The Booksellers Association of the U.K. & Ireland is launching a Summer Books catalogue, "providing independent booksellers with a bespoke marketing and sales resource for the summer trading season." A joint venture between the BA and Nielsen in partnership with wholesaler Gardners, the initiative, modeled on the format of the popular Christmas Books catalogue, will feature titles chosen by indie booksellers for indie bookshops and their customers. It is set to be in stores by mid-May.
Emma Bradshaw, head of campaigns at the BA, said, "It continues to be a challenging time for the industry, and we hope that this resource will help booksellers to navigate the shifting retail landscape this summer. With bookshops hopefully open and trading, and customers seeking holiday reading, the Summer Catalogue will deliver the best of summer titles to bookshop customers."
Matthew Mansfield, head of business development at Nielsen, added: "On the back of a record-breaking year for the Christmas Catalogue, with 163 indie booksellers participating, we feel it is an ideal time to release a new marketing tool for independent bookshops and publishers. In these testing times, we believe this will drive sales both physical and online, and are confident this will help contribute towards a thriving summer for the book market."
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"Amid the flurry of pandemic-driven retail closures," the Zall Bookstore, an outlet for Chinese-language titles, opened this week at Wheelock Place in Singapore, "near where the iconic Borders flagship was located till its closure in 2011," Straits Times reported. The shop is the first overseas branch for Zall, which operates four bookshops in Hubei, China.
Zall Bookstores was founded in 2013 by billionaire Yan Zhi, a writer and poet. His daughter Laura Yan Ge is general manager of the Singapore store. At a media preview last week, she said, "Because of Covid-19, there is a lot of distance between people nowadays. We believe books will help to close this gap. They provide food for thought and people can use them to widen their worlds.... Many small independent bookstores have closed due to the pandemic, and I think that is a great pity. I hope there will continue to be many more physical bookstores in the future."
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| Julia Marshall | |
Publisher Julia Marshall was named the 2021 Storylines Margaret Mahy Medal recipient for lifetime achievement and distinguished contribution to New Zealand children's literature. Storylines noted that Marshall has been described as "a truly innovative and fearless publisher [whose] standards of excellence never waver," with a record of being innovative and brave--no more so than when starting Gecko Press in 2005.
"She began by selecting other quality titles previously unpublished in English, and has continued her approach to publishing quality literature for young people over the last 16 years," Storylines said. "More recently, she began publishing titles as te reo Māori editions."
Marshall is also strongly supportive of local writers and the New Zealand children's literature community. Over the past two years she has been president of the Publishers Association of New Zealand, and part of the PANZ/NZSA/CNZLA Copyright Working Group set up to protect the rights of writers and illustrators. --Robert Gray