I attended the annual Booksellers Association conference earlier this week. There were a number of highlights including Richard Dawkins' attack on religion in his new book The God Delusion based on the TV series The Root of all Evil? Go buy the book when it comes out in the Autumn.

There were discussions on whether or not to print prices on books, whether or not the London Book Fair should be in Earl's Court or Docklands, whether all publishers should be buried alive for their iniquitous discount policies or just some of them, and so on.

The most important thing from my point of view related to the future of independent (and not so independent) bookselling in a digital environment.

Nobody doubts that the book has a future and that booksellers will continue to  find a decent market for fiction and popular non-fiction. However, some areas of publishing have already moved to a completely new distribution mechanism which eliminates the role of the traditional bookseller. The first movers were scientific and legal publishers, rapidly followed by business information providers. Schools business could be hugely affected by the BBC's plans for a digital curriculum. Right now reference books and travel guides are moving rapidly to a web-only model. Other areas of non-fiction, particularly high-level academic works, will follow.

One can certainly paint a picture of doom for the small book retailer. But I came away from the conference convinced otherwise. Provided publishers digitise their material and make it available to all at a price. Provided booksellers are willing to take risks and learn new skills. Provided that authors allow fast and effective re-use of their copyright works. I believe the small bookseller can build a profitable and growing business selling traditional books on the web and still serving their local community; building deeper communities of interest among readers; building digital delivery websites for text and audio books. The more book retailers enter this business the more we and our customers will all be protected from the dangers of monopolistic or oligopolistic distribution channels.

In Britain and Ireland we are hugely fortunate in having an organisation which can facilitate this future and who have proved its worth time and time again. Now the BA needs to encourage all its members to seek advice in order to harness the potential of these powerful new digitalia (as a colleague calls it).

Keeping a blog is bringing out all my trainspotter tendencies. For instance, I spend a probably unhealthy amount of my time looking at my web statistics to see how many hits the blog has had, and so on. The bit that really fascinates me though is the referring searches that bring web surfers to the blog. A cursory look today shows the usual Google searches for 'Charkin' and even for 'Charkin blog', which just goes to prove that new-fangled ideas like 'viral marketing' really do work. But it also reveals the interests so common to us all right now - for example the number of searches on 'e-books' or 'digital publishing'. Perhaps more interestingly it conclusively proves that cricket is the new football with searches for 'Wisden' rating highly. One lone search saddened me to my boots, though - the one looking for 'Elsevier mission statement.' But I guess the most disappointed searchers will have been all those looking for 'condom.'

I have just been sent this link to a review by Grumpy Old Bookman and couldn't resist posting it.

Subject to weather, today will see the first game of the 2006 season for Baldons Cricket Club. We play Tetsworth in the second round of the Cricketer Village Cup - our opponents in the first round were clearly intimidated by our reputation and waved us through without playing. I've spent the morning rummaging for my whites, box, strapping etc. In the olden days I was always keen to win. Now survival seems a worthwhile objective. The competition ends up with a final at Lords on 3rd September. Betting on cricket is very popular. Don't bet on Baldons CC to reach the final.

Which leads clearly to today's Sunday Telegraph. The headline is a joyous example of misleading in order to increase sales:

Out of the shadows: It's a church wedding at last for Kate and William.

William is Prince William and Kate is his girlfriend. You might think they'd announced their wedding plans but no, merely that they are going together to someone else's wedding. Priceless.

In the same issue there is an article about seismic changes in publishing. More inaccurate stuff about the industry and digitisation and self-publishing blah blah.

After the cricket I'm heading off to the gorgeous seaside town of Bournemouth for the Booksellers Association annual meeting where I suspect the industry will be spending a few days discussing digitisation, self-publishing blah blah and .... trading terms. Plus ça change.

My favourite columnist of the moment is Ben Macintyre in the Times (of London). Today's Last Word piece is a fine example. For those who can't be bothered to click, here is his glossary of literary euphemisms. I think we should add to this list so that in time OUP will be able to publish a truly scholarly, magisterial, authoritative and comprehensive Dictionary of Literary Euphemisms which might just fill the much-needed gap in the market.

Mesmerising This word is traditionally deployed by the non-specialist reviewer to describe a specialist book, for example:

“Hawking’s A Brief History of Time is quite mesmerising.” It translates as: “I didn’t understand a word, but I’m not going to admit it because I need the money, and I’ve already sold the book.”

