There's a distinct whiff of panic in the publishing world. It's not just a reaction to the current economic mess: it seems to me that there is a communal loss of direction, courage and ideas. And I think it's connected to the commoditisation of literature — and the fact that that's failing as a business model.

Books are products. Publishers have always known this, but their ranks once contained individuals with the courage to take risks and the ability to spot talent. And so publishing made room for the quirky and the truly original — in fact, it thrived on them. So while this is and always has been a business, it is also an essential part of our culture, and that's the part I'm afraid we might be losing.
I'm not harking back to some mythical golden age — I'm not that naive. Getting published has always been tough. Here are a few famous examples of rejections:

• "I'm sorry, Mr Kipling, but you just don't know how to use the English language" (Yes, that was to Rudyard Kipling)
• "I wouldn't be able to sell 10 copies" (said one publisher to Colette)
• "Jonathan Livingston Seagull will never make it as a paperback" (Avon Books eventually sold more than 7.25 million copies)
• "[Your poems] are generally devoid of true poetical qualities" (to Emily Dickinson)
• "It would be extremely rotten taste, to say nothing of being horribly cruel, should we want to publish it" (Rejection for Hemingway's 'The Torrent of Spring')
• "If the book had a plot and structure, we might suggest shortening and revisions, but it is so diffuse that I don't think this would be of any use. My chief objection is that you don't have any story to tell." (to William Faulkner)
• "You're welcome to le Carré – he hasn't got any future." (The Spy Who Came in from the Cold)

Of course, these books were eventually published. What this shows is that, while true originality has always met resistance, the publishing world contained enough risk-takers and literary enthusiasts to ensure that these works eventually made it into print.

Being different has become far more dangerous — at least to your chances of winning that contract.

Some years ago, when my novel Lady Caine was taken on by a leading agent, he warned me that the book "is very zany and something of an acquired taste" (I still have that letter). And so it proved. He tried several editors before giving up. None was willing to take a chance.

And it's only got worse since then.

Quality control

One of the common complaints among would-be authors is that, in spite of the much-vaunted filtering process of readers, agents and publishers — which is supposed to assure quality and weed out the rubbish — what makes it through and gets published so often is rubbish.

The shelves are packed with me-too titles, trying to cash in on some surprise best-seller whose success no-one was able to predict; and celebrity titles where name is so much more important than content.

In a way distinctly reminiscent of record labels' panic over digital downloads, publishers have yet to really get to grips with new business models and distribution channels made possible by the web. Some are dipping their toes in the water, but the overall response seems to be one of clinging frantically to the traditional ways of doing things.

In a forum, I recently saw a publisher write about the tried and tested method of getting published — the filtering process mentioned above: "If it ain't broke, don't fix it".

But clearly it is broken. It's getting harder than ever for new talent to break through and at the same time publishers are seeing profits slashed, are laying off staff and are even witnessing titles with major celebrities' names on the cover sitting unsold on shelves.

People may be buying more books (the latest year-on-year increase in the UK was over 4%, I believe), but the number of people buying them is down and so is the number of titles that sell well.

If you study the figures, you have to conclude that much of the book industry is being carried by a hard core of well-known writers. So are publishers right to concentrate on their best-selling names and ignore the wealth of nascent talent knocking at their doors? Should they be dumping their backlist titles and midlist authors to focus on the money spinners?

I don't think so. Because I don't think they're reacting to a trend — they're creating it.

Taking risks

The commoditisation of books has reached the point where many publishers are severely risk-averse. They are afraid to nuture talent because of the hit they might take on the balance sheet.

Some people believe that small, independent presses will take up the slack. Hirsh Sawhney's article in the Guardian, How independents will save literature from the recession, argues that small presses are less threatened by economic turbulence and can afford to give a home to new, quirky or unproven writers.

The same goes for self-publishing. CNN carried a story — More authors turn to Web and print-on-demand publishing — which led with the success of Lisa Genova and her book 'Still Alice'. This was turned down by every agent and publisher Genova contacted. Against the advice of one agent, who warned Genova that she was about to kill any chance she had of a writing career, she self-published the book. Following favourable reviews, it was picked up by Simon & Schuster and has spent (so far) 14 weeks on the NY Times bestseller list.

This might be a freak. I'm still somewhat unconvinced that self-publishing is a viable route for novels. But I think even that could change, and soon. (In my next blog post, I'll be looking at a new model for publishing.)

Few businesses can insist of doing things the way they've always done them. Circumstances and markets change in ways that are beyond their control. The newspaper industry has found this to its cost. First TV, then 24/7 rolling news, then the web has eroded newspapers' very raison d'être. For two or three decades now, we've watched circulations drop and publishers thrash around for a lifebelt — a shift from hard news to lifestyle, bingo, free DVDs and celebrities, celebrities, celebrities. It hasn't worked and, just recently, the decline has accelerated rapidly. We'll see many newspapers disappear in print form within the next few years. The Guardian, with its new API, is repositioning itself as a content provider. (And note how the byline for that article referenced earlier says that the piece was 'posted' by — the language of the web is now all-pervasive.) Newspapers have been dragged on to the Internet, not all of them willingly and not all of them successfully. More than a few will fail to survive the change.

And just as we saw music publishing flounder in its attempt to deal with the changed realities of web-based culture, so I think book publishing must change or die. Clinging to traditional attitudes and methods is resulting in poorer choice, less originality and a sea of predictable, bland product that is failing to bring the profits that this risk-phobic approach is meant to ensure.

Don't get me wrong. I'm not for one minute suggesting that traditional, large-scale publishers are dead or unnecessary — or that everything they publish is bad. Far from it. I think they're perfectly capable of making this transition and of continuing to give the world much that is valuable, enjoyable and worthwhile. If you want to make a career out of writing, and writing alone, there is no better way than with the backing and resources of a major publisher and a skilful agent.

But let's not pretend that that's the only way. In her blog, Indie Author, April Hamilton argued that attitudes to self-publishing are woefully outdated.

Small presses have always played a valuable role in supporting innovative work. And I believe that independent publishers, self-publishing and new web-based methods of distribution and marketing, will amplify the importance of that role. It's time to change our attitudes and to see how these publishing streams can work together.