I fear for the future of publishing

Over the last couple of weeks I’ve finished three books, Finest Years by Max Hastings, Generosity by the American novelist Richard Powers and an extraordinary book by William Blacker about his life among the farmers and gypsies of Transylvania, Along the Enchanted Way. They were thrilling to read. We should prize the system that produced such wonderful storytelling: It needs to be nurtured as an essential part of our society. To write a book half as good as any of them is what makes me proceed with trepidation from the first to the second paragraph.