Hi everyone:

I seem to be blogging regularly on the news page at FuseLiterary.com/blog/

So while I shall update agentsavant.com occasionally, you will find most of my news and views at the agency’s website.

Wow. 2016 sucked. In so many ways. I was never happier to kick a year to the curb than 2016. From David Bowie in January to Carrie Fisher in December, it seemed that each week brought a fresh tragedy to our lives. And all the while the nastiest election ever roared in the background. At times I just wanted to hide my head in a good book. Thank goodness I’m in the publishing industry!

But it’s a new year now and things have to be better. Right?

However, before I move on to my 2017 predictions, let’s see how I did with my 2016 predictions last year.

I said that ebook sales are not stagnating, and that is definitely true. What you hear are erroneous statistics from an industry that has not kept up with the growth of non-ISBN self-published ebooks, and did not allow for the short-lived fad of adult coloring books, which can only exist in print in their numbers. I’ll talk more about this in regards to 2017 because this meme is not going away.

I said that physical bookstores will continue to decline and I believe I was wrong on this one. I see a renaissance in indie bookstores as they expand and localize their offerings.

I predicted that Kindle Unlimited will become a larger part of self-published authors’ revenue and this seemed to play out, albeit in a minor way.

I thought that ebook lending in libraries would increase and according to an informal survey of librarians I know, this is a big growth area for libraries.

I said that more midlist authors would self-publish and alas this is true. Most have been pushed out of the traditional publishing model, unless they are writing work for hire projects (more on that in 2017 predictions). But they are still creating wonderful books for their fan base and earning more money by self-publishing.

I felt that the Hollywood Blockbuster model would continue in traditional publishing and it did. I predicted that Apple’s iBookstore might make a run for market share against Amazon and it didn’t. I imagined that geographic boundaries for translated ebooks would disappear and that has not happened. Yet. I also felt that “lost” novels would resurface, and some did. I predicted that a breakout novel would be created specifically for the mobile environment and there was a modest success story called The Creature’s Cookbook, on mobile publisher Tapas Media’s app that quickly became their best selling franchise (it’s from one of my clients, so I feel obligated to mention that). So I’ll give myself a win on that one.

The last three predictions, that adult coloring books would expand, that traditional ebook royalties would escalate, and that indie authors would take market share from traditional authors, all proved true to some degree. Adult coloring books rose higher in the beginning of 2016, then tanked towards the end of the year. Ebook royalties saw some escalation tied to sales figures (like a rise to 30% after 10,000 ebooks were sold and such). And indie authors continued to rise marginally over traditional author sales, but it had slowed way down from the heyday in 2009-2014.

So seven predictions panned out, three did not, and three were kind of maybes. In my book, that’s pretty good.

Now on to my thoughts for the coming year!

1. DIVERSITY WILL BE HUGE. The trend towards publishing books by ethnically diverse, LGBTQ+, physically challenged, and “other” voices will accelerate in 2017. Especially with the social media backlash against our new president’s conservative viewpoints, you will see the publishing industry double down on their selection of books by and about people of color, the LGBTQ community, and others whose voices and stories we have not heard much from the straight white publishing world. Sure, there will still be plenty of books by straight white authors. But the books causing most of the conversation in publishing will be by “other voices.”

2. AUDIOBOOKS WILL RISE DRAMATICALLY. Oh, my goodness. Audiobook growth is out of this world. We’re talking nearly 30% increase in digital downloadable audiobooks (mp3s) in 2016, which is really where most of the growth is occurring as physical CD media sales plummet. A lot of this is attributable to the rise of smart phones and the ease of listening to audiobooks as you commute, exercise, or just have some downtime. Add to that the fact that Audible has seen its monthly subscription membership grow at a rate of 40% each year for the past three years and you can easily see that audiobook sales are skyrocketing. I don’t see any decrease in this growth for 2017. In fact, I see it accelerating as pricing becomes even more desirable.

