World Fantasy is a bibliophile’s dream, and a wallet’s nightmare. It starts out in bountiful excess: as soon as one checks in at the con, one receives a giant bag o’ books. Each bag is a little different–though there are similarities–and this year’s crop has many nifty surprises: an audiobook of Margo Lanagan’s Tender Morsels, The Hollow Earth by Rudy Rucker, the superb Eclipse One anthology…there is always the chance for reproduction of what’s already on one’s shelf. For example, between my wife and I we now officially have four copies of John Shirley’s Living Shadows (great book, btw! I reviewed it for Rain Taxi a few years ago). Luckily there is a swap table for good books to find the right homes.
That giant bag o’ books, however is just the beginning. World Fantasy has one of the highest “bang for your buck” dealers’ rooms out there. Lots of high quality books of every stripe. And indeed, the question becomes one of a spatial issue, especially if one is flying home (there is a makeshift post office set up not far from the dealers’ room for this very purpose, to ship the books back to one’s home). Since Kristin and I arrived in San Jose with literally a suitcase of our own press’s new book (Under in the Mere, by Cat Valente), we are hoping those sell…briskly, to allow us room to bring home more of other people’s books.
Some nice finds: Vampire City by Paul Feval and “adapted” by Brian Stableford, a lovely, tenebrous volume that was only $10. (Of course, the dealers’ room has books in the rarified air for collectors, which one might need a large bank loan to properly finance.) The Night Shade Books table also had some superb new titles, such as Paolo Bacigalupi’s Pump Six and The Windup Girl (he happened to be sitting at the table and happily signed the books for us). I’m sure we will make a last surge of picking up a few more strategically picked books either later tonight or tomorrow morning.
One question that I’ve wondered about: as the field moves in more of a digital textual direction–as e-books gain more of a foothold–what does that hold for the convention dealers’ room? I’m sure that’s inextricably tied to questions about bookselling in general in the next ten to fifteen years or so. And yet, a dealers’ room such as this is the nexus for the book as physical object. Perhaps the focus will grow even larger on the specialty and collector side of things. Will more digitally oriented displays and purchase options be in the future? It’s hard to say, but certainly, despite the changes that will almost certainly be forthcoming, an event like World Fantasy gives one knowledge–which is better than hope–that the field is vibrant and thriving, and the texts will find their way to avid readers no matter what the circumstances.
Certainly at UK conventions, the book dealer’s room is shrinking. When I were but lad, it was a place to get all kinds of otherwise hard-to-get items, from import hardbacks to small-press magazines like SF Eye and New Pathways. But online book shopping is what’s killing off the dealer’s room, rather than ebooks.
People don’t go looking for books at conventions any more because they can now order them from anywhere in the world and find with stunning ease books that used to be nearly impossible to find in pre-internet days. As a result, when people do go to conventions, there’s no point in stocking up on books they can get hold of with a bit of point and click from their armchair back home.
How much are tables/booths at events like this?
Oh, wow, I am dying to go to this.
I don’t think dealers/publishers, etc. will be able to shift entirely or even mostly to e-environments, because they can’t be sure attendees have access to the readers, and they sure aren’t going to provide those. Besides, too many of us still love physical books for them to do that to us. At the American Library Association national conference, people knock each other over to get their hands on ARCs and even older books along with other book-related materials. It’s like the meat sale at the grocery store – dangerous in a very physical way.
Thanks for the responses! I’m not sure how much the tables are–I’m sure that info is there somewhere. Perhaps another angle to look at it is from the perspective of the generational shift. The attendance at these cons tends (although there are definite exceptions) to skew older. What happens when the generation that is more conversant/comfortable in the e-literature form as a default starts going to these conventions? Of course, perhaps it’s self-selecting (in that those in the field as professionals, no matter what the age, are going to have a propensity for printed material).
Also, as another data point, sales in the dealer’s room seemed to be a bit sluggish, which could be from any number of factors, but Occam’s Razor probably suggests the recession.