Episode 57: How the Pandemic is Changing Publishing
As the world gets used to the new normal of living through a global pandemic, the Book Friends Forever reunite this week to talk about how things are going in each other’s lives. This episode was recorded on March 30th so by the time you are reading this, things will have changed even more. Also, if you have a moment, please rate and review the BFF’s on Apple Podcasts! Once they hit 50 of either, (whichever comes first) there will be a drawing and a chance to be a guest on the podcast! Thank you in advance!
“How are you doing!?
Alvina has been doing ok and notes that she is settling in to the “new normal” way of life. She discussed how it’s better when they set the guidelines for social distancing farther out instead of two weeks at a time. In her mind, she is planning to quarantine until the end of May at least. It’s interesting to her that her social life is actually busier than before because of all the people reaching out from all over the place. It will be interesting to see how long it all lasts.
Some of her days still includes zoom brunch, a virtual zoom dance party, and zoom yoga!
Grace has been super busy as well! She wonders how some people are saying they have all this time for binge watching! She’s trying to balance working with homeschooling and that’s been getting much better but is still challenging.
Book Recs:
Just to name a few…..
Alvina would like to recommend two adult books:
Stay Sexy and Don’t Get Murdered by Karen Kilgariff and George Hardstack (From Alvina’s favorite podcast, “My Favorite Murder”!
Kids Books:
Grace is looking for a new book to read to her daughters class! On the subject of We Need Diverse Books, she is specifically looking for an animal book with a diverse human sidekick! This is really tough to find! In the meantime, she is finishing The Mouse and the Motorcycle with the class and her daughter is now reading Dragons and Marshmallows.
How is the pandemic changing publishing?
Grace and Alvina talk about how this pandemic is really hurting independent book stores and how Amazon will be the only ones still in business. Please support your local independent book store! You can do that if you purchase books from bookshop.org! (Side note: Alvina has not purchased anything from Amazon in ten years!) Will people buy more E-books? If they do then amazon will still come out on top because that’s where you have to get them. Alvina thinks that kid books will be OK. She has heard that Young Adult has risen in popularity while picture books have fallen. Maybe that is because so many teens are now at home more and need to dive into long series. Audio book sales have gone up and that is because anytime you can get your child away from looking at a screen during these times is a win! It will be interesting to see how this pandemic shapes book sales in general. Also, will there be more book submissions when this is all over because some authors have had so much extra time?
There will probably many books about the pandemic. Speaking of that, Grace and Alvina get into a discussion about what they like to read DURING the pandemic. Alvina likes reading about the pandemic and fiction ABOUT pandemics, apocalyptic tales, end of the world, etc…Some examples she mentions:
Grace wants to read the opposite: She would like to read coronavirus news to stay up to speed but in terms of picking up a fiction book, she would like to read to temporarily escape all of it!
The Open Library has been a hot topic. Authors have weighed in how they feel about all of their books available for free online and they’re not happy. Some say its a piracy issue. Alvina compared it being just like Napster used to be and that really ended up hurting the music industry. Grace is not a fan because she is relying on the income from her books right now as her school visits have all been cancelled. Authors were not given consent. They can opt out of it but it is very time consuming to do so.
Grace is very worried about the economy and wondering about her job as an author. Will it have to be something different? They both agree this is a unique time for people to think about what’s important in their life and who the real “essential workers” are. Only time will tell what is going to be the shape of the future. Will we “move on from this or move forward?” Grace asks. Either way, the book friends forever predict there may be a good amount of memoirs that come out of this!
“What are you grateful for?”
Alvina is grateful that she still has a job and that she can do that job from home. She knows many companies who have put their employees on furlough and she’s glad that her company is not having to do that.
Grace is grateful that at least her daughter is appreciating their homeschooling efforts! Even though Grace doesn’t totally agree that they have it down pat! Every night before bed, her family lists what they’re grateful for and her daughter mentioned she was so happy they got the homeschooling thing down.
Other books and media mentioned in this episode:
