And books. The latest book reviews and well talk about the current Nonfiction Books featured on cspan, spook tv. And this is about books book tvs program and podcast that looks at the business of publishing. Now, in just a few minutes, New York Times books and publishing reporter Elizabeth Harris will join us to talk about how the book talks. Social media phenomenon is changing the Publishing Industry. Book talk is part of the social media empire of tiktok. But first, heres a look at some of the latest stories in the publishing world. Bestselling author Hilary Mantel has died. The british author of the historical novel wolf hall was the two time winner of the booker prize, englands highest literary award. And as the holiday months approach, various booksellers and literary groups are releasing their lists of best books of 2020 to being named to one of those lists can serve to boost book sales as much as they do an authors prestige. Heres a few of the recent announcements from barnes and noble, some of their best books of 2022 include ben mcintyres prisoners of the castle. Its a history of the nazi maximum security prison that was used to house escape prone allied prisoners. Theres also im glad my mom died. This is by director and singer jennette mccurdy. Its a memoir of her time as a child star in hollywood and her victimization at the hands of her mother and the television industry. And one book on this years barnes and noble list wont be released until november. Its former first Lady Michelle obamas forthcoming book, the light we carry. Its a follow up on her bestselling memoir, becoming, and it is set for release on november 15th. Well, another closely watched annual best book list comes from the nonpareil effort National Book foundation. Their National Book awards were first established in 1950 to celebrate the best in american writing in the nonfiction tegory this year, finalists include Megan Orourke for the insie kingd rmagining chronic illness, imani perry for south arica, a journey below the masondixon to understand the soul of aatn. David quammen is also on the list for breathless, the scienticace to defeat a deadly virus. Author Ingrid Rojas Contreras wrote the man who could move clouds, a memoir. And Robert Samuels and tolu olaru nipa for his name is george floyd. One mans life and the struggle for raci jtice. And those are the finalists for the National Book award in the nonfiction category. The winners of this years awards will be announced in new york city on november 16th, and book tv will be covering, as we always do, that award ceremony. And now a focus on a more recent phenomenon that is having a major impact on book sales. New york times books and publishing reporter Elizabeth Harris joins our program to talk about the social media phenomenon known as book talk. So ms. Harris, when did book talk get started . And exactly what is it . So book talk publishers started to notice book talk probably about a year and a half ago, roughly. And book talk is its sort of its its a hashtag within the platform, tick tock, which is, you know, traffics in, you know, very short videos of people dancing or people cooking or people saying funny things or, you know, can be anything. And book talk is people talking about books and it can be videos of sort of individuals talking about books that can just be sort of flashing a list of covers and that sort of thing. And publishers started noticing early last year that it was, you know, people werent just talking. They were they were buying the books they were hearing about. And it was starting to move a substantial number of copies and has become a real a real sales force in the industry. So how many views are some of these videos garnering . Oh, gosh. I mean, hundreds of thousands easily. You know, i mean, its it can really it can really be huge. I mean, sometimes, you know, its very hit and miss, like a lot of social media. I mean, just because you tag something for book talk doesnt mean its going to go viral. But a lot of things really do. And there are also there are a subset within book talk. So there are sort of people who want to talk about romance novels. There are people who want to talk about nonfiction. There are people who want to talk about lgbt. Q why . A like there it gets very it can be very it can be very segmented. And so, you know, sort of some some segments are also bigger than others. So it varies a lot. So, Elizabeth Harris, did this grow organically . Can anyone hashtag big book talk put up a video . It did grow organically, which is so interesting. I mean, you know, publishers have been paying attention to social media for years and years. And youtube used to sell a lot of books and still sell some publishers and and readers are active on instagram. Their what is called books to gram, i think. But nothing has ever sold sold books the way book talk is doing, which is really interesting. And yeah, it just it has its users. I mean, its, i mean, its readers basically. These are readers and it started with mainly young people who were just talking to each other about books they loved and they would, you know, post videos of themselves like weeping, holding the book in their hand, being like this book destroyed me and throw it across the room. And the book and the poster go viral because, you know, thats thats big. Part of why people read is they want to go on an emotional journey and the videos on book talk are really good about kind of very quickly and very specifically imparting exactly how youre going to feel when you read the book. Have there been some breakout stars when it comes to these book reviews . Oh, sure. I mean, the biggest is Colleen Hoover, who has been writing for years. She began as a selfpublished novelist and sort of started and kind of took off on her own, and then she really explode. Did during the pandemic when which was when book talk was really taking off. She has sold 20 million books now and its not all tech talk, but thats a lot of thats been a lot of it. And i mean, its amazing. You look at the fiction bestseller list on any week and its like half the Colleen Hoover list. Its really incredible. But there have also been one example i really like is madeline miller, who wrote the song of achilles, which is a love story about achilles and petroglyphs. Its very tragic. And, you know, its a gay love story about, you know, theres war and people die. And like, this is not an obvious, you know, this is not like an upbeat romantic comedy romance novel sort of thing. Like its not necessarily an easy book, but it has sold. I dont actually know where it is now, but over a million copies and i think its original print run was Something Like 20,000 books. It really took everyone by surprise. But it and it came out a couple of years ago but just sort of took off again because of because of tick tock and has sold incredibly well. Well, we want to show an example this is an example of a history book. Seven historical Nonfiction Books that betty ann and i both love. Number one, history of the world in six glasses. This is my go to like big scope of history. Devil in the white city is a crazy, untrue story. Chicago, worlds fair zero killer classic book club book. If you want to have your mind blown and get a little philosophical. W. E. B. Dubois the souls of black folk is beautiful and a work of art. If you dont have a lot of time on your hands, i recommend you just read one chapter of this a night. Maybe to celebrate pride month. Its really great, short, digestible stories. Apparently a big reason i did biographies, but i am number one genghis khan in the making of the modern world World History perspective. Antieuro centrism. Number two, the biography of augustus by Anthony Everett like stuck with me from grad school really amazing story. And last but certainly not least, its got to be eleanor happy reading so Elizabeth Harris were using betty the beagle to sell books. I mean who doesnt love a dog . Its brilliant, right . But i mean, tick tock, book talk also loves a list when you give sort of very short snippet reviews of of a couple of books or just list a couple of books and say, why you do, i dont like them, or you put them in a category. A lot of those have done very well, like i would do. Tick tock. This morning there were a i got a couple like books i would kill to be able to read again for the first time things like that or six books that will destroy you or six, you know, i know like enemies to lovers books, things like that. So, you know, that kind of fits into the same the same thing where its like, heres, heres a list. If youre looking for a particular kind of thing, heres my thumbs up, thumbs down, you know. And if youre looking for this, you want to try this. And there, you know, there are very kind of specific, very quick, very like user friendly, reader oriented. So if you wanted to make a tick tock book review video, where would you start . How long would it be . Would it have to be a little bit edgy . Oh, to be edgy, i would say it has to be short. You dont want to make it longer than you know. Some of them are a minute or so long, but, you know, 30 seconds is plenty. Often. I mean, one thing people have done to sort of game the system a little bit is part of the algorithm and tick tock works by using music. And if there is a music clip thats going viral and doing quite well, if you put that music in your video, that can help. Kind of how that can help your video do better and get more views. So i might do something sneaky like that, but you know, in terms of sort of edgy or not, i would say edgy is less important than emotional because not all of them are emotional. Some of them are funny, some of them are are are created by readers who have developed a following. And people kind of like their tastes and they trust that theyll say, you know, this book sucks and they think it sucks and this book is great. If they think its great. But you dont have to have a lot of followers to go viral on tiktok. But yeah, i would say aiming for an emotional video, a book that, like, made me cry or made me, like, want to throw it against the wall, or if, you know, you have some sort of like really strong reaction, those those tend to do very well. Now, you mentioned that published owners have started to notice book talk. Have they started putting up their own videos yet . They have. And, you know, mixed success. And i spoke to somebody in a Marketing Department a couple of months ago about sort of how that was going. And, you know, she was saying that its its so unpredictable. And like, you know, theyll kind of put a lot of thought into one video and try really hard and its nicely produced and whatever. And that kind of flops. And then they do a video thats kind of emotional or theyre like, this book is amazing for 7 seconds, and it does well, you know . So i think theyre still figuring it out and i think an issue thats that comes up in a lot of social Media Marketing kind of questions for publishers in any company is the authenticity issue. Like people dont trust something they dont think is real. You know, they are much more likely to take a book recommendation from another reader than they are from a publisher who obviously has a stake in how the book does. So that makes it trickier for publishers. So. So, yeah, i mean, what takes off on tick tock is not something that publishers can control. Theyre, you know, theyre sending review copies to to readers, people with lots of followers. And theyre kind of trying to you know, theyre trying to promote those relationships. And some people are probably getting paid a sort of, you know, people are getting paid a certain amount of money, but its difficult for publishers to to really crack. So Elizabeth Harris of the New York Times, if you were an author, would you rather have a prestigious kirkus starred review or a viral book talk video review . If i wanted to sell books. So to ever put her. Mm hmm. Thats my that would be my guess. I mean, reviews certainly help, but right now, book talk. If something goes viral on tiktok, it can really explode. So nothing against kirkus and nothing against reviews. I would love a great review, too, but if i had to pick one, i would say four on a pure sales basis. I would say tick tock. At the moment. Are there any other social Media Companies that are having the influence today . That book talk is no, thats an easy one. Its really incredible. I mean, there is you again, the youtube has been a pretty interesting sales force for books over the years. Is instagram. But it does it you know again back to the authenticity thing like on instagram, you know, its like a beautiful stack of books or its a bookshelf where thats, you know, lovely and color coded and it has the lighting is nice and or, you know, its sort of a beautiful picture of one book, you know, like range just so on a couch next to a plant or something. Oh, my gosh, my cat is going to knock over my plants. Sorry, but. But it doesnt really get it doesnt get to the emotion and it doesnt its not as its not a sort of quick and satisfying and pithy. As you know, this book is great. This book is terrible. I love this book for this reason. Youll love this book for that reason. Here are six books you should read if you want to, you know, like laugh until you cry, you know, that sort of thing. Like it doesnt its not its not as emotional and its not as sort of punchy. So it really its really its really a unique its got a unique level of power at this point. Well, heres a Nonfiction Book that came out recently. The author did not do book events. But heres a review of his book. We want to show call me a murder and masochist. But i read the first six chapters of Jared Kushners new book, breaking history. So you dont have to. It was painful. Jared kushner has a god complex. He thinks that everything he touches turns to gold. And from the beginning, he shows moral blind spots as wide as the grand canyon, the book is written in an as told to style the language about seventh grade level. What comes across loud and clear is that youre reading the book of a rich kid with no interior life and no introspective ability. Elizabeth harris thats not going to help to sell books as it is. I dont know, is all is all news, you know, it is all attention, good attention, but probably not. But i dont think. But that you know, that that has gotten a good number of views. But the people watching that, i dont think were ever going to read that book. I think they kind of enjoy hearing someone say the book is bad. I think thats why theyre watching it, not because theyre looking for a recommendation. I would just be my guess when i grow up, i want to be an influencer. What does it mean . What does an influencer . Oh gosh, what is an influencer . Thats a great question. I guess in this case, it would be somebody who can you know, i guess a book talk influencer would be somebody with a lot of followers who take their recommendation seriously and go out and buy the books. Well, heres an influencer talking about University Press books full on like not even humblebrag. But now that ive become a pretty big Nonfiction Book, influencer University Presses are reaching out to me to send me some books. And heres what i got from university of North Carolina press. And its incredible. White, evangelical racism, the politics of morality in america by Anthea Butler hammered home alabama communists during the Great Depression by robin kelly white balance how hollywood shaped colorblind ideology and undermined civil rights. Look, that i feel guilty because i had it already purchased as race for profit. How banks and the Real Estate Industry undermined black homeownership in a book. You just know, im going to talk a lot about from asylum to prison to institutional ization and the rise of mass incarceration. After 1945, the male chauvinist pig a history i am so thankful for usc press for sending me these books. I am so excited to get to these and if you want to see who is even more excited for this package, go check it out. Iliza beth harris. How does that sell books . Just showing them rather than talking about whats inside them . Yeah, i mean, i think that so that reviewer has a lot of followers. So its sort of i think if that person had just posted that video as their first video, i dont think it would have done particularly well. But, you know, once somebody has an established presence on book talk, they have followers who trust them and are interested in what theyre reading, interested in what they like. I mean, that one is interesting because he doesnt even he hasnt even read them yet. Right. Hes just saying like these are the books i have. But i think people are probably just curious at what he is. You know, theyre already curious about the guy. Like, i wonder if people will go out and buy those if he just says that they were sent to him. But maybe i dont know. Or maybe people will be like, oh, this and interesting. Ill put them on my list if they have similar tastes to his. And he says hes excited, but im not sure, you know, its really its hard to its very hard to draw like a Straight Line from like this video sells this many books you can kind of see there have been maybe like one or two instances where ive been able to figure out, okay, this was one of the first videos that really took off that push this book. But its not never precise. And i would not i would not bet on it. But its interesting, right . I mean, thats another sort of list format, right . Where its just like, heres a book, heres a book, heres a book. And its just, you know, people people also just like to talk about books, you know . I mean, readers like to talk to other readers about what theyre reading, like people who just really enjoy reading and read a lot. Theyre sort of super readers, just like to talk about it. And i mean, the thing that book talk really does is it sort of supercharge just word of mouth, which is has always been really the holy grail in book sales, you know, getting someone to tell their friend that they like a book is like, thats what you want. You want a talker, you want a book that people are going to be chatting with their friends about and, you know, book talk allows people all over the country, all over the world to find like minded people who like similar kinds of books. And so rather than just like talking to the people they know, they can talk to thousands of people. They have they dont know at all. And it allows these sort of communities of almost like mini book clubs in a way, but like sort of this recommendation communities to sort of form organically on their own based on what people are interested in. Now, i should have asked this question at the beginning, a kind of a fundamental question are book talk, tick tock, videos, limit in length . Can you do 10 minutes if you want it . Oh gosh. I dont know the answer to that question because ive never seen one thats 10 minutes. I think that the successful ones are short. I think tick tock does have a limit on the on the videos. But to be honest, i dont know the number of nine on top of my head. Is amazon connected with this . Have they been linking at all these book talk videos to their sellers pages . I dont know. To be honest. I havent noticed that. But i dont i dont know the answer, to be frank. Well, we want to show one more book talk video. This is about rediscovering the classics. Are these classics worth the read part . Why would absolutely. It just gets better and better every time. I guess for me, theres so much to unpack. No. Sounded too bizarre and not funny. Yes. Just be these love story you even think about. You know, it verified to me that so tom sawyer is a verified snooze fest on that one. And little women is worth reread reading apparently. Yeah, i know that. Thats a really interesting one. That speaks to a couple of things. Again, theres the list, theres the recommendation format, right, that people, you know, kind of want a thumbs up, thumbs down and just like a really quick a really quick why its good or why its bad. And it also speaks to something thats very interesting. So in book sales, usually if a book is ever going to sell well and most books dont, sadly its right out of the gate. But book talk highlights, books that came out a couple of years ago, often, you know, a lot of books that are out in paperback now, you know, they dont have to be new or they can be classics. Like i was i was sort of surprised, tickled when i learned that there were you know, there are some classics that have really done well on the platform. And, you know, i mean, people just want to want a good book. I dont really care when it came out or, you know, whos pushing it or what. They just they just want a good read. Elizabeth harris, want to ask you about a few other issues. Where are we when it comes to audiobooks . How many are being listened to . Is it is it a growing format still . Yeah, it is. Its become its become a substantial part of of book sales. Its like a its i mean, print books. Interestingly, still account for the vast majority of of of sales for publishers. It hasnt the industry hasnt been disrupted the way, say, newspapers have where, you know, kind of the print versus digital shift has been really enormous for books. Print is still very strong, but audiobooks have