Cook Partners

Guadalajara's International Book Fair Kicks Off

The 22nd installment of Guadalajara's International Book Fair begins today, and Letralia, a literary magazine in Spanish, describes the event:

Nearly 500 authors and intellectuals, 380 book presentations by publishing houses and participation institutions, and debate... [from November 29 to] December 7 will attract more than half a million visitors to a venue hosting more than 1,600 publishers and 17 thousand book professionals.

Mike Hyatt of Thomas Nelson visited the event last year, and shared his impressions "gave [him] a renewed vision—and hope—for the Christian publishing industry" to introduce the Evangelical Christian Publishing Association's Christian Book Expo scheduled for March 2009. Read more here, and think about how what you see at your next book fair can inspire you to implement something new in your own efforts to promote Christian books.  

Last Languages Campaign

Wycliffe Bible Translators launched the "Last Languages Campaign," to start, by 2025, a "language development and Bible translation program" for approximately 2,400 languages that currently do not have one. The campaign, according to Christian News Wire, will use "new strategies and high-tech translation techniques, developed by Wycliffe personnel, that accelerate the pace of language development and Bible translation by three times the pace of a decade ago."

Becoming Screen Literate

The New York Times notes the shift from orality to writing and now, to screen literacy:

We are now in the middle of a second Gutenberg shift — from book fluency to screen fluency, from literacy to visuality.The overthrow of the book would have happened long ago but for the great user asymmetry inherent in all media. It is easier to read a book than to write one; easier to listen to a song than to compose one; easier to attend a play than to produce one. But movies in particular suffer from this user asymmetry ... cheap and universal tools of creation (megapixel phone cameras, Photoshop, iMovie) are quickly reducing the effort needed to create moving images.

Croatia: Mother Theresa's Letters Published

On Tuesday, November 11, 2008, "The Verbum publishing company ... presented the Croatian issue of private letters of the ‘saint from Calcutta’, Mother Theresa, Come, Be My Light, collected by Brian Kolodiejchuk," reports the Javno news portal. "The Croatian issue is special because of the introduction with copies of thee letters of Mother Theresa in Croatian."

Bulgaria: Art Exhibits Promote Bible

To celebrate 2008 as the "Year of the Bible," the Bible League in Bulgaria has held art exhibitions in the country's biggest cities:

"From the beginning of the year," says Hari Atanasov, a Christian artist and the publisher of an evangelistic newspaper titled Spiritual Light, "we have had seven exhibitions with our illustrations for first Bulgarian Family Bible. This is a very good way to give testimonies for the Lord."

Atanasov hopes to eventually sell the original illustrations to finance church construction. Additionally, he is also "working to print two books which are very important for Christians and Moslems in Bulgaria." 

China's Urban Revolution

To The Ends of The Earth, a Fall 2008 publication of the International Mission Board of the Southern Baptist Convention, states that "In China, 200 million people (the equivalent of two-thirds of the U.S. population) have migrated from the countryside to cities during the last 10 years."

This population shift is only the beginning. This month, Business Week magazine featured an article on China's urban revolution:

Over the next 17 years, 350 million rural residents (more than the entire U.S. population today) will leave the farm and move to China's cities. That will bring the Chinese urban population from just under 600 million today to close to 1 billion, changing China into a country where more than two-thirds of its people are city dwellers.

And how will they access the life-giving Scriptures and learn more about the Lord? Through the witness of Chinese Christians, of course, but also through Christian literature. Read more about publishing in China in the current issue of Cook Partners magazine.

 

Gains and Losses of Internet Research

Each day, more information is available on the Web at the click of a button, and the impact this has on academic research may not be all good, according to The Boston Globe:

A recent study [suggests] the boom in online research may actually have a "narrowing" effect on scholarship. James Evans, a sociologist at the University of Chicago, analyzed a database of 34 million articles in the sciences, social sciences, and humanities, and determined that as more journal issues came online, new papers referenced a relatively smaller pool of articles, which tended to be more recent, at the expense of older and more obscure work. Overall, Evans says, published research has expanded, due to a proliferation of journals, authors, and conferences. But the paper, which appeared in July in the journal Science, concludes that the Internet's influence is to tighten consensus, posing the risk that good ideas may be ignored and lost - the opposite of the Internet's promise.

Others disagree with Evans' conclusions, downplaying the danger that search engines will promote group think. But what implications do these findings have for publishers, editors and writers? Here are just a few that come to mind:

• Aim to do thorough research.
• Do not rely on just one medium (or search engine).
• Expose yourself to both old and new ideas. 
• Think about the breadth of knowledge of the people you hire and train.
• Consider how you engage in fact and source checking.
• How do you determine who is an expert? Do your editorial guidelines address this? 
• Salvage the "older and more obscure" parts of your inventory by repackaging them.
• Take advantage of browsers' interest in the most popular items and post such lists on your Web site. 

Albania: Mrekullia To Celebrate 15th Anniversary

A Christian children's magazine in a country known for atheism: Mrekullia (Miracle) magazine was launched at Christmas in 1993 as a quarterly with a print run of 3,500, and this year it will celebrate 15 years of ministry. With God, everything is possible! Founded by Besa Shapllo, Albania director for Mission Possible (MP), the magazine is distributed through MP's "Miracle Bible Clubs," bookstores, and even secular elementary schools.

Rick Warren and Reader's Digest

Rick Warren and Reader's Digest are partnering to launch, early next year, The Purpose-Driven Connection, a quarterly magazine for "people who are seeking their purpose in life and wish to interact with others on their spiritual journeys." The partnership will also include development of additional products including "DVDs, workbooks, Internet-based discussion guides and a Christian social networking website." What does Warren hope the partnership will accomplish? He is quoted as saying, “The Purpose Driven Connection represents more than simply integrated multimedia resources; it will become a platform for a movement of people to change the world.” And changing the world is fun, said Warren to Christianity Today.

ECPA's PubU Switching to Online Format in 2009

The Evangelical Christian Publishing Association announced today that

...its popular Publishing University (called PUBu) will move from a one-time physical event to multiple online webinars for 2009.

... The webinar format will allow ECPA to tailor the subject matter to meet pressing industry needs, recruit previously unavailable (or higher-profile) presenters and schedule the seminars quickly. 

...PUBu could return as an on-site educational event in 2010 or later. 

  More details about the 2009 change will be available in January.