Embracing Technology in a YA World

By Kate Pavao, Children's Bookshelf -- Publishers Weekly, 7/17/2008

“The future is now,” said David Levithan, author and executive editorial director at Scholastic, stressing that YA publishing needs to adapt to changes brought on by teens’ use of technology. Publishers need to think of themselves as content providers, which means exploring new options, from developing multimedia publishing projects to getting ready for digital books for mobile reading devices.

Ypulse Mashup speakers Lisa McMann and David Levithan.
Photo: Kate Pavao.

Levithan’s remarks were part of his keynote address at the books and publishing preconference of this week’s Ypulse Mashup in San Francisco, an annual event focusing on youth media, marketing and technology. YA authors and publishing executives alike spoke at subsequent panels about how technology is already changing how they publicize—and even produce—books.

One of the biggest changes is that authors must now increasingly handle their own publicity efforts, which can mean lots of online time. Lisa McMann, author of Wake (Simon Pulse), told the audience she spent hours networking on sites like MySpace and Facebook before her book came out. “One-on-one with the author is huge,” she said, stressing the importance of answering every question teen readers ask.

For McMann, the effort paid off in more ways than one. Not only did she attract fans, who even came to her live events, but booksellers admitted that reading the comments on her Web pages helped them determine how much to order. Beyond that, S&S posted a podcast interview with McMann on its own site, and used Internet video producer TurnHere to put together a video trailer of Wake, which has received more than 4,500 hits on YouTube.

Some of the two-day conference's more than 400 participants.
Photo: Pilar Johnson.

Even when authors’ promotional efforts are not technology-based, they take time and imagination, panelists said. Melissa Walker, author of the Violet YA series (Berkley), in an effort to give readers a “real take on a fake world,” cross-promoted her books with a product mentioned in one of them—Juicy Tubes lip gloss—and threw a party during New York Fashion Week. Girl Overboard author Justina Chen Headley noted that “there is only so much time” so—since her book features a snowboarding protagonist who raises money for cancer awareness—she focused on a partnership with Burton Snowboards and Youth Venture to offer challenge grants to youth-led projects.

What ideas might be next? Publishing executives who spoke at the conference agreed that content is becoming more integrated—for example, a book may be promoted with an original webisode, which could ultimately provide content for a new book in the series. Levithan called Scholastic’s forthcoming project The 39 Clues a true multimedia affair; it includes a book series, an online game, collectible cards—and $100,000 in prize money.

Free content is another trend to watch, said Courtney Wood, senior online marketing manager at Penguin. She said Penguin is experimenting with publishing free content that can be embedded in blogs and emailed to friends. And Penguin’s not alone: as Levithan pointed out, just this week Stephenie Meyer said in Entertainment Weekly that when it comes to her forthcoming book Midnight Sun, she might just give away for free on her Web site. (Of course, she said it tongue-in-cheek.)

Many audience members raised concerns about how technological advances, like digital editions, will affect author royalties, independent bookstores and books themselves. Levithan, who predicted that books will not go away but may become more valuable, collectible objects, encouraged attendees to remain open-minded during this “prime period of change.” After all, he pointed out, change brings advantages, too. For example, as teens gain access to mobile reading devices, they will have access to books anywhere. The big question for authors and publishers to ask, Levithan said, is “Can we go where teens live?”