grown and they grew during the pandemic. And they were growing before. And theyre theyre are doing quite well, you know, i mean, and its also from a publishers perspective, its you know, its a nice its a nice area because they dont have to ship the books. Books are heavy. You have to print them, that kind of thing. You dont have to do that. So audiobooks are are very are becoming are are quite important to publishers and probably will only continue to be more so well earlier in this program, we noted the passing of Hilary Mantel and as a booker prize award winner in england, National Book awards are coming up. Do these tags and do these awards help sell books . They do. They can you know, they dont always but they really can change. They really can change things for an author, you know, having a there are there are a good number of people who read based on Award Winners who read based on kind of ten best lists from places like the New York Times, things like that. People people like guidance. You know, theres a ton of theres a ton to read every year. And so a stamp like a National Book award winner can can really be helpful significantly. Elizabeth harris covers books and the Publishing Industry for the New York Times. We appreciate your time on about books. Thanks for having me. And youre watching and listening to the about Books Program and podcast produced by book tv. Well, each tuesday, dozens of new books are published. Heres a recent sampling. In hold the line, the insurrection and one cops battle for americas soul. Former washington, d. C. Police officer Michael Fanone offers his account of his neardeath experience during the january 6th attack on the u. S. Capitol and in an american martyr in persia, the epic life and tragic death of howard baskerville, iranian american scholar and tv host reza aslan tells the story of a south dakota Christian Missionary turned Iranian Revolutionary in the early 20th century and bestselling author Temple Grandin has a new book out titled visual thinking the world renowned Animal Science professor and autism advocate writes that, quote, its possible that the most important thing my mother did for me was to not see herself primarily as the mom of a disabled kid. Dr. Grandin says she wrote her latest book because of the rise in autism diagnoses and that these seem to be Holding Children back. Her book was recently reviewed in the wall street journal. And as a side note, Temple Grandin appeared on book tvs indepth program a few years back, and that entire three hour interview can be watched online at book tv, dawg. Well, each week as well, National Publications publish their reviews of newly released books. Heres to the National Review magazine looks at john aggressive. Those new book, the death of learning. The subtitle little is how American Education has failed our students and what to do about it. Now, dr. Arresto is the former president of St Johns College and his book is a defense of liberal arts education. The National Review writes that, quote, there is nothing new in the death of learning, but there is plenty of good sens in ct, it is one of the best defenses of a liberal arts edution. It is both realistic and nonpartisan, and thats according to the reviewer. Micah maddocks another book recently reviewed is david colemans latest breathless the scientific race to beat a deadly virus. The prolific scientist is also the author of the bestselling book spillover about animal infections transmitted to humans. Well, in his latest book, mr. Quammen attempts to pinpoint the origins of the covid 19 virus. The wall street journal had the former head of the fda, scott gottlieb, review it. And in his review, dr. Gottlieb writ, quote, whe mr. Quammen devotes considerable time exploring e efforts to pinpoint the virus, says origin, and concludes that covid jumped from one species to another. He doesnt recount the National Security reporting that can be used to buttress the lab leak theory. Now you will see all these books and authors featured in the near future on book tv. Also coming up on book tv on our afterwards program, its Bloomberg News is mark bergen, who looks at the growth and creation of youtube and how its changed society. He was interviewed by politico tech policy reporter rebecca kern. Heres a preview. I thought this was a fascinating story about this media platform thats really, despite its size and influence, just not have the same level of attention as some of its peers. And i thought within that story that you have plenty of fascinating characters on youtube and then inside the company you have this whiplash of going from the underdog to sort of seen as big tech and seen as something that for associated with a lot of problems in democracy and to reminder that afterwards airs every sunday at 10 p. M. On book tv. Well, thanks for joining us for about books, a program and podcast produced by cspans book tv. Book tv will continue to bring you publishing news and author events and you can get this podcast and all the cspan podcasts on our cspan now app. You can also watch all our programs online at book tv, dawg. Good evening, everyone, im robert dor, the president of the American Enterprise institute and i welcome all here to this i think important conversation about a topic that i have cared a lot about for my entire career. And