somersault

USA TODAY (@USATODAY) reports on one author, Amanda Hocking, who became frustrated in trying to find a traditional publisher to accept her young-adult paranormal novels. So last year she published them herself in the ebook format.

By May she was selling hundreds; by June, thousands. She sold 164,000 books in 2010. Most were low-priced (99 cents to $2.99) digital downloads.

More astounding: This January she sold more than 450,000 copies of her 9 titles. More than 99% were ebooks.

In fact, her Trylle Trilogy will debut in the top 50 of USA TODAY’s Best-Selling Books list on Thursday! Truly book publishing and distribution is changing. How can Somersault help you navigate these waters?

Read this article in full.

On The Nervous Breakdown (@TNBtweets), J.E. Fishman (@JEFISHMAN) scans the bookstore trade and hazards to forecast its fate in this world of digital publishing:

1. Superstores will shrink in number.

2. Non-book merchandise will consume half the bookstore.

3. More independents will die.

4. Google eBooks will not save independents.

5. Independents will succeed by going into the experience business.

6. Booksellers will charge admission and split the fee with visiting authors.

7. Booksellers will go forth, projecting their expertise into the community.

8. Publishers will open “bookstores” again.

Read this article in full.

The Washington Post’s On Faith section (@onfaith) has an article by Michelle Boorstein about the status of Christian bookstores today. Here’s an excerpt:

Although religious retail tends to be more resilient during tough economic times, the market is in tremendous flux. After several decades of intense growth in Christian books, music and films, there have been no religious blockbusters in the past couple of years to drive sales during the holiday - a time religious retailers rely upon even more than their secular counterparts.

Thousands of Christian bookstores - long the backbone of the religious retail industry - have closed in the past decade. A good part of the churn is happening in retail generally as sales go online and become more competitive and more segmented. Religious music sales have been hit hard by digital sales (and piracy).

Read this in full.

Because of the current news swirling about a Florida pastor and his actions toward the Koran (or the alternate spelling Qur'an), we thought you may be interested in seeing a collection of published books, available through ChristianBook.com, that explain the Koran and its role in Islamic belief. Here's the list. And here's a list of books dealing with the broader topic of Islam.

You may also be interested in reading the Christianity Today interview with Lawrence Wright, subject of the HBO documentary My Trip to al-Qaeda.

If you weren't able to get to this year's International Christian Retail Show in St. Louis (and even if you were), you'll want to read about it from literary agent Chip MacGregor's always insightful viewpoint: http://bit.ly/dBVZ7B