Libraries Must Draw the Line on E-books - Sari Feldman, Publishers Weekly

Librarian Sari Feldman

Because so few avid readers can afford, or have the space, for all the books they want to read, they are highly dependent upon their local libraries to fill in the gaps. I have read an average of about fifty library books per year for the last ten years, so that’s most certainly the case for me.  And I’m not talking about just tree-books, I also check out e-books and audible books. Sometimes the titles I’m interested in are readily available; other times I find myself waiting for more than fifty others to read a copy of the book before my turn at it finally comes. That’s frustrating - but apparently, it’s not frustrating enough for Macmillan.

About a year ago, Macmillan placed a four-month library “embargo” on e-books published by its Tor imprint.  Now, it seems that the publisher has become convinced by its embargo that releasing new e-book titles to public libraries sooner than four months after publication depresses sales of the titles to the consumer, and it has indicated that the embargo is likely to be extended to titles released by any and all other Macmillan imprints. Personally, I’m not a huge fan of the Tor imprint, anyway, so the Macmillan trick hardly impacted me.  But there are plenty of other Macmillan titles that I do want to read – and I don’t want to wait four months to read them just because I can’t afford to buy all the books I read in a given year.  I sympathize with the publishers, and I understand that they are searching for the business model that will maximize profits in an environment in which readers have wholeheartedly embraced e-books and audiobooks. I get it.  But I think that Macmillan is taking it too far.

According to librarian Sari Feldman’s recent article in Publishers Weekly, public libraries are already paying “three to five times the consumer price for two-year accessto e-books” to pretty much all publishers (but only Macmillan actually embargoes titles for four months). She gives the example of Elin Hilderbrand’s The Rumorselling to libraries for $84 per copy and to consumers for $14.99. At first, I was also against access being limited to two years, but I suppose that compares to something close to the average shelf life of a physical library book, so it does make some sense.  But those inflated per-copy prices are a big reason that I’m lined up behind 50-150 people on the more popular titles that I don’t jump on right away.  Do publishers make more money by selling fewer copies at five times the price than they would make by selling some higher number of copies to libraries at the consumer price? That sounds like a question out of Economics 101, but I doknow it would ease the pressure on public library budgets everywhere.

And now, according to Feldman, Hachette Book Group and Simon & Schuster have placed a two-year limit on copies of audible books sold to libraries for streaming purposes.  Can the other major publishers be far behind? 

That brings us to the super villain of retailing, Amazon.  Amazon, via its Audible service, is said to be aggressively pursuing exclusive agreements with publishers that would preclude those publishers from selling any copies at all to libraries of “the most highly desirable audio content, including from major authors such as Margaret Atwood and Michael Lewis.” The only good news in audio books that Feldman shares with us is that “four of the Big Five publishers – Hachette Book Group, HarperCollins, Penguin Random House, and Simon & Schuster – have thus far committed to a no-embargo policy for new release titles” (on audiobooks).  That’s something, I guess.

But between the usual evilness of Amazon and the greed of Macmillan, the cracks in the public library business model are starting to become obvious. Despite what politicians and retailers like to believe, there are millions and millions of people who love their local libraries and depend on them to provide the reading material they cannot afford to purchase for themselves.  Too, I am particularly concerned with publishers deciding to limit ready access to audiobooks because so many sight-impaired people depend on them for entertainment and access to current trends and thought.  (And since I have the beginning stages of macular degeneration in both eyes, this hits very close to home.)

Maybe it’s time for public libraries to ask for some help from the Federal Trade Commission before things get even worse for library patrons.  And maybe it’s time for library patrons everywhere to speak up for themselves.  This is what we pay all of those childish do-nothings in Congress to help us with, after all.

The Punishment She Deserves - Elizabeth George

Last year’s The Punishment She Deserves is the twentieth detective novel in Elizabeth George’s Inspector Lynley series, and the first addition to the series since 2015’s A Banquet of Consequences. Fans of the author’s Detective Sergeant Barbara Havers character will be pleased to learn that the novel is as much, actually much more, about Havers as it is about her boss Thomas Lynley.  Lynley, in fact, does not make a “live” appearance in the book until approximately page 200 of the 690-page novel. Prior to that point, he is either referenced to by other characters, or perhaps consulted from afar.

Barbara Havers has never gone exactly by the book when it comes to homicide investigations, an attribute that Lynley sees considerable value in if only he can keep her from being fired or transferred to the boonies because others in New Scotland Yard do not share his appreciation of Barbara’s methods.  But now it seems that Barbara is on the brink of having precisely one of those two things happen to her because she has been assigned, along with a superior officer who wants little more than to rid herself of Barbara’s presence, to a tricky investigation in the sleepy little town of Ludlow.  Just the two of them – and DCS Isabelle Ardery is hoping that if she gives Barbara enough rope, she will hang herself with it.

