String theory suggests a universe (or many) in which there are hidden joins between the different parts: in more everyday terms it helps to explain how we come together, bond, but also fall apart, and what the implications of all this toing and froing can be.

At the fast-approaching London Book Fair, we will once again see this activity writ large, as publishers, agents, authors and other book trade professionals mingle at Olympia for another year. I doubt we are the only sector that believes in these connectors, but we are probably one of the best at exploiting them.

This year’s fair, as well as the Bologna Children’s Book Fair that swiftly follows, comes at an unusually difficult time. If there has ever been a moment when so much has felt in flux, then I do not remember it. From President Trump to AI, we are seeing the world reshape (and be reshaped) around us. As Adam Ridgeway, the LBF’s latest director, tells us this week, LBF provides the platform from which we might hope our voices are heard. In pure trade terms, the biggie, of course, is AI, and the conclusion of the government’s consultation into changes to UK copyright law, with its preferred option to allow tech companies access to published materials on an opt-out basis. It is rare to see so many creatives and copyright holders come together – from Kate Bush to the BBC, we are witnessing a wholesale rejection of the government’s approach, and if it does not listen, then I expect objections to grow.

If there has ever been a moment when so much has felt in flux, then I do not remember it

Actually, Publishers Association CEO Dan Conway put it better, saying: “The strength of support shown in recent weeks for copyright and our world-class creative industries is something the government ignores at its peril. When Booker, Grammy, Oscar and Nobel-prize winners are united in calling on the government for a fair hearing, we have to hope they listen. The message to government is clear: the great copyright heist cannot go unchallenged.”  At LBF, a conversation between Conway and his US counterpart Maria Pallante, president and CEO of the Association of American Publishers, will be fascinating. The US operates in a different copyright regime, with a fair-use exception that has been used as a back door by tech companies, and we can learn much about how to police one.

LBF will also be our first moment to gather since the election of Donald Trump as US president, with the first weeks of his new administration deeply worrying. What we hear from US publishers, agents, and those booksellers returning from the American Booksellers Association’s Winter Institute taking place in Denver this week, will be vital to our understanding of the changed world we now inhabit. Our agents’ hotlist suggests we are already manoeuvring, and I expect an air of resistance will be a big part of the fair this year. 

Of the trade fairs, LBF is the least political, but you can only duck away from the big debates for so long. Ridgeway says that the “main part of [his] role is, is that I can get people on the stage who are – and help focus the conversation on the things that are vital for the industry’s future”. He is right to an extent. I don’t wish to mix metaphors, but this year’s London Book Fair is more than just a stage: it’s a melting pot for our hopes, a petri dish for our ideas, and no doubt, too, a place of solace for those who need to be reminded that we are not alone, and that the strings that bind us remain strong.