Karen Lotz is the Group Managing Director of Walker Books Ltd., a London-based company that includes the children’s publishing companies Walker Books UK, Walker Books Australia, US based Candlewick Press, and a children’s television development unit, Walker Productions. She is the President and Publisher of Candlewick Press. The Walker Books Group is one the world’s largest employee-owned publishing companies, and it has a unique business model that includes more than one hundred and fifty authors and illustrators in its profit sharing. I recently interviewed Karen regarding the future of children’s books.
What is your estimate for children’s e-books and print books over the next 3 a 5 anos?
The children’s books market was estimated to be over $3 billion in sales in 2010, aproximadamente 25% of the overall book market. We are beginning to see traction for digital sales of young adult fiction, though children’s as a whole is well behind the adult marketplace in terms of what percentage of new releases might be purchased in print versus e-book. Over the next 3 a 5 anos, I can imagine that digital will trump print in the majority of cases rather than the exception. Currently a lot of adults, as well as teens, buy new young adult books in digital form, which is a really good thing in terms of expanding our market overall. Teens are purchasing more than ever before as reading devices proliferate, and from Candlewick’s perspective we’ve also seen some significant growth in middle-grade digital purchasing during 2011. Picture book publishing in digital form is still in its infancy, mas isso também vai mudar mais rapidamente do que podemos imaginar. Em 5 years you will have an entirely new marketplace of digital reading material for young children, in all new forms – alguns dos quais nem sequer podemos imaginar ainda.
Sales in children’s picture books seem to have fallen in the last decade. Do you believe this trend will continue with e-books?
É interessante ouvir essa estatística, porque na minha perspectiva, não é tão verdadeiro. Alguns dos publicação de livros de imagem de maior sucesso aconteceu durante a última década, um período durante o qual nós basicamente duplicaram em U.S. receitas como uma empresa, e tem sido um catalisador para o nosso crescimento. Para Candlewick Imprensa e Walker Books globalmente, investimento livro de imagens continua mais forte do que nunca, e nossas vendas também são muito fortes, mesmo tendo em conta a perda de alguns parceiros comerciais importantes que apoiaram livros ilustrados, como Borders na U.S. e U.K., e algumas correntes chaves na Austrália. Os nossos outros parceiros, embora, incluindo o U.S. independentes, são tão forte como nunca. Fazemos excelente negócio na China, com livros ilustrados, e nosso primeiro livro de imagens chinês que trouxemos, A New Year’s Reunion, has just been recognized as a New York Times Best Illustrated Book of the Year. The market for young adult fiction has grown, but it does not seem to me that it’s been at the expense of picture books, as others suppose. Without loving picture books, kids are less likely to grow up to love chapter books or graphic novels, e assim por diante. Reading starts here: that’s our picture book publishing motto.
What will Candlewick’s products for young readers look like – for print, e-readers, e tablets? How much emphasis are you putting on digital products?
We consider digital editions to be simply another format. We have a very organic process for determining which books go into e-books, just like we do for hardcovers, paperbacks, novelty books, and board books. Every department at Candlewick is involved in making sure that the quality of our e-books is superb and equivalent in every possible way to our beautiful print editions. It is a much more intensive process than simply scanning a page and distributing it in digital form. One aspect of e-books that we have agonized over is typography. Thank goodness, technology is now catching up to enable more graphic choices, and to once again open the doors for a unique aesthetic of presentation. Decades, even centuries of wisdom about typographic choice go into the design of each print book, especially when it comes to designing books for young children. How we learn to read has everything to do with what we see – and don’t see – on the page.
Do you see brick and mortar outlets (livrarias, school libraries) continuing to attract the youngest readers?
I believe brick and mortar outlets – and I love that you include libraries in that category – are going to be hugely important for the youngest readers going forward. A experiência de estar em uma sala cheia de livros, para uma criança, é uma das experiências mais potentes e emocionantes que alguém pode ter. Para olhar para uma prateleira de livros, para puxar um fora porque nos atrai, and to begin to read is a sacred and amazing process. We know from research that the process of reading aloud to a child is incredibly beneficial and cannot be replaced by mechanical interactions of any kind. Livrarias e bibliotecas são os locais perfeitos para a partilha comum de livros, no seio das famílias e entre os profissionais e as crianças. Posso absolutamente ver um mundo onde outlets livro físico continuará a ser lugares de maravilha para jovens leitores, ainda melhor através da melhor tecnologia a ser adicionado na mistura, mas isso só será verdade se uma coisa acontece: temos de continuar a apoiar a importância da leitura para os nossos filhos como uma cultura. Se não o fizermos, um futuro muito maior do que a de livrarias e bibliotecas está em jogo.
Qual será a evolução significa para ilustradores e autores de livros ilustrados para crianças? Por exemplo, soará, animação e interativos características tornam-se importantes? Will authors and illustrators become less dependent on publishers?
Eu realmente acredito que no nosso novo mundo digital, os editores têm a oportunidade de ser o que sempre foram: os amantes de livros, spotters e nurturers de talento, motoristas culturais, grandes comerciantes, vendedores pensativo, e cuidadores fanáticos de todos os detalhes. Autores têm frequentemente ouvidos maravilhosas, meaning that music, speech and drama are often very natural to them. To employ their talents in new ways is an interesting challenge. For illustrators, obviously the choices and possibilities are endless – no longer being bound strictly by the 32-page forms of the printing presses, por exemplo. But for those authors and illustrators who love the haiku of a printed picture book, and the challenges the limitations pose, I hope those forms will always be there too. They certainly will be there at Candlewick.
What are your favorite paper and e-books for children this holiday season?
When it comes to our books, I love them all! And with that, a lovely backlist title for families with siblings pops into my mind: You’re All My Favorites, by Sam McBratney and Anita Jeram. Among our new books, the picture book I guarantee you’ll clutch with joy is I Want My Hat Back by Jon Klassen. For teens, there is a series by L.A. Weatherly that begins with Angel Burn — it’s very satisfying and highly addictive. For a true holiday classic to give as a gift, experimentar The Flint Heart by Katherine and John Paterson, illustrated in full color by John Rocco. It is one of the most beautiful physical books we’ve ever offered. This is a retelling of a fabulous early twentieth-century novel by Eden Phillpotts that established how the heartbeat of ultimate good and evil came to be buried in England’s dark moors, years before Gollum even found the Ring. My favorite quote from Phillpotts: “The universe is full of magical things, patiently waiting for our wits to grow sharper.”
Photos courtesy of Candlewick Press.
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CM. Rubin é o autor da série on-line amplamente lido, A Pesquisa Global para a Educação, e também é o autor de três livros mais vendidos, Incluindo The Real Alice no País das Maravilhas.
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