Book Publishing Quotes

Book-publishing is all about politics. Agents, editors, which books will be puffed, which ignored, etc. ~ Alexander Theroux

I thought, 'Okay, what's going to be my edge, and how am I going to define what I'm doing differently?' Once I had that key idea of the software developer as an artist, once I had that idea, a whole bunch of other ideas flowed from that, because I realized that I need to go study the music industry, I need to study the book publishing and Hollywood and figure out how they do things, why they do them that way, and then I need to borrow, and rearrange, the things that they're doing to fit my industry so that I can invent and create this new industry. ~ Trip Hawkins

No book or magazine article is for "everyone" so know your audience, then target them with your writing. ~ W. Terry Whalin

There's a cardinal rule in book publishing that applies equally to brain surgery and auto mechanics: "If it ain't broke, don't fix it." Since people are still buying the original Where Is God When It Hurts? ~ Philip Yancey

It began to falter not when the book publishers who loved books gave way to those who preferred profits to reading. It happened when publishers and editors cut back on their drinking. If there is one national flower in book publishing, it is the martini. ~ Al Silverman

In TIME June 7, 2010
On the sustainability of the publishing industry, in the Chicago Tribune:
"I think that book publishing is about to slide into the sea. We live in a literate time, and our children are writing up a storm, often combining letters and numbers ... The future of publishing: 18 million authors in America, each with an average of 14 readers, eight of whom are blood relatives. Average annual earnings: $175." - 5/26/10 ~ Garrison Keillor

I lived through a classic publishing story. My editor was fired a month before the book came out. The editor who took it over already had a full plate. It was never advertised. We didn't get reviewed in any major outlets. ~ Anita Diament

Technology has changed the way book publishing works, as it has changed everything else in the world of media. ~ Bruce Jackson

One of the greatest threats facing book publishing, and the entire country for that matter, is censorship. ~ Bennett Cerf

But jackets are the redheaded stepchildren of book publishing. We blame them for everything. ~ Gabrielle Zevin

Book publishing would be so much easier without the authors. ~ Dan Brown

I began illustrating children's books because of a growing disillusionment with the sort of work I was doing in the advertising industry. Book publishing offered me the chance to be far more creative. ~ Graeme Base

The size of your audience is more important than the size of your book ~ Bernard Kelvin Clive

But the thought leaders on talk radio and Fox do more than shape opinion. Backed by their own wing of the book-publishing industry and supported by think tanks that increasingly function as public-relations agencies, conservatives have built a whole alternative knowledge system, with its own facts, its own history, its own laws of economics. ~ David Frum

Last Victorian and Edwardian Britain saw a mega-change in reading habits. For the first time fiction took the primary place in book publishing, and the medium was taken up by briliant and entertaining authors with an agenda for 'a brave new world'. Such men as Thomas Hardy, H. G. Wells and George Bernard Shaw were the opinion-makers for coming generations. 'With the next phase of Victorian fiction', wrote G. K. Chesterton, 'we enter a new world; the later, more revolutionary, more continental, freer but in some ways weker world in which we live today.'
Chesterton did not live to see the full consequences of the change but W. R. Inge predicted what was coming when he wrote:
No God. No country. No family. Refusal to serve in war. Free love. More play. Less work. No punishments. Go as you please. It is difficult to imagine any programme which, if carried out, would be more utterly ruinous to a country situated as Great Britain is today. ~ Iain H. Murray

I think that the economics of book publishing favor hits with long book runs. You make all your money on the last bunch of books, not the first. ~ Seth Godin

Publishing is a business and writing is an art. The two have to be crammed together despite the clearly different motivations behind them. ~ Michelle M. Pillow

There's only one thing more frightening than being asked to do a book tour, and that's not being asked to do a book tour. ~ Gerald Petievich

As a book author, it's your responsibility to cast a vision for your book about the length and appearance before you pitch the idea to a publisher. ~ W. Terry Whalin

I wanted to highlight that whole dreadful process in book publishing that 'nothing succeeds like success.' ~ Doris Lessing

When I left college I thought - based on a staggeringly inadequate understanding of how the world worked - that I might like to go into book publishing. ~ Lev Grossman

We do our best when we are in over our heads, and we eventually forget about how panicked we felt at the time. That's one of the amazing aspects about book publishing. Yes, it is conservative by nature and rich with tradition, but every morning on the job I still feel like a freshman. There is still so much to learn about serving the church through publishing, and that is its enduring joy. ~ Ann Byle

Australian SF book publishing has undergone a boom recently, and sometimes it's easier for new writers to sell a book to a local publisher first, which then makes a US edition more likely. ~ Greg Egan

It's interesting that the book publishing industry, on the iPad, has much more flexibility than the music industry had. ~ Edgar Bronfman, Jr.

