Trying to understand statistics and commentary on current e-book sales is no easy task. While in New York, John and Joe were immersed in “yak about the Big E.”

JOHN: E-books, e-reading, and e-gizmos. Does the reading future lie solely in the device? No answers here from me. The yak about the “E” was constant, especially early on. “Where will e-book sales level out?” seemed to be the big question. My guess, for whatever it’s worth, is 50/50.

My personal conclusion is how can the reader give up the magical quality time spent reading a physical book. It’s simply just too plain good. An afternoon off, reading on your porch, couch, by the beach, in a park or anywhere can’t be replaced. The young gal next to me on the plane home was reading something on a tablet. I was reading an advanced readers copy of Karl Marlantes’ What It Feels Like to Go to War, his new nonfiction book coming out in October. I thought for no amount of money would I swap places in this present situation. She looked bored and buying time and I felt hypnotized by the magic of reading a great book with a scotch, being transported into my own frame of mind.

JOE: It’s true that there was a lot of talk about e-books in NYC but I can’t say we heard anything new. No one knows where it’s going to pan out and everyone wants it to pan out soon. My guess is more like 65/35 – 35% being the e-books.

I did hear that on the first day of BEA that Dominique Raccah, founder of Sourcebooks, predicted that the industry would, in five years, be 50% of what it is now. To me that kind of prediction is pretty much “the sky is falling” kind of stuff. Sourcebooks will definitely sell more e-books than most publishers because they produce the sorts of books that people read on e-books, i.e., romance and popular fiction, but there are other parts of the industry that just won’t change that much.

There are just some things about traditional reading that are too good to go away. For example, I’m not going to read to my kids at night on a kindle or i-pad, I really can’t imagine that I would want to read anything with footnotes or maps on an e-reader, and I’m on the computer so much during the day that when I read at home at night I for sure don’t want to read on something that can have any kind of hardware failure or can crash and cause me to lose my place or not be able to continue my reading.

I did see the same person reading on her i-pad on the plane and she eventually got tired of the i-pad reading experience and switched to playing crossword puzzles. Meanwhile the two ladies I sat between were reading paperback books – on my left an Elizabeth Spencer short story and on the right The Help. As our plane descended we talked about our books and the “Jackson, MS” connections with Kathryn Stockett’s book and family – Stockett Stables, the Jitney, Belhaven, etc. That kind of thing never would have happened if we had all been reading on our e-readers. I’m glad we weren’t.

Above Photo: Pictured are members of a Boston book club. Most members decided to go with the physical copy of The Help. Taken from this article on The Christian Science Monitor website.

Lemuria’s Bookstore Keys Series on the Changing Book Industry

Indie Bookstores Buying from Amazon? (June 1) BEA Roundup (May 19) Lemuria’s Headed for NYC (May17) Barnes & Noble Bankrupt? (April 28) Decluttering the Book Market: Ads on the latest Kindle (April 14) Independents on the Exposed End of the Titantic? (April 6th) Border’s Bonuses (March 30) The Experience of Holding a Book (March15) Finding “Deep Time” in a Bookstore (March 8th) Reading The New Rules of Retail by Lewis & Dart (March 3) The Future Price of the Physical Book (Feb 18) Borders Declares Bankruptcy (Feb 16) How Great Things Happen at Lemuria (Feb 8th) The Jackson Area Book Market (Jan 25) What’s in Store for Local Bookselling Markets? (Jan 18) Selling Books Is a People Business (Jan 14) A Shift in Southern Bookselling? (Jan 13) The Changing Book Industry (Jan 11)

Share