I received an email yesterday from the ever-wonderful Authors Guild of America announcing that they were able to restore a list of authors on the shelves of Barnes & Noble bookstores.

With the advent of eBooks and an economy where the first things to go are luxuries like novels, the ivory tower, as trade book publishing was once perceived, has turned in the wild, wild West, everybody gunning for somebody and authors and readers being used as shields or weapons, depending on one’s point of view.

At any rate, Amazon bought Marshall Cavendish Children’s Books in December and in January B & N announced they would not carry any Amazon-published titles in the chain.  I now lead you to parts of the email from the Guild:

“With this announcement, B&N pulled Marshall Cavendish children’s books from its shelves. For Debby Dahl Edwardson, the timing could not have been worse or more devastating. Her most recent book, “My Name is Not Easy,” had been selected as a 2011 National Book Award Finalist.  This sort of recognition can transform an author’s career, and authors typically visit countless bookstores to make the most of such opportunities. Ms. Edwardson, however, found her opportunity drastically curtailed…

As we’ve made clear over the last several years, we’re very concerned with Amazon’s rapidly growing dominance of bookselling… So we’re sympathetic to the position of brick-and-mortar booksellers, even the largest of them: this isn’t a fair fight, by any stretch. Still, it’s essential that authors and readers not become collateral damage. The authors and illustrators who signed contracts with Marshall Cavendish had no way of anticipating that the publisher would assign their contracts to Amazon.”

So the Authors Guild was able to persuade Barnes & Noble to reinstate the Cavendish titles on the bookstore shelves, but this is an exception to the rule.

All other Amazon-published writers are still banned from the shelves.

 
As a long-time author and a new eBook publisher I am first to say that both Barnes & Noble and Amazon have always been and still are wonderful to me.  But this idea that authors should be punished for choosing a publisher who very much wishes to publish them well is rather bizarre in terms of book publishing, but unfortunately makes much too much dreadful sense in terms of retail wars.

(Remember the days Barnes & Noble was slammed for publishing books?)

On the other hand, bookstores, like public libraries, are cultural institutions we cannot  do without. One of the downsides of the wonderful new technology is our increasing physical isolation from other human beings which, let’s face it, is starting to make our country a little weird. (It is one thing to retreat from the world through reading while sitting in the same room with other people, but it is another when you are entirely absent!)

At any rate, the Author’s Guild has done the impossible for one list of authors.  We all should be very grateful to them.  It means someone in the wild, wild West is keeping an eye on the whole territory.