At this point I feel I would be remiss to not mention the prevalence of a specific kind of person who enters the field of book publishing. This is the English lit major who never should have left academia, a genius who has read all of V.S. Naipaul but can't photocopy title pages right side up. This person is very thin, possibly vegan, probably Ivy League. He or she feels as if answering the phone in a chipper voice is a form of legalized prostitution. He or she has a single quirky fashion piece, usually red or black, and waxes poetic about typewriters and the British, having never truly known either. Regardless of sex, they all want to be David Foster Wallace when they grow up. ~ Sloane Crosley

The purpose of the appeal was to open a subscription list by which signatories pledged themselves to support the cost of printing a limited edition, of which they themselves would be entitled to one or more copies, depending on the amount pledged. This was the usual means at the time [1836] of enabling the publication of an expensive book… ~ Charles Allen

REFLECTION. In discussing abortion, its supporters never defend the act of abortion itself, but only the alleged right of someone to have one. They focus on the freedom to choose it, but avoid describing what is chosen. ~ Catholic Book Publishing Corporation

Six men control almost all the media in the United States--book publishing, magazines, television, movie studios, newspapers, and radio. They are not friendly toward feminism, which has almost disappeared from the surface of our society. You will almost never see a feminist column on an op-ed page, a feminist article in a magazine, or newspaper, actual (not satirized) feminist ideas on television or in the movies. Only magazines & radio controlled by feminists--and these are few and not well-funded--offer information on the feminist perspective.

This might be understandable if feminism were a wild-eyed manic philosophy. But it is a belief, a politics, based on one simple fact: women are human beings who matter as much as men. That is all that feminism claims. As human beings, women have the right to control their own bodies, to walk freely in the world, to train their minds and bodies, and to love and hate at will. Only those who wish to continue to coerce women into a servant/slave class for men cannot accept this principle. ~ Marilyn French

People in the newspaper industry saw the web as a newspaper. People in TV saw the web as TV, and people in book publishing saw it as a weird kind of potential book. But the web is not just some kind of magic all-absorbing meta-medium. It's its own thing. ~ Paul Ford

OUTLANDER A Delta Book PUBLISHING HISTORY Delacorte Press hardcover edition published 1991 Delta trade paperback edition/July 2001 Published by Bantam Dell A Division of Random House, Inc. ~ Diana Gabaldon

Hook your editor with a strong opening sentence to bring attention to your writing. ~ W. Terry Whalin

Is it not by learning to read the book of nature with the eyes of faith that we come to recognize the drop of divinity that resides in our own souls though hidden, master? In the end is this not faith; to seek the light that takes us further, the light of Christ that brings that to which reason and knowledge alone can never raise itself? This is truth! ~ Adriana Koulias

There was something in the pages of these books that had the power to make him feel better about things, a life raft to cling to before the dark currents of memory washed him downstream again, and on brighter days, he could even see himself going on this way for some time. A small but passable life.
And then, of course, the end of the world happened. ~ Justin Cronin

I've been able to write at least one book a year for 20 years, and I don't think I would've had that kind of drive if I hadn't come out of the journalism business. ~ Michael Connelly

In order to protect their good names for posterity, many writers never wrote what they thought or the truth as it stood. That's why truth still lies hidden in matters of power, sex and religion. No wonder they chose to do so, many who dared paid with their heads ~ Bangambiki Habyarimana

I thought of that lost book and all the memories it held and how it was just one of millions of objects in the world loaded with secret history which pass hands until eventually they excite nothing more than mild curiosity or, often, complete apathy. It was like all the sadness and loneliness of life resided in these objects. I realised the moment anything loses its context it becomes a husk. ~ Glenn Haybittle

He is also experienced. Though I don't know Ralph's age, I do know that, like many of our managers, he is over 65. At Berkshire, we look to performance, not to the calendar. Charlie and I, at 71 and 64 respectively, now keep George Foreman's picture on our desks. You can make book that our scorn for a mandatory retirement age will grow stronger every year. ~ Warren Buffett

I didn't know the comic at all, which is really funny because I grew up here and I had friends who worked at all of the places. Like The Beguiling, which is a store here, and Suspect Video and one of my friends actually worked at Suspect and The Beguiling. So it's kind of crazy that I'd never known the books before. ~ Alison Pill

