Can you sell a book in 10 or 20 words? Possibly, but you can certainly make or break a reputation if those few words are passed on hundreds and thousands of times.

There have always been word-of-mouth successes in publishing, easy to describe but hard to predict. Now, a lightspeed version of word-of-mouth, based around social networks...

W H Smith has sought to play down the effect its exclusive deal with Penguin will have on the travel market saying that it captures only 5.6% of retail travel book sales. The deal, revealed first in The Bookseller 10 days ago, has faced a barrage of criticism from travel writers, and rival companies. The Guardian reports that...

The Society of Authors (SoA) and the Outdoor Writers and Photographers Guild (OWPG) have become the latest writers' groups to hit out at W H Smith's exclusive deal with Penguin, as rival travel publishers say they are bracing themselves for a "whopping great returns" list. The Bookseller revealed last week that W H...

"The market is glutted: publishing has degenerated into a gambling competition for potential bestsellers." This sounds like contemporary hand-wringing but it is Geoffrey Faber in 1934. Similarly "Waterstone's is finished: it's soulless and corporate" was said to me by a bookseller in 1988, on my first day in the company. It...