April Fool's Day for the book industry means a day of pranks, tricks - and perhaps a few pointed digs at powerful players like Amazon, all in the name of a "joke."
Literary connections to the day stretch back many years - Herman Melville published his final novel The Confidence-Man: His Masquerade on April Fool's Day, the very day on which the satirical plot was set, while the first mention of April Fool's Day is held by some scholars to be in Chaucer's Canterbury Tales.
This year, among the merry pranksters:
I'm so excited to announce that @joshboonemovies and Fox have chosen me to play Augustus Waters in the forthcoming TFiOS film.
— John Green (@realjohngreen) April 1, 2013
BookRiot published four fools for the price of one, including an EL James "52 Shades" romance imprint, and Jeff Bezos buying the top 50 independent bookstores. And, disappointingly, there isn't actually going to be a Building Stories TV show from Chris Ware.
Shelf Awareness described "a tumultuous weekend in publishing" in which the Big Six became The Big One:
"One, under the aegis of Random House, combines HarperCollins and Hachette and will be called Random Ha Ha, while the other, under Penguin, comprises Macmillan and Simon & Schuster, and will be called SSMac Penguin."
Marketing guru Seth Godin "announced" the Kindle Zero, a Kindle that is completely free - a story that has some basis in fact.
Chelsea Green, a small publisher of books about sustainable living, revealed their latest imprint: Apocalyptica (™), a new eBook-only imprint for “green” erotica. "Who’s writing erotica for the permaculture activists, horse farmers, fermentos, and orchardists? No one. It’s an open market. We decided to jump in bed right away," their President "said." They should be careful - this is the kind of prank that could end up becoming real.
It's a tricky day for book publicists, of course, as Sarah Weinman of Publisher's Lunch points out:
The poor publicists who are sending word of real news today. I feel for you guys. I really, really do
— Sarah Weinman (@sarahw) April 1, 2013
We'll add to this list as the day goes on! Have you spotted any literary-themed April Fool's this year? Let us know in the comments or tweet us @HuffPostBooks!
via Books on HuffingtonPost.com http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/04/01/april-fools-day-book-pranks_n_2991933.html?utm_hp_ref=books
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