TOP TWENTY WELL-READ CITIES

Amazon.com Names America’s Most Well-Read Cities

Is it any wonder that Cambridge, Massachusetts, which Harvard University calls home, topped Amazon.com’s recent listing of the Top 20 Most Well-Read Cities in America?

I lived in Cambridge eons ago. Residents walked along streets reading books, book stores - be they large retail outlets or mom and pop resellits - on nearly every block, citizens in the parks reading magazines or best sellers, riders of MBTA missing their stops while engrossed in Follett or Oates. Add the Kindle and residents are now ordering more books, magazines and newspapers in print and Kindle formats. The survey began Jan. 1, 2011 and was based on cities with more than 100,000 residents. Cambridge residents also ordered the highest number of nonfiction books.

The Amazon.com top 20 list:

1. Cambridge, Massachusetts
2. Alexandria, Virginia
3. Berkeley, California
4. Ann Arbor, Michigan
5. Boulder, Colorado
6. Miami, Florida
7. Salt Lake City, Utah
8. Gainesville, Florida
9. Seattle, Washington
10. Arlington, Virginia
11. Knoxville, Tennessee
12. Orlando, Florida
13. Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania
14. Washington, D.C.
15. Bellevue, Washington
16. Columbia, South Carolina
17. St. Louis, Missouri
18. Cincinnati, Ohio
19. Portland, Oregon
20. Atlanta, Georgia

Happy to see Atlanta, my adopted home of many decades ago, sneak onto the list. St. Louis, my birth place, came in 17.
Echoing results from Sisters in Crime’s recent Mystery Book Buyer Study, nearly half of the cities on the Amazon.com list are located below the Mason-Dixon line.

The Washington, D.C. area includes three of the top 20 cities – Alexandria, Va. (#2), Arlington, Va. (#10) and Washington itself (#14). Alexandria residents also topped the list of buyers of children’s books.

The sunshine state, Florida, has three cities in the top 20 – Miami (#6), Gainesville (#8) and Orlando (#12).

“We hope book lovers across the country enjoy this fun look at where the most voracious readers reside,” said Mari Malcolm, managing editor of Books at Amazon.com.

Submitted by
Gerrie Ferris Finger
http://www.gerrieferrisfinger.com/

SOON TO BE RELEASED: THE GHOST SHIP

BISG Conference Message: Change or Die

BISG Conference Message: Change or Die

On my recent book tour, readers and potential book buyers ask: "Is your book available on Kindle or Nook?"

The answer is YES.

Read the link below to understand the changing nature of book sales.

Gerrie
http://www.gerrieferrisfinger.com/

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"I REALLY DON'T KNOW CLOUDS AT ALL"

Dan Clancy, director of Google Books, says data now stored on a PC should be stored on a "cloud" instead.

When I read this I thought, there are those who've said I have my head in the clouds most of the time, I'm interested.

Clancy goes on to say, "...the concept (is) that you can get services through the Internet that are accessible no matter what hardware you use and where you are."

So how does this relate to the book world?

He admits digital reading is taking off, although still small and, he says, the concept of Amazon's Kindle is "cloud-based". If you buy it, it's stored online. If you lose your Kindle, you just access your book from the online cloud with another device. He adds, "One of the challenges, however, is 'to trust that it will be there when you want it.'

There's always a caveat.

AMAZON BACKS DOWN

As an author, and I know I speak for other authors, we live to write. Period. We create stories in our heads, and, using our fingers - first pen and ink, then typewriter, now computer - we extract scenes that won't emerge like we want them to because they have a dastardly life of their own. It ain't easy, but we are compelled. It's in our DNA.

Then we have to make agents and publishers want to represent and buy our manuscripts. That really ain't easy.

Then we have to promote our novels or non-fiction works by traveling to book stores and sitting at tables looking pleased and prosperous even if people aren't flocking to us like we're Dan Brown. We promote on social networks hoping our friends don't feel like they're being shilled.

Then along comes a disagreement between our publisher and the A Number One Bookseller in the country over the price of their Kindle books. And that bookseller gets its electronic pages in a snit and pulls the BUY button on our books, thus unfriending our publisher.

What's a writer to do?

We can do nothing but sit back and wait, and, voila, Amazon declares our publisher, Macmillan, has the right to set its own prices, and eventually the BUY buttons are returned and all is friendly again.

Or is it? For now it is, but is there a next chapter?

These are difficult times for writers, publishers and book sellers, particularly brick and motar stores. Let's hope Amazon uses its internet deep pockets wisely so it's a win-win for everyone in the book business.


That's all for now.
Gerrie