Canadians Trish Salah, Michel Marc Bouchard win Lambda Awards

Two Canadian writers were honoured last night at the 26th annual Lambda Literary Awards in New York City. The awards recognize the best LGBT books of the previous year. Trish Salah's poetry collection Wanting in ... Read More »

June 3, 2014 | Filed under: Awards

Joseph Boyden double winner at Libris Awards

By Sue Carter

Joseph Boyden was a double winner last night at the Retail Council of Canada's 2014 Libris Awards gala in Toronto. Boyden took home best author and best fiction prizes for his novel The Orenda. The ... Read More »

June 3, 2014 | Filed under: Awards, Bookselling

DoJ asks publishers to reveal pricing discussions, erotica authors’ real-life inspiration, and more

By Sue Carter

U.S. Department of Justice asks publishers to come clean about recent pricing discussions Disney World's Haunted Mansion, the Louvre, and other locations where erotica authors claim to have had sex BookExpo America attendance down slightly ... Read More »

June 3, 2014 | Filed under: Book links

James Patterson blasts Amazon at BEA; Slate blames publishers for Amazon’s practices

By Steven W. Beattie

People who have been suspicious of Amazon's quote-unquote predatory practices with regard to dealings with publishers have had quite a bit of evidence to back up their claims in the last week or so. On ... Read More »

June 2, 2014 | Filed under: Digital publishing and technology

Paul Carlucci wins Danuta Gleed Award

By Steven W. Beattie

The Writers' Union of Canada announced over the weekend that Paul Carlucci has been named the winner of the 2013 Danuta Gleed Award, presented each year to the best debut story collection in English. The ... Read More »

June 2, 2014 | Filed under: Awards

Poetry has “connived at its own irrelevance,” claims prize juror Jeremy Paxman

By Steven W. Beattie

The winners of the 2014 Griffin Poetry prizes are due to be announced later this week, which should be a happy event for writers and readers of poetry in Canada and internationally. But the U.K.-based ... Read More »

June 2, 2014 | Filed under: Writing life

Reading as public protest in Thailand, injecting new life into bricks-and-mortar bookstores, and more

By Steven W. Beattie

BookNet Canada interviews Mark Ury, CEO of Toronto-based "visual storytelling" platform Storybird Nineteen Eighty-Four and The Politics of Despotic Paternalism among the titles citizens of Thailand are reading in public to protest the crackdown by ... Read More »

June 2, 2014 | Filed under: Book links

Toronto Public Library opens 99th branch, Piketty responds to critics, and more

By Steven W. Beattie

Major new art exhibit (including giant Lego towers) by Douglas Coupland debuts tomorrow at the Vancouver Art Gallery TPL's new 99th branch, at Fort York, proves Ford brothers wrong on libraries, says Marcus Gee of ... Read More »

May 30, 2014 | Filed under: Book links

Why the loss of Access Copyright royalties could be devastating for educational publishers

By Julie Baldassi

Earlier this year, Oxford University Press Canada ceased publishing in its schools division after yet another year of double-digit sales declines. As with other publishers active in the K–12 market, OUP Canada faced shrinking provincial ... Read More »

May 29, 2014 | Filed under: Book news