“A bricks and mortar shop” is precisely what readers want.
My reasoning in believing this is simple enough: writers are generally interesting people with interesting ideas and many of whom have visited unmapped dimensions of thought, their experiences similar to adventurers and pioneers. Would-be book buyers want to share in that cerebral exploration somewhat (perhaps having discovered that life is greatly enhanced by a full intellectual experience) and play the role of the author’s sidekick and confidante. How thrilling then for the reader to meet this torch-carrier, the writer of the prose which has been so engaging and the inventor of such characters of intrigue. So quite apart from the social occasion visiting a bookstore – with coffee, tarts, chairs and tables – the reader can legitimately anticipate interacting with powerful minds, even visionaries.
Hiding in front of TV’s, video games and Yes, even computer monitors doesn’t hold a candle to shaking the hand of an Einstein, Hawking, Huxley, Michael Ondaatje or Angela Burns.
Reading text on screens at home alone supposes that the material is so riveting that joy can be elicited from this solitary experience, and the writer so sure of their brilliance at wordcraft that readers will be wholly satisfied with their pristine (sterile?) body of work.
“Websites are cheap,” Yes, and as effective as an ice cube retail stand in the arctic. They tend to glorify the writer meanwhile expecting the potential buyer to be so moved as to write and send a cheque or provide PayPal their credit card number and then pay for the shipping.
Ebooks can work for research and data transfer but isn’t it so much more fun to hold a new, nicely bound text in your hands and crack that spine for leaf after leaf of the stuff of surprises? And even the paper itself may have its own unique feel and story about its creation.
The print-on-demand aspect of the enterprise would be approached with a separate business plan and no commitment made until viability is clearly established, justifying purchase of printer/binder equipment. But imagine the control we would be wresting from the hands of conventional publishers who have been reducing our take(for our life’s work) to 7% and the retailers who fire-sell us in their big box discounts bins. And shipping freight back and forth from publisher to retailer and back again is a total no-win situation for the scribe.
I invite all the writers with whom I am corresponding to join this debate and also make contributions of anything else on their mind by posting to my four year old The English Bay Banner – the forum for Writers’ Own and a platform advocating social justice.
And no matter where you live in British Columbia, a one week window display and intense promotion of your work to the Vancouver market can’t hurt.
Finally, as to costs to writers: 200 members would get the monthly stipend down to $20 for a home-made-artsy-crafty kind of effort. And what fun!
-Harry Langen
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