Despite corporate consolidation and the proliferation of leg-up grad programs, journalism and publishing retain their guild-like patinas. Former AP correspondent and novelist Fred (Cybersona
) teams with spouse Jan, a Macmillan and Grove vet, to produce this overview of the fourth estate for prospective entrants. The two also founded an independent press, Hannacroix Creek books, in 1996, and thus write from a perspective outside of the main fray. They divide the book by the subtitle's three industries, detailing title hierarchies, salary ranges, prerequisites, advancement prospects and membership organizations for 86 different jobs, from senior editor and marketing director to news assistant and novelist. It's all by-the-numbers ("Sometimes Book Publicists get approval from their company to give a certain amount of money to an outside Publicist on behalf of an author or his or her book") andstraightforward. A foreword by AAP president and CEO Patricia Schroeder begins with a declaration about the death of publishing (prematurely announced) and ends with familiar advice ("If you're primarily motivated by a need to make a lot of money, the publishing industry may not be for you") and the characterization of publishing people as those who "care about the culture." (Jan.)
