[inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations] good evening. Im bradley graham, coowner politics prose along with my wife, and lissa muscatine, whos standing back there on behalf of the entire staff here thank you her image for coming. I had a terrific panel for you this evening on a new book by peter ginna, right here, titled what editors do the art, craft and business of editing. Politics and post although politics politics prose owes many others this year its not nearly as common for us to host the experts behind those authors are the editors, publishers and agents he was at efforts are essential to the books. Peter himself with more than three decades has had a range of editing positions. His work with the small independent Publishing Firm and a scholarly run as well as with the large commercial houses. Most of his time in thin trade publishing. Most recently publisher and editorial director of bloomsbury press, an imprint he founded. For his new book coming peter gathered essays for more than two dozen contributors from across the publishing field and row 1 piece himself. The articles take readers through every phase of the production from acquisition to the editing process, to publication and marketing. Later chapters provide case studies and a look at pursuing a career in publishing. The book comes at a time of significant and fastpaced change in the publishing business. The rise of amazon, the advent of ebooks and the growth of selfpublishing opportunities all have attributed to shaking up the industry more in the past 15 years as peter notes in his process than in the previous 50 years. Joining peter on the panel this evening are two other veteran publishing insiders who contributed pieces to what editors do. One is cal morgan on the and here, who after spending many years that a big house, harpercollins, joined this very fine house of riverhead is executive editor. Among the successful authors champion by transistor in his career barack sameday career barack same day, jess walter, emilia gray, Julie Quattro and mitchell asked jackson, just to name a few. His chapter in what editors do is called to start spreading the news about the editor as evangelists. Seated next to him is susan ferber come executive editor at Oxford University press. She has focused much of her acting career on books about history from the ancient to the modern. Among the books and authors she has shepherded our winner is that if you let there price is as well as New York Times bestsellers. Her chapter in a what editors do titled of monographs and magnum opus is is about editing works of scholarship. And speaking of University Press, i should note that what editors do itself is published by one. The university of chicago. Now also joining the discussion this evening in philly now the panel will be kill rock, founder of the Literary Agency and a friend of lissa in mind. People interested in getting a book published often ask how best to go about it. In general, the answer is to find an agent and said to who specializes in nonfiction is as good as they come and also to provide a little truth in advertising, gail is lissas agent for a book lissa is currently writing. Featuring men in welcoming our very accomplished panel. [applause] thank you, brad. It is a thrill for me to be presenting at this store because politics prose has been a great supporter of the kind of books i love to publish antireagan and the authors of mine have had terrific events here, so for me to be up front rather than the stand on thank you, mr. Chairman. In the back to thank you for hosting the panel and thanks for taking the time taking the train in the case of the new yorkers to be here. So we are talking about this book called what editors do. It seems like a straightforward, not to say a obvious title, but one reason i chose it is because they think most people dont understand just what we do with editors. It is our own fault for a business thats all about words, we have some of the most confusing and ambiguous terminology of any industry that i know an editor would be exhibita. When you hear the word editing, you think about a person sitting from and making notes on a manuscript, connecting grammar or maybe making a note for the author to make a shop or shorter, swap these points around, but that is only a small slice of the pie of what an editor actually does. I have come to think of the editors role in the most fundamental way as being a connector. You are the person who makes and facilitates the connection between writer and reader. An old saying in publishing that the editor represents the author to the house and the house to the author and that sort of janusfaced boy is actually a big piece of the editors responsibility. But you also are standing in, representing the reader to the author. You are trying to be that ideal ultimate reader in deciding, helping the author and what gets across most effectively to them. That involves both working on the authors way i was just describing, but also the much broader task of reading the reader to the book, to figure out who those ideal readers are for this particular work and how you get them to read it, to want to read it in the first place. So i see the editors job is raking down into three phases that brad mentioned in his introduction. They all overlap and some take place simultaneously. The first one is acquisition, finding books to publish. In many ways thats the most critical part of the job because if you dont find books to publish, you cant do any of the other things. There