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Amazon gets further into publishing with its own ‘Montlake Romance’ line

by 7 Comments

Apparently there’s more bodice-ripping going on in Montlake than we ever knew.

Amazon.com is expanding its publishing business with a new line of romance novels under the “Montlake Romance” imprint, named after the upscale Seattle neighborhood. It’s part of a broader push by the Seattle-based online retailer into the business of publishing books, not just selling them. It’s also part of a trend in which Amazon is increasingly competing with its own suppliers, as noted in this Wall Street Journal piece this afternoon.

Explains Amazon in a news release …

Montlake Romance takes its name from the central Seattle neighborhood of Montlake, and will publish a broad range of front list titles in popular romance sub-genres, including romantic suspense and contemporary and historic romance novels, as well as fantasy and paranormal. The new imprint joins AmazonEncore, AmazonCrossing and Powered by Amazon as part of the Amazon Publishing family. Montlake Romance books will be available to North American readers in Kindle, print and audio formats at www.amazon.com, as well as at national and independent booksellers.

The first book to be published under the imprint will be Connie Brockway’s “The Other Guy’s Bride” this fall.

  • http://twitter.com/chrisamccoy Chris McCoy

    It’s amazing that when you know what people like to read, you can predict what people might want to read next.

    Amazon, taking a page from Netflix, owns the necessary graph-based recommendation data to re-invent the publishing industry.

    Curious to see if they’ll (a) go big on publishing, (b) sell their recommendation data to publishers, or (c) something else. This data is king.

    Same thing for Netflix. Will they become the Hollywood movie studio of the 21st century or license their recommendation data to the studios?

    context: http://arstechnica.com/media/news/2011/03/netflix-going-up-against-cable-with-original-series-deal.ars

  • http://twitter.com/lukobe Benjamin Lukoff

    Montlake? Of all Seattle neighborhoods, Montlake?

    • Anonymous

      I know! Where’s the love for the Denny Regrade?

  • E Jennings

    lazy lazy journalist, for shame! Bodice ripper is a term that is well over 30 years old and in no way applies to the broad range of books coming under the ‘romance’ genre. It’s like calling glasses ‘spectacles’. do your homework. Elizabethwriter

    • Anonymous

      Thanks, but as I’m sure you can tell from the tone, that sentence wasn’t exactly serious. Is there another phrase you’d suggest that would have worked?

      • http://blog.findwell.com Kevin Lisota

        In defense of Todd’s reporting, I believe it has been at least 30 years since Todd has personally read any romance novels. Correct Todd?

  • Glenn Fleishman

    It can’t be upscale. I live in Montlake!