Tuesday, April 29, 2014

So, farewell then, NZ Post Book Awards

NZ Post has been sponsor of the children’s book awards since 1997 and of the grown-up book awards since 2010. It has been an exemplary sponsor – but this will be the last year.

Or so my bookseller friends tell me. No one whom I know knows for sure, but this is the word in the book trade. Odd that it hasn’t been reported anywhere, at least that I have seen.

If it is true – and it would be understandable given the sunset-industry state of NZ Post’s core business – I wonder where on earth the book trade will find another corporate sponsor that will see a benefit to its business in aligning itself with the dwindling number of booksellers, publishers and readers. Bah.

So here is Elvis Costello (and the least enthusiastic backing singers you’ll ever see) with “Every Day I Write the Book” from his 1983 album Punch the Clock:

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