It seems that the church deacon, Ian Druitt, has been found dead while in police custody. Due to the circumstances of the man’s death, the police are of course anxious to have the local coroner’s characterization of the death as a suicide confirmed by the investigators from New Scotland Yard.  And Isabelle Ardery, who has personal problems aplenty of her own at the moment, is inclined to humor them – if only she can reign in Barbara long enough to make suicide appear to be the most likely possibility.  Well, good luck with that.  Barbara, instead, tries to walk the fine line between following orders precisely and letting the investigation lead her anywhere and everywhere it might. That’s not usually where DCS Ardery would like her to be.

Author Elizabeth George

The Punishment She Deserves is very much a police procedural, and it is fun to watch the wheels turn in the minds of Lynley and Havers as one small clue leads to another and another until some big piece of the puzzle finally falls into place.  The last few Lynley novels have seen the Havers character evolve into one of the better investigators in all of New Scotland Yard, and she more than holds her own when teamed up with Lynley in this one.  Despite still being as socially inept as she always has been, Havers and Lynley have by now managed a solid bond both on and off the job.  Lynley is probably Barbara’s best friend in the world, and the protective Lynley considers her a good friend, also.  When Lynley and Barbara are sent back to Ludlow to finish up the investigation into Druitt’s death, things finally begin to happen.

Bottom Line: The Punishment She Deserves will probably be more satisfying to long term fans of the series than it will be to those reading it as a standalone.  This is particularly true because of how adeptly the novel further evolves the Havers character into a truly impressive New Scotland Yard investigator. This is not so true of the Lynley character, however. Thomas Lynley reached a low point in his personal life several books back, and the character has changed very little since he stabilized and returned to the job. At 690 pages, the novel has somewhat of a bloated feel to it, but the same can be said for the last few Lynley novels (think Stephen King).  That said, I’m still a huge fan of the series and will most certainly buy the next one to see what’s going on in the lives of two of my favorite fictional characters. I just hope I don’t have to wait three years this time.

Book Number 3,416

Blood Ties - Barbara Fradkin

Blood Ties is the fourth in a series of what author Barbara Fradkin calls Cedric O’Toole Mysteries. It is my first exposure to Mr. O’Toole and his friends, and I’m still trying to figure out what I really think of the guy – and his friends.  Cedric (or Rick, as he prefers to be called) is so laid back about life that he doesn’t get very excited when a man shows up at his door claiming to be the half-brother Rick never knew existed.  Well, I figured, maybe this is just the mark of an overly cautious man.  But it turns out that even after Rick has decided to help Steve answer some key questions about the father they supposedly share, he is still not willing to approach the very people most likely actually to have the answers they are seeking. 

Then, just when I was ready to write Rick off as some kind of oblivious weirdo, I decided that he was probably just afraid of what he might learn about his family by asking the wrong questions of the wrong people. Steve, though, was not playing that game.  And that got Steve – and Rick - in a whole lot of trouble.  The book’s cover describes Cedric O’Toole as a “reluctant sleuth and unlikely hero,” but that description does not much hint at what Rick is capable of when a hero is required and he is the only one around even remotely fit for the role.  He can be a hero when he has to be one, Rick just doesn’t really want that job. 

Author Barbara Fradkin

Barbara Fradkin, who is also a practicing child psychologist in Ottawa, has set Blood Ties in a relatively remote Canadian village, and she uses that closed setting to emphasize how easy it is for a relatively small circle of adults to keep a life-changing secret from someone who was not even born yet when the event in question occurred.  Fradkin gives her readers plenty of action and plenty to think about in this novella of only 148 pages – maybe not enough to get me to look for the previous three books in the series, but definitely enough to get me to check out the other two series she is writing.  I would call Blood Ties a “cozy mystery,” because it shares most of the key characteristics that I use to define that mystery sub-genre: mild language, behind-the-scene sex and violence, and a community in which everyone seems to know everyone else. If cozies are your thing, this one might be just the thing for you.

Orca Book Publishers provided an Advance Reading Copy of Blood Ties for review purposes.

(Book number 3,415)

Stranger than Fiction - Will Ferrell & Emma Thompson

This is day number two of my no-reading week, but I did manage to find a fun, book-related movie today to help ease some of the pain of my book-withdrawal. I'm referring to a 2006 movie called Stranger than Fiction starring Will Farrell, Emma Thompson, Dustin Hoffman, Maggie Gyllenhaal, and Queen Latifa. 

I suppose that Stranger than Fiction could be categorized as more of a romantic comedy than anything else, but its unusual plot is what really caught my attention. Will Farrell plays an IRS auditor who hears a voiceover in his head describing everything he does. The voice narrates his toothbrushing technique, his necktie choice, the speed at which he walks to the bus stop, etc., until it begins to drive him nuts.  His search for answers leads him, of all things, to a literature professor who recognizes that the narration described by Farrell sounds an awful lot like words from a novel.

