• Mary Ann Gwinn at the Seattle Times says that seven local booksellers from University Book Store, Third Place Books, Elliott Bay Book Company, Liberty Bay Books, Village Books, and Eagle Harbor Book Company have won "bookseller bonuses" from ridiculously wealthy author James Patterson.

• Well, here's a disgusting bit of year-end fuckery: Penguin Random House, the large publisher that formed when Penguin merged with Random House, "has derecognised the National Union of Journalists and Unite for collective bargaining with its management," according to The Bookseller, which reports the move has left staff "nervous." Over 140 authors have signed a letter asking Penguin Random House to rethink this anti-labor position. All readers, authors, librarians, and booksellers should stand with Penguin Random House's union; we need more unions in this world, and if the somewhat civilized leaders of the publishing industry can't recognize the dignity of their employees, what hope does that offer anyone else?

• E-book news site Tele-Read has recently stopped paying freelancers and so it is now running less news. Publisher David Rothman blames Google and Facebook for "siphon[ing] ads from us and burden[ing] us with bureaucratic requirements" for photos and content.

• You should read Kevin Nguyen's year-end roundup and complaint about literary whiteness at the Millions. A taste:

...if you think Book Twitter is white, try going to a book event. These are almost exclusively white spaces, and being a person of color in them has become increasingly anxiety inducing. You drink with familiar people and strangers and just wait for someone to say something kinda fucked up to ruin your night. Just because my last name is Nguyen doesn’t mean I want to talk about Viet Thanh Nguyen’s The Sympathizer. I am not interested in hearing you talk about how attractive an Asian-American debut novelist is. And for the last time, as much as I love Ed Park, we really, really do not look alike.