Edgy Any author under the age of 30, being reviewed by someone over 30, is likely to be described as edgy. The edginess factor will increase in proportion to whether the author is non-white, female and attractive, and the reviewer is white, male, and fat. Drugs, sex and racial conflict are also contributory factors. Edgy is also a synonym for glue-sniffing, necrophilia, lap-dancing and Michel Houellebecq.

Exquisite sensibility Gay.

Veiled sensibility Closet gay.

Shot through with mordant wit This phrase tends to be used by reviewers to describe books written by other reviewers. It means:

“Extremely nasty, but I don’t want this bastard to work me over next.”

These are minor quibbles (mere cavils) . . . This is a favourite of the weedier academic reviewers. It usually crops up towards the end of the review, when the reviewer has suddenly realised that he may have put the boot in too hard at the start, and feels guilty.

Writing reminiscent of Probably plagiarised.

It is a truth universally acknowledged . . . that any review touching, however tangentially, on the life, times, writing or recipes of Jane Austen must begin with this knackered introduction.

X meets Y This is the single greatest contribution of publishers’ marketing departments to modern literature. It shackles together two more famous authors or books in the hope of making a hybrid, and can lead to some unlikely couplings: “Henry James meets Hunter S. Thompson” or “Virginia Woolf meets Naomi Wolf meets Steppenwolf meets Peter and the Wolf”. The offspring of such unions are almost always stillborn. (qv The next Dan Brown / Brick Lane / Shakespeare etc.) Exhaustive Exhausting. Wears its scholarship lightly Author is not a real scholar. But I am. Triumphant return to form I was expecting this to be as abysmal as the last one, but it was only mildly disappointing. Gnomic Baffling. Imaginative Fiction reviewers use this to describe a book that they wish they had written; nonfiction reviewers use it to describe a book they do not believe. Compelling I managed to finish it. Painfully funny / sad / poignant / long Demonstrates the deep sensitivity of the reviewer. A health warning also attaches to any book described as achingly, eye-wateringly or heart-stoppingly anything. Arch I’m not sure if this is funny Detailed Has footnotes. Richly detailed Has lots of footnotes. Densely detailed Has footnotes, endnotes, acknowledgements, epigrams, foreword, preface, bibliography, appendices, indices, and marginalia. Translation: unreadable. qv panoramic, workmanlike, painstaking, extensively researched. Quaint Eccentric. Eccentric Author should be sectioned immediately. Vertiginous So clever and showy that it made me feel a bit sick. Vibrant Usually used to describe a young author that the reviewer met when drunk at the Martin Amis launch and thinks he might have fancied. (See also accomplished debut.) Important Worthy. Crucial Worthier. Seminal Worthiest. A colourful cast of characters The author is trying to be P. G. Wodehouse This curate’s egg of a book . . . The telltale mark of the indecisive reviewer Whips along, zips along, rattling yarn, high-octane, page-turner I usually review books about classical music, but the literary editor has given me this ghastly potboiler and I am putting a brave face on it Smorgasbord, potpourri, salmagundi, etc are typical literary show-off terms intended to demonstrate the international learning of the reviewer. Translation: mixture. Schadenfreude “The book of mine enemy hath been remaindered, and I am glad” (Clive James). Tightly plotted Has a beginning and a middle, and you find out whodunnit at the end.

The great thing about children's publishing is that everything about is worthwhile. The authors and illustrators, not to mention the editors, designers andf salespeople, are all committed to an important set of objectives - making great books to help literacy, stimulate creativity, enhance enjoyment and to educate. Even when individual titles fail commercially at least they had a good reason to exist which cannot be said of all types of books.

It is therefore with enormous pride and pleasure that I heard today of Macmillan's success on the prize front today.

Frank Cottrell Boyce’s second novel Framed has been shortlisted for the Carnegie Medal. Published by Macmillan Children’s Books, Frank won the Carnegie Medal last year with his debut novel Millions. Described as original, charming and funny, Framed has achieved great acclaim and was also shortlisted for the Whitbread Medal.

Emily Gravett’s Wolves has been shortlisted for the Kate Greenaway Medal. This is Emily’s debut picture book, which was also awarded a bronze medal in the Nestle Children’s Prize. It was published to great acclaim last year.

