Publishers Weekly

Publishers Weekly is a weekly trade news magazine targeted at publishers, librarians, booksellers and literary agents. Published 50 times a year, it carries the tagline, "The International News Magazine of Book Publishing and Bookselling."

Related Topics:
News magazine - Publisher - Librarian - Bookseller

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The circulation as of 2004 was reported to be approximately 25,000, including

Related Topics:
Circulation - As of 2004

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6000 publishers; 5500 public libraries and public library systems; 3800 booksellers; 1600 authors and writers; 1500 college and university libraries; 950 print, film and broad media; and 750 literary and rights agents, among others.

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Subject areas covered by Publishers Weekly include bookstores, book design and manufacture, bookselling, marketing, merchandising and trade news, along with author interviews and regular columns on film rights, people in publishing and bestsellers. It attempts to serve all involved in the creation, production, marketing and sale of the written word in book, audio, video and electronic formats. Book reviews are an important part of the magazine, which offers opinions on 7,000 new books each year. These anonymous reviews are short, often no more than 220 words, and the review section can be as long as 40 pages, filling the second half of the magazine. This requires a book review editorial staff of eight editors who assign books to some 60 or more freelance writers. Some are published authors and others are experts in specific genres or subjects. Although it might take a week or more to read and analyze some books, reviewers are paid only $45 per review. Since reviews are scheduled to appear one month or two months prior to the publication date of a book, books already in print are seldom reviewed.

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First published in 1872, the magazine today is part of Reed Business Information's Publishing Group, which includes Variety and Daily Variety, as well as the book publishing trade outlets Criticas, Library Journal and School Library Journal. Publishers Weekly was once one of the many trade magazines held by the Boston-based Cahners Publishing Company, the trade publishing empire founded by Norman Cahners. After the London-based Reed Publishing bought Cahners in 1977, the merger of Reed with the Netherlands-based Elsevier in 1993 led to many Cahners cutbacks amid takeover turmoil. Nora Rawlinson, who once headed a $4 million book selection budget at the Baltimore County Library System, edited Library Journal for four years before stepping in as editor-in-chief of Publishers Weekly from 1992 to 2005.

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In recent years, the importance of Publishers Weekly diminished as it faced strong competition from newsletters (Publisher's Lunch, Publishers Marketplace), websites (The Book Standard) and a variety of blogs, such as Galleycat.

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Beginning January 24, 2005, the magazine came under the direction of a new editor-in-chief, veteran book reviewer Sara Nelson, known for her publishing columns in the New York Post and the New York Observer. A senior contributing editor for Glamour, in addition to editorial positions at Self, Inside.com and Book Publishing Report, she had gained attention and favorable reviews as the author of So Many Books, So Little Time: A Year of Passionate Reading (Putnam, 2003), in which she stirred a year's worth of reading into a memoir mix of her personal experiences.

Related Topics:
New York Post - New York Observer - Glamour

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Nelson immediately began to modernize and streamline Publishers Weekly with new features and a complete makeover by publications designer J-C. Suares. The many alterations included added color (with drop shadows behind color book covers), Nelson's own weekly editorial, illustrated bestseller lists and "Signature," longer boxed reviews written by well-known novelists. The switch to a simple abbreviated logo effectively changes the name of the magazine to PW.

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She also introduced the magazine's Quill Awards, with nominees in 19 categories selected by a nominating board of 6,000 booksellers and librarians. Winners are determined by the reading public, who can vote (from August 15 to September 15) at kiosks in Borders stores or online at the Quills website.

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In the past, the front covers of Publishers Weekly have been used to carry advertisements by book publishers, and this policy was changed to some degree in 2005. Although new PW covers now display illustrations and photographs tied into interior articles, these covers are often hidden behind a front cover foldout advertisement. The visual motif of each cover is repeated on the contents page.

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See also:

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• Kirkus Reviews
• Library Journal
 
Publishers Weekly: External links ►