Paper-Over-Board Follow-Up

So a couple weeks ago I caused a little bit of a stir by announcing via an article in Publishing Perspectives that we were abandoning the paper-over-board format in favor of all paperbacks. We got a lot of responses about this, ranging from people who were disappointed and love paper-over-board, to booksellers explaining that yes, they were shelving these in the hardcover section which has a very different market.

In the end, I think we did the right thing, but one of the reasons we were resisting this change is because we were afraid that reviewers wouldn’t take the paperbacks as seriously as the hardcover, p-o-b books.

But everyone assured us that those days are over . . . that paperback originals are acceptable to everyone, etc., etc.

We send each new catalog to hundreds of reviewers, bloggers, booksellers, and usually include a letter offering free reading copies if there are any titles you might like to review. So today we received this response from The Post and Courier in South Carolina:

“Thanks, Chad, but we do not review softcover books.”

Fantastic!