on about books. we delve into the latest news about the publishing industry with interesting insider interviews with publishing industry experts. we'll also give you updates on current nonfiction and authors and books. the latest book reviews and we'll talk about the current nonfiction books featured on c-span, spook do, that award ce. and now a focus on a more recent phenomenon that is having a major impact on book sales. new york times books and publishing reporter elizabeth harris joins our program to talk about the social media phenomenon known as book talk.

so ms. . harris, when did book talk get started? and exactly what is it? so book talk publishers started to notice book talk probably about a year and a half ago, roughly. and book talk is it's sort of it's it's a hashtag within the platform, tick tock, which is, you know, traffics in, you know, very short videos of people dancing or people cooking or people saying funny things or, you know, can be anything. and book talk is people talking about books and it can be videos of sort of individuals talking about books that can just be sort of flashing a list of covers and that sort of thing. and publishers started noticing early last year that it was, you know, people weren't just talking. they were they were buying the books they were hearing about. and it was starting to move a substantial number of copies and has become a real a real sales force in the industry. so how many views are some of these videos garnering?

oh, gosh. i mean, hundreds of thousands easily. you know, i mean, it's it can really it can really be huge. i mean, sometimes, you know, it's very hit and miss, like a lot of social media. i mean, just because you tag something for book talk doesn't mean it's going to go viral. but a lot of things really do. and there are also there are a subset within book talk. so there are sort of people who want to talk about romance novels. there are people who want to talk about nonfiction. there are people who want to talk about lgbt. q why? a like there it gets very it can be very it can be very segmented. and so, you know, sort of some some segments are also bigger than others. so it varies a lot. so, elizabeth harris, did this grow organically? can anyone hashtag big book talk put up a video? it did grow organically, which is so interesting. i mean, you know, publishers have been paying attention to social media for years and

years. and youtube used to sell a lot of books and still sell some publishers and and readers are active on instagram. their what is called books to gram, i think. but nothing has ever sold sold books the way book talk is doing, which is really interesting. and yeah, it just it has its users. i mean, it's, i mean, it's readers basically. these are readers and it started with mainly young people who were just talking to each other about books they loved and they would, you know, post videos of themselves like weeping, holding the book in their hand, being like this book destroyed me and throw it across the room. and the book and the poster go viral because, you know, that's that's big. part of why people read is they want to go on an emotional journey and the videos on book talk are really good about kind of very quickly and very specifically imparting exactly how you're going to feel when you read the book. have there been some breakout stars when it comes to these book reviews? oh, sure. i mean, the biggest is colleen

hoover, who has been writing for years. she began as a self-published novelist and sort of started and kind of took off on her own, and then she really explode. did during the pandemic when which was when book talk was really taking off. she has sold 20 million books now and it's not all tech talk, but that's a lot of that's been a lot of it. and i mean, it's amazing. you look at the fiction bestseller list on any week and it's like half the colleen hoover list. it's really incredible. but there have also been one example i really like is madeline miller, who wrote the song of achilles, which is a love story about achilles and petroglyphs. it's very tragic. and, you know, it's a gay love story about, you know, there's war and people die. and like, this is not an obvious, you know, this is not like an upbeat romantic comedy romance novel sort of thing. like it's not necessarily an easy book, but it has sold. i don't actually know where it

is now, but over a million copies and i think it's original print run was something like 20,000 books. it really took everyone by surprise. but it and it came out a couple of years ago but just sort of took off again because of because of tick tock and has sold incredibly well. well, we want to show an example this is an example of a history book. seven historical nonfiction books that betty ann and i both love. number one, history of the world in six glasses. this is my go to like big scope of history. devil in the white city is a crazy, untrue story. chicago, world's fair zero killer classic book club book. if you want to have your mind blown and get a little philosophical. w.e.b. dubois the souls of black folk is beautiful and a work of art. if you don't have a lot of time on your hands, i recommend you just read one chapter of this a night. maybe to celebrate pride month. it's really great, short, digestible stories. apparently a big reason i did biographies, but i am number one genghis khan in the making of the modern world world history perspective. anti-euro centrism. number two, the biography of

