I was particularly taken aback by number of people who read as adults, and number of people who think they can write! Those who do buy books must make up for those who don't, or publishers would go out of business.
I cherish in my heart the story told in Joel Engel's Rod Serling biography of Serling's running a contest to tap public talent, only to be bombarded by such a pile of junk he learned the sad truth: most people can't write!
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Yeah, if you google around, you'll find lots of commentary on how crocked those statistics are.
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Comparing book purchases with bookstore use...who says you have to buy a book in a bookstore? Practically every store I go into will have some kind of book for sale...
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Oh, I think you can find plenty to be depressed about in the reading habits of the American public; it's just that these statistics don't hold up.
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Guilty as charged. I'll see an interesting book in a bookstore, then buy as good a copy cheaper online.
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Something like Amazon.com might as well be a bookstore...I was thinking more of supermarkets and airport newsstands...and even the modern-day hardware stores like Home Depot and Lowe's always carry a large selection of do-it-yourself books.
(I've usually found the online discounts usually disappear when postage and handling are factored in...it doesn't matter to me much.)
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Think of writing like sports. Everybody has done a bit of it. many of them might have been published in papers that don't pay. It is only when you become really good that you actually can make a living at it. Unlike the sports, though, there is no "farm" system for writing. People write, submit, and if they are good enough, get published. Some can do that the first time they submit, others might have to work at it for a long period of time.
Like is sports, there are those who have loads of talent, and no heart, and end up unpublished.
In essence, if you can put one word after another, you can write. The ability to put them in an order that can be published, is something else.
On other boards, I include in my signature a quote I attribute to "Scott Card" which I learned recently is our beloved Orson.
"If you write, you are a writer. If you are not talented, you will not get published as often, or at all."
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