3 ms·

My long retired parents met and worked in publishing. The continued deterioration of the industry is a source of deep sadness for them. I personally however rec

My long retired parents met and worked in publishing. The continued deterioration of the industry is a source of deep sadness for them. I personally however recently found my own ray of hope. By chance I started reading something I really liked, found it was published by a tiny house that has a subscription plan- which is different from an aggregator having a book of the month kind of thing- and publishes super niche unique voices, mostly translations into English. Have read 6 of their books this year, every single one has been just great. Think the breakdown of the big house and homogeneity of the star model leaves space for new shoots to find their audience.

rudyfink 2y ago
What you said reminded me of this Royal Road (https://www.royalroad.com/home https://www.royalroad.com/home) website I came across. It is not physical publishing (at least I don't think so), but it is a large collection of different authors who release books / work incrementally. The work mainly seems to be fiction of different varieties.
- davisp 2y ago
  Royal Road is a place for a lot of folks to get audiences seeded before they inevitably move on to some combination of Patreon, Amazon Kindle Unlimited, and Audible. One very notable example of this is Dungeon Crawler Carl by Matt Dinniman. He's even just announced that he managed to sell publishing only rights to Ace for large scale distribution which to my knowledge is a first (from authors that started on Royal Road). https://x.com/mattdinniman/status/1780998536529883622 https://x.com/mattdinniman/status/1780998536529883622 Also, I'd highly recommend reading Dungeon Crawler Carl if you enjoy anything close to Douglas Adams-esque comedic sci-fi. Its definitely trends a lot more "adult" than Douglas Adams, but that's about as close as I can think of off the top of my head for comparison. And I'd very much recommend the Audible versions narrated by Jeff Hayes for anyone that does audio books. The Sound Booth Theater production is also good but I'd only recommend that if you're doing a re-listen.
  - murphyslab 2y ago
    The Dungeon Crawler Carl series' first 4 or 5 books (it's been a little while) were excellent. Carl's tone reminds me of a detective novel, while the setting is more reminiscent of Ready Player One and The Matrix. The genre is a LitRPG novel (admittedly a genre I'd never known existed until reading DCC), heavily doused with comedic elements. Lots of mature themes and references to sex, drugs, politics, and violence, but with some of the allegorical or illustrative critique (to the point of absurdity) you'd find with Douglas Adams or Terry Pratchett when discussing serious topics with parallels to real life, in an imagined scifi/fantasy setting. I'd recommend the series if for those who haven't picked up a book in a while and who would appreciate those elements.
- o11c 2y ago
  RoyalRoad has at least 3 major problems: * there's a significant conflict between "this is a place to read stories" and "this is just a place to advertise for Amazon" * the effective site rules are unwritten and quite arbitrary (one unwritten rule: you are not allowed to say anything positive about real-ish religions, only negative things) * way too much pedophilia, including in site-promoted stories. Unlike religion, it's clearly not something they put effort into removing.
  - Narishma 2y ago
    Another problem is the ratings. Everything there seems way overrated. You'll see a ton of 5-star or 4-star ratings for things that are barely readable.
    - dageshi 2y ago
      When you've spent many a year reading machine translated chinese xianxia then indeed many stories on RR are 4/5 star worthy in comparison. Royalroad is not a place you go to find objectively good stories, it's the place you go to enjoy your particular blend of delicious trash because in the end you'd rather read chapter 1600 of the long running braindead litrpg than you would whatever just won the hugo's.
    - lenkite 2y ago
      Wasn't the case before, but RR allows banning readers from rating author stories. So, usually authors have become smarter and immediately ban readers whose review history looks critical. You cannot rate a story from which you have been banned. Of-course readers have also gotten smarter, many now leaving 0.5 stars for all new stories. If they are banned later, you can still adjust your rating. So now many new stories get a surge of 0.5 ratings.
  - api 2y ago
    Eww that’s not just a problem. The last two tell me something about the community. Hard pass.
carabiner 2y ago
Naturally, you mustn't mention the name in order to keep it exclusive.
- jonahbenton 2y ago
  The publisher is And Other Stories, UK based. Not a pitch. Just my experience.
  - handfuloflight 2y ago
    [dead]
satvikpendem 2y ago
What are the names of these books?
- jonahbenton 2y ago
  Mammoth, Inland, Down The Rabbit Hole, Open Door, Zbinden's Progress, The Luminous Novel, I Don't Expect Anyone To Believe Me. Actually that is 7. All very different, but arresting. Purity, All Dogs Are Blue, and Lightning Rods are next up for me, not sure which one will grab me, probably Purity.
lachaux 2y ago
I am very glad that you find your own ray of hope. I understand the sadness that you parents feel. I know some people in publishing. The industry was in an mode of existential crisis when Amazon Publishing was launched. It then went through social media, Goodreads, etc. It seems the industry survives, although the future is still murky. The industry indeed needs J. K. Rowling, Sally Rooney, Colleen Hoover, celebrity biographies & memoirs etc. to survive. Good books will find their way to be published, and get discovered, maybe dozens of years later. I happened to read a novel by an English author published ~100 years ago. It is a good book, IMO. The publishing house had only one person. The entire office was one room in his apartment.

