Another quote from Matthew Engel's forthcoming Red Notebooks, this time by Adlai Stevenson: An editor is one who separates the wheat from the chaff and prints the chaff.

As the sales figures for 2006 flow in from all parts of Macmillan I thought I'd share with you over the next few days a more international representation of the non-chaff bestseller lists from our various companies.

First, South Africa where Peter Godwin's When a Crocodile Eats the Sun is second only to the perennial Guinness World Records.

3. Wilbur Smith's Triumph of the Sun

4. David Baldacci's The Collectors

5. Jeffrey Archer's Cat o' Nine Tails

6. The Google Story

7. Jeffrey Archer again with False Impressions

8. The 80th birthday edition of the condensed version of Nelson Mandela's Long Walk to Freedom

9. Our Iceberg is Melting

10. Scott Turow's Ordinary Heroes

Here in the UK it has been an interesting week for national statistics (a contradiction in terms?), with the simultaneous launch by the UK Office for National Statistics (ONS) of their new Personal Inflation Calculator to much media attention, and the launch, to a perhaps somewhat less frenzied press interest, of a new ONS journal publication – the monthly Economic and Labour Market Review - which Palgrave Macmillan publishes on behalf of the Office for National Statistics.

The two were launched together on Monday evening at an event hosted at the DTI conference centre in Victoria Street, London. The personal inflation calculator, which has been heavily trailed in the media already, is explained in detail in the new Economic & Labour Market Review. A definitive article on the new calculator can be accessed for free here.

There's a wonderful news story this morning about a suggestion by the French Prime Minister in 1956, Guy Mollet, to the British Government that France and Britain merge. And when that idea was scotched by the British Prime Minister, Anthony Eden he then applied for membership of the British Commonwealth. This triggered a memo just released which stated that:

"The PM told him on the telephone that he thought in the light of his talks with the French:

• "That we should give immediate consideration to France joining the Commonwealth

• "That Monsieur Mollet had not thought there need be difficulty over France accepting the headship of her Majesty

• "That the French would welcome a common citizenship arrangement on the Irish basis"

We publish an excellent series of books with the generic title, What If? which address just this sort of thing but I don't think even they had the nerve to think this was within the realms of possibility. But just think, what if France and Britain merged? No European Union? A state-driven British economy. The English language 'purified' and kept pure. A much better rugby team. Windsor Castle moved to Versailles. No net book agreement in France! Les Tuileries converted into a cricket ground. Extraordinaire.

Back to publishing, this is the week when news comes in from round the Macmillan world about the final reckoning for 2006. There's one stand-out piece of good news from just about everywhere and it is the success of both Macmillan Children's Books and Priddy Books. The latter was set up only a few years ago and it is already the leader in information books for young (and not so young) children. There are always arguments about whether children's books can cross cultures. Sometimes yes, sometimes no. In the case of both these businesses just about every country has welcomed their titles as if they were created specially for their children. It's great to see genuinely innovative publishing teams succeed in this tough old world. 

I came across an interesting website, Publishing Hub, sponsored by the Oxford International Centre for Publishing Studies, Specifically I can recommend a podcast interview with David Attwooll of the electronic publishing consultancy Attwooll Associates. Here's a picture of David whom I've known for decades.

As you can clearly see from his physiognomy he is an optimist and he sees the opportunities in publishing - a key characteristic for success. Perhaps less characteristic of publishers is that he doesn't just want to succeed in his own endeavours, he revels in the success of others. Cheers to David.

This article from the Independent newspaper is entirely different. It is an attack on Jeffrey Archer's forthcoming The Gospel According to Judas. The journalist, Boyd Tonkin, has decided it's worthless before reading a word. He's rather thrown by the fact that Archer has had support from the likes of theological giants such as Cardinal Martini, Desmond Tutu and Frank Moloney. He can only explain this away by  suggesting that they are simply being Christian in supporting a repentant sinner. Boyd, how about the possibility that they might think it a good idea to work with a best-selling author to make Christianity more relevant and interesting to a wide audience?

He then tries another tack. The Christian establishment shouldn't suppport someone who committed perjury (for which, incidentally, he served a long prison term). Boo to Boyd.

Fortunately not everybody is so negative, so partial, so mean-spirited and the world's media have welcomed the forthcoming event with enthusiasm - I won't bore you with the five pages listing the coverage but here is a balanced piece from Publishing News.

The book and audio version will be available on 20th March. I'm sure you'll be able to order from all good booksellers but perhaps you should try the excellent Bedside Crow or Keeble Antiques who, as independent booksellers, give personalised customer service rather than relying on discounting books.

