A bumper crop

On 3rd September, some 600 books were published in the UK. That’s a huge number for one day. And it was the smaller publishers, independent bookshops, and little-known and first-time authors who lost out. Covid-19 is of course the reason why many publishers postponed publication dates for a few months leading to the scrum. The big guns – Martin Amis, Robert Harris, David Attenborough, Elena Ferrante, Caitlin Moran and others – were all reviewed. But the smaller fry were often ignored: there’s only so much space newspapers and magazines can give to reviews, and cuts in advertising meant literary editors were given fewer pages to fill. Small independent bookshops are often pushed for space and can stock only comparatively few new titles – and anyway browsing in this age of coronavirus is still a problem.

The latest James Bond film has been delayed twice because of Covid and now won’t be released until April next year. And many publishers have followed suit. Profile Books, for example, moved most of its new titles from May this year, rescheduling many for next year. John Preston’s Fall, The

Mystery of Robert Maxwell was moved by Vintage from July this year to February 2021; Harpercollins’s Dr Karl’s Little Book of Climate Change

Science by Karl Kruszelnicki has moved from this year to March 2021; and Canongate, Cornerstone and Orion have all delayed publication of major new works until the new year.

Literary festivals also fell under the coronavirus curse; but many – including Cheltenham, Hay and Chalke Valley – re-invented themselves online – not as good as the real live thing but a great alternative.

Online surveys found that people were reading more during the pandemic; and my own (completely unscientific and tiny) survey found that many reread old favourites and ‘light’ rather than ‘challenging’ books. But whatever your inclination, where better to look for ideas for yourself and friends than inside this supplement? Happy (safe) browsing.