rudyfink 2y ago

What you said reminded me of this Royal Road (https://www.royalroad.com/home https://www.royalroad.com/home) website I came across. It is not physical publishing (at least I don't think so), but it is a large collection of different authors who release books / work incrementally. The work mainly seems to be fiction of different varieties.

davisp 2y ago
Royal Road is a place for a lot of folks to get audiences seeded before they inevitably move on to some combination of Patreon, Amazon Kindle Unlimited, and Audible. One very notable example of this is Dungeon Crawler Carl by Matt Dinniman. He's even just announced that he managed to sell publishing only rights to Ace for large scale distribution which to my knowledge is a first (from authors that started on Royal Road). https://x.com/mattdinniman/status/1780998536529883622 https://x.com/mattdinniman/status/1780998536529883622 Also, I'd highly recommend reading Dungeon Crawler Carl if you enjoy anything close to Douglas Adams-esque comedic sci-fi. Its definitely trends a lot more "adult" than Douglas Adams, but that's about as close as I can think of off the top of my head for comparison. And I'd very much recommend the Audible versions narrated by Jeff Hayes for anyone that does audio books. The Sound Booth Theater production is also good but I'd only recommend that if you're doing a re-listen.
- murphyslab 2y ago
  The Dungeon Crawler Carl series' first 4 or 5 books (it's been a little while) were excellent. Carl's tone reminds me of a detective novel, while the setting is more reminiscent of Ready Player One and The Matrix. The genre is a LitRPG novel (admittedly a genre I'd never known existed until reading DCC), heavily doused with comedic elements. Lots of mature themes and references to sex, drugs, politics, and violence, but with some of the allegorical or illustrative critique (to the point of absurdity) you'd find with Douglas Adams or Terry Pratchett when discussing serious topics with parallels to real life, in an imagined scifi/fantasy setting. I'd recommend the series if for those who haven't picked up a book in a while and who would appreciate those elements.
o11c 2y ago
RoyalRoad has at least 3 major problems: * there's a significant conflict between "this is a place to read stories" and "this is just a place to advertise for Amazon" * the effective site rules are unwritten and quite arbitrary (one unwritten rule: you are not allowed to say anything positive about real-ish religions, only negative things) * way too much pedophilia, including in site-promoted stories. Unlike religion, it's clearly not something they put effort into removing.
- Narishma 2y ago
  Another problem is the ratings. Everything there seems way overrated. You'll see a ton of 5-star or 4-star ratings for things that are barely readable.
  - dageshi 2y ago
    When you've spent many a year reading machine translated chinese xianxia then indeed many stories on RR are 4/5 star worthy in comparison. Royalroad is not a place you go to find objectively good stories, it's the place you go to enjoy your particular blend of delicious trash because in the end you'd rather read chapter 1600 of the long running braindead litrpg than you would whatever just won the hugo's.
  - lenkite 2y ago
    Wasn't the case before, but RR allows banning readers from rating author stories. So, usually authors have become smarter and immediately ban readers whose review history looks critical. You cannot rate a story from which you have been banned. Of-course readers have also gotten smarter, many now leaving 0.5 stars for all new stories. If they are banned later, you can still adjust your rating. So now many new stories get a surge of 0.5 ratings.
- api 2y ago
  Eww that’s not just a problem. The last two tell me something about the community. Hard pass.

carabiner 2y ago

Naturally, you mustn't mention the name in order to keep it exclusive.

jonahbenton 2y ago
The publisher is And Other Stories, UK based. Not a pitch. Just my experience.
- handfuloflight 2y ago
  [dead]

satvikpendem 2y ago

What are the names of these books?

jonahbenton 2y ago
Mammoth, Inland, Down The Rabbit Hole, Open Door, Zbinden's Progress, The Luminous Novel, I Don't Expect Anyone To Believe Me. Actually that is 7. All very different, but arresting. Purity, All Dogs Are Blue, and Lightning Rods are next up for me, not sure which one will grab me, probably Purity.

lachaux 2y ago

I am very glad that you find your own ray of hope. I understand the sadness that you parents feel. I know some people in publishing. The industry was in an mode of existential crisis when Amazon Publishing was launched. It then went through social media, Goodreads, etc. It seems the industry survives, although the future is still murky. The industry indeed needs J. K. Rowling, Sally Rooney, Colleen Hoover, celebrity biographies & memoirs etc. to survive. Good books will find their way to be published, and get discovered, maybe dozens of years later. I happened to read a novel by an English author published ~100 years ago. It is a good book, IMO. The publishing house had only one person. The entire office was one room in his apartment.