We Don't Have as Many Advance Reads on the Hot Titles for Fall, and Here's Just One Reason (OK, Lots More than One) Why

We don't see the number of advance reader's copies that we used to. There are a lot of reasons for this of course.

1. We are a smaller store than before. If a rep got one or two galleys before, we might have been on the shortlist. Now it's less likely.

2. We're a new store and inadvertently were left off mailing lists in the transition. One publisher actually left me on their mailing list but didn't have the new address. Mailings have been going out as: "Daniel Goldin, Address TK, 53202." Believe it or not, these mailings are eventually getting to me, even though our current zip code is 53211. Thank you to the UPS gang (can I give a shout out to Drew?) for forwarding this properly.

3. Publishers are doing less of them. One place where the ebook has really caught on is with uncorrected proofs/bound manuscripts. Most of my reps have Sony Ebooks for this sort of thing. At least one group was given Kindles, even though under that scenario, the publisher no longer has control of their own product. Big mistake, it seems to me. The rep can no longer share that ebook manuscript with a store.

4. In my particular case, I'm no longer the new book buyer. The copy often (but not always) goes to Jason and though he may think of me as the best person to get the galley, he may not. I could say to him, "I want to see everything you get and get first dibs." But how's that going to help the books take off? He's great about divvying up titles to our booksellers, and I can only read seven or so books per month. There's usually a couple that I start and don't finish because, well, I don't like them. I shouldn't have gotten those in the first place.

So I have nothing personal to say about all the exciting August books I mentioned in a previous post. It's all hearsay, of which I am trying to absorb plenty! I've only read four "fall" titles (which I think we consider August through November on sale). I've pictured two of them, from Dan Chaon and Richard Powers, but Jeannette Winterson's cover is changing so I won't post the old one.

Despite this, our galley shelf in our break room is pretty full. So what's going on? That's for another post.