A Note about Locus Online’s Monitor Listings

As just posted on yesterday’s New Books page, in the freshly installed WordPress Monitor blog:

Beginning August 2011, Monitor listings will be based on publisher schedules and availability on Amazon, rather than on confirmation of physical publication (i.e. via purchase, review copies, or sightings in bookstores). As before, titles are listed only once they are published; we do not list galleys or advance reading copies.

In addition, some titles (especially latter volumes in ongoing series) will be listed at the bottom of each page, without description.

Locus Online will endeavor to list, with or without description, all significant titles from the principal SF/F and mainstream publishers (omitting for the most part YA, horror, media and gaming ties, and self-published books). Publishers are welcome to alert Locus Online of scheduled titles, but such notice does not guarantee listings; and again, galleys and ARCs are discouraged.

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I alluded to this change in my last post here, as a direct result of the closing of Borders bookstores and the consequent dearth of physical bookstores to browse and try to verify that scheduled books have actually been published. With Borders gone, there will be two Barnes & Nobles near me, in Woodland Hills and Calabasas, and then… I’m not sure how far to the next physical bookstore (let alone independent bookstore). There are B&Ns in Santa Monica and West L.A., each 12-15 miles away; independents are Book Soup in West Hollywood and Vroman’s in Pasadena, 15 and 20 miles away…. And that’s about it. In a big city. Times, they are a-changing.