In the week leading up to the Australian Booksellers Association 2018 conference, June 17-18, Books+Publishing is interviewing each of the five shortlisted nominees for Young Bookseller of the Year. In the third installment, Dani Solomon, assistant manager at Readings Kids in Melbourne, answered the question:
Where would you like to be in five (or 10, or 20) years’ time? And what do you hope the industry will look like then?
I would like to still be where I am right now and doing what I do now, but be even better at it!
As for the industry, I hope it continues to publish more diverse books, particularly in children’s publishing. We need to get as much diversity of cultures, bodies, families (and more) out there as possible. For instance, there is a laughably small amount of children’s books with divorced parents available for kids right now--it’s 2018, someone address this!
Other than that I very much hope the industry keeps growing and remains flexible and open, and that GST is abolished on books.