2011 Independent Booksellers Week (UK)

Independent Booksellers Week is part of the IndieBound campaign for independent bookshops, which promotes independent bookshops, great books, strong reading communities, and the idea of shopping locally and sustainably. An exciting new development for 2011 is the inclusion of National Reading Group Day on the second Saturday of IBW, Saturday 25th June. National Reading Group Day is one of BA President Jane Streeter's key objectives for 2011. It's not necessarily about booksellers starting reading groups, or even running groups in the shop, but about capitalising on the current huge grassroots affection for Reading Groups in the UK - 18 to 25 June 2011. RSS Feed

The British Library and Google to make 250,000 books available to all

The British Library and Google have announced a partnership to digitise 250,000 out-of-copyright books from the Library's collections. Opening up access to one of the greatest collections of books in the world, this demonstrates the Library's commitment, as stated in its 2020 Vision, to increase access to anyone who wants to do research. Selected by the British Library and digitised by Google, both organisations will work in partnership over the coming years to deliver this content free through Google Books and the British Library's website. Google will cover all digitisation costs. This project will digitise a huge range of printed books, pamphlets and periodicals dated 1700 to 1870, the period that saw the French and Industrial Revolutions, The Battle of Trafalgar and the Crimean War, the invention of rail travel and of the telegraph, the beginning of UK income tax, and the end of slavery. It will include material in a variety of major European languages, and will focus on books that are not yet freely available in digital form online

The Publishers Association Bulletin - 20 June 2011 (UK)

The Publishers Association Bulletin - 20 June 2011 - is now available online

Andrea Levy wins Walter Scott Prize for The Long Song (Scotland)

The second Walter Scott Prize for historical fiction has been awarded to Andrea Levy for her slavery novel The Long Song. The £25,000 prize was awarded at one of Scotland's top literary events, the Borders Book Festival in Melrose. The author accepted the award from the Duke of Buccleuch, sponsor of the prize, at a ceremony hosted by festival patron Rory Bremner

Book Grocer: 22-28 June 2011 (UK)

Book Grocer: 22-28 June 2011 - The week ahead in literary London from the Londonist blog

Germany honours John Le Carré with Goethe Medal

John Le Carré has been named as one of this year's recipients of Germany's Goethe Medal, which goes to individuals who "have performed outstanding service for the German language and international cultural dialogue". This "master of the political and psychological crime novel", according to the Goethe Institut, "condensed Germany's difficult role during the era of the cold war" in his books, and "vividly brings to life the global fields of conflict"

Palgrave Macmillan announces Palgrave Open

Palgrave Macmillan has announced the launch of Palgrave Open which offers authors of accepted primary research papers the option to publish their articles with immediate open access upon publication. With Palgrave Open authors can choose to pay an Article Processing Charge (APC) in order for their article to be made available to non-subscribers