Another day, Another Book Review Outlet Gone: Kirkus Closes
News surfaced Thursday that Kirkus Reviews, the 76-year-old trade review publication for books, is closing. Nielson Business Media, the publication’s parents company, decided to drop the title from its holdings, along with Editor & Publisher, another trade pub for the newspaper business. It was all part of Nielson’s move to clean its stables of print publications. In the move, titles such as Adweek, Billboard magazine, and The Hollywood Reporter, and five other titles, were sold off to e5 Global Media Holdings, a new company formed by the private equity firm Pluribus Capital Management. You’ll be pleased to know that Nielson did, however, hold on to Progressive Grocer.
The death of Kirkus has been the center of attention for publishing types for the past two days. Kirkus was a hub for libraries and booksellers to peruse what was coming down the pike from book publishers up to three months prior to publication. It allowed libraries and booksellers to be informed and they sought out that starred review in Kirkus for a strong seller. Some feel that the death of Kirkus was long overdue and not unexpected. Others are upset at the continued collapse of the book review industry and will miss it. It is surprising, however, that Kirkus lasted longer than the Washington Post Book Review section, which shuttered last February. Those that do not feel remorse for Kirkus’s death note the publication’s often acrid and unnecessarily negative reviews. Ira Silverberg, a legendary literary agent, was quoted in the New York Observer as saying “hearing about their closing reminded me that they were still publishing.” Ouch. Esther Newberg, another well-known literary agent who counts among her clients, Thomas Friedman, remarked that “the reviews were almost always negative and not helpful in any way … Good riddance.”
It’s all well and good for big shot literary agents to not feel a pinch of sadness about Kirkus, but they are also not really the best voices to speak to the publication’s closing. Literary agents sell book to publishing houses. Good reviews for the books they sell to publishers might mean big sales for the publisher and therefore augur a better business relationship between literary agent and publisher. But Kirkus was not a large enough blip on the radar for star literary agents to care much about. Big shot literary agents like Silverberg and Newberg rarely take on small or middle range books that Kirkus might have an effect on. Big books sold by major agents to major publishing houses have money and publicity behind them. That’s where a strong NYT review is going to make the difference, not Kirkus’s endorsement to booksellers and libraries.
The loss of Kirkus really is a loss for authors hoping to break through and for literary agents hoping to establish a reputation, for small book publishers, and for independent bookstores and libraries looking to round out their offerings. Kirkus was at the worst time in book publishing stuck in the middle between the major reviewing sources, like The New York Times or The New Yorker, post-publication outlets, and the publicity that is rolled out behind a major book before publication. Pre-publication buzz is now a matter of Internet chatter and word of mouth more than anything. And independent bookstores, who are scraping by, don’t have the capacity to increase their orders based on a good review in Kirkus. A good review or a starred review was a small tap of progress, but toward what? If negative, the review was dismissed as meaningless for the most part, since this pessimism had become Kirkus’s trademark and its Achilles heel. The major problem is that book publishing is a business of inches these days. Kirkus may have had the unfortunate reputation as the complainer at the party, but he also brought his share of booze and therefore made the party worth attending and contributed to the good times. So where does this leave the trade magazine in the middle, like Kirkus? Well, now we know. R.I.P. Kirkus Reviews and Editor & Publisher.
via Kirkus Reviews: The End | Publishing Perspectives.
via Nielsen Will Close or Sell Many Trade Magazines – NYTimes.com.
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The closing of Kirkus impacts more than the bookseller and librarian, it impacts the consumer. There are so many books out there, with the vast majority being simply terrible, that we need something that can be trusted to tell us, “this book is junk, don’t bother.” If I see an author blurb on a book, I disregard it; sometimes I disregard other journals too, because they seem to like everything that comes out. Not so with Kirkus! The only reason to use Novelist is to find out what the Kirkus had to say about a book. Other than that it’s pretty much a useless database.
If there is, I suppose we should say — was, a Kirkus review on the jacket of the book, I would read book. This is the worst publishing news I’ve heard all year long.
Stephent,
Thanks for your comment. I think you are right in many ways but your perspective is also unique. most consumers, or your average reader, did not use Kirkus to buy books. The majority of people who read it were booksellers and librarians, and this is mostly because the average book buyer doe snot care about reading a review three months before a book comes out. but I agree that the loss of Kirkus in the review world is sad and now there will be a void in yet another segemt of the book selling industry. Hopefully someone will fill this void, but I am also surprised that they could not transition Kirkus to an all online venture.
“but I am also surprised that they could not transition Kirkus to an all online venture.”
That does seem strange.
I want to address another point of yours, that most people don’t care about reviews two or three months pre-release, and that is true, but once the book is released people like me look for the Kirkus stamp of approval. I know people who will not read a book that has not been reviewed by Romantic Times. Each genre has at least one publication that will always tell the truth. I find the most review journals to be more interested in selling a book than giving an honest appraisal of the book’s quality.
As to filling the void, I think Goodreads.com has begun to do that very thing. People are always going to read, and write reviews no matter how the future of publishing works out. My interest is in making certain that there are still places that will tell you “this book is good,” or “this book might appeal to this or that segment,” and “this book is a doorstop and nothing else.”
In response to another comment. See in context »Stephent,
The Kirkus stamp of approval on a book might be worth more than an endorsement from another author, you’re right about that. Author blurbs are usually acquired through who know who arrangements and there can be a system of I’ll blurb his or her book if they blurb mine set up. But I do know there are many authors who will not blurb a book until they have read the entire thing and only if they like the book will they offer a few words. The stamp of approval of the reviewer on the other hand does say something for impartiality. Goodreads is good to point out. I think there will always be places where an opinion is put forward, whether one trusts that opinion is another questions all together.
In response to another comment. See in context »