3. PRINT VERSUS EBOOKS? THEY WILL BOTH GROW! I was really hoping that we’d be moving beyond the “us versus them” mentality of this print versus ebooks debate by now, but I think it will continue into 2017 with a slight decline in vehemence. By this I mean more and more pundits will be saying that both print and ebook versions of a book are growing. The vitriol is silly at this point. An author can make money by selling either or both versions of a book. And as I mentioned earlier in this post, the companies like Bowker and Nielsen do not do a good job accurately measuring the digital portion of our industry. Look to Author Earnings and Data Guy for a more full-fleshed analysis of digital book growth in both traditional and self-publishing. My agency specializes in hybrid authors, authors who have some works traditionally published and some self-published or with small e-book first presses, so we tend to see more of the new ways authors are telling their stories. And this is why I can tell you that self-publishers are getting more knowledgeable about the business aspects of publishing and the traditional publishers are getting cagier about digital opportunities. Both are growing as where, when and how you “read” become mobile, interactive, expansive, and desirable over other forms of entertainment and education.

NOTE: Adult coloring books as a fad have petered out, finally. Last Christmas (2015) all of the top ten bestselling titles were adult coloring books. This year at Christmas (2016) only two bestsellers were adult coloring books, and those were at the number 8 and 10 positions. Adult coloring books were a huge part of the print resurgence everyone in publishing was talking about in late 2015, early 2016.

4. INDIE BOOKSTORES WILL THRIVE AS THEY EVOLVE. Well, perhaps thrive is the wrong verb. In 2017 small bookstores will continue to live on the bleeding edge of profitability, but we’ll see a lot of innovation at the retail level with localization, personalization, subscription models, author events, group events, community building, product line expansion and just plain fun at the bookstore. In San Francisco, where Fuse Literary is headquartered, a law was just passed where non-food retail businesses can provide alcoholic beverages to their customers. Bingo! Browsing through bookstores can now become an even more enjoyable experience. Casinos have long understood that the more you enjoy your experience, the more money you spend. So how about buying a Moleskin journal to go with that new thriller or romance novel. Heck, buy all three. As hand-selling recommendations from your trusted bookseller become more and more important to readers, and the shopping experience transforms into bliss, watch for a renaissance in local bookstores across the nation.

5. ADULT FICTION WILL MOVE TO BECOME A MAINLY DIGITAL MARKET. Okay, this is a bold prediction, but think about it. How many hardcover first editions did you plunk down $35 or $40 for in 2016? I’ll go first. As a reader. One. And I regret that I did not buy the ebook version for $15.99 instead. Most adult fiction I read is genre fiction and it is like candy. I love the storytelling, the writing, the action and the characters. Oh, my. But I love the stories just as much in ebooks as hardcovers. And my pocketbook loves the financial savings of an ebook over a hardcover all day long. Plus, I can take my Kindle with me anywhere in my purse and read whatever/whenever I like, where the portability of a hardcover is not so great. So I’m going to predict that in 2017 we’ll see the rapid decline of adult fiction hardcovers except among the perennial bestsellers. This decline will be replaced many times over by the expansion of adult fiction ebooks. In both quantity of books and in relation to print sales. And adult fiction will become mainly a digital market.

6. IP FROM PUBLISHERS WILL INCREASE. IP, or intellectual property in this context, are the titles that are conceived and published by traditional publishers based on ideas by their staff. The only difference is that they are written as “work for hire” projects by contracted authors who may or may not see their names on the cover. I have seen a marked increase in these types of opportunities for authors over the past year and I expect that to increase in 2017. Authors usually get a modest advance, and sometimes, but not always, they also get a modest royalty rate (1-3%). IP are usually series titles that are conceived by editors and publishers based on what book buyers are telling them are selling well. If John Green-type contemporary realistic books are trending down in the YA category, and supernatural witch-based modern fantasy is trending up sharply, HarperCollins may come up with a “bible” of plot, character sketches, setting, etc. and ask a few select authors to provide a chapter, effectively competing to see which one will be allowed to write the story (or in some cases the series) in a compressed timeframe. This is like the old Nancy Drew or Hardy Boys books that were written by a parade of authors under the pseudonyms Carolyn Keene and Franklin W. Dixon respectively. IP gives a debut author a leg up into traditional publishing. And for a mid-list author it may give you a way back in if the book or series is successful.

