Friday 18 April 2008

Fair Enough


Monday to Wednesday this week has seen publishing taking part in its annual gathering to moan about the London Book Fair. I think it’s compulsory to go on about how much you hate it, even though secretly everyone quite likes a couple of days out of the office swanning around as though they’re dead important. The days of the big fair books felt a long time ago, with most of the major announcements being books that had been bought months back and the rights people seeing more action than editors. The best bits, as always, were not the appointments themselves, but the people you bump into in the corridor. On Tuesday night, an impromptu gathering in a nearby pub swelled into what felt like half of publishing by the time I wended my way. I got more out of those couple of pints than the rest of the fair put together.

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