In yet another worrying sign of the decline of printed books, Dorchester books has announced they’re going all digital.. Dorchester was also the distributor for Hard Case Crime, but not the imprint owner, which is mystery writer Charles Ardai (who, in “it’s a small world after all” fashion, is married to fantasy writer Naomi Novik). So Hard Case Crime (which has published a number of extremely interesting titles, including works by Stephen King, Roger Zelazny, and Watergate burglar E. Howard Hunt) will either disappear or move to another publisher; things are still up in the air.
Sadly, for a paperback publisher like Dorchester, this is probably the right economic decision. There may come a day when the only fictions books actually printed will be signed limited editions…