is no Publishing House. Second is what i call text development, the classical editing function again when you make note in shaping the actual words, the writing with the author. And finally, there is publication, that part of reading the book out into the marketplace, making readers aware of it in convincing people this is a book that they need to die. I have asked each of our panelists to focus on one of these aspects of editing. Gail is an agent and has a Critical Role to play in the acquisition process, so shes going to talk about what that looks like from her site or susan has rich richer chapter in the book about working with scholarly authors and she has helped many academic writers do their first book for a general audience come which involves often in intensive editorial intervention. So she can talk about that editing piece and cal who has my favorite chapter title in the book, which brad also mention, start spreading the news, about the editors role of conveying his passion about the book out to people as colleagues in the Publishing House and then out into the media and the booksellers in the world atlarge. So he will talk about that piece last. Gail, we are going to turn it over to you. Tell us what agents think about what editors do. [inaudible] [laughter] we love you guys. One of the books i worked on when i first started in the business was by a woman who had a testing device that was far simpler than myersbriggs. It only had four kinds of personalities. She said to me after going around talking to editors in new york that. It is you do bring together the two least complementary parts of her Personality Test and that it was impossible to do what you have to do. So here is to you all. I want to say this is a fantastic book. I read this book and learned lots of things about the process i didnt know and im buying a case in giving it out to each of my new clients because it answers all those questions i wont have to answer any more. In terms of what we do, and we have to know the individual editors. I work on a regular basis for semi regular basis and interact with 100 different people in publishing, 100 different editors, lots more in marketing and such and that requires i think the three most important things to me are smart, talent, passion, responsiveness and those are the things my client wouldve said dont work for the same people because its hard to sit in a room and make a big deal. Those are not complementary things. And so, what i find is the greatest thing for me as i get to know all of these people and i know every press editor in new york. I know their kids names and where their kids are going to school. If im doing a book on summer camp, and thats the passion, most of the people i deal with a birdie made smart responsiveness by working with people. They fall in love with this. I would say in the midwife of the project. We need a partnership because they are that connector. They are everything at the house and they will only do the things that i cant do and that is what i need them to make my client better than my client is. And to follow mild and care can be their advocate all the way through. That is the most fun part coming off the list of people who are the right. Frankly it is hard to start out of this business and so i always tell people to call me and say how can i become an agent to work for the region because those relations are really crucial. It is hard. Its not that they dont want to publish books, but they have to go through so many hoops that you need someone who will fight as hard as i am and as an author is for their work because its tough out there and it the best thing in the Worldwide Networks and even when it doesnt work, when you know youve been in a partnership and not much better work their hardest, all the different parts of the house will be talking about that are and they have to do that to make that acquisition to start with, they have to really love it and learn to love it as much as you do. We will answer questions later. Will answer one question now because you talk about the number of troops that have to be jumped through acquisitions. A lot of people dont understand how complicated and byzantine the process can be. Talk for a minute about what that is like from your side. I work for a long time on a proposal to make it the best they can possibly be in my intent with working on a proposal as an author is to answer and editor and marketing peoples questions before they have been to anticipate what the problems are going to be ms preparing the proposal with authors and editors and figure it out for you and make the job easier. Give you all the ammunition you need and that the proposal in the author to make it simple. You take a proposal and the boss says byatt. Most places you got your editorial meetings. Sometimes they are editorial driven and the publisher loves that. In other places you from sales and marketing and editorial meetings are legendary and a hundred people at a table and you have to go back to an acquisitions meeting after the editorial meeting. They can be byzantine, but when they wanted it can be pretty fast. Right, right. All right, lets ask susan about the actual editing piece of the process. Thank you. I first wanted to say for anyone in the publishing world, politics prose is the super bowl mac. All wrapped up in one store. We know how hard it is to get the feeds because we try to get them for authors. Im especially grateful and feel like i won the Golden Ticket just being here and this is a terrific turnout. I had many