augustus by anthony everett like stuck with me from grad school really amazing story. and last but certainly not least, it's got to be eleanor happy reading so elizabeth harris we're using betty the beagle to sell books. i mean who doesn't love a dog? it's brilliant, right? but i mean, tick tock, book talk also loves a list when you give sort of very short snippet reviews of of a couple of books or just list a couple of books and say, why you do, i don't like them, or you put them in a category. a lot of those have done very well, like i would do. tick tock. this morning there were a i got a couple like books i would kill to be able to read again for the first time things like that or six books that will destroy you or six, you know, i know like enemies to lovers books, things like that. so, you know, that kind of fits into the same the same thing where it's like, here's, here's a list. if you're looking for a particular kind of thing, here's

my thumbs up, thumbs down, you know. and if you're looking for this, you want to try this. and there, you know, there are very kind of specific, very quick, very like user friendly, reader oriented. so if you wanted to make a tick tock book review video, where would you start? how long would it be? would it have to be a little bit edgy? oh, to be edgy, i would say it has to be short. you don't want to make it longer than you know. some of them are a minute or so long, but, you know, 30 seconds is plenty. often. i mean, one thing people have done to sort of game the system a little bit is part of the algorithm and tick tock works by using music. and if there is a music clip that's going viral and doing quite well, if you put that music in your video, that can help. kind of how that can help your video do better and get more views. so i might do something sneaky like that, but you know, in terms of sort of edgy or not, i

would say edgy is less important than emotional because not all of them are emotional. some of them are funny, some of them are are are created by readers who have developed a following. and people kind of like their tastes and they trust that they'll say, you know, this book sucks and they think it sucks and this book is great. if they think it's great. but you don't have to have a lot of followers to go viral on tiktok. but yeah, i would say aiming for an emotional video, a book that, like, made me cry or made me, like, want to throw it against the wall, or if, you know, you have some sort of like really strong reaction, those those tend to do very well. now, you mentioned that published owners have started to notice book talk. have they started putting up their own videos yet? they have. and, you know, mixed success. and i spoke to somebody in a marketing department a couple of months ago about sort of how that was going. and, you know, she was saying that it's it's so unpredictable. and like, you know, they'll kind of put a lot of thought into one video and try really hard and

it's nicely produced and whatever. and that kind of flops. and then they do a video that's kind of emotional or they're like, this book is amazing for 7 seconds, and it does well, you know? so i think they're still figuring it out and i think an issue that's that comes up in a lot of social media marketing kind of questions for publishers in any company is the authenticity issue. like people don't trust something they don't think is real. you know, they are much more likely to take a book recommendation from another reader than they are from a publisher who obviously has a stake in how the book does. so that makes it trickier for publishers. so. so, yeah, i mean, what takes off on tick tock is not something that publishers can control. they're, you know, they're sending review copies to to readers, people with lots of followers. and they're kind of trying to you know, they're trying to promote those relationships. and some people are probably getting paid a sort of, you know, people are getting paid a certain amount of money, but it's difficult for publishers to

to really crack. so elizabeth harris of the new york times, if you were an author, would you rather have a prestigious kirkus starred review or a viral book talk video review? if i wanted to sell books. so to ever put her. mm hmm. that's my that would be my guess. i mean, reviews certainly help, but right now, book talk. if something goes viral on tiktok, it can really explode. so nothing against kirkus and nothing against reviews. i would love a great review, too, but if i had to pick one, i would say four on a pure sales basis. i would say tick tock. at the moment. are there any other social media companies that are having the influence today? that book talk is no, that's an easy one. it's really incredible. i mean, there is you again, the youtube has been a pretty interesting sales force for books over the years. is instagram.

