WHAT'S IT ALL ABOUT?

The Borders Group, the bankrupt 40-year-old bookseller, said on Monday

that it will move to liquidate after no last-minute savior emerged for the company.

Borders will begin closing down its remaining stores as soon as Friday, and the liquidation is expected to run through September.

Publishers were disheartened but hardly surprised by the announcement, as they have watched Borders's troubles deepen for years. According to Bowker, a research organization for the publishing industry,

Borders accounted for 13 percent of the overall market share for print books in 2010. By July, that had dwindled to less than five percent, several large publishers said.

Barnes & Noble has fared better than Borders but after putting itself on the selling block close to a year ago, the company has only seen lukewarm interest.


Barnes & Noble has seen its book sales drop steadily, but had one major survival advantage over Borders with its Nook digital reader.

While the Nook isn't quite as popular as Amazon's Kindle, it has steadily brought in income for the slumping company.

But with news of the official collapse of Borders, even though it had been in the works for some time, Barnes and Noble might be wise to finally accept Liberty's offer.

While some could speculate that the loss of competition would be good for the company, it also could show that the market has completely dried up.

Borders Group Inc has entered talks to sell a small number of stores to retailer Books-A-Million Inc while hundreds of its other locations would be liquidated.

What does that mean for us as writers? Is America becoming a non-reading market? How will we fare in the eBook market? What will this mean to our chances with agents?
Tell me what you think?
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