And as it turns out, the Will Farrell character is actually the central character of a novel being written by the Emma Thompson character.  Farrell, of course, knows nothing about Thompson, but Thompson is equally in the dark about their situation. She has no idea that the character she’s in the process of creating is walking around in the real world. The scary thing for Farrell, is that Thompson has killed off the central character of all eight of her previous novels, so it seems to be just a matter of time before his own turn comes.  And then one day, Farrell hears the voice in his head say that, even though he doesn’t know it, his own death is fast approaching.

In the middle of all this, the Farrell character is falling in love with a baker he’s been assigned to audit, a rebellious young woman who purposely underpaid her taxes by 22 percent in protest of how the government uses its tax revenue.  So now that he knows that the novelist is about to kill him off, what is our friendly IRS auditor to do?

He starts with a visit to the writer’s apartment - and that’s when things really get interesting.

Stranger than Fiction is fun, but I think it chickened out on the ending it should have had, and that makes the movie’s attempt to pull hard on the heartstrings not very effective.  In the end this is kind of a throwaway movie, and I’m a bit surprised that actors like Emma Thompson and Dustin Hoffman were part of it.  But during this no-book week, I’m really, really glad that I found it.  

In and Out - But Mostly Out

My second cataract surgery and lens implantation was done early this morning, and that means that my reading and blogging time will be severely limited/handicapped for the next six or seven days.  I've really got to force myself to stay away from physical books and the internet as much as possible because that is supposed to hasten the healing process, but that's tough for me.  Until the eyeball swelling goes down considerably, I can't see much of anything out of my left eye, so there's that for motivation.

The Bookshop of the Broken Hearted - Robert Hillman

I read and review so many books with the words “bookstore” or “bookshop” in the title that I could never hope to hide my attraction to them.  Spotting a new one of those on a bookstore shelf is sure to stop me in my tracks – and as often as not, the book ends up going home with me.  That’s, in fact, exactly how I found Robert Hillman’s The Bookshop of the Broken Hearted.  I enjoy the bookstore setting of this kind of book, but just as important to me are all those little “insider” references sprinkled throughout them that only an avid reader will appreciate or even much understand.

The Bookshop of the Broken Heartedis a little different, though, from what I expected it would be because, while it does have plenty of bookish references, it is not primarily set inside a bookstore.  Rather, a bookstore is the device used by the author to bring the novel’s two main characters together so that the rest of their story can be told.  It is 1968, and Tom lives alone on the small Australian sheep ranch he’s inherited from his family. His wife has twice left him, the second time taking with her the little boy he considered to be a son.  Hannah is a Holocaust survivor who has come to Australia to begin the rest of her life. She has buried two husbands, her only child, and everyone else in her family by the time she arrives in the little town nearest Tom’s ranch.  Fate takes a hand when Hannah, after more than a year in town, decides to open up what will be the only bookstore anywhere around – and she asks Tom to build the shelves she will need to display the 7500 books with which she wants to open the store.

Author Robert Hillman

Tom and Hannah feel an almost immediate connection between them, and suddenly a man who has read only one book in his entire adult life finds himself spending more time in a bookstore than he does with his sheep and cattle.  But the emotional baggage being carried by Tom and Hannah makes their relationship a fragile one from the beginning.  If it is to survive, they will have to figure out a way to incorporate two little boys (one dead and one very much alive) into their lives.  For Hannah, that may not be possible.  Upon Tom’s advice, Hannah calls her new bookstore simply “Hannah’s Bookshop.” Perhaps more fitting, would have been her first choice of a name for the store, “The Bookshop of the Broken Hearted,” because seldom have two more broken hearted people tried to start a new life together.

Hillman did manage to work in a few of the kind of bookstore details that I enjoy.  Here are a couple of them:

·     “But even here in Hometown, Australia, the censors must be accommodated. Her solution was to display a block of wood where a banned title would have been shelved. On each block she attached a label: Borstal Boyis banned in Australia.  Apply at the counter for a summary of the story. Or Lady Chatterley’s Loveror Eros and Civilization. The summaries were in Hannah’s head. She intended to rattle off the comings and goings recorded in the banned books for anyone with enough curiosity.”  (Remember, this is 1968.)

·     “They were in the shop, shelves of books competing in allure, arranged by title rather than writer – Hannah’s democratic bias.  She didn’t want sections of shelves turned into colonies of titles by the same author. Writers had to muck in together.”

Bottom Line: This one will appeal to fans of bookstore novels, but it will probably be appreciated even more by fans of historical fiction and the more serious romance fiction. It’s two main characters are memorable ones, and the novel offers an interesting look at life in rural Australia fifty or so years ago.

Book Number 3,414