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The bestseller who made $49,000 last year (This week in books)

March 13, 2026 by Nathan Bransford 1 Comment

This week! Books! What Do You Do and What Do You Make? – New York Magazine – This fascinating snapshot of how much money various people in NYC make sent many tongues wagging, particularly the New York Times bestselling author with 800,000+ Instagram followers, who made $49,000 last year, roughly the same amount as a […]

Filed Under: This Week in Books Tagged With: Alexandra Alter, Casey Newton, Chang Che, Grammarly, Greg Greeley, James Patterson, Jim Milliot, Kate McKean, Miles Klee, Mr. Beast, publishing industry, Simon & Schuster, Vauhini Vara, Walter Marsh

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

February 6, 2026 by Nathan Bransford

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 […]

Filed Under: This Week in Books Tagged With: Adam Kirsch, Allie Canal, Bari Weiss, Bookshop.org, Daniel Arkin, Ed Nawotka, Jeff Bezos, Jeffrey Epstein, Kate McKean, Laura Esposito, Lincoln Michel, Peter Attia, Ron Charles, Sally Lodge, Suzy Khimm

The chill over the publishing world (This week in books)

January 16, 2026 by Nathan Bransford

This week! Books! Trump’s return chills embattled LGBTQ book industry: ‘They’re stepping back’ – Surina Venkat, The Hill / What if Editors Don’t Want <Your Kind of Book> Anymore? – Kate McKean, Agents + Books – We’ve long suspected that book bans and censorship have cast a chill over the publishing world, particularly on the […]

Filed Under: This Week in Books Tagged With: A.I., Alia Hanna Habib, Bookstores, Censorship, Claire Kirch, David Marchese, George Saunders, Jim Milliot, John Kaag, Kate McKean, Rachel Kahan, Rachel Reid, Rebecca Newberger Goldstein, Surina Venkat, Wiley

The best book covers of 2025 (This week in books)

December 13, 2025 by Nathan Bransford

This week! Books! A day late! The 173 Best Book Covers of 2025 – Emily Temple, Lit Hub – Always one of my favorite features of the year! The winner is an absolute stunner. Sophie Kinsella, ‘Confessions of a Shopaholic’ Author, Dies at 55 – Sopan Deb, New York Times – The tremendously influential Madeleine […]

Filed Under: This Week in Books Tagged With: A.I., Allison K Williams, Bethanne Patrick, Book covers, Carolyn Kellogg, Emily Temple, Entangled, Jonathan Slotkin, Kate McKean, Katy Hershberger, KPop Demon Hunters, Mark Athitakis, Nicholas G. Miller, Oxford University Press, Sam Spratford, Scholastic, Sopan Deb, Sophie Kinsella

Has the Big 5 become the Big 6? (This week in books)

November 21, 2025 by Nathan Bransford

This week! Books! Sourcebooks Cracks the Big Five – Katy Hershberger, Publishers Lunch – Lots of caveats here, as Sourcebooks is 75% owned by behemoth Penguin Random House, and as Jane Friedman noted in her newsletter, they do quite a few print deals with self-published authors who retain e-book rights. But it’s still a pretty […]

Filed Under: This Week in Books Tagged With: A.I., Alice Wong, Catherine Pearson, Clay Risen, Daniel Yadin, Dennis Zhou, Eliza Clark, Elon Musk, Jay Foreman, Jessa Crispin, Josh Taylor, Kate McKean, Katy Hershberger, Katy Waldman, Kelly Burke, Mark Cooper-Jones, Rebecca Makkai, Romantasy, Scams, Solvej Balle, Sourcebooks

Are we in a book affordability crisis? (This week in books)

October 24, 2025 by Nathan Bransford

This week! Books! I’m still catching up after being out of town for a bit, so just links this week, but I’m hoping to return to a normal blogging cadence next week! Army of Bots: Deeper Into the Vortex of Nigerian Marketing Scams – Victoria Strauss, Writer Beware Book Bans Continue to Threaten the Wellbeing […]

Filed Under: This Week in Books Tagged With: Censorship, Jane Friedman, Jim Milliot, Karis Rogerson, Kate McKean, Leigh Stein, Liam O'Donoghue, Manvir Singh, Maris Kreizman, R. Nassor, Victoria Strauss, Writer Beware

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About Nathan

Hi, I’m Nathan. I’m the author of How to Write a Novel and the Jacob Wonderbar series, which was published by Penguin. I used to be a literary agent at Curtis Brown Ltd. and I’m dedicated to helping authors achieve their dreams. Let me help you with your book!

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How to Write A Novel
Cover of How to Publish a Book by Nathan Bransford
Jacob Wonderbar and the Cosmic Space Kapo
Jacob Wonderbar for President of the Universe
Jacob Wonderbar and the Interstellar Time Warp
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