Living All In

So, another year in the books (pun intended.)

Time for a look back at my top ten events in Christian publishing for 2006 (aka "The Year of the Acquisition") in no particular order.  I’m not saying these are good or bad, just unavoidably noticeable:

1. Multnomah bought out by Random House (who already owns Waterbrook.)
2. Simon & Schuster buying up (and I assume, *hugging*) Howard Publishing
3. Baker/Revell landing a NYT Bestseller with 90 Minutes in Heaven
4. Thomas Nelson going from publicly traded to owned by a private equity firm (InterMedia Partners)
5. Thomas Nelson buying up Integrity Publishers
6. Thomas Nelson dumping imprints/brands and publishing by category
7. Purpose Driven (the business) hemmoraging money (and jobs) and being folded back into Saddleback’s church operations
8. Tangently related - Republicans losing the House and Senate in midterm elections (politicians woke up to the fact conservatives aren’t robotic rubberstampers; publishers take note.)
9. Family Christian Stores (and others) pull out of ECPA STATS reporting in favor of CBA’s not-yet-fully-adopted CROSS-SCAN; CBA still uses ECPA STATS for bestseller lists without Family (and CROSS-SCAN) data. 
10. Hungry Planet hitting the ‘500,000 books sold’ mark in just three years in a tough teen/young adult non-fiction market that other publishers have pretty much abandoned.

I’d love to expound on each event, but isn’t that living in the past?  Besides, I’m finishing up an overdue manuscript.  Ever seen that plate-spinning guy on Letterman?  Yup, that’s how I feel sometimes.  But the plates are ones that no one else has spinning, so it kind of feels necessary.  And fun.

January (and early 2007 as a whole) is going to be an incredibly busy season for me, Hungry Planet, and other ventures we’re launching.  Expect a slew of press releases, announcements, and perhaps some mainstream media attention.  Hayley and I are thankful for an incredible year that saw six new releases and a continued presence (dominance?) of the CBA Young Adult bestseller list.  In fact, every disappointment we encountered as a company (albeit only a few) are actually turning out to be huge blessings. 

Honestly, with my  beautiful wife and daughter, I hardly need anything more.  To my  ever-growing blog readership, may you greet 2007 fresh and free of worries and fear, ready to risk your time, money, and talent on projects worthy of all three. 

Happy New Year from Hungry Planet.