Twice in the last 30 days I have been interviewed about the "state of the industry." The journalist's questions were insightful and thought I would share some of them with you. My answers have been expanded beyond the original ones since I have more space to work with here.
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1. What do you believe to be the most important trend in Christian publishing and why?
This can be a complex question depending on which part of publishing being discussed. The obvious answer is the digital revolution. While e-book sales are still only a tiny percentage of the whole, the foundations being laid today will have long term implications.
In fiction I have been encouraged by the continued diversity in publisher's acquisitions. While "romance" is king, a great story can still get a chance.
In non-fiction there has been a concerted push by publishers to acquire only those authors with a built-in audience of some sort. This is especially hard for the debut writers who have enormous talent and insight but have yet to construct a personal following. I even had one editor at a publishing house write me the following after I groused about a rejection letter that didn't square with what I knew about that publisher:
"...it seems we no longer trust the old methods of reading the market, trying to get ahead of the curve on reader tastes and needs, and so forth. Now we have to prove a book's success in advance, on paper, using mathematics."
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SOURCE: Steve Laube.com
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