hours of transportation where i could get in my own little world just editing and that could be very happy. I work with a lot of firsttime authors, but a lot of authors who lost track of how many things they published. They really require its own diagnosis for what work needs to be done, what work i deal it could be done and what the optimal outcome for the author and the press. Im going to hone and as requested to networking mysterious epidemics and in the field that i work win, which was history there are a lot of them. There arent enough shelves in the start of a number of historians who want to write crossover books or trade books are anything but the dreaded m. Ward, monographs. What does this actually mean and what does it require in terms of editors intervention . Its a different challenge than a nonacademic. They still need to make an intervention in the field or better yet the longheld leave to do anything to move the needle in terms of a conversation happening in academia for a long time. For a general audience the opinions to wear his or her hand lightly and the ideas of how his or her own perspective alters the picture. This is not the place for editing, offering the great intellect and putting someone elses words first, which is the first thing i normally encounter when i see a lot of academics in this kind of writing. This is where scholars often go wrong. Overreliance on secondary sources and theoretical ideas for indecipherable sentences completely out of context and everything written before us in the work appears to be the first the only one ever written on the side check. Things go one direction or the other. Finding the right balance is key not to being perceived as lighter popular much of the time for me the products that i see a crossover book i. D. Idea, but quite hard to develop the ideas in the structure and usually without an agent doing the work before i get to see a. Its a much more organic process of going to the conference of listening to people talk about their ideas and working with them afterward and something i really like im turning point in key figures of the story they may be human, animal, landscape and things that pacing and coloring contacts, they often get much more easily than academics. If im lucky, what i get to review already has all these elements, but most of the time is not the case. Its a rarity in the United States or is that the United States series with an author like richard white. They are to have publishing platforms, quite expensive ones and followers in the arty no they have trade audiences and how to do it. Instead its more likely they will see projects that disembodied torso or virginia andersen summer during the trader a Rosslyn Rosenbergs gina crowe. I swear i dont only at women or American History. A couple of others here at the store. Jeffery stewarts, the new just coming out. Right craze, the cry of the renegade. These are not the authors that come to mind when you think American History or world history. They are not David Maccoll said. They work through these quite a number of times and academic editors dont take the time to do that. A number of us do when its not always a single straightforward at it, but working over these tax to think about the introductions and craft a book that will really bring readers and end that will allow extensively researched, deeply, deeply researched books and products to a larger audience, but not papering over eight years with jargon and not telling us much about the place come a person, motivation as possible. It means figuring out how long of a book for the approach of what it is either definitive biography in advance book, big idea book, synthesizer gigantic narrative history. No one has more time now to sit and read than they did in the past been truly concentrate on the book, so we have to find works that are right size or make them out way. It is easy for readers and reviewers to turn to those they know and love and it needs to be extra good and to be like me, lucky enough to win the Golden Ticket to find true trade success. I think thats a good description of the work by susan does typically with historian, but that process of finding the balance between your expertise and the ignorance of a delayed reader is something that anyone who was an expert in a journalist or a scientist or thinking person and im sure many of you in this room are in one of those categories. What susan has to say and i recommend her chapter highly is quite applicable to things outside of academics or history. Cal, how about telling us about the editor evangelist . I first want to say we all pay tribute to a Little Something at the beginning of our remarks here. My version of that is i wouldnt be sitting in this chair if you work for the guy sitting creatures over. It was peter who was the first verse and whoever hired me into a publishing job. I was thinking after he did not, i was tired to be his assistant in the assisting to the guy who ran the company we were both working for. A short time later i came across my resume on peters dust, which was still around and around on the top of it, specs, which is how he remembered which guy i was. Which i guess is the impression that i made. The spec wearing young graduate right out of school who came and sat down in peters office really came to that of room to talk about doing the job that susan talk about, to talk about the on the page editor, to see whether its possible to realize the great dream of a twentysomething year old kid to spend all day long working with words and