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Anthropic settlement class now searchable (This week in books)

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This week! Books!

Anthropic Copyright Settlement Website – If your book was pirated by Anthropic and you or your publisher registered your copyright within five years, you may be in the settlement class that’s eligible for $3,000 per book. You can search here, and the Authors Guild has more information on how to file a claim. If you don’t see your book in the settlement but did see it in the Atlantic database, you may want to double-check if your publisher properly registered the copyright.

The Publishing Industry Has a Gambling Problem – Tajja Isen, The Walrus – This is a well-written version of an evergreen “state of publishing” article that received quite a lot of attention in the past week. These pop up every year or two, and invariably posit that the publishing industry is risk averse, overly focused on past sales, and failing to stick with promising but modestly-selling authors for the long haul like they did in the Good Old Days (insert Toni Morrison, Cormac McCarthy, et al, but downplay recent examples like Percival Everett–who to be fair the article mentions–or Dan Brown, Taylor Jenkins Reid, and Charlaine Harris). My take: It has always been thus.

For more detailed responses on this article, publicist Kathleen Schmidt and author Lincoln Michel discuss the way publishers are often in fact responding to retailers’ emphasis on sales track. The publishing industry starts to make more sense when you realize publishers have historically marketed to retailers via their sales teams more than they’ve marketed directly to consumers, for better or worse (currently worse).

Robert B. Barnett, Washington Master of the Book World Megadeal, Dies at 79 – Alexandra Alter and Elizabeth A. Harris, New York Times – Bob Barnett was a fascinating player in the book world, essentially functioning as a high-powered literary agent but being paid as a lawyer. Among his many clients were the Bushes, the Clintons, the Obamas, James Patterson, Mary Higgins Clark, and Khaled Hosseini.

Reading Rainbow Returns With New Host and Celebrity Guest Stars – Rachel Raposas, People – Reading Rainbow is returning, with Mychel Threets, known on TikTok as Mychel the Librarian, taking the helm.

S&S Launches Crossover Romance Imprint – Sam Spratford, Publishers Weekly – True “crossover” imprints straddling Young Adult and New Adult are increasingly A Thing.

Book Club Scams Are a Warning of Emerging AI Super-Scams – Jason Sanford, Genre Grapevine – If you received some over-the-top praise about your self-published book (including from someone impersonating me) you’re probably being scammed. Author Jason Sanford intentionally took the bait to see how these scammers attempt to draw people in with a hefty dose of A.I.

William Morris and the Ideal Book – Michael John Goodman, Print – A very cool look at artist/designer William Morris’s influence on book design.

Can Set Up and Backstory Actually Work in Chapter One? – Donald Maass, Writer Unboxed – Can you open with setup? Yes, if it has some impact on the protagonist in the scene at hand.

This New Garlic-Scented Book Wards Off Vampires While You Read – Angel Saunders, People – Jennifer L. Armentrout and Hellmann’s are producing a book that smells like garlic, which will go down as a case study on just how bananas marketing ideas need to be to gain traction in the year of our TikTok 2025.

This week in bestsellers

Here are the top five NY Times bestsellers in a few key categories. (All links are affiliate links):

Adult print and e-book fiction:

  1. Alchemised by SenLinYu
  2. The Primal of Blood and Bone by Jennifer L. Armentrout
  3. The Secret of Secrets by Dan Brown
  4. Circle of Days by Ken Follett
  5. Tourist Season by Brynne Weaver

Adult print and e-book nonfiction:

  1. 107 Days by Kamala Harris
  2. Poems & Prayers by Matthew McConaughey
  3. Awake by Jen Hatmaker
  4. Confronting Evil by Bill O’Reilly and Josh Hammer
  5. Softly, As I Leave You by Priscilla Beaulieu Presley with Mary Jane Ross

Young adult hardcover:

  1. Hour of the Pumpkin Queen by Megan Shepherd
  2. Thorn Season by Kiera Azar
  3. A Stepping of Blood by Hafsah Faizal
  4. A Theory of Dreaming by Ava Reid
  5. Hekate: The Witch by Nikita Gill

Middle grade hardcover:

  1. The Court of the Dead by Rick Riordan and Mark Oshiro
  2. The Poisoned King by Katherine Rundell
  3. Wonder by R.J. Palacio
  4. Troubling Tonsils by Aaron Reynolds
  5. Pocket Bear by Katherine Applegate

This week on the blog

In case you missed them, here are this week’s posts:

And keep up with the discussion in all the places!

And finally:

OpenAI’s Sora Makes Disinformation Extremely Easy and Extremely Real – Tiffany Hsu, Stuart A. Thompson, and Steven Lee Myers, New York Times – Noted cancer curer Sam Altman and OpenAI have unleashed A.I. slop at scale with its new social app Sora. Good luck to all of us.

Have a great weekend!

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Photo: Yeule at The Belasco, Los Angeles. Follow me on Instagram!

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