Amazon founder guts books coverage at WaPo (This week in books)

This week! Books!

Bookshop.org Teams with Draft2Digital – Ed Nawotka, Publishers Weekly – I want to start with the good news first. Independent online bookseller Bookshop.org has partnered with e-book distributor Draft2Digital to make self-published e-books available for sale via Bookshop. If you haven’t already canceled your Amazon Prime and ditched the Kindle ecosystem, now would be a great time to do so! How to Write a Novel and Jacob Wonderbar are now available for sale as e-books on Bookshop.

Washington Post lays off one-third of its newsroom – Allie Canal, Suzy Khimm and Daniel Arkin, NBC News – Amazon founder Jeff Bezos’ immolation of the Washington Post continues apace, and the entire books department was among this week’s wreckage. It’s not the first time the Washington Post has gutted its books section (they killed it before in 2009), but it’s still a very depressing domino. Let’s not fool ourselves, we’re living through a concerted effort from the billionaire class to strangle free discourse by acquiring and controlling news and social media outlets.

I’ve Been Laid Off. I’m Not Done. – Ron Charles, Substack – Beloved books columnist and reviewer Ron Charles was among the casualties, so now’s the time to subscribe to his new Substack. He already gamely put up a Friday newsletter.

Why Literature Needs a Punk Rock Mindset – Lincoln Michel, Counter Craft – As books institutions fracture, author Lincoln Michel argues for a punk-rock “DIY or die” ethos.

What Happens When Books Aren’t News – Adam Kirsch, The Atlantic – Adam Kirsch notes that there’s no shortage of interesting coverage of books and sees the closure of the Post books section as a story of the continued disaggregation of media, which degrades the ecosystem for readers and reviewers.

Scholastic’s NEXT Line to Start Up This Fall – Sally Lodge, Publishers Weekly – In a further sign of the downward pressure on word counts in the publishing industry, Scholastic is launching a new line of middle grade novels with snappy plots and low page counts.

When Should You Stop Querying a Book? – Kate McKean, Agents + Books – Agent and author Kate McKean tackles an age old question about when to call last chance saloon for your query.

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. Dear Debbie by Freida McFadden
2. Theo of Golden by Allen Levi
3. The Correspondent by Virginia Evans
4. Heated Rivalry by Rachel Reid
5. Pendergast: The Beginning by Douglas Preston and Lincoln Child

Adult print and e-book nonfiction:

1. The Invisible Coup by Peter Schweizer
2. Strangers by Belle Burden
3. The Body Keeps the Score by Bessel van der Kolk
4. Where We Keep the Light by Josh Shapiro with Emily Jane Fox
5. 1929 by Andrew Ross Sorkin

Young adult hardcover:

1. Fake Skating by Lynn Painter
2. If Only I Had Told Her by Laura Nowlin
3. Dragon Cursed by Elise Kova
4. Wings of Starlight by Allison Saft
5. Better Than the Movies by Lynn Painter

Middle grade hardcover:

1. Wonder by R.J. Palacio
2. Growing Home by Beth Ferry
3. The Complete Cookbook for Young Chefs by America’s Test Kitchen Kids
4. The Court of the Dead by Rick Riordan and Mark Oshiro
5. Pocket Bear by Katherine Applegate

This week on the blog

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

• Words pull us through to the future

And keep up with the discussion in all the places!

• Follow me on Bluesky
• Check out the Bransforums

And finally:

CBS News’ Star Hire Hung With Epstein as Baby Son Fought for Life – Laura Esposito, The Daily Beast – It’s hard to even know where to start with the deluge of new Jeffrey Epstein revelations (including the fact that Epstein played a key role in triggering the 2008 financial crisis), but spare some outrage for Bari Weiss’s new CBS hire Peter Attia, who was busy hanging out with Epstein while his baby son was in the ICU after a cardiac arrest. Despite Attia sending an email to Epstein where he gushed, “You [know] the biggest problem with becoming friends with you? The life you lead is so outrageous, and yet I can’t tell a soul…,” Weiss chose to keep him on board. Lovely stuff.

Have a great weekend!

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