7. MEDIUM-SIZED PUBLISHERS WILL DISAPPEAR. This trend is alarming in its pace, but predictable given the changes in publishing. Mid-sized publishers are finding it increasingly difficult to make a profit, meaning only large conglomerates and small publishers with a razor-sharp focus will eventually remain viable. So be careful when offered a contract from a medium-sized publisher. You might want to make sure that the bankruptcy clause reversion of rights process is spelled out specifically and the length of the contract is for a certain number of years instead of the term of copyright (70 years after the author’s death). Medium-sized publishers are increasingly having a tough go because they lack the cost-efficiency of the large conglomerate as well as the market focus and penetration of the tiny publisher. I predict this trend is going to accelerate massively in 2017.

8. AMAZON WILL CONTINUE TO DOMINATE AND GROW THEIR MARKET SHARE IN PUBLISHING. I guess this one is not too much of a prediction. It’s become a fact. No other publisher or distributor is stepping up to challenge Amazon and they are running away with the market. But unlike other historical dominant players in a particular industry, Amazon treats itself like a tech start up in some respects and keeps innovating at a phenomenal pace, so I do not believe they will topple from their own weight. It has been estimated that Amazon already sells 70% of the ebooks and 50% of the print books in the U.S. I expect those numbers to rise. Also, with Amazon’s new brick and mortar stores, I expect their own imprints to do a better job of selling print books.

9. CHINESE INFLUENCE. This is just starting to pick up steam. It began with movies and television shows over the past few years. When you see those opening movie credits, the producers (aka the financiers) are more frequently Chinese corporations and partnerships. I just learned over the holidays that a Chinese company owns the AMC movie theater chain. My prediction is that as Chinese companies and entrepreneurs see huge profitability in the American entertainment industry, it is only a matter of time until Chinese publishing begins to take a more active role in American book publishing. Four out of the Big Five publishers are multi-national conglomerates with headquarters in other countries (Bertelsmann in Germany and Pearson in the UK own Penguin Random House, NewsCorp in Australia owns HarperCollins, Hachette Livre in France owns Hachette USA, and Holtzbrink in Germany owns Macmillan. Only Simon & Schuster, owned by CBS, is a US-owned company.) Watch for Chinese involvement either directly, as in creating a Big Six publisher, or more likely indirectly, by financing imprints within Big Five publishers. This could be a major opportunity if you have content that Chinese audiences crave (and that the government approves of.)

10. EXPORT SALES ARE BECOMING MORE IMPORTANT TO US PUBLISHERS. This may be a bit more esoteric for some of you, but it is very important to agents. When a publisher asks for World Rights to your book, it used to mean that their rights department would attempt to interest foreign publishers in translating your book into their native languages. For English speaking countries such as the UK and Australia, it meant making deals with publishers in those countries as well. But more often now US publishers are using the Export subsidiary right to publish the US version in English-speaking foreign countries. A digital file is transmitted to a printer in London or Sydney, or even a foreign country that sells English-language books, and they print/distribute the book from there. Export sales are usually at half the royalty you’d be getting from a foreign publisher so be aware of this trend.

And that’s it for 2017. Publishing is healthy. The chaos of the revolution is slowing down, but still expanding in many directions at once, so keep an eye out for opportunities you could benefit from (especially storytelling in multiple media, which I am especially interested in). Happy New Year.

