2008 was a year with no Harry Potter circus; that has run its course. So, there was really no big book to carry the year and give the book industry an artificial high. In fact there were hardly any big books at all, except for Salman Rushdie's The Enchantress of Florence, which I thought was one of the best books he has written in a long time, surely one of his most readable. Yes, some will quibble that it does not have the stature of his Midnight's Children (that was more than a quarter of a century ago, please move on). Some will complain about the way he is liberal with historical truths. So was Homer. It is a good story, a fun read.
As for Aravind Adiga's The White Tiger, my current plans are to give it a miss -- "the story of two Indias" is such a cliche. Why are Indian writers (apart from Naipaul and Rushdie) not allowed to simply tell a story? But, Amitav Ghosh's Sea of Poppies is still on my list. I am not interested in the rest. It was a pretty slow year for fiction. I am waiting for some translated works of Le Clezio to come out. Meanwhile, I will catch up on the classics.
In other international news, we all know about Borders selling off their stores in Australia, New Zealand and Singapore. In UK we have just heard that Euler Hermes has withdrawn credit insurance to their suppliers, which could mean that they will have to pay cash upfront for their merchandise. It appears they are a bit shaky in the US too.
In another story, Bertrams, one of the bigger book wholesalers in the UK, is up for sale after the demise of their parent company, Woolworth. Expect a major shake-up in the book industry next year. But Amazon.com did well over Christmas.
An industry shake-up is surely on the cards now. The book had been commoditised to absurdity, mass market merchants only understands what turns over or, in the bookseller language, "sells through". Books could be beans for all they cared. Perhaps now the real bookshops (indies or otherwise) will return to the fore, and publishers will focus on real books.
Shelf Awarness puts it succinctly: "Now may be a good time to get back to basics and do business together again if we all want to survive. Mass merchants will likely cut back on book sections at the first signs of under performance ... (but) Bookstores will stay the course. As the restructuring goes forward, we can only hope that publishers will return to their roots and work with booksellers to enhance backlist opportunities and develop new authors."
Which is what we at Silverfish Books have been doing most of 2008: developing new authors. There was no Silverfish New Writing 8. That felt kind of strange, but also a relief. It was fun while it lasted. We decided to stop it when it became a chore. So in 2008 we published three books by individual authors: Tales from the Court by Matthew Thomas (who, ironically, is the only Malaysian writer to 'graduate' from the New Writing series to produce a whole book of un-recycled material), Poems Sacred and Profane by Salleh ben Joned (a reprint of a collectible classic) and Ripples and other stories by Shih-Li Kow, who simply keeps going from strength to strength. We were putting the final touches to her work end of last month when we received an invitation to submit an entry for the Commonwealth Writer's Prize for the South East Asia and South Pacific region. We thought, if any current Malaysian writer deserves the nomination it is Shih-Li Kow. We have sent off her entry but we hope they will receive it on time considering the year-end holiday season. We are keeping our fingers crossed for her.
It has been a very memorable year.
Happy New Year, 2009.
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