Every ceremony or rite has a value if it is performed without alteration. A ceremony is a book in which a great deal is written. Anyone who understands can read it. One rite often contains more than a hundred books. ~ George Gurdjieff

I've probably had my day in the sun. I think I've influenced a lot of comic book writers. ~ Harvey Pekar

When I read books it's to escape. It's so I don't have to talk to people. ~ Stephen Colbert

Increasing your speed means making your mind and body more alert, and therefore more likely to keep going strong for longer periods of time. ~ Inspire3 Publishing

Las Vegas has become a child's picture-book dream of a city-here a storybook castle, there a sphinx-flanked black pyramid beaming white light into the darkness as a landing beam for UFOs, and everywhere neon oracles and twisting screens predict happiness and good fortune, announce singers and comedians and magicians in residence or on their way, and the lights always flash and beckon and call. Once every hour a volcano erupts in light and flame. Once every hour a pirate ship sinks a man o'war. ~ Neil Gaiman

In lots of books I read, the writer seems to go haywire every time he reaches a high point. He'll start leaving out punctuation and running his words together and babble about stars flashing and sinking into a deep dreamless sea. And you can't figure out whether the hero's laying his girl or a cornerstone. I guess that kind of crap is supposed to be pretty deep stuff - a lot of the book reviewers eat it up, I notice. But the way I see it is, the writer is just too goddam lazy to do his job. And I'm not lazy, whatever else I am. I'll tell you everything. ~ Jim Thompson

When you read a great book, you don't escape from life, you plunge deeper into it. There may be a superficial escape – into different countries, mores, speech patterns – but what you are essentially doing is furthering your understanding of life's subtleties, paradoxes, joys, pains and truths. Reading and life are not separate but symbiotic. ~ Julian Barnes

The historical problems with Luke are even more pronounced. For one thing, we have relatively good records for the reign of Caesar Augustus, and there is no mention anywhere in any of them of an empire-wide census for which everyone had to register by returning to their ancestral home. And how could such a thing even be imagined? Joesph returns to Bethlehem because his ancestor David was born there. But David lived a thousand years before Joseph. Are we to imagine that everyone in the Roman Empire was required to return to the homes of their ancestors from a thousand years earlier? If we had a new worldwide census today and each of us had to return to the towns of our ancestors a thousand years back - where would you go? Can you imagine the total disruption of human life that this kind of universal exodus would require? And can you imagine that such a project would never be mentioned in any of the newspapers? There is not a single reference to any such census in any ancient source, apart from Luke. Why then does Luke say there was such a census? The answer may seem obvious to you. He wanted Jesus to be born in Bethlehem, even though he knew he came from Nazareth ... there is a prophecy in the Old Testament book of Micah that a savior would come from Bethlehem. What were these Gospel writer to do with the fact that it was widely known that Jesus came from Nazareth? They had to come up with a narrative that explained how he came from Nazareth, in Galilee, a little one-horse tow ~ Bart D. Ehrman

[The tamed squirrels] made jolly companions but became very annoyed with her if she read too long; one would climb onto her shoulder, down her arm and sit on the page of her book 'with bushy tail outspread'. ~ Mary Allsebrook

I open the book, the book moans / I cast for the times, the times are gone ~ Tudor Arghezi

I read every book I could find. I picked up stuff like a Hoover, and remembered it out of the sheer joy of finding out that the universe is stuffed with interest. ~ Terry Pratchett

Note to self: being Kurt's son, being an ex-mental patient, getting into Harvard, having written a book, and being a doctor are all things that in and of themselves do not make a life. If you lean on them too hard, you'll find that there's not much there. But if you add up a lot of things that aren't in and of themselves enough, it almost starts to add up to something ... ~ Mark Vonnegut

Time has a doomsday book, upon whose pages he is continually recording illustrious names. But as often as a new name is written there, an old one disappears. Only a few stand in illuminated characters never to be effaced. ~ Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

The pleasures of being a novelist are many. But the greatest by far is the manner in which I live through my characters; experiencing every detail of their story as it unfolds gradually and personally within my own creative psyche. I'm like a cat with untold lives, because each new book is my rebirth. ~ Richelle E. Goodrich

Every time I got 'Amazing Spider-Man' or 'Fantastic Four' or another book firmly on the rails, we got pulled into some big event book or crossover and it cost momentum and messed badly with the pacing and structure of the book. ~ J. Michael Straczynski

I haven't done a book for about 3 or 4 years now. ~ Gerald Scarfe

Let me out, witch," growled Alice. She began to hum off key.
Griselda stepped away from the door.
"I can help the little wee babes," Alice sung sweetly. "Through the woods and into the dark. Where he whispers the words to make his mark. Little boy of green..." Alice chuckled. "...has gone to the wizard who is evil and mean. ~ Kathy Cyr