Laurie McLean, Partner

FUSE LITERARY

Laurie McLean spent 20 years as the CEO of a PR agency and 8 years as an agent before co-founding Fuse Literary in March 2013 with her partner Gordon Warnock. Fuse now has 8 agents in New York, San Francisco, Chicago, Dallas, Vancouver and Sacramento. Laurie specializes in adult genre fiction plus middle-grade and young adult children’s books, but is currently closed to new submissions. Find out more at FuseLiterary.com, subscribe to the newsletter, read the blog, and follow the agency on Twitter @FuseLiterary and Laurie @AgentSavant.

The Creature’s Cookbook debuted yesterday on the Tapas app (the app is free to download at Apple or Android app stores), and fans ate it up. So we thought it might be fun to interview author/monster Simon Alkenmayer’s first human friend, Rebecca (no last names please), about the chef.

So, Rebecca, you seem like a nice, quiet woman. How did you become friends with a monster like Simon?

That’s a pretty easy question. I went out one night to get a bagel, and there was this gross dude looking through all the shop windows. I saw him go into this corner store, and used the opportunity to escape. I didn’t want him to see me walk home, so I went around the back of the building and walked up the service drive. There’s these warehouses all linked, and I thought I was being pretty clever, because unless he looked down every alley, he wouldn’t see me. I guess I wasn’t really being clever. It didn’t occur to me that the guy might have been waiting for me to leave and to see where I went.

Anyway, he grabbed me from behind and put a knife to my throat. He said he was going to kill me if I didn’t do what he said. He pushed me really hard, and I fell behind some trashcans. I cut myself on some glass, and got scraped up pretty badly. I was sure I was going to die, or worse, when he started hitting me. Then all of a sudden, there’s this noise, like when a car reeves its engine, and the dude is laying about ten feet away with this thing— I don’t know, like, sitting on top of him. There was all this blood. I wasn’t really paying attention. I was looking for the knife.

When I picked it up, everything was quiet, and there was Simon, covered in goo, but watching me. After a while, I realized what was going on, and that he wasn’t going to hurt me. That he was like, waiting for me to say something. Being polite, you know?

It was overwhelming. I didn’t really have any time to sort through how I felt, because he saved my life! He killed the bad guy, and was super nice about it, but duh, he’s got sharp teeth and says he’s a monster. What could I do with that?

I guess, that’s when we became friends.

Are you afraid he’ll eat you when he gets hungry?

Life with Simon is kind of a balancing act. You have to learn to read his face and know what things will worry or upset him, because whenever he goes through emotions, he gets really hungry. Like his brain needs more calories, or something. If he spends any time with you, then he can smell you. I guess he retains like, a memory of people’s smells? Kind of how we remember what a person looks like. When he zones out, you know, like when he gets so hungry he can’t control himself, then you have to worry. That’s when he reverts back to what he remembers and tracks down what he knows. It’s never happened to any of us, but it’s something he’s always warning us against.

There have been a couple times where I thought he was about to pounce on me, but he really has self-control down to a science.

It probably seems weird that any person would put up with that kind of danger, but not to me. I grew up in a broken home. I’ve been in abusive relationships. What it’s taught me is that anyone can hurt you, really badly. Anyone can hide who they really are and then turn into an animal. Simon is so much better than that. He doesn’t lie about it. At least, not to me. I knew from the beginning that he doesn’t want anything from me, he wants to protect me.

I guess I kind of think of his hangry side as like, a mental illness, and it’s just my job to help him through it.

Is it difficult keeping this part of your life a secret?

It’s not as bad as you might think. I’m not the only one who knows. It’s kind of like a club. We get together over cocktails and dish. I guess the only time it bothers me is when I go to therapy. I really can’t talk about it with my therapist. I don’t think she’d call the cops or anything. I just think she’d assume I was losing my mind.

I guess that’s kind of what Simon feels when he tries to tell people he’s really a monster, and they don’t believe him. It has to be hard on his self-esteem. That’s probably one of the reasons he started coming out on the internet, you know?

