April 4, 2026
Book biz or mob biz?
The most-disliked people in the publishing industry
Authors yell exploitation, publishers say loss leader — and the mob joke writes itself
TLDR: Kanakia argues publishing isn’t just about profit—institutions shape what counts as “literary” today. Commenters brawl over money: some say authors are squeezed by big publishers, others say most books lose money, while jokers compare the book biz to Get Shorty—culture clash meets cash math.
Naomi Kanakia’s latest think-piece asks a spicy question: is “literary quality” central to publishing, or just a side effect of selling books? She defends the sociology of literature—studying how creative-writing programs, reviews, awards, and big publishers shape what we call “good”—and even tosses in a wild Beowulf thought experiment. The vibe: publishing isn’t just a business, it’s a culture machine. The comments? A cage match.
One camp says the real villains are the suits. As one poster puts it, writers hand a “huge corporation” their work for less than it costs to make, and still get told to be grateful. Cue the outrage gifs. Another camp fires back with the brutal math: “most books are loss leaders”, so the catalog has to be wide to find the rare hit. It’s not evil—it’s survival. Cue accountant memes.
There’s also confusion (and comedy) over the industry’s labels—“prestige,” “commercial,” “nonprofit”—with one reader admitting they got lost in the genre salad. Meanwhile, a fan just loved the piece, no drama, thanks for the link. And then came the thread’s star meme: a Get Shorty comparison—Hollywood as mob-adjacent—which commenters gleefully repurposed for publishing. Is the book biz a cathedral of culture or Get Shorty with dust jackets? The community can’t agree—and that’s the show.
Key Points
- •The article outlines the sociology of literature as examining how institutions shape what counts as literary quality.
- •It references major studies: Mark McGurl’s The Program Era and Dan Sinykin’s Big Fiction, plus works on reviewing and prizes.
- •Christian Lorentzen’s Granta review critiques the field for reducing aesthetics to market forces; the author disagrees.
- •A medieval scriptorium thought experiment shows how institutional decisions (e.g., copying Beowulf) affect interpretation.
- •The author raises a central question: in modern publishing, is literary quality core to mission or incidental to profit?