This weekend, my RWA (Romance Writers of America) chapter hosted Amy Pierpont from Grand Central Publishing. A number of us agreed this meeting was one of the best we’ve had because Amy has such a wealth of industry experience and is so passionate about books.

One key take-away from our discussion about the industry was that paranormals are still going strong with no end in sight. (Keep looking for those vampire books!) Expect paranormals to combine with other genres or subgenres. Recently I found a pirate vampire series for young adults that seems to be checked out of our library most of the time (a definite issue when my young adult is clamoring for book 2). I was particularly happy to hear that paranormals have a bright future since my second novel is a paranormal thriller with romantic elements (no, I didn’t entirely drop the medical slant, it’s just less prominent than in book 1). There aren’t any vampires in my novel but I believe I have some beings who are just as intriguing.

Another trend is the growth of e-books and e-readers. Publishers are looking to do more in this area because of the growth even though, at this time, the e-book area is only a small part of overall sales. From our informal sampling, there’s still a lot of room for growth since only one writer in the room currently has an e-reader. However, there was strong agreement that as readers, we book people are enamored of the touch, feel and smell of books- something an e-reader doesn’t offer.

The final trend I’ll mention is the growth of e-marketing tactics. Look for electronic announcements of all kinds from publishing companies promoting novels. Word of mouth is still the best way to attract readers and that is moving to the Internet as well with bloggers recommending novels and talking with their favorite authors.

While the publishing industry, like most other industry, hit a rough patch, there are a lot of exciting things going on!

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