There are times I want to explain why he is behaving weirdly, but I can’t. So instead, I just have to feel embarrassed and look out for him. You know, like if we are out together and he suddenly gets hungry. He does this thing where he goes all still and closes his eyes, like all of a sudden he’s meditating. Except his face is all scrunched up. I can tell he’s concentrating really hard. I know now that I have to get him something to eat that has proteinv in it, before his nose starts to wiggle, or he won’t be him anymore.

Like one time it happened at a grocery store, because there was this fight that broke out, and I guess Simon hadn’t eaten properly. Anyway, I had to — right then and there — open a package of beef jerky and just shove it in his face. And people were like, “What’s wrong with that woman? Is she going to pay for that?” And they stared at us.

But whatever. I don’t mind. It’s worth it. Simon is worth it.

How do you feel about being featured in Simon’s writings? Were you worried about being interviewed?

Well, on the one hand it’s a little flattering but awkward, having my private life put out on the internet. Sometimes I worry my ex will see it, or that some mistake I make will come back to bite me in the ass. Then on the other hand, no one knows that me, this Rebecca, is the Rebecca. Like Simon is always saying, no one believes it, so even if my boss read the book, he’d probably just assume it was a coincidence.

I think it’s pretty telling that none of Simon’s friends care about his obsession with chronicling his life. It says how much we enjoy being his friends. Not just because it’s cool to know something that no one else does, or know a monster who can get rid of your dickhead coworker if you ask. But because he makes our lives better. We’re all kind of messed up in our way, and he just patches us up. He’s very good at fixing things.

As for this interview — I’ve never done one before, and I’m a little embarrassed that anyone would ask me questions, but at the same time, I believe in what Simon is doing. If I can help him make his point, I’ll do it.

What do you actually want from Simon? I mean, it’s easier to have normal human friends, yes?

Not really. See, that’s what I’m saying. Humans are way harder. People lie and have all these weird issues, where they’re all jockeying for position. It’s like one big competition reality show. They friend you on Facebook, and suddenly you get to see all their opinions on everything. They expect you to help them move, care about their head cold, or coo at their kids.

Simon doesn’t care what I do. I can walk into his house, walk right up to his fridge, eat an entire plate of brownies, take a shower, and then pass out in his bed, and he’ll just be like, “Hello, my dear. Would you like me to fetch you another blanket?”

And I know what you’re thinking. You think I just want a butler, or like, a gay best friend, or whatever. No! That’s not it. I mean it’s nice that he takes care of me and stuff, but that’s not why. He respects me. I don’t think a lot of people, women especially, know what that word really means. He finds me interesting. He listens to me speak and thinks about what I say. He is like, the walking, talking epitome of the phrase “water off a duck’s back”, and I just think that’s so refreshing.

Plus, he knows a lot of stuff, tells me all these stories about his lives. He’s a great cook. He enjoys spending time with me, with nothing but that as his reward. I don’t know if I’ve ever had a friend like that. I don’t know if it’s possible for a human to be a friend like that. Simon has forever, he doesn’t need anything…well, except to eat people.

About the only bad thing about being his friend is finding body parts.

Do you find Simon sexy?

He’s going to read this, isn’t he? Oh man, I’m in for a huge lecture on “the perils of survival landscapes”. Oh well.

So first of all, Simon is weird looking. Like, reads Mary Shelly at a coffee shop on a rainy day, works swing shift at a morgue, leans out from dark corners in the dead of night, kind of weird. His eyes are like, wide and staring, and his nose is funny. Well, you know, you’ve seen him. Point is, he’s not what people would think of as being attractive. Well, okay, that’s not entirely true. When he dresses like a woman, he’s pretty hot. Make-up suits him and he’s a master at costumes.

