Fascinating news: Google is becoming, in essence, a digital bookshop.

Google Signs a Deal to e-Publish Out-of-Print Books – NYTimes.com reports:

“Last week, American authors and publishers reached an agreement with Google to settle lawsuits over Google’s Book Search program, which scans millions of books and makes their contents available on the Internet. The deal lets Google sell electronic versions of copyrighted works that have gone out of print.”

It will be interesting to see where this initiative is a decade from today. Perhaps books will never go out of print; they’ll always be available.

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Sadly, Michael Crichton is no longer with us. He’ll be missed. I’ve never yet been disappointed when reading one of his novels, and I’ve some of his books several times.

My favorite is Timeline, a book which takes you back to the Middle Ages and is, in my opinion, the best time travel novel ever.

An Appraisal – Michael Crichton – Builder of Windup Realms That Thrillingly Run Amok – NYTimes.com says:

“Michael Crichton, who died on Tuesday at the age of 66, was like a character in a Michael Crichton novel. He was unusually tall (6 feet 7 inches), strikingly handsome and encyclopedically well informed about everything from dinosaurs to medieval banquet halls to nanotechnology.”

If you’re writing a book, you may think that you need an agent.

However, for some writers, a literary lawyer makes more sense.

FT.com / Arts & weekend / Magazine – The Washington insider who made Obama rich reports:

“Barnett’s business model doesn’t suit all authors. ‘I probably get 50 proposals a year I don’t make sense for,’ he concedes happily. ‘I make no sense for a first-time novelist in Vermont who’s going to get a $10,000 advance. I make better sense for Bill Clinton or Tony Blair or James Patterson.’ In the case of Patterson, who dependably produces eight best-selling novels a year (only actually writing a portion of them), the savings can run into tens of millions. Patterson, a former ad executive whose books earned $50m in the past year alone – only J.K. Rowling made more – left his third agent for Barnett early last year. And he probably doesn’t even need the full treatment.”

Fascinating article.

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Self-help queen Louise Hay is a publishing phenomenon, with her own publishing house.

Read this excellent article Louise Hay – Hay House – Publishing – Books – Authors – You Can Heal Your Life – New Age – New York Times which reports:

“LOUISE HAY IS ONE OF THE BEST-SELLING AUTHORS IN HISTORY, and none of the women who have sold more — like J. K. Rowling, Danielle Steel and Barbara Cartland — owned a publishing empire. They did not change the spiritual landscape of America and several of its Western allies. They were not pregnant at 15 and they did not lack high-school diplomas. Finer writers they may have been (depending on your taste), and wealthier women, but it would be hard to argue that any was more interesting than Louise Hay.”

I love the self-help field – it’s one area where you can turn the lemons which life hands you into lemonade, using your writing skills.

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Harry Potter publisher Bloomsbury has some unhappy authors.

Bloomsbury authors revolt over Harry Potter – Telegraph reports:

“One of their bestselling authors said: ‘I wouldn’t place another book with them.

‘They treat you with complete disregard and I know of four other writers who are very discontented.’”

Joanna Trollope has moved to Transworld, and the publisher has paid vast sums for celebrity “books” – viz “Gary Barlow, the singer with boy band Take That, received a £1 million advance for his autobiography, while the young boxer, Amir Khan, was said to have received £400,000 for his memoirs.”