Big Idea: Bringing Instincts Back to Book Acquisitions

By Caleb Mason

Book Business asked industry thought leaders to discuss the big ideas that are changing the book industry. We are excited about the future of publishing, and we hope these essays invigorate you with new and illuminating perspectives on that future. View the complete essay collection here.

There are agents and editors working in book publishing who may love a new project under consideration but realize they cannot justify it given the likely modest sales. This is especially true for first-time novelists, but also for other midlist authors who have been published before and are running out of options as the trade print marketplace continues to narrow around bestsellers.

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Caleb Mason Author's page Caleb Mason is the founder and publisher of Publerati, a literary fiction publisher employing a unique socially-responsible business model aimed at helping spread literacy via Worldreader. Caleb also writes fiction under the pen name Don Trowden (as in downtrodden), author site here. Earlier in his career, after working in bookstores, and at Little, Brown, and then co-founding Salem House Publishers (sold to News Corp), Caleb left publishing for several industries disrupted by change. These include the now-defunct 35m film and photo industry; the mostly defunct packaged goods CD-ROM software industry, and the ever-changing GPS industry. Having experienced many shifts, Mason has formed a unique perspective on the digital changes ongoing in the book industry. He shares that perspective in his blog "Outsights on Publishing."