working with authors and selling more and more rooms that look like my bedroom for this room or what have you, just full of books that somebody would read. The great joy of my first year or two in the company where we both worked, which was state Martins Press at the time was that it was a place where the young editor you could again to do that very quickly. One of the things if any of you do when i hope any of you will buy the book and spend some time skimming through peters book is how many, before you even listen, once they bought it [laughter] one of the things you will find right away is how many people in the book who are in many cases sort of prominent position started out at saint Martins Press and the reason for that was it was a place where young editors could begin to acquire books very quickly without a lot of rhyme or reason necessarily sometimes based purely on passion for the books and based purely on the small fact that they wanted to take that there may be an audience out there for this first novel award this book on a small subject, it is rare. I was able fairly quickly to start doing not and i had a little bit of a sobering sort of second shoe drop about a year after i bought my first couple of books, which is that i did all of the stuff we talked about. I nurtured the authors that i worked with the manuscripts. I thought enormously proud that these books were doing the thing i wanted them to do. I thought great, my work is done and i will carry on and hand these books off to the Marketing Department and go back to my work, which is, is. And then nothing happened. I thought what is the piece of this process but i have missed . What have i done or failed to do to ignite the marketing and publicity and sales machine behind these books in a way that meant that they were suddenly the talk of the town in washington or new york or what have you that they were getting out there and having a successful publication. The ceo and editorial director of saint Martins Press at that time in peter and i both said minter guy. Tom looked at me from the other end of a very long cigar that he used at a bit of an argument as a tool and weapon and when he was still about in the office at that time and they ran the whole company so he could do what he wanted in his office. He looked at me and said youve just learned the secret of publishing, which is that an editor is not just an editor. An editor has to be the associate publisher of all of these books. He probably said his even know half of its editors were women. He probably said his. That sounds great. Am i getting a raise . Sounds like a wanted job title. That means you have a set of responsibilities you completely neglect that you have to begin to learn. Those responsibilities are the secret key to launching authors could we as editors acquire books that would bring them into the Publishing House. We nurture them, edit them, work with the authors, but the thing that makes them connect when they do connect in the world is a vision for how to reach the audience and that is based by rick that we ignite with the Raw Materials that the author brings in. We are the people who start the fire. As i was thinking about the way to describe in the book, the image that came to me was the thing that happens to me when we discover a new project is a little bit like a religious conversion, has a subtitle the editor evangelist. When we go home at night with a new manuscript, we read it, fall in love with it. We then have to do a very strange, quick job of educating our job of finding a way in very short words, probably shorter than im using right now because im sure im eating into the time to describe to everybody else why it is a lovable book, like an important book on embraceable book, a book the publisher should find it now becomes what is effectively the conversion narrative, and that the editor brings into the publisher to get the publisher to acquire the book. And then that conversion narrative carries on to the rest of the process and becomes a script that the editor shares with publicity, with marketing, with Sales Department so that they all see what the path looks like. They all learn how to fall in love with it the same way we do so that when the book then finally lands on store shelves like these, it is packaged in the right way, being promoted in the right way, being written about on the back of the book the right way so that when you folks walk in the doors as consumers come the Authority Heard of the book him a seat in the right place in the stores and you are to know that you fall in love with it because the conversion narrative has reached you in a way. That is a big unknown part of what we do, a part that towards your point is very, very difficult to reconcile sometimes at the bash word people we are as editors, but it could not be more important to the success of our book and our authors. Right, i think editors come a lot of us get into the business for introverted reason and then you have to go out and be pretty extroverted on behalf of your books was to bring them out into the world. Just one correction to what rad said. I have a couple of chapters in this book in the introduction and conclusion and also a chapter about acquisitions in the image that comes to my mind and starts in the chapter is there was a spark. When you read something as an editor and you feel a spark, it is sent me about the plot grips you are it might be the authors way of writing grips you are all of the above for maybe a topic they are really interested in the near