bookselling

Barnes & Noble had its best holiday season in over a decade with store sales up 9.7% over last year, and online sales soaring a whopping 67%.

The country's second-largest bookstore widened its third-quarter loss to nearly double that of a year ago. Even worse, the estimated value of its inventory has declined, making it harder for Borders to borrow money. Will the company find a way to transform itself?

Google opened its long-anticipated Internet book store Monday, putting itself in direct competition with Amazon.com. Buyers can read its 3 million e-Books on any Web device or reader -- except on Amazon's Kindle.

Matthew Biberman had a story to tell about his dad and a one-of-a-kind motorcycle, and he soon turned his passion into a book deal. But the newly published author says the book deal is just the beginning -- learning how to pitch your story is what builds audiences.

It has been a tumultuous year for Barnes & Noble, the country's largest bookseller, and its quarterly earnings report reflects that. Total sales for the quarter were $1.9 billion, a bit less of a gain than analysts had predicted, while earnings were a net loss of $12.6 million, also worse than expected.

Back in September, billionaire Ron Burkle lost his proxy war with Barnes & Noble's board, failing to kill the poison pill that kept him from upping his stake in the company. That made Wednesday's shareholders meeting all but a formality. But what's next for the nation's largest bookseller?

Sales of e-books on Apple's iBookstore have made "barely a blip" in the digital book market. Will its new iBooks gift cards help to change this -- or will customers continue to use apps to allow them to read Amazon and Barnes & Noble e-books on their Apple devices?

Barnes & Noble is hoping to boost holiday sales by testing new toy sections, following the "store-within-a-store" model, in five of its locations.

This week, Barnes & Noble is expected to unveil a new, color edition of the Nook e-reader. As the company moves forward with new digital products, however, it faces lawsuits that won't go away -- and which have the potential to complicate chairman Leonard Riggio's plans to stay with B&N if the company is sold to the highest bidder.

The sale of Borders' Ann Arbor, Mich., headquarters for almost $18.4 million adds to persistent rumors of the company's imminent demise. But the truth has more to do with the real estate market than books sales.