Opening the Purse: Public Money & Indie Authors: DEBBIE YOUNG, PETER URPETH, GEMMA SELTZER, NICOLA SOLOMONS

After all that excitement about Bookshop.org, here finally is a story that doesn't feature them. It's been refreshing to see AI take a back seat in the news, but its developments are still with us and important to keep abreast of.

Many literary fiction authors feel caught in the middle, shut out of a traditional literary establishment that foregrounds their genre, but also out of indie advice urging marketing methods that feel misaligned. Orna Ross explores the psychology of literary writers who feel uneasy about selling their work, shares her own marketing shifts as a literary novelist and poet, and explains why literary fiction is not a special case—simply another genre with its own reader psychology and buying behavior.

Bookshop has been very busy of late. We ended last week with two significant stories related to the platform that lets people buy globally and support local bookstores. And we start this week with the biggest story of the trio.