like this is the book that tiles that story. You feel that spark in yourself. You keep flipping the pages faster and you come to the end of it and you feel like this is it. This is one of the ones im going to go down the hallways. The beginning of that conversion narrative that youre going to Say Something about this. Im sure you feel it. One year or three years i have that to waiting for the final draft. But also live with that author for many books and many years this work had to do with the writer so that you want to invest in your after year and hoping that passion that you have sustained the rest that they will break through. We should open it up to some questions we can go on to pontificate about publishing on the drop of a hat but i am happy to take questions. That was lovely. There has been some quick changes and that seems like something that happened to publishing so what do you want to change about it. I wouldnt necessarily say those changes happen to publishing some of them did and some publishers were resistant to those changes that they affected the industry so much but publishers i think in a lot of ways it took a while to figure out how to do it but now they publicize on social media or using the ebooks very effectively. If we dont necessarily like those changes but what i would love to see is for the industry at large to make more of an effort to bring people into reading to make as big a part of that culture and that is the demand on peoples attention. This isnt something publishing can do alone but publishers have a vested interest to help society and to keep up with the new cycle and to keep pace that doesnt lead to longterm thinking with the history of the longterm roots that people will sit and read with print books a long time so it is easy to get turned on and not be able to concentrate anymore other questions . I have a particular wish for the future that every person who comes into the independent bookstore if they buy their books online. [applause] everybody across the country needs to take my pledge. Absolutely. I have the privilege of having peter edit both of my book and if i could discuss they could persuade if they talk about editors working to persuade authors from different angles of a particular chapter during the writing process. I am happy to talk about that. Do you guys want to step up to that . A lot of times, longterm reading with that editorial letter first we were extremely excited to get the feedback maybe i will cancel the book but then if we come back to it, a lot of times the chapter that doesnt fit in there somewhere that it came from maybe it is a better article or a different approach so at the end of the day the company name is on the side or the acknowledgment it is the authors book and then to say why that would be better as a result it isnt reaching me the way that i thought it would. So instead of saying this is awful it shows how it can be better. But it is much easier to do when it is 50000 words over. When there no way we can get this down. But it is something that is really important with the editing process. This is one of the reasons why i use the word arch or craft in the subtitle and one of the things hardest part of editing is as an editor you have to align yourself with author sensibility and bring yourself in to understand what is this book trying to do or what is it trying to be . That isnt always something the author fully understands as he or she is writing it. So i get asked this question you have to argue with the authors to make them make changes or they get mad at you. I almost have never found that because my whole effort as an editor is to say here is what i think this chapter is trying to do in this is the best way i can identify why that isnt happening anything if you do this it will achieve it better. If you are right and the author understands you know where the manuscript is going is to make the changes. On my way down here working on the editorial letter sitting on Union Station two hours ago and they make the point to understand nearly as well as the author does so to replicate the actions of those who know nothing about it at all. So for them to bring mom be entertained or captivated while also working for the reader to ensure there is a seamless experience that is a balance beam type of thing so it is a famous quote but never trust a teller to tell a tale. Maybe personally you are out of sync but what he or she is writing and then to make those right kinds of edits. You spent months or years finally gets to the publication and release so do you wish anything we would do differently with the movies. We honestly have an interest. Please put all of mine in the front. [laughter] i will say from the editors perspective, one of the happiest and most surprising things about the bookselling part is in the past ten years and that because of social media and a bigger and more cultivated culture of readings and events with author centered longterm promotions there is a conversation out there that did not use to exist. So that last little piece is the fact in the old days when we learn to be associated publishers so it would and when the book was out the door. So now we are in the case that there is a transparency there but that there is just more activity going in support of books not that illusion over the last 36 hours it was availed the book was done. I have been so impressed by the new generation of those indie booksellers who learn from a store like this who has been doing it right for a long time and is making that