It feels like it was only a few days ago that I reported on a Big Five publisher launching an imprint to target successful self-published authors. Indeed, I assumed that I was reading more about the same story I had reported on earlier this month. But it's not.
ALLi News Editor Dan Holloway
Earlier in July, Simon and Schuster announced they were relaunching Pocket Books, the erstwhile mass market paperback imprint, as a press to publish two or three bestselling titles by previously self-published authors per month, with an emphasis on romance. The intention that time was to work with forward-thinking hybrid authors, as they put it.
Simon Stream Goes Digital
Now, Simon and Schuster have launched another imprint aimed at attracting indie authors. Called Simon Stream, this time the focus is digital, with titles coming out in e-book, audiobook, and print. As quoted in Publishers Weekly, Simon and Schuster's CEO Perminder Mann says Simon Stream looks to create “a distinctive global digital-focused publishing program” with the “speed and agility this market demands.” It will offer authors 50 percent net royalties on e-books and seeks to retain the agility of self-publishing while offering full editorial and marketing support. That marketing support will be led in the first instance by influencer-driven reading clubs.
Canadian E-book Habits
The launch of a digitally focused imprint like this, which clearly believes it can make a case that indies will in some cases be better off with a traditional publisher (or rather non-traditional traditional, as it were), provides an apposite segue to a new study on e-book habits. BookNet Canada has released key information on Canadian readers' buying, borrowing, and reading habits when it comes to e-book reading. As always, I recommend you go and read the report in full before deciding whether what it contains is key intelligence for your own publishing decisions.
But a couple of juicy extracts. The headlines are that 71 percent of Canadians read an e-book in 2025, while a third (34 percent of book buyers bought one) and only just fewer (29 percent) of borrowers borrowed one. But the figure I found most interesting is the average price buyers paid: $11.85 (US$8.74). This is in the context of the recent raising of KDP's cap for the 70 percent royalty rate to $12.99. In Canada at least, it's clearly not inconceivable to pay more than US$9.99 for an e-book if the average price is only a dollar lower.
But spend per e-book in 2025 was significantly lower than 2024 ($13.50) and at the lowest level since 2020. Meanwhile, the number of people buying at full price (38 percent) was the lowest recorded in the four years for which figures were given, while discounts, coupons, and bundling were all at their highest level.
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