 Emma Hopkin, MD of Macmillan Children’s Books says: “We are delighted to have a book on each shortlist – something that we have not achieved for years. Both Emily and Frank are masters of their craft and both thoroughly deserve to be on the shortlists. Both the Carnegie and Kate Greenaway awards are very important to us as publishers, because the books featured on them are chosen by librarians for outstanding work.”

 Full shortlists are available at www.carnegiegreenaway.org.uk

I'm going to take a risk today and celebrate the closure of a public library.

For a period in the 1990s I was Chairman of the Whitechapel Art Gallery. It was established in 1901 to bring great art to the people of the East End of London. At the time (and it is still true today) Whitechapel was home to recent immigrants. In 1901 the imigrants were largely Jewish. Today they are largely Asian. The impact of these immigrant comunities has been enormous and beneficial and the area continues to thrive as a creative catalyst for London, Britain and the world.

The gallery has premiered international artists such as Pablo Picasso, Jackson Pollock and Lucien Freud. It is financed by public bodies, private individuals and companies, and through the hard work and entrepreneurism of its staff.

Next door to the gallery is a public library with a rich history, particularly from the 'Jewish' times but in recent years it had become run down through lack of investment and changing social needs. The library is being moved to a new site close and merged with another library. I really believe that one first-class library is better than two second-class ones in this case.

And the gallery acquired the freehold in th elibrary and last night celebrated the launch of the Whitechapel Project which will turn this beautiful and historic building into a beautiful space for creative artists, students, art lovers and coffee lovers to use and enjoy. Losing the Whitechapel Library is sad but extending the Gallery is a cause for celebration and support.

The Director of the gallery is Iwona Blazwick. She used to work at the famous art publisher Phaidon and she brings to the leadership of this project everything that is best about publishing - optimism, shrewdness and charm. This project deserves to succeed.

Putting the final touches to a talk I am giving tomorrow for the STM organisation. It occurred to me that the list of speakers at this conference might give a flavour of how book publishing is changing in the 21st century. Many of the companies did not exist a decade ago and yet I suspect that the debates at this meeting may prove more relevant to our future than the retail 'controversies' we are suffering in the UK right now. I have also pasted in the aims of the conference which set out very clearly some of the challenges facing book publishers today.

• Keynote Speaker: Richard Charkin, Chief Executive of Macmillan and President of the Publishers Association    'The Internet Changes Everything - Not!'
  

• Chris Armstrong, Managing Director, Information Automation, Ltd

• Louise Breinholt, Marketing & Communications Manager, Wiley Interscience

• Paul Carr, Editor-in-Chief of The Friday Project and Editor of 'The Friday Thing' and 'London by London'

• Warren Cowan, CEO, Greenlight

• Adrian Driscoll, Publishing Consultant, Caxtonia

• Richard Fisher, Executive Director, Humanities and Social Sciences, Cambridge University Press

• Suzanne S. Kemperman, Director, Publishing, NetLibrary (a division of OCLC)

• Sara Lloyd, Business Development Director for BookStore, MPS Technologies

• Ray Lonsdale, Reader in Information Studies, Department of Information Studies, University of Wales, Aberystwyth

• Jayne Marks, CEO, Global Operations, MPS Technologies

• Dan Penny, Account Manager, Electronic Publishing Services, Ltd

• Marika Stauch, Marketing Manager, Mathematics & Computer Science, Springer

• Wim van der Stelt, Vice President Global Marketing, Springer

While STM journal publishers have been driven to "go digital" by market need, the market and business models for digital book content delivery have been far from clear.

It has been difficult to assess if and when students, graduate students, academics, and the general reader, will begin demanding digital delivery of the content they want. Publishers have questioned which formats and business models will dominate, and, crucially, how we can unlock the revenue potential of digital delivery.

During the past year book publishers have recognized the need to resolve the answers to some of these questions. This has been driven partly by non-traditional, Internet-based competitors such as Google and Amazon stealing the march on publishers, launching their own initiatives enabling readers to get to the content they need. Also new "non-publisher publishers", such as Wikipedia, are introducing innovative content development and delivery mechanisms playing to markets where 'good enough' content is increasingly acceptable.

There is also a sense that, particularly in academic and professional markets, at least a proportion of readers are actively beginning to seek digital engagement over print content, delivered in the simplest, fastest and most cost-efficient way. The key question for publishers is: how to remain at the heart of the relationship between author and reader in this new digital environment? In other words, how do we continue to add value for authors and readers in the digital delivery chain?