bookstore culture and indispensable part of Community Culture to have outward looking stores. Other questions . I am a book reader and spent about one third of my life in this bookstore. I only live two blocks away luckily. [laughter] so my question is i say why in the world does this book exist . [laughter] who will read this . Who wrote that . We think the same thing. [laughter] the only thing i can respond that could be different we work for University Press our mission is to disseminate information and because the press is so old it doesnt happen unless there is a journal or something that has to have added to its core that will be a commercially successful book. Many of those in that critical sense they sell very few copies to the esoteric audience because that sits at the center and that is different where it is all about the money. Really it is a critical part. And with the literary agents they do an important job for people to filter out what gets to us. [laughter] and what distinguishes a really good agent is when you get a proposal or a manuscript from her you know she is not wasting her time. Or another book on the subject that has already been done. It is kind of what you talk about with a failing of publishers in general sometimes they are a herd animal so lets publish something that was successful before. I remember being at an editorial meeting when i worked at a big corporate Publishing House when serial killer novels were a big thing. This is the downside of success and everybody had to have serial killer novels and we published many of them where i was. Why wasnt this new book on the list be sold to the Literary Guild . The director said i talked to the editor and she said we already have 51 serial killer novels under contract which made me think 52 would have killed you . [laughter] so then why would you stop at 51 . So imagine what there was at that time with the glut maybe it is surprising everybody wants to have Something Like that the important thing that i learned from academic publishing is they have to go through a peerreviewed process but in susans publishing Publishing House does not get out unless some people who really know about the subject say this is something that has worthwhile to say people in my field like linguistics will want to know that they have to reckon with this book when it comes out. And i learned myself that the importance of who needs to read this book . To identify the reader and you say this is so wellwritten i could not put it down so who are you going to sell it to . How do they get to know about it . That is a good question that editors ask other the question why is this here . None of the major publishers so i would start in this business it is what the publishers acquired to be the best sellers maybe they are happy or developing an author than those are the books that are in every store in america every day of the week whether shakespeare or to kill a mockingbird. So those sell year after year all you pay for is the paper not publicity cost but today there are very few of those books published many are not doing that well they thought they would be when they were acquired nobody is trying to publish that list. But it used to be you could sell a lot of books now it is a problem so nobody is trying to publish bad books. I had a friend that worked on a Publishing House they brought in the Consulting Firm to decide what they should be doing better or differently so the consultant said you should only publish the bestsellers. [laughter] how are you doing . To publishers like the short story collections . That varies from house to house and i think it still happens now and again but probably not as often as it used to. When i got into publishing with a Small Literary house i let that slush pile religiously every week. The slush pile is what the literal stack. We are not getting past that line. And say we have heard stories to be discovered in the slush pile and that is what i would find but what i rapidly learned is the slush pile is full of slush. People who dont have more of a clue than to send their manuscript to the editor University Press harpercollins are not likely to have those mental abilities to be a writer of a full link the book. It occasionally happens at least through reading the acknowledgments of the books to see who the editor is and say i saw you were the editor and that book is fabulous. But i hope they might be interested in mind for the following reasons. So the slush pile is a big idea to send that in. But the point im trying to make is authors and riders in a time when there were not many other ways to be noted by publisher. There are a lot of riders. Finding myself drawn to a lot with the first novelist because we were following her for several years online. With a nicely packaged submission i started to read her. So that hurdle for a young writer to get published now to get in front of editors like us is entirely different. So we will be due if the material is out there and you find a way through friends that are associated in some way. It doesnt feel like a Charity Project with a needle in the haystack. Nowadays we have a medium and people self publishing their books. And blogs and if you write really good stuff you can get an audience it wont necessarily get you a publishing contract but people are we spying on responding to what you write. I want to be a contrary and i see the slush pile and submissions it is a very large number i take in all kinds of projects with that opening line or the advisor suggested that they write