But that’s not important. What is, is that he has a way about him. Like, always courteous, always kind. He’ll be walking along, and suddenly he’s staring into space with this little smile on his face, and I just know he’s remembering something from a long-ass time ago and thinking profound thoughts about the human race, or whatever. He almost never interrupts people when they talk. He can be snarky, sure, but seldom out loud. He even bows. Who does that?

The first time I read his website and saw all the stuff he was actually thinking, it made me laugh, because it’s so different from how quiet he seems.

Anyway, Simon is also ridiculously protective. I feel really safe with him, in a way I guess I can’t feel with men. I know that if he’s within hearing distance, if I make one tiny sound of unhappiness, he’ll be there in a flash. And I know what he’ll do.

So yeah, in that way, he’s pretty sexy.

Have you ever eaten human?

Oh my god, I hope not! *gag*

We figured out, pretty quick that if I was always going to be coming over to spend time with him, there’d have to be a system. So we went to every department store in the county and bought all these Tupperware containers. Anything that has people parts in it goes into a red container. Anything that is Rebecca-safe, goes into a blue. And because he’s really organized (borderline OCD, if monsters can be OCD), he even uses separate cookware and whatnot. There’s a whole human-compatible cupboard of stuff with color-coded handles.

But I have to admit, it still freaks me out when I open the fridge and there’s like a bowl of brains, or like fingers just sitting in mustard. I mean, he’s pretty good at keeping stuff like that hidden, but I’m kind of always in his business, so I see things I shouldn’t. I try to just ignore it, or tell myself it’s fake, which he’ll probably also lecture me about.

If I found out I’d accidentally eaten human…I don’t know. I’d probably throw up.

Tell us about your life before Simon.

Boring. And not so great. I grew up in a small town. Lots of cows, dirt, fields. My dad was a complete asshole. Sick. Drank a lot. Not a nice person. I met a guy in high school and moved out of my house as soon as I could, but then it turned out that I went from one bad situation to another. He was abusive and had a drug problem. I got to the point where I knew that if I didn’t leave, I was going to die. Something just clicked. I put all my stuff in my car, emptied my bank account, and drove. When I got here, I sold my car. I went to a local support group, where I met my friend Lisa, and she helped me get a job. Then I got an apartment. Right across the street from a monster.

I would make a joke about my luck, but it turns out, my luck is pretty good.

THE PUBLISHING REVOLUTION IS DEFINITELY NOT OVER

(Regardless of what you’ve heard)

From the title of this post, you can tell I’m at odds with the notion that the digital publishing revolution is now over, ebooks are slipping in popularity, print is once again king of the world, indie bookstores are back on a steady footing, and adult coloring books are saving the world. Well, except for that last one. I agree with traditional publishing that adult coloring books are propping up print book sales big time. But as far as the other “facts” go, I say hogwash.

That’s a lot to digest, so let me bullet point these 13 predictions for ease of digestion…and hopefully inspiration…for 2016!