And to end on a recommendation, Andrea Camilleri. His detective books set in Sicily have made him Italy's most popular novelist. Picador has just launched his sixth in English, described here in the Independent. The (anti)hero Montalbano is definitely the grumpiest detective in fiction and makes even our correspondent, Clive Keeble, seem restrained.

It's curious that when I or others write about the problems of independent bookselling in 2006 there is always a flurry of vaguely nostalgic comments about the long defunct Net Book Agreement. And yet when I invite comments on that subject to help inform our German bookseller and publisher colleagues there is hardly any response. My view is best expressed in an extract from a letter in yesterday's Bookseller from the Chief Executive of the Booksellers' Association, Tim Godfray.

Moreover, it is ridiculous to suggest that the BA just watched the Net Book Agreement wither.  With the PA, we played a leading role in successfully heading off an OFT investigation on two occasions, as well as winning a court case against DGIV (the European Competition Commission) in the European Court of Justice.  But at the end of the day, the NBA was a voluntary publishers' agreement.  Two leading trade publishers had by 1995 elected to have nothing to do with it;  they were joined by other leading publishing houses who, faced by opposition from the competition authorities, the media, many politicians, and by one of our largest members, Dillons, decided it could no longer be sustained.  It cannot be brought back.  It is history.  We have to move on.

I was unable to attend the funeral of the great publisher and friend of Macmillan, William Armstrong. He died on 22 December 2006. The funeral took place on 11 January at St Michael's Church, Highgate.

George Morley described the event for us.

After the first appropriately irish hymn, ‘Be Thou My Vision’, his daughter Dido – who used to work at Sidgwick with William before she became a successful singer songwriter – gave a touching, heartfelt and funny address, ending it by singing ‘The Mountains of Mourne’ a traditional Irish song beloved by her father.  Next came William’s cousin from Limerick, Des O'Malley, who told wonderful stories of William and his family, including an encounter between William’s formidable mother and the B Specials.  William’s wide-ranging and often unusual literary tastes were apparent even as a young man, he told us, when he was very keen on the Venerable Bede who was ‘not very big in Ireland then.’  The priest of St Joseph spoke next and even managed to work in a reference to Bede’s story of the sparrow’s flight through a great hall being a metaphor for human life.  William’s widow, Clare, then read John Donne’s ‘Death Be Not Proud’, followed by a family friend, who read a poem about William that she had written.  Another hymn – Lord of the Dance – preceded Patrick Janson-Smith’s encomium to William’s long and successful career, reminding us that he had presided over Sidgwick & Jackson’s golden age, publishing – among many, many other successes – Edward Heath’s bestselling books about music and sailing, Shirley Conran's book of household hints, for which William coined the title and thus ensured its success - Superwoman, Shirley's novel Lace, Judith Krantz's Scruples, Bob Geldof's Is That It?, the memoirs of Ron & Reg Kray, Boy George's Take It Like A Man, whose title, PJS said, had to be explained to him by younger members of staff and, of course, General Sir John Hackett’s The Third World War, which was entirely William's idea.  Mary Mount, ex Sidgwick work experience, now Editorial Director of Viking and family friend, read Philip Larkin’s ‘On an Arundel Tomb’ and the congregation sang the final hymn, ‘The Day Thou Gavest, Lord, Is Ended.’  William’s son, Rollo, came next, speaking about his dad lovingly, wittily and warmly, before Dido sang Patrick Kavanagh’s On Raglan Road, which she had sung to her father when he was dying and which he always claimed was about his great-aunt Hilda O’Malley.  The service ended with the Pie Jesu from Faure’s Requiem and the usual prayers.  Afterwards, the family and many of the congregation followed the cortege to Highgate Cemetery where William was buried, but not before Clare, Dido and Rollo had thrown tennis balls into the grave with him, reflecting William’s abiding love of a fiercely competitive game of tennis.

And I am grateful to Patrick Janson-Smith for his permission to quote from his eulogy.

Willian O'Malley Armstrong was a good friend of many years' standing. I met him through publishing and so it is of his distinguished career in publishing that I will speak.

Insofar as I am aware, William began his publishing career at Purnell, whre he edited a partwork on World War 2, but it was in 1968, when ke joined the then independent publishing house of Sidgwick & Jackson that he began to attract the trade's attention. For over a quarter of a century, through several changes of ownership. William presided over what was, without question, Sidgwick's Golden Age, publishing enthusiastically across a wide range of subjects, from poetry and politics to hard rock and even harder criminals' memoirs...

Milestones in William's illustrious career would have to include Edward Heath's extraordinarily successful books on sailing and music, of which it was said: The unsigned ones are the valuable ones...

In conclusion I have chosen an anecdote, Mildly censored, that, to me, best sums up his human qualities:

'I was going to lunch one day when William hailed me over. He was at his desk reading a tabloid newspaper.

