Daily book biz round-up: new Oprah pick coming; money for Ontario textbooks?; and more

Today’s book news:

• Oprah prepares to announce new book club pick, and it’s not Freedom
• Scholastic Book Club takes new marketing approach
• Dalton McGuinty makes vague reference to helping Ontario schools cover cost of textbooks
• Penguin sues sports writer over undelivered bio
• Century 21 scoops up former Barnes & Noble space before corpse is even cold
• EW uncovers shocking Hollywood prejudice: authors not asked to be on Dancing With the Stars
• Delightful literary oddities available on EBay

Price drop rumored for Kobo eReader

When it launched in May, one of the Kobo eReader’s big selling points was that it was one of the cheapest e-reading devices on the market at $149. But now, with Barnes & Noble selling the new wi-fi Nook for $149, and Amazon selling the new wi-fi Kindle for $139, the Kobo eReader – which requires a Bluetooth connection – suddenly has a lot less to recommend it. No surprise, then, that a Kobo price drop appears to be in the works. Though nothing has been announced officially as of yet, a current online-only piece in The New Yorker suggests that Kobo will be lowering prices very soon.

Reporting on a swanky rooftop party Kobo recently hosted in Toronto, The New Yorker had this to say:

Kobo is perhaps the scrappiest and most focussed player in the e-book war. Its online store has a vast and rapidly expanding catalogue of e-books that can be read on almost any mobile device (notable exception: the Kindle). And its own e-reader’s simplicity and affordability (it will reportedly be down to $99 in time for Christmas) has spawned a cult following. In Amazon’s rear-view mirror, Kobo is quickly gaining ground.

When asked by Q&Q to confirm the $99 rumor, Kobo vice-president of content, sales, and merchandising Michael Tamblyn said he wasn’t currently at liberty to comment on future pricing.

Harlequin launches digital-only Carina Press

Carina Press, a new digital-only Harlequin Enterprises imprint, officially launched today by releasing 10 titles. Carina will publish 37 books, which will cost between $2.99 and $6.99, in its first month. The books will be sold directly to consumers through Carina’s website and through retailers such as Amazon and Barnes & Noble.

Harlequin CEO and publisher Donna Hayes stated in a press release: “As a digital-first publisher, Carina Press is a natural extension to our business. It gives us greater flexibility in the type of editorial we can accept from authors and offer to readers.”

Daily book biz round-up: Danielle Steel bamboozled, Yann Martel lambasted, and more

Have some book news with your morning coffee:

• Danielle Steel needs to be more selective when hiring assistants
• London Book Fair attendance down by a third
• Yann Martel responds to critical thrashings
• Salon co-opted by Barnes & Noble Review
• OMG! Kindle to be sold at Target
• Amazon won’t retroactively fix errors in the e-books you buy from them
• For those of you unfamiliar with the lingo of fan fiction: meet Mary Sue

Barnes & Noble e-books are coming to town

B&N announced yesterday that beginning around Dec. 1, Canadian customers will have access to the U.S. retailer’s e-book store and will be able to download titles to their iPhones, BlackBerrys, etc. However, B&N’s own e-reader, the Nook, will remain unavailable in Canada.

From B&N’s website:

We are not selling Nook in Canada (or anywhere outside of the United States) at this time. If you’re using a Nook in Canada, you will be able to sync your B&N eBooks library and access our eBook store via Wi-Fi.

We know there’s an incredible interest from readers who want to buy them from our eBook store outside the United States, and we are looking at our options for international sales. 

Bookmarks: Suing the Nook, profitable poetry, and more

Bookish links from around the Web:

• According to Amazon, Colum McCann’s Let the Great World Spin is the best book of 2009. Also on its list of the top 10 books of 2009: Strength in What Remains by Tracy Kidder; Hilary Mantel’s Booker Prize-winning Wolf Hall; Brooklyn by Colm Tóibín; Beautiful Creatures by Kami Garcia and Margaret Stohl; Crazy for the Storm by Norman Ollstead; The Girl Who Played with Fire by Steig Larsson; The City & The City by China Miéville; Stitches by David Small; and The Boy Who Harnessed the Wind by William Kamkwamba
• More trouble for Nook, Barnes & Noble’s new digital reader: GalleyCat reports that Spring Design is suing B&N over the Nook’s design, stating that the bookseller broke non-disclosure agreements and “misappropriated trade secrets” about Spring Design’s own Google-Android based e-book reader, Alex Reader
• British author/actor/comedian/Oscar Wilde fan/blogger/Tweeter Stephen Fry has something to say about the benefits of social media in this two-part online interview
• If you think the mania for classic literature and zombie mash-ups is going to die anytime soon, think again. The LA Times Jacket Copy reports that Quirk Books, the publishing company responsible for Pride and Prejudice and Zombies and Sense and Sensibility and Sea Monsters has announced their latest project, titled Dawn of the Dreadfuls
• Can poetry be profitable? Publisher Dominique Raccah thinks so. The Wall Street Journal‘s Speakeasy announces Raccah’s trial website, an online poetry community that allows Web browsers to upload, hear, and buy poetry
• The ever-controversial Globe and Mail columnist and author Margaret Wente responds to her many haters. Turns out she likes to make Canadians angry, especially Newfoundlanders

