From The Bookseller:
Contrary to what you might read elsewhere, there are three stages to a pandemic. The up curve, the downwards one and the bit in between. I don’t wish to get ahead of myself, but with Italy allowing bookshops to re-open and other first-wave countries slowly and carefully relaxing their restrictions, the United Kingdom will also shortly be in transition too.
There is some way to go, of course, and with Covid-19-related deaths continuing to escalate, this will remain for many a scary and discombobulating time. A generation-defining moment of fear, change and renewal. Not unique to the book trade, but deeply felt by this most social and empathic of businesses.
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“Love is keeping our distance.”
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A few weeks ago, I alluded to the sentiments of France’s President Macron in arguing that no bookshop should go down as a result of the economic fallout created by the coronavirus. But there remains other areas of the trade also severely impacted. Small presses have seen their revenue drop by as much as 90%, and now face increased costs from storing books that were meant to be in bookshops. Freelances’ commissions have dried up, and they must wait for invoices to be paid—never on time, of course. As we note in the magazine this week, many suppliers, such as printers and distributors, have kept on, albeit at reduced levels. Libraries’ doors have been shut at a time when their services have never been more in demand. Event organisers’ businesses have vanished. And many authors’ books may not now have the lives their creators would have wished.
Link to the rest at The Bookseller
So, pretty much like everybody else?