It says here that my son Rollo was cavorting on a beach in Ibiza with someone called Helena Christensen .... why is THAT in the newspaper?

She's a well-known supermodel, William.

Oh really....So it's a GOOD thing?'

May the road rise up to meet you,

May the wind be always at your back,

May the sun shine warm upon your face,

and the rain fall soft upon your fields,

and until we meet again,

May God hold you in the palm of his hand.

A week ago I (perhaps unwisely) gave space to the cri de coeur of an independent bookseller. This was followed by several days of interesting and sometimes coruscating debate. I tried to steer things away from re-runs of the Net Book Agreement argument on the grounds that we no longer have retail price maintenance, it won't reappear, and there's little point crying over spilt milk.

However, some things never seem to go away altogether and the retail price maintenance debate is still a live issue in Germany. I wonder (again perhaps unwisely) if any of the commentators to this blog can offer advice to German publishers and retailers. For instance has the experience in the UK shown:

British consumers benefit from lower prices?

Supermarkets have significantly widened the market for books?

If the NBA had continued would supermarkets have even been interested in books?

Quality bookshop chains have thrived?

Independent booksellers have been able to carve out a price-insensitive niche?

Publishers have behaved responsibly in post-NBA dealings with retailers?

I think I can predict the responses but I'd love to be proved wrong. From a commentator in the USA a very interesting Q&A session with a mystery entrepreneur.

A very sad blog relating to the AMS bankruptcy in the USA which is likely to send small publishers into financial danger or disaster.

More statistics for the Macmillan year-end round-up - Numbers 1 and 2 in the back-to-university bestseller lists: Study Skills Handbook and Student Planner.

For those interested in cricket here is an extract from an email I received from a distinguished cricket journalist (you have to understand the game to get the joke/irony):

Sorry I haven't replied earlier but I have only just got back from Australia and what was probably a v close and competitive Test series compared with the ODIs to come!

And finally a show-off piece about a paper on stem cells which appeared in Nature Biotechnology. So far the paper has appeared in more than 1000 newspaper articles around the world according to Google News and any number of TV and radio mentions. Science may be difficult to understand but there is a huge demand for information about it and the reliability of that information is vital. We think our team offers just that reliability to scientists and the general public alike - and our press team knows how to make a scientific paper famous. That's a pretty good description of what all publishing is about - good content and good publicity.

This comes to you from very genteel Henley-on-Thames where I'm staying at the contemporary posh Hotel du vin. The people here at the front desk disagree with my description - they prefer words like beautiful, comfortable and friendly. It is a great hotel but I'm fixated by the fact there were 39 stairs between the door of my room and the bed. A record I think, although someone will probably correct me.

I'm here for the Publishers Association international strategy meeting. In spite of the importance of the UK book trade, British publishers would not exist without their exports. And we do it really rather well in spite of having to contend with a very strong currency (vs our major competitor, the US dollar), threats from territorial erosion, piracy, dodgy dealers and restrictive practices in some countries.

The latest statistics show export growth of 14% in units and 10% by value with fastest growth in children's books and educational programs. Academic unit sales actually fell as a result of people switching to digital delivery but revenues held up. This year, subject to the usual provisos about political events and natural disasters should see further growth in Asia, Eastern Europe and the emerging markets in general.

The biggest issue (and cost) continues to be piracy and the Publishers Association (whose website will shortly reflect more obviously its merits!) leads the world's publishing industries in taking action where necessary and supporting legal and consitutional routes to the protection of authors' copyrights. It is expensive but vital. It is another example of a cost which commentators from within and without the industry tend to forget when calculating profits.

I rather liked this cartoon from the New Yorker.

In the 1990s when I worked at Reed International Books my office was in the spectacular art deco Michelin House building in Fulham Road. Apart from the publishing businesses, the building also housed (and still does) several other businesses. When we first moved in there was a deal with the Conran Shop whereby our employees got a discount at the shop and theirs got a discount on our books. Terence Conran rapidly realised he was getting the worse end of the deal and cancelled it. On the first floor was the glamorous Bibendum restaurant with a less formal Oyster Bar on the ground floor. Outside there is a fishmonger on the left and a florist on the right. It transpired that by far the most profitable and most stable of all the businesses was the florist which exceeded its budgets through the booms and busts of the economic cycle and all the other vagaries of retailing. Is there a lesson?