Bookmarks: Google Editions, and more

Sundry links from around the Web:

• Google announces that its online e-book service, known as Google Editions, will launch sometime in the first half of 2010. According to a report on CNET, Google will take a 37% cut on titles sold through its own website; for books sold through a third party – such as Amazon – the publisher would get a mere 45%
• Delivering the keynote at Frankfurt’s TOC conference, Cory Doctorow says that the publishing industry is bent on destroying itself through a restrictive approach to copyright
• The jurors for the 2010 Griffin Poetry Prize are: Anne Carson, Kathleen Jamie, and Carl Phillips

Barnes & Noble launches world’s biggest e-book store

U.S. mega-chain Barnes & Noble announced in a press release yesterday the creation of the world’s biggest e-book store comprising “more than 700,000 titles, including hundreds of new releases and bestsellers at only $9.99.” Unlike Amazon’s Kindle-only e-books, e-books purchased through B&N’s store will be compatible with a number of platforms (aside from the Kindle, of course): iPhone, BlackBerry, and most Windows and Mac computers. Through a partnership with Google Books, the B&N e-book store will also offer more than 500,000 free and downloadable public domain e-books.

B&N als announced an exclusive agreement to provide e-books for the forthcoming Plastic Logic e-reader, a device that is geared toward business professionals. From Fortune:

Plastic Logic vice president of business development Daren Benzi says his device is geared for business travelers, and as such will support the display of PDF files, Microsoft’s MS Word, Powerpoint, and Excel, as well as newspapers and magazines. But e-books are a big part of the game plan. “Will we carry every single one of those 700,000-plus titles? I don’t know. We’ll announce that as we get further along,” said Benzi. “But we will have access to them all.

Elsewhere in the blogosphere, The Book Oven analyzes how B&N’s move will affect the e-book market.

Your e-book speculation for the day

It’s a shame Canadians still can’t experience the apparent bliss that is Amazon’s Kindle 2 (despite the release of that iPhone app that would doubtless work perfectly well on Canadian models), but that hasn’t stemmed our interest in all the commentary on e-book readers, like that which came out of a recent publisher’s conference in Britain.

Meanwhile, American author Steven Johnson’s piece from The Wall Street Journal is perhaps the first article this Quillblogger has read that makes an e-book reader sound like something worth owning:

A few weeks after I bought the device, I was sitting alone in a restaurant in Austin, Texas, dutifully working my way through an e-book about business and technology, when I was hit with a sudden desire to read a novel. After a few taps on the Kindle, I was browsing the Amazon store, and within a minute or two I’d bought and downloaded Zadie Smith’s novel On Beauty. By the time the check arrived, I’d finished the first chapter.

This has obvious benefits for publishers, says Johnson:

Amazon’s early data suggest that Kindle users buy significantly more books than they did before owning the device, and it’s not hard to understand why: The bookstore is now following you around wherever you go. A friend mentions a book in passing, and instead of jotting down a reminder to pick it up next time you’re at Barnes & Noble, you take out the Kindle and — voilà! — you own it.

Inaugural poet bolsters small publisher

A small St.Paul, Minnesota-based publisher is hoping to reap big rewards in the wake of Barack Obama’s swearing-in ceremony yesterday. Graywolf Press is the publisher of poet Elizabeth Alexander, who wrote and recited the inauguration poem, “Praise Song for the Day,” and the company has reportedly been receiving urgent calls from Barnes & Noble to ship copies of the work as quickly as possible.

According to the Canadian Press:

The St. Paul-based publisher is printing 100,000 copies of Alexander’s inaugural poem, by far the biggest print run in its 35-year history but not for an inaugural work. Maya Angelou’s “On the Pulse of the Morning,” recited in 1993 at President Bill Clinton’s inaugural, was a million seller.

Alexander’s poem, titled “Praise Song for the Day: A Poem for Barack Obama’s Presidential Inauguration,” consists of 14, unrhymed three-line stanzas, and a one-line coda: “praise song for walking forward in that light.” It will be released as an US$8 paperback, 32 pages, on Feb. 6.