but it does it you know again back to the authenticity thing like on instagram, you know, it's like a beautiful stack of books or it's a bookshelf where that's, you know, lovely and color coded and it has the lighting is nice and or, you know, it's sort of a beautiful picture of one book, you know, like range just so on a couch next to a plant or something. oh, my gosh, my cat is going to knock over my plants. sorry, but. but it doesn't really get it doesn't get to the emotion and it doesn't it's not as it's not a sort of quick and satisfying and pithy. as you know, this book is great. this book is terrible. i love this book for this reason. you'll love this book for that reason. here are six books you should read if you want to, you know, like laugh until you cry, you know, that sort of thing. like it doesn't it's not it's not as emotional and it's not as sort of punchy. so it really it's really it's really a unique it's got a unique level of power at this point. well, here's a nonfiction book

that came out recently. the author did not do book events. but here's a review of his book. we want to show call me a murder and masochist. but i read the first six chapters of jared kushner's new book, breaking history. so you don't have to. it was painful. jared kushner has a god complex. he thinks that everything he touches turns to gold. and from the beginning, he shows moral blind spots as wide as the grand canyon, the book is written in an as told to style the language about seventh grade level. what comes across loud and clear is that you're reading the book of a rich kid with no interior life and no introspective ability. elizabeth harris that's not going to help to sell books as it is. i don't know, is all is all news, you know, it is all attention, good attention, but probably not. but i don't think. but that you know, that that has gotten a good number of views.

but the people watching that, i don't think we're ever going to read that book. i think they kind of enjoy hearing someone say the book is bad. i think that's why they're watching it, not because they're looking for a recommendation. i would just be my guess when i grow up, i want to be an influencer. what does it mean? what does an influencer? oh gosh, what is an influencer? that's a great question. i guess in this case, it would be somebody who can you know, i guess a book talk influencer would be somebody with a lot of followers who take their recommendation seriously and go out and buy the books. well, here's an influencer talking about university press books full on like not even humblebrag. but now that i've become a pretty big nonfiction book, influencer university presses are reaching out to me to send me some books. and here's what i got from university of north carolina press. and it's incredible. white, evangelical racism, the politics of morality in america by anthea butler hammered home alabama communists during the great depression by robin kelly white balance how hollywood

shaped colorblind ideology and undermined civil rights. look, that i feel guilty because i had it already purchased as race for profit. how banks and the real estate industry undermined black homeownership in a book. you just know, i'm going to talk a lot about from asylum to prison to institutional ization and the rise of mass incarceration. after 1945, the male chauvinist pig a history i am so thankful for usc press for sending me these books. i am so excited to get to these and if you want to see who is even more excited for this package, go check it out. iliza beth harris. how does that sell books? just showing them rather than talking about what's inside them? yeah, i mean, i think that so that reviewer has a lot of followers. so it's sort of i think if that person had just posted that video as their first video, i don't think it would have done particularly well. but, you know, once somebody has an established presence on book talk, they have followers who trust them and are interested in what they're reading, interested in what they like.

i mean, that one is interesting because he doesn't even he hasn't even read them yet. right. he's just saying like these are the books i have. but i think people are probably just curious at what he is. you know, they're already curious about the guy. like, i wonder if people will go out and buy those if he just says that they were sent to him. but maybe i don't know. or maybe people will be like, oh, this and interesting. i'll put them on my list if they have similar tastes to his. and he says he's excited, but i'm not sure, you know, it's really it's hard to it's very hard to draw like a straight line from like this video sells this many books you can kind of see there have been maybe like one or two instances where i've been able to figure out, okay, this was one of the first videos that really took off that push this book. but it's not never precise. and i would not i would not bet on it. but it's interesting, right? i mean, that's another sort of list format, right? where it's just like, here's a book, here's a book, here's a book. and it's just, you know, people people also just like to talk about books, you know? i mean, readers like to talk to other readers about what they're

