World Book Night

Writing on Facebook, our writer J. David Simons said about the forthcoming World Book Night: I'm not sure what to think of World Book Night. Of course, it is a noble cause to get great books out there into the hands of readers. I wonder what kind of deals these already well-known writers have with their publishers - is there anything in at all for the writers apart from the proliferation of their books? [I know a couple of the writers on the list- I must ask them]. If it's all for free, could we have other such nights of free services for other noble causes? A World Boiler-Fixing Night, A World Car-Servicing Night, A World Free Banking Night, A World Free Bottle of Wine Night, A World Free Cinema Night, A World Free Insurance Night. Why does it always have to be the writers that give away their work for free?!

My own experience of WBN is limited. Last year I was a "giver" but rather than send the books to my appointed pick up point, a bookshop, WBN sent them to a library miles from where I live and work. Two buses away in fact (I don't drive). I was not keen on carrying 48 copies of The Spy Who Came in From the Cold on the buses, but I did not need to as the books never actually arrived. They are out there somewhere. I did, however, make up part of a panel at an arts association in deepest rural Leicestershire, with a writer, a librarian and a bookseller. Several of the association were givers. We had a very good discussion on all things bookish, and WBN was the trigger.

I can see David's point, but I know that he and most other writers do want to create a reading culture whereas I doubt the bloke who comes to mend our boiler wants to put boilers at the heart of public life. And, locally, some people have from time to time organised free cinema showings on giant screens for all to see. Certainly we give away some overstocks from time to time - usually anthologies lest any individual author gets upset - as freebies in, for example, Library Reading Day goodie bags.

My main concern about WBN is that as that it relies on well known writers giving their work away free (I presume it is free) it will perpetuate the dominance of those big name writers. Wouldn't it be grand if WBN also had some dosh to pay deserving writers, and deserving small publishers to enable, well, us to give away 25,000 books to help draw the reading public's attention towards, say, J. David Simons?

WBN givers often do try hard to get books into the hands of those who don't read very much, but I confess that over the last year I've got my hands on several of last year's list, introducing me to writers I'd been meaning to read. We all like freebies. I mentioned recently to Robert Chandler, the translator of Life and Fate, that I'd recently found a copy of his book in goodie bag at a Vintage event, having already bought two copies. He said that he was recently at a similar event and on leaving found his goodie bag had that book in it too.

Some bookshops have been concerned about books being devalued by being free, or taking up people's reading time to the exclusion of bought books. I don't accept that. Most book readers read from all sorts of sources, bookshops, second hand bookshops, libraries, book sales at summer fetes, borrowing from friends. But I'm interested to see how this argument develops.

World Book Night

Arguments are raging about the value of World Book Night, though I get the impression the doubters are using WBN as a lightning conductor to focus their rage about other things making the life of a bookseller pretty tough right now. WBN was all over the press and radio, and 19,999 people gave away a million books selected from 25 great titles. Yes, there were glitches - the WBN website was late and not the best, and on Friday I got an email saying my books had been delivered to somewhere miles from where I live and work, and even further from the bookshop I had nominated as my delivery point. Except they haven't been delivered anywhere as yet. But anyone trying to deliver 20,000 parcels with a million objects is bound to have teething problems.

I joined forces with another "giver" who had received her books and we gave our titles - The Spy Who Came in from the Cold - at a special showing of the film of the same name. Except they were furtively handed over by a fairly unconvincing looking spy wrapped in a brown paper bag marked "World Book Night 2011. Classified papers. Authorised readers only. TOP SECRET". We also gave away a mixed box of the 25 titles and toasted World Book Night with some sparkly stuff. In what way could this be bad for bookselling?

The doubters are meantime arguing whether giving away, say, tens of thousands of copies of Toast will lead to better sales of the book in the long run. No, WBN was not about whether Toast shares will go up 3% or down 3% but whether you can get people excited about books. It worked.

All of the day and all of the night

It's World Book Night this Saturday. I'm joining with 19,999 other people to give away 48 books, part of a million being given away from a set of 25 very good titles reprinted specially by big publishers. I should have subverted it slightly and given away 48 Five Leaves' books. But I'm mean that way. I'll be giving The Spy Who Came in from the Cold, mostly to people attending a showing of the film by the same name at Flicks in the Sticks, Lowdham Book Festival's film weekend. Is it a good thing? There are quite a few people in the book trade complaining that flooding the market with free books at a time when shops are under pressure is crazy. On the other hand, in Lowdham village there are quite a few givers, and the local bookshop is handling the distribution, as part of its general promotion of a reading culture. I'm with them on that. Two of our writers are taking part in WBN events - J. David Simons will be doing a late night at Sauchiehall Street Waterestone's in Glasgow and Russel McLean will be strutting his stuff at Dundee Waterstone's, together with other local writers in each city. Some, backed by Susan Hill, argue that - as they do in Catalonia - there is a day where everyone buys a book to give away. This is the first WBN - I'm happy to go with the flow for next year, but there is a day Five Leaves' will be backing for sure. The Campaign for the Book is proposing a national library day, on the first Saturday of February, following the 110 events of protest against closures this February just gone (see this blog passim). The Campaign is suggesting a celebration of libraries - as the day of protest turned out to be - as part of a longer term campaign to keep libraries open, public and popular. Five Leaves can sign up for that without any need for discussion.