1. Ebook sales are NOT stagnating. I’ve always been a firm believer that you can make numbers and statistics dance to any beat you play and I believe the Big Five are skewing these numbers with their newly won agency pricing models. Last year I saw several of my clients’ debut novels come out with an ebook price that was higher than the print book price. Check it out on Amazon. I’m not kidding. That’s part of the “decline” scenario, because honestly who would not buy a hardcover print book if it was cheaper than a digital book. Most people would make that choice. And because of this, ebook sales from traditional publishers large and small seem to be declining. Once you add Amazon ebook sales into the calculation, however, it all falls apart. Unfortunately that is not what most reports have done. They only concentrated on traditional retail sales numbers from their usual cast of publishers. So you’re getting fed false numbers. Ebooks are healthy and should continue to be healthy throughout 2016 and beyond. They are here to stay. Once ebook pricing stabilizes, because while I’m sure the traditional booksellers and publishers are trying to help their physical retail partners (aka bookstores) by increasing print sales, they will see that they went too far and the smart ones will adjust. At least that is my opinion.
2. Physical bookstore sales will continue to decline. Amazon already sells the vast majority of print and digital books. They are a healthy company. Heck, they signed up 3 million new Prime members at $99 a pop during the third week of December alone! So I’m betting that they will continue to discount books, support indie authors through KDP Select and Kindle Unlimited, and the local bookstores and chains will simply not be able to keep up. I’ll talk about Google and Apple as possible white knights a bit later, but for now I’m predicting that Amazon is just going to keep growing and taking market share from bookstores in 2016.
3. Kindle Unlimited will continue to become a larger part of KDP Select author revenues. Amazon is always fine-tuning the customer experience. It’s their obsession. And with KDP, authors are their customers too. When Kindle Unlimited disproportionately rewarded short-story-size books, causing a proliferation of 14 page erotic fiction and episodic novels where 14 books should really be counted as one, Amazon adjusted things. Now they pay per page read and this upset a lot of writers who were trying to game the system. But my hybrid client-authors have seen a steady increase over time in their Kindle Unlimited subscription revenue and I believe this is going to keep growing.
4. Library lending of ebooks will increase. I have several author-clients who are librarians as well, and they unanimously inform me that the ebook lending side of the library business is booming. As indie authors recognize this missing link in their distribution plans, more libraries will flock to them as sources of inexpensive books (especially when it is so expensive to buy those bestsellers in print and ebook formats). Sure, Smashwords, Overdrive and others allow libraries access to indie published ebooks, but it is a cumbersome system. Libraries and publishers will eventually figure out the user interface and back office processes, and once they do library ebook lending will accelerate in popularity. Especially for all those lucky readers who received a $49 Kindle Fire for the holidays!
5. Midlist authors will be pushed to self-publish. This is not really a prediction since it’s been going on for years now. But if you’re a debut author it’s worth noting that if your debut trilogy or series or even a stand alone book does not reach a high altitude in sales within the first 6 months (and I’m being generous), you’re probably going to see your advances dwindle, your future contracted books put out in digital only, or canceled altogether, and you had better be building your author platform with social media and some self-published material to be ready for the inevitable slide. I’m not being an alarmist. I’m just trying to get you prepared in case it happens, as it is happening more often these days and I believe that trend will continue.
6. The Hollywood Blockbuster mentality will continue with the Big Five. Just like the Hollywood “tent pole” blockbuster, the bestseller is still the Holy Grail for traditional publishing. They’re willing to roll the dice on debut authors because they might become bestselling authors, but generally all their marketing dollars go to support their established bestselling books and authors. That’s the way it’s been in the past, and it has become more and more prevalent now. That’s where all the big advance money goes. That’s where all the innovative social media marketing and book tour money goes. Hey, it works for Hollywood, it stands to reason it’s a good model for New York publishing too. Indie books, like indie movies, will fill the void.

Okay. Those are the easy ones. I could predict those without a crystal ball. But let’s have some fun and I’ll share what might happen in publishing in 2016. These are riskier predictions, but they might come to pass.