to me there are awardwinning books coming out of there are those that come up to me with conferences and usually it is what we pick up after going through dozens of projects at a time. I dont care what the letter says at all. This is really good. I am wondering. I will let other people go first. I could tell that story from most every book i have worked on. One of the nice things about starting out as an editor with a general interest house i was looking for a subject that i grew up loving some of the first books i worked on were biographies of film directors or musicians. There was a certain type of fiction that i liked when a novel crossed my desk with miracle writing or punctuation. With a 500 page novel it was a 500 page suicide note at the end of the day he decides not to kill himself. Nobody got there but me by the way. [laughter] but i would have that experience i cannot stop thinking about this book are stop talking about it. That is the spark i was talking about with that experience that i had that we say at one time or another to read a manuscript at a time in hawaii have never been there so i read this manuscript going out from california where she grew up to hawaii and she conveyed that to me. I thought hawaii. How did i not know . And i was completely captivated by the book. It made me interested in something i didnt think i was interested in so to convey her passion so effectively those are the happy surprises if you know you are interested in film directors if it is john ford or Buster Keaton but if you are ideally looking and suddenly you say i never thought about this, this is the most joyous experience as an editor. Starting as publisher i inherited a lot of projects you dont know the reason not to get a book done was for otherwise a version of my dog eat my homework but they were not like stepchildren but became children every bit of there being was part of that book that they would outlive them by decades and i knew that but with print on demand we dont have that anymore but knowing the author did not want to leave the earth without the book done. You said the editors name appears on the book do you think that it shed . [laughter] im worried about the spectrum of how much writing there is i know there was an edited version from hemingway it was a full page describing somebody leaving the room it was crossed out and he said he left. [laughter] do you feel that you do too much of the work or how much you feel you are rewriting . When you have been at the business for a while and our senior enough to have more choice in those projects that you acquire and then to inherit a project with a serial killer novel and nothing i could have done but starting out sometimes you have to take books that are not as well well written and make a contribution but as the authors book you shouldnt try to rewrite the book yourself or you were doing it wrong. Every instinct to say i really like this maybe i havent gotten over that but to sit with a perfect manuscript i have never seen such a thing. It would be easier to write rewrite this myself and a note to the author to explain how to do it and i have been in that situation. There are stories that are hairraising to the effect in editor did exactly that then the book is reviewed and the review says either this one paragraph was so embarrassing or the greatest ever. [laughter] then the author calls that is one of the reason to be careful. Just to wrap this up i will sound like a complete novice but now having seen the business running the bookstore and having the fund to work with gail one of these that has struck me, i do bye for those Publishing Houses about this entire industry that is infuriating and perplexing on the one hand it is one of the few industries that passion is in the metric. But from working on a proposal with a great agent who has kicked my butt for months and good enough to be turned into a book that he meet with the editors and publishers yes they have to throw money around but it is about a belief that is rarely the metric in this day and age we get dozens of book each week on our desks that publishers and editors send us advance copies we cannot possibly read all of them. They come with a robotic letter that says dear bookseller you should love this blah blah blah. But if i get a handwritten note or a personal note from an editor to say i really want you to read this book because whatever. I will pay very close attention. That is another gut instinct Publishing Houses have representatives that meet with various stores in the regions they go through a minuet you should order 12 copies do you think it will sell that much may be only for maybe you should order 24 but they have to win our trust and we have to show them we know what we are doing it is a gut instinct so one of the great things passion of the editors and publishers and the readers and the booksellers. [laughter] [applause] this book was reviewed a couple weeks ago and i was very flattered to see if there with the american editors and british editors and i made an emphasis in my writing to say often it is romanticized or glamorized but i would try to explain in this book but i hope it came through that we are only in this business because we love reading just like the people who come to the bookstore. And that is what keeps us coming back again and again. [applause] thanks for being here. Thanks for the questions. Dont go home and order. [laughter] [inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations]
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