Cuban poets will be joined be poets from 25 countries for the first Havana Biennial of Poetry, which will take place in the Martinez Villena room of UNEAC (Union of Writers and Artists of Cuba) on May 27. Alex Pausides, president of CubaPoesía, which is organizing the event, described the biennial as, a poetic action Read More …
Celebrating its bicentennial, Colombia this year had itself as guest of honour at the Bogota International Book Fair, and attracted 605,000 visitors, up from 575,000 last year and 550,000 in 2017. Sales are reported to be up 10% on 2018’s Bogota event. Last year 1.5 million Colombians bought 1.1 million books at national book fairs, Read More …
The contrast couldn’t be starker. On the one hand we have Nielsen and the National Syndicate of Book Publishers (SNEL) telling us bookstore sales are in freefall. On the other hand we have the Flipoços (the Poços de Caldas International Literary Festival) reporting not just record attendance but record sales. Again. Are Brazilian readers sending Read More …
The latest report from ebook and audiobook distributor Libranda indicates global Spanish-language ebook sales up 10% YOY, with sales in Spain up 8% YOY in 2018. It is the ninth year in a row for rising digital sales in the Spanish-language markets, defined as Spain, Latin America and the USA. The figure for Spain, which Read More …
Italy-based digital books distributor and publishing facilitator StreetLib has offered its support to the governments and publishers of Uruguay and Vietnam as part of its commitment to a truly global book market. Full disclosure: The New Publishing Standard (TNPS) is published by StreetLib to further the debate about the global book markets. TNPS is not a StreetLib Read More …
Flávio Osso’s Ubook has long had the Brazilian audiobook market to itself, with no serious interest from rivals within the country or beyond its borders. That’s about to change, with Storytel due to launch in Brazil at any time, and Amazon’s Audible said to be preparing for any entrance at some unspecified future date. But as Read More …
Registration is underway for FIL Lima, the international book fair that will run in the Peruvian capital July 19 through August 4. And, and to make sure everybody can get in the floor space has been increased by 1,500 square metres (1,800 sq yards). Event organiser José Carlos Alvariño, who is also president of the Peruvian Read More …
With London and Paris in the rear mirror, European book fair groupies have their next fix coming up on April 1 when the Bologna Children’s Book Fair gets underway in Italy. A common feature at the world’s book fairs nowadays is Brazilian Publishers, an umbrella organization that looks after the best interests of, you guessed Read More …
The 40th Feria Internacional del Libro del Palacio de Minería wound up earlier this week, and provides another example of the myriad book fairs around the world that attract booklovers that spend money on books outside the traditional bookselling infrastructure of book stores and online stores. Book sales that therefore rarely get noticed by the Read More …
Self-publishing is alive and well across Latin America, and nowhere more so than in Colombia, where the Bogota International Book Fair (FILBo from its Spanish title Feria del Libro Bogotá) is for the second year running giving self-publishers a chance to, participate in the Book Forums and other professionalization spaces promoted and organized by FILBo. Read More …
Brazilian audiobook firm Ubook is preparing for an IPO in Canada that will value the company at anywhere from USD $8 – $15 million as CEO Flavio Osso looks to expand Ubook’s operations further into Europe. UPDATE: Flavio Osso points out that “The range from 8 to 15 million dollars is the the target amount Read More …
When StreetLib launched The New Publishing Standard in September 2017 we made clear the function of the journal was to stimulate debate about the much-neglected global book markets. It was not a StreetLib promotional tool, and not a vehicle to advocate digital at the expense of traditional formats. But occasionally StreetLib becomes part of the Read More …
Germany-based Bookwire has reported 65% sales growth and a 25% increase in titles registered for its Spain and Latin America market venture. The increase in Spanish-language titles was to the tune of 33,000, while for Portuguese-speaking Brazil the number of titles rose 40% to 32,000. Bookwire also announced its venture into the audiobook arena. Elena Read More …
Europe’s biggest consumer-facing book fair will be taking place in the El Retiro park in Madrid from May 31 through June 16. Anyone wanting to participate as an exhibitor will need to complete registration by noon on 11 February. The Dominican Republic will be guest of honour at the 78th Madrid Book Fair. In 2018 the Read More …
Venezuela’s National Book Center (Cenal), backed by the Ministry of Culture, gave a three day workshop on the value of digital publishing at the end of January. Cenal president Raul Cazal stressed the need for quality content, but the workshop was focused on the mechanics of ebook production and distribution with the aim of boosting the Read More …
The US $10,000 Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz Prize for Literature will be awarded in Mexico on 4 December this year, and authors and publishers have until April 30 to get their submissions in. The award, launched in 1993 and funded by the Universidad del Claustro de Sor Juana, is for books originally published Read More …
Excitement is building for the 28th Havana International Book Fair in Cuba, which kicks off 7 February through until 17 February, and will then move to the provinces until winding up on April 14, in the eastern city of Santiago de Cuba. Improbable as it may sound the Cuban book fair is not just the Read More …
The second edition of Feria del Libro de la Costa is taking place on Argentina’s Atlantic coast. PublishNewsES reports nearly fifty major publishers are alongside booksellers and authors and a range of independent presses which have, Revitalized the production of books in Argentina during the last 20 years (with their) commitment to new writers, with translations Read More …
Times change and you have to adapt to them, reports PublishNewsES, and in the tiny Central American republic of El Salvador the libraries have finally began to embrace the internet. The House of Culture of Metapán, PublishNewsES explains, was, one of the ten first Houses of Culture that were founded in the country in 1973 Read More …
Over at PublishNewsES this week, a thought-provoking study of the Peruvian book market that, unusually, adopts a holistic approach more akin to that we’d take here at TNPS. That is to say, a view that looks at all the key market segments rather than the usual introspective focus on publishers and offline/online retail. In this Read More …