1. Apple’s iBookstore will make a run for market share against Amazon. I’m not sure about this one, but if anyone can take aim at reducing Amazon’s market share in books, it would be either Apple or Google. Google Play is not getting any traction, so I don’t see Google busting through. But Apple got serious with its operating system finally and included iBooks as a stand alone app instead of making the reader jump through hoops on iTunes (where half of them probably bought the new Adele song instead!) If Apple could just swallow their ginormous pride for one second and make an Android app for iBooks, imagine what could happen. Apple…are you listening?
2. Geographic boundaries for translated ebooks will disappear. This is already a thought in Amazon’s mind with English-language books. You can select a myriad of countries where your ebook can be sold through Amazon France or Germany or India or Brazil, etc. Now if they can only figure out how to do that with translated ebooks, we’re in for a revolution of another sort. Maybe some enterprising company (Apple? Google? Amazon?) will create a peer-to-peer ADX type of exchange for translations, where authors can pair up with translator talent and get those books distributed in other languages themselves. Audiobooks too. Why not? That would certainly shake up contracts from the Big Five. Oh, man. Can’t wait. More upheaval is good for everybody.
3. More “lost” novels will resurface. We saw how wildly popular Go Set a Watchman from Harper Lee was last year…and it was basically a rougher draft of To Kill a Mockingbird! A lot of descendants of famous authors are going to be rooting through attics, storage lockers and safe deposit boxes, looking for their ancestors’ long lost, unfinished works. Could be good. Probably not. But it will be lucrative.
4. There will be a breakout novel created specifically for the mobile environment. I have long believed that a shorter, episodic story, filled with cliffhangers, is perfect for the millennial generation of readers. You can read a quick bit while waiting in line for your latte or Frappuccino at Starbucks. Or when you’re on the light rail to work. Or if you’re bored with your lunch companions. I know of one company, Tapas Media, that will launch this spring, that is combining a sexy gaming interface with what they’re calling “bite-size” content. For authors this might mean you want to start imagining what a story could look like if it were optimized for this new environment. Charles Dickens would be pleased!
5. Adult coloring books will expand. These things were such a huge success, and as I mentioned previously, single-handedly boosting print book publishing last year, that publishers will expand them in number as well as branch out to other formerly youthful books. One of our authors, Helen Wrath, just debuted Drawing with a Vengeance, which is Cards Against Humanity with doodles. I expect there to be a huge variety of doodling, coloring, structure-building and other relaxation books for adults. I hope so anyway. I’m kind of tired of crayons and mandalas.
6. Traditional ebook royalties will escalate. This is a fight that agents have been waging since 2008. Today’s standard 25% royalty rate for ebooks is simply too low. Publisher overhead had already been figured into the original 6%-12.5% royalty rates for print books eons ago. So for a publisher to take 75% of the revenues from ebooks with very little if any additional overhead is unfair. In fact, ebooks have no printing/binding/distribution costs, and near zero return expenses, plus the marketing dollars they spend are format agnostic, so they are even more profitable to publishers. I am going to go out on a limb and say that in 2016 we’ll see royalties for ebooks begin to escalate commensurate with increases in sales. It might not get to the totally fair 50-50 split that agents have been screaming for, but even 40% would make my day.
7. Indie authors will continue to take market share from traditionally published authors. If you’re a fan of Hugh Howey and Data Guy and their Author Earnings report (and I am!), you already know that the statistics being handed to us by publishers and traditional organizations like Pew, BookScan, and BISG are way skewed towards the old publishing paradigms. Indie authors ARE grabbing market share from traditionally published authors and I believe that trend will continue. In fact I think there is a schism in the reading marketplace developing between those readers who will not blink an eye spending $35 for a hardcover first edition book from their favorite author and those who regularly balk at paying more than 99 cents for an indie author ebook—or even a multi-author anthology! This is especially true in genres like romance, science fiction, mysteries, fantasy, thrillers and graphic novels/comics. The traditional book market is shrinking while the indie market is growing. It’s not difficult to see where the growth is coming from Indie books are eating away at big book publishers. This should become indisputably obvious this year.

But also remember…books and reading are only one facet of the multi-billion dollar entertainment industry. It will be interesting to see how the publishing industry continues to evolve as it not only fights for profitability against books published outside of its purview, but also against movies, videogames, network television, streaming shows, and all the other entertainment items literally at consumer fingertips.

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So there you have it. My 13 predictions for the coming year? I’d love to hear your predictions for anything I’ve missed. Or if you agree or disagree with anything I’ve presented. I have an agent’s viewpoint, which is pretty much in the eye of the storm at all times. But I welcome viewpoints from authors, publishers, pundits and anyone who loves books as much as I do!

**This article originally appeared on Anne R. Allen’s blog.