April Fools’ Day Publishing News

By Maryann Yin 

In honor of April Fools’ Day, fake publishing news has been circulating the Internet all day. We rounded up a few examples.  Above, we’ve embedded that Harry Potter/Dangerous Minds parody skit from College Humor.

Smashwords revealed plans to purchase Amazon to create Smashazon.com, a site dedicated to making “your eBook, your way.”

Author Jane Friedman offered her funny predictions with The Future of Publishing: Enigma Variations. She imagined that authors James Patterson, Stephen King, and Dan Brown will create United Authors, an collective earning $11 billion by 2016.

The Huffington Post reminded us that writers have executed some of the greatest literary hoaxes of all time.

Finally, Quill & Quire reported that the Canada Council will issue travel grants for authors on blog tours. The instructions require that “authors must submit detailed tour plans outlining the number of book blogs and literary sites that will be hosting them, as well as the amount of effort they plan to put in at each site.”

Add your favorite funny headline in the comments section.