Junot Diaz

NEW YORK (AP) - Three years ago, guest speaker Mindy Kaling joked that publishing's annual national convention, BookExpo America, resembled "a high school reunion where all the jocks were killed in a plane crash, and all the minorities, too."

Little seems to have changed.

From Wednesday to Saturday, tens of thousands of publishers, authors, agents and librarians will meet at the Jacob K. Javits Center in New York for a convention predominantly organized by whites, spotlighting books predominantly written, edited and published by whites.

The literary scrap over Jonathan Franzen’s diatribe “What’s wrong with the modern world” continues, with the world ahead on points so far, and most respondents turning pretty fast to what’s wrong with Jonathan Franzen. And one theme that’s growing stronger and harder to avoid is that Franzen looks all too much like a privileged white [...]

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In many ways, Boston's publishing industry is a mirror on the iconic city. Though relatively small, the city and its publishing are known for history; for being a center for academics, thought and innovation; and for being a hub of independence and rebellion that triggers change. In these times of rapid transition in the industry, Boston just might be the place to see big changes happen in publishing.

Last September, author Junot Diaz spoke to a standing-room-only audience at Town Hall in Seattle. Within the first few minutes, he gave the city props for approving a $122 million library levy the previous month. That’s how Seattle rolls.

It’s a book town and proud of it. Seattle always ranks at the top of the list of the most literary cities, dueling with Minneapolis and Washington, DC. Amazon and Costco are headquartered here. We thought we’d head to the Pacific Northwest and see what the publishing scene is all about. And what we found was a vibrant literary community with a lot of publishing options. It just doesn’t look like what you’d expect.

On Monday afternoon, the Pulitzer Prize Board will announce the winner of the 2013 Pulitzer Prize for fiction. Or not. Last year, for the first time in 35 years, there was no prize awarded for fiction. Imagine Bono walking on stage to award the Grammy for Album of the Year and announcing that there wouldn't be an award for Album of the Year. It was like that. The snub earned the Pulitzer Prizes more publicity -- and not the good kind -- than the actual awards …

What Will Amazon Do With Goodreads? (DBW) Generation Mooch? Why 20-somethings have a hard time paying for content (Paid Content) Google Starts Google Shopping Express Pilot in San Francisco (The Digital Reader) Junot Diaz Wrote a Short Story Worth a New Mercedes (Publishing Perspectives) Kindle Daily Deals: Birdman by Mo Hayder (and 3 others)

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