Life in the Book Review Vacuum

Today, two more print outlets for traditional literary coverage tumbled into yawning maw of the bad economy monster.

Creative Loafing–the parent company of a host of alternative weeklies, including Chicago Reader and Washington City Paper–declared bankruptcy this morning. Coincidentally, the New York Sun quietly folded the same day.

These unfortunate events will shrink the already shrunken market for professional book reviewers. As a number of writers have already reflected, we are living in a traditional book review vacuum. Analysis of the crisis is easy to come by, but practical advice is harder to find.

This goes out to the publicists in the audience. On a practical level, how are you coping with these disappearing markets? What strategies, tricks, or magical incantations do you use to get people pay attention to books in the shrinking universe of book reviews? Email us if you feel like sharing.

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