

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Former Grand Central author Joe Konrath has responded to our So What Do You Do? interview with Grand Central publisher Jamie Raab.

Below, we have reprinted the response from the self-publishing champion in its entirety. Konrath also wrote a response to the leaked Hachette memo with author Barry Eisler.

Konrath began: “I have nothing but respect for Jamie Raab, and for the most part I enjoyed working with Grand Central. They’re a group of dedicated, talented professionals. But they’re dedicated, talented professionals in a broken, outdated, and increasingly irrelevant business model.” Read more

The Authors Guild posted a long essay yesterday, arguing that “the abandoning of New Deal era protections of retailers” is helping Amazon dominate the book business.

Referencing Barry Lynn‘s piece in Harper’s this week called “Killing the Competition: How the New Monopolies Are Destroying Open Markets,” the Author’s Guild explained: “Mr. Lynn makes the case that Amazon’s dominance isn’t just a story of an industry disrupted by online commerce and digital upheaval, it’s about the abandoning of New Deal era protections of retailers in 1975 (promoted by backers as a means to fight inflation, says Mr. Lynn) and what he portrays as a shift in 1981 in the Justice Department’s interpretation of antitrust law based on ‘Chicago School’ theories of efficiency and consumer welfare.”

The Guild’s blog also asserted that while online bookstores work well for established authors, emerging authors struggle in this arena.

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Fantasy authors Neil Gaiman and Todd McFarlane have settled their decade long dispute about who owns the copyright to Spawn characters that Gaiman created for McFarlane’s comic book in a guest appearance.

In 2002, Gaiman filed his first suit claiming that he co-owned Medieval Spawn, among other characters that he had created. In 2010, Gaiman won a suit in which a judge determined that he should be paid royalties.

The Daily News has more about the settlement: “Jeffrey Simmons, one of Gaiman’s attorneys, said terms of the agreement were confidential … ‘This is intended to put an end to the whole thing. It’s fair to say both parties are pleased to have this resolved,’ Simmons said.”

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Author Jonathan Franzen is not a fan of eBooks. While speaking at the Hay Festival in Cartagena, Colombia, last week, he said that print books are more permanent than eBooks.

The Telegraph UK recorded his comments: “Maybe nobody will care about printed books 50 years from now, but I do. When I read a book, I’m handling a specific object in a specific time and place. The fact that when I take the book off the shelf it still says the same thing – that’s reassuring. Someone worked really hard to make the language just right, just the way they wanted it. They were so sure of it that they printed it in ink, on paper.”

You can read more at eBookNewser: “Franzen defended the paperback technology saying that he could spill water on it and it would still work. He also defended the print format for its permanence.” You can also watch a video about more cutting-edge features of print books.

Author Malcolm Gladwell will deliver the closing address at the Association of American Publishers’ Annual Meeting on March 14 in New York City. Gladwell will discuss “Publishing in the 21^st Century.”

Follow this link to register.  Hachette Book Group chairman David Young will introduce the author and U.S. Copyright Office register of copyrights Maria Pallante will keynote the event.

AAP president Tom Allen explained the choice: “The focus of our gathering will be on critical current issues such as distribution channels and copyright protection, considered through the prism of publishers and our historic partners.  Malcolm Gladwell’s remarkable skill in interpreting new ideas and inspiring thoughtful debate, particularly with a community in which he’s a member, will be a wonderful closure to the day.”

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