reading, like people who just really enjoy reading and read a lot. they're sort of super readers, just like to talk about it. and i mean, the thing that book talk really does is it sort of supercharge just word of mouth, which is has always been really the holy grail in book sales, you know, getting someone to tell their friend that they like a book is like, that's what you want. you want a talker, you want a book that people are going to be chatting with their friends about and, you know, book talk allows people all over the country, all over the world to find like minded people who like similar kinds of books. and so rather than just like talking to the people they know, they can talk to thousands of people. they have they don't know at all. and it allows these sort of communities of almost like mini book clubs in a way, but like sort of this recommendation communities to sort of form organically on their own based on what people are interested in. now, i should have asked this question at the beginning, a kind of a fundamental question are book talk, tick tock, videos, limit in length? can you do 10 minutes if you want it? oh gosh.

i don't know the answer to that question because i've never seen one that's 10 minutes. i think that the successful ones are short. i think tick tock does have a limit on the on the videos. but to be honest, i don't know the number of nine on top of my head. is amazon connected with this? have they been linking at all these book talk videos to their sellers pages? i don't know. to be honest. i haven't noticed that. but i don't i don't know the answer, to be frank. well, we want to show one more book talk video. this is about rediscovering the classics. are these classics worth the read part? why would absolutely. it just gets better and better every time. i guess for me, there's so much to unpack. no. sounded too bizarre and not funny. yes. just be these love story you

even think about. you know, it verified to me that so tom sawyer is a verified snooze fest on that one. and little women is worth reread reading apparently. yeah, i know that. that's a really interesting one. that speaks to a couple of things. again, there's the list, there's the recommendation format, right, that people, you know, kind of want a thumbs up, thumbs down and just like a really quick a really quick why it's good or why it's bad. and it also speaks to something that's very interesting. so in book sales, usually if a book is ever going to sell well and most books don't, sadly it's right out of the gate. but book talk highlights, books that came out a couple of years ago, often, you know, a lot of books that are out in paperback now, you know, they don't have to be new or they can be classics. like i was i was sort of surprised, tickled when i

learned that there were you know, there are some classics that have really done well on the platform. and, you know, i mean, people just want to want a good book. i don't really care when it came out or, you know, who's pushing it or what. they just they just want a good read. elizabeth harris, want to ask you about a few other issues. where are we when it comes to audiobooks? how many are being listened to? is it is it a growing format still? yeah, it is. it's become it's become a substantial part of of book sales. it's like a it's i mean, print books. interestingly, still account for the vast majority of of of sales for publishers. it hasn't the industry hasn't been disrupted the way, say, newspapers have where, you know, kind of the print versus digital shift has been really enormous for books. print is still very strong, but audiobooks have grown and they grew during the pandemic. and they were growing before.

and they're they're are doing quite well, you know, i mean, and it's also from a publishers perspective, it's you know, it's a nice it's a nice area because they don't have to ship the books. books are heavy. you have to print them, that kind of thing. you don't have to do that. so audiobooks are are very are becoming are are quite important to publishers and probably will only continue to be more so well earlier in this program, we noted the passing of hilary mantel and as a booker prize award winner in england, national book awards are coming up. do these tags and do these awards help sell books? they do. they can you know, they don't always but they really can change. they really can change things for an author, you know, having a there are there are a good number of people who read based on award winners who read based on kind of ten best lists from places like the new york times, things like that. people people like guidance. you know, there's a ton of there's a ton to read every

year. and so a stamp like a national book award winner can can really be helpful significantly. elizabeth harris covers books and the publishing industry for the new york times. we appreciate your time at 10 pk tv. well, thanks for joining us for about books, a program and podcast produced by c-span's book tv. book tv will continue to bring you publishing news and author events and you can get this podcast and all the c-span podcasts on our c-span now app. you can also watch all our programs online at book tv, dawg.