Wednesday 28 October 2026. 15 stories from across the book trade, about 5 minutes to read. Every link is free to read.
The short version
Market Developments: Anthropic's IPO filing warns that losing on fair use could force it to pay for licences or retrain its models
Deals & Acquisitions: Murdle creator G.T. Karber signs a seven-figure, seven-book deal with St. Martin's new puzzle imprint Tytora
People News: Enrique Vila-Matas wins Spain's National Prize for Literature
Events: All four Goncourt finalists come from the Madrigall group
Industry Buzz: Vancouver's Poetry in Transit is saved after a 2,000-signature petition
The lead
Anthropic's IPO filing warns that losing on fair use could force it to pay for licences or retrain its models
In the S-1 prospectus filed with the SEC on Monday, Anthropic says it believes training on books and other data is fair use, but warns that if a court disagrees, for example by following the reasoning in the authors' Bartz case, it may have to pay significant fees for licences or retrain affected models from scratch. It adds that adverse rulings against other AI developers could set precedents for the whole industry, reports ChatGPT Is Eating the World.
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Market Developments
Bad Blood paperback sales more than double after the Theranos documentary You Can See Everything
John Carreyrou's 2018 bestseller sold 985 paperback copies in the week to 17 October, up from 439 the week before, according to Circana BookScan, and its sales this year are up 55%. Nathan Fielder and Lance Oppenheim's documentary about Elizabeth Holmes has grossed $45 million in two weekends, reports Natalie Chandler for Publishers Weekly.
Penguin Random House will add accessibility features to tens of thousands of backlist e-books
Frontlist e-books from PRH's core publishers already carry text-to-speech, structured navigation and image descriptions. The upgrade extends them to the deep backlist for readers who are blind, vision-impaired or dyslexic, and readers can ask for specific titles to be done first, Publishers Weekly reports.
Australian publishing in 'crisis' over AI, as human-authored certification firms see a boom
Three literary prize winners have been accused of using AI this year. Louise Doughty, a judge of the Commonwealth Short Story Prize, warns that AI detection tools are being used to make accusations that hit new authors hardest, while Trevor Woods of Proudly Human says certification could become an industry worth hundreds of millions, paid for by authors and publishers, reports Aoife Hilton for ABC News.
Read at ABC News (Australia)
Sofia gave 4.2 million euros to 347 festivals and other projects in 2025, against 6 million euros for 409 projects in 2022. Its director Geoffroy Pelletier says the private copying levy that funds the aid is impossible to forecast and too many warning lights are red for books and reading, as nearly 60 book organisations protest cuts in France's 2027 budget, reports Nicolas Gary for ActuaLitté.
Read at ActuaLitté (France)
Deals & Acquisitions
Murdle creator G.T. Karber signs a seven-figure, seven-book deal with St. Martin's new puzzle imprint Tytora
Courtney Littler bought world rights from Melissa Edwards at Stonesong, starting with Merry Murdle: Ghosts of Christmas in autumn 2027, and the deal takes the Murdleverse into new formats and genres including romantasy. Profile has UK rights, and the Murdle books have sold more than four million copies, Publishers Weekly reports.
Gilmore Girls star Kelly Bishop will co-write a novel with Ali Rosen for William Morrow
Broad Appeal, billed as Golden Girls meets Sex and the City, follows Roz, a 78-year-old New Yorker who has to take in roommates when her homeowners association raises its fees. It is Bishop's fiction debut after her 2024 memoir The Third Gilmore Girl and comes out on 21 September 2027, reports Michael Schaub for Kirkus Reviews.
Aaron Blabey's Game of Pets books are being developed as an animated film
Rideback and Foundation Media Partners are behind the film, with Blabey as executive producer. The series began last month with The Boy Who Knew Too Much, and Macmillan has brought the second book, Farmageddon, forward to 1 June 2027. Blabey's Bad Guys books have already been made into two films, reports Michael Schaub for Kirkus Reviews.
People News
Enrique Vila-Matas wins Spain's National Prize for Literature
The 78-year-old author of Bartleby & Co. receives the 50,000-euro Premio Nacional de las Letras Españolas from Spain's culture ministry for his whole career. The jury praised his decisive influence on contemporary literature and called him one of Spain's most subversive writers. His work is translated into about 30 languages, reports Hocine Bouhadjera for ActuaLitté.
Read at ActuaLitté (France)
Antoine Spire, former PEN Club français president and France Culture voice, has died at 80
The journalist, publisher and author of about 30 books died on 26 October. He worked at France Culture for 23 years, interviewing Pierre Bourdieu, Jacques Derrida and George Steiner, and led PEN's French centre from 2020 to 2023, reports Hocine Bouhadjera for ActuaLitté.
Read at ActuaLitté (France)
Events
All four Goncourt finalists come from the Madrigall group
Yannick Haenel (Gallimard), Philippe Jaenada (Flammarion), Clémentine Mélois (L'Arbalète/Gallimard) and Sylvain Prudhomme (Minuit) are left in the running, and the winner is named at Drouant on 3 November. The Académie had already removed Thélyson Orélien's debut over plagiarism and suspected AI use, which left Grasset out, reports Hocine Bouhadjera for ActuaLitté.
Read at ActuaLitté (France)
Mona Awad and Luke Kennard make the Bollinger Everyman Wodehouse Prize shortlist
The six books for the UK's comic fiction prize are Kirsten King's A Good Person, Kennard's Black Bag, Sophie Irwin's How to Lose a Lord in Ten Days, Anna Brook-Mitchell's Motherfaker, Avigayl Sharp's Offseason and Awad's We Love You, Bunny. The winner, named on 30 November, gets a pig named after their book, reports Shelf Awareness.
Industry Buzz
Vancouver's Poetry in Transit is saved after a 2,000-signature petition
TransLink, which had planned to end its support for the 30-year programme by 2027, has told Books BC it will keep funding it after reviewing its ad space and community feedback. The petition to keep poems by British Columbia writers on buses gathered some 2,000 signatures, Publishers Weekly reports.
Unpublished Sartre notes for his memoir Les Mots go up for auction at Christie's
The handwritten notes, linked to the autobiography Gallimard published in 1964, are estimated at 25,000 to 35,000 euros in Christie's online rare books and manuscripts sale, which runs until 5 November. The auction house has not said exactly what the pages contain, reports Cécile Mazin for ActuaLitté.
Read at ActuaLitté (France)
Taika Waititi's Klara and the Sun flops with a $701,000 opening
The Sony adaptation of Kazuo Ishiguro's novel, starring Jenna Ortega and Amy Adams, opened in 880 cinemas and averaged under $800 a screen, after sitting on the shelf for two years and poor reviews from the London Film Festival, reports Anthony D'Alessandro for Deadline.
Read at Deadline (US)