Current t-shirt: "The Incredibly Strange Kitties," by Emily the Strange. www.emilythestrange.com. Just about one of the greatest t-shirt and intelligent goth-girl apparel line in existence.
Current Music: Winterpills, http://www.winterpills.com/ especially the song "Found Weekend," …you will live forever, apples still crisp on the shelf…life goes on underground, we won't surface til' we are found.
Had a disturbingly family conversation today. Disturbingly familiar because I've had it at least five times in the last few months. Goes like this: Newspaper book reviews are being squeezed and cut. One effect is that lead-times for reviews are getting longer.
Lead-time is the time between when a book review is okayed and the actual pub date of the book. Publishers that can afford to put out galley copies, sometimes called ARCs (advanced reading copies) beforehand.
If a galley comes out far in advance, the book is more likely to be reviewed.
But putting out a galley or arc months in advance costs money. Smaller presses get hurt. And I love small presses. Small presses have heart. Small presses take risks. Small presses are the good guys. Small presses are where I go shopping for gems…
(For a great small press, try Small Beer Press, http://www.lcrw.net/)
It also favors established authors and authors who don't take risks. Publishers are less likely to be able to justify marketing dollars to themselves if a book is a debut and/or unusual.
The book reviewing process is screwy. Everyone knows it. No one likes it. Reviewers receive books for free, which then turn up in The Strand, often before their publication date. Maybe publishers could put their books into an online database before publication and simply give out passwords. Yes, a bitch to read off the screen, but I'd do it.
BTW, nifty little graphic novel about Ronald Reagan coming out with FSG. No where near as good as Sentences or Cairo, but a nice blow.
Makes me feel all warm and glowy to think a whole generation will learn about the Gipper from a subversive little comic book that uses the truth like the weapon it is.
Love and Ketchup (as a vegetable),
The Red Pooka!
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