Our President-Elect reads books

Another letter for the BAIPA News [December 2008]

It matters to us in the book world that people read, or don’t read, books. We have all read the sad statistics* about books and reading, such as:

• 58% of US adult population never reads another book after high school
• 80% of US families did not buy or read a book last year
• 42% of college graduates never read another book
• 33$ of high school graduates never read another book
• 57% of new books are not read to completion

And yet… our president-elect, Barack Obama, reads books. And there is a great picture of him (http://papercuts.blogs.nytimes.com/2008/05/21/what-obama-is-reading/) at the airport in Bozeman Montana – he has his finger in a book to mark his place. What a great image!

Why does this matter to us?

Finding the right energy

Another letter for the BAIPA News [July 2008]

Being an author and a publisher can pull at us in different ways – and being small, independent publishers means that there are dozens of tasks we need to complete on a regular basis. Some days I get up gung-ho and step right into the external tasks on my plate – calling people, making connections, negotiating, asking for help. And some days I turn off my phone and write or read. I used to fight this. I used to push myself to make those calls or I’d get angry with myself if I couldn’t sit down and read a manuscript or write.