You and I will always be friends."
"Yet you poisoned me with a book once. I should not forgive that. ~ Oscar Wilde

A cashmere knit is like a book. It is something to save and go back to time after time. It is the feeling of an embrace. ~ Brunello Cucinelli

A book without potty humor is like a banana split without hot fudge. It can still be good, I suppose, but you kinda get the feeling that something is missing. ~ Dav Pilkey

I think of myself as a songwriter, a weaver of story and imagination in a way that a novelist might write a book. ~ PJ Harvey

My yacht. I don't mind going for a coupla hours' cruise. I'll even lend you that book so you'll have something to read on the revenue ~ F Scott Fitzgerald

Eragon started as me but ended up evolving into his very own character, .. Even as he has gone through his coming- of- age story, the process of writing and publishing these novels has been my own coming- of- age story. There are parallels between my own experience and Eragon's, but fortunately, I don't have people charging at me with swords. ~ Christopher Paolini

Sometimes it is the sharp contrasts in life, the bitter and the sweet; things not working out as planned, relationships falling apart, losing your loved ones - these are the things that shake you and make you appreciate life, see the good in it and love anew the people around you. ~ Amy Passantino

I think it's very important for someone going to buy a book, taking a class or listening to a lecturer to ask, "Is this the right thing for me to do now? If it isn't, guide me to what I need." ~ Echo Bodine

the ideas presented in this book culminate a century of research questioning the calorie balance model of obesity, and represent a fundamentally different way to understand why we gain weight and what we can do about it.7 ~ David Ludwig

The only thing a closed book is good for is a table that wobbles. Be an open book. ~ A.D. Posey

Alister McGrath has now written two books with my name in the title. The poet W. B. Yeats, when asked to say something about bad poets who made a living by parasitizing him, wrote the splendid line, 'was there ever dog that praised his fleas? ~ Richard Dawkins

let's get our semantics straight. Story does not equal fiction, much less "lies." It's the world we Christians inhabit as "people of the Book." We are story people. All ~ Sarah Arthur

I always encourage authors (especially new authors) to be as generous as we are blessed. For one thing, it is a way to help people. For another, it is a seed one is planting for the life of the book. Someone gave it to someone who gave it to someone else. ~ Andy Andrews

How can anyone become a thinker unless he spends at least a third of every day away from passions, people, and books? ~ Friedrich Nietzsche

I simply believe that a book has a journey to make, and should not be condemned to being stuck on a shelf ... Let's leave our books free to travel, then, to be touched by other hands, and enjoyed by other eyes. ~ Paulo Coelho

With stand-up, I can have an idea, go down the street to a comedy club and work on it, flesh it out, book a venue, people will come, then film it. I do all that myself; I never have to answer to anybody. ~ Aziz Ansari

As for my writing process, there is one truth I have discovered after writing some twenty-plus books: Not every book is the same, but the middle of every book is where I really begin to question my choice of vocations. The beginning and end is usually fairly clear to me, but that middle just sucks the life right out of me. ~ Julia London

You cannot pretend to read a book. Your eyes will give you away. So will your breathing. A person entranced by a book simply forgets to breathe. The house can catch alight and a reader deep in a book will not look up until the wallpaper is in flames. ~ Lloyd Jones

I do reread, kind of obsessively, partly for the surprise of how the same book reads at a different point in life, and partly to have the sense of returning to an old friend. ~ Elizabeth Strout

And this is where I, the narrator, tell you that it's my story and I'll do as I please. You can close the book at any time, you know. ~ K.L. Montgomery

It's just...sometimes he says or does something so random it's like he's a life-form from another planet who's failing at blending into life on earth but trying like really hard, and you just have to share it with other people. ~ Emma Mills

I expect to think that I would rather be author of your book [The Origin of Species] than of any other on Nat. Hist. Science.
[Letter to Charles Darwin 12 Dec 1859] ~ Joseph Dalton Hooker

Books have always been to me like a kind of embalmed mind. The dead may be scattered, and who can find them, but their voices live in the library. ~ Laurel Lea

Having books published is very destructive to writing. It is even worse than making love too much. Because when you make love too much at least you get a damned clarte that is like no other light. A very clear and hollow light. ~ Ernest Hemingway,

The Little Friend is a long book. It's also completely different from my first novel: different landscape, different characters, different use of language and diction, different approach to story. ~ Donna Tartt