In those days the production director of the trade division (Heinemann, Secker, Methuen etc) was Peter Kilborn. He convinced me of a publishing rule which I now know to be immutable. If you want a thorough and sensible analysis of any publishing-related problem (or maybe any problem at all) ask your production director. Anyway, since then he has worked constantly in the book trade and is now head of the Book Industry Communications organisation which we all know as BIC. BIC is the unsung hero of the book trade and it has been responsible for the successful implementation of many of the most significant industry initiatives. He has been following a number of the debates on this blog and is convinced that solutions lie in improving efficiencies rather than trading insults. I agree. He sent this contribution and I hope that this might move the debate from the sterility of differential discounts to the real gains to be made from technological investment and implementation.

Richard – and Macmillan Distribution - have long been supporters of electronic trading and I'm grateful to him for the offer of a guest blog on e-commerce and BIC’s e4books campaign.

As an industry we have a good record of exploiting new technologies. Which publisher, small or large, doesn’t use email or sell from a web site or use desktop publishing or use computerised accounting? Why then does supply chain e-commerce provoke so much hostile attention? Why are telephoned orders and paper invoices the sacred cows of our industry?

For instance, readers may be interested to look at Simon Edwards’s article in last week’s Publishing News (I cannot link to the article direct because the archive search isn't working properly - ed) about the costs and complexities of running a telephone hotline. This is a huge expense for distributors, both in terms of personnel as well as disruption to working patterns, yet they still feel the need to offer them for fear of upsetting both booksellers and their third party clients. And one of the biggest users of telephone hotlines is also the bookselling chain which has put the most resource into persuading its suppliers to trade electronically!

Nielsen’s recent decision to stop sending out thousands of Teleorders by fax or post – to publishers who may or may not even still exist – and set up an order collection web site instead has met with a mixed reaction. This has to be a step in the right direction but sadly Nielsen can do little to persuade the thousands of publishers who still keep title records and product information in manual (even hand-written) form to submit it electronically.

There are many similar examples of old practice which give our trade a much higher than necessary cost base and of course lower profits. As an industry, we need a much better understanding of what the real cost is of doing business inefficiently - and how easily this cost can get neglected when it comes to negotiating booksellers’ discounts or the terms under which distributors contract with their third party client publishers. For example, it is perfectly possible for one bookseller who trades electronically, returns very little and is altogether a model customer to get lower discounts than a bookseller who orders on paper, pays late and has high returns. Armed with some cost-to-serve analysis and a willingness to question the way we do business, much could be done to make the book trade more efficient, more profitable and more resilient.

I was sent this link today by the US media investment bankers DeSilva and Phillips. It is an in-depth review of mergers and acquisitions activity in the media sector. They conclude that:

“the year 2006 has turned out to be not merely strong, but also a year of extraordinary deal-making in both quality and quantity.  A dollar volume of $20.5 billion in media transactions makes 2006 the strongest year since 2000, and close in volume even to that year’s total.” 

Within the report they predict that there will be trends towards the privatisation of public companies and the acquisition of US media companies by Europeans on the back of improved European economis and a strong euro. They also predict that 2007 will be even more active than 2006.

It is, of course, great to know that we are involved in an industry with so much activity. The trouble is that all this wheeling and dealing comes with significant costs - lawyers, bankers, accountants, disruption, redundancies, strategy consultants, headhunters, stockbrokers. At the same time the industry needs to invest more in transforming its activities from print to digital and customers are demanding ever better value for money. Somewhere there is a mismatch.

On a more parochial level it is remarkable that a blog I did recently about independent bookselling in the UK has generated 24 comments and quite a deal of heat addressed at publishers, supermarkets, Internet booksellers, and the Booksellers Association and its executives. It's good to see the debate and I understand the fears and concerns of independent booksellers. I do wish, however, that some of the commentators would try to understand the issues facing those they attack.

Publishers owe it to their authors to maximise sales of their books. In the 21st century this must involve sales through supermarkets, through Amazon, through chain bookshops as well as through traditional independent booksellers. The value chain and costs for each of these channels is different and complex. Publishers don't grant higher discounts than they need to and they certainly want to see the continuance of as many routes to market as possible.

Supermarkets need to serve their customers. Part of that service involves the supply of books as well as magazines, food, clothes etc. They also need to offer best value. They can achieve this by being able to sell very large quantities efficiently and that is certainly the case with best selling books. Publishers would be seen as very elitist if they didn't see the supermarket shopper as a potential customer for books.

Amazon and other Internet booksellers have generated new sales for authors by the re-invigoration of the 'long tail', by sophisticated algorithmic market research, and by heavy investment in customer service, technology and marketing.

The BA tries to represent all those organisations who sell books in the UK and Ireland. To shun certain booksellers because they are not 'independent' or 'traditional' would be daft. Of course it must be difficult for its executives to satisfy all its members all the time but that's true of every organisation from the local Parish Council to the United Nations. I think the BA gives booksellers a fantastic service and deserves 100% support from all interested in the security and development of the book market.