Horace Bent: FBF kicks off with a kvetch

Whoooo, lordy, there was some rather thorough frisking at the Frankfurt beefed-up security gates yesterday, wasn’t there? Which may or may not have something to do with the presence of Roberto Saviano, the author-in-(sometimes)-hiding who has received death threats from the Camorra mafia family. Saviano will be rocking up to the Messe grounds on Friday for a couple of panels. If Giorgia Meloni shows up in the audience, there may be some heckling.

And the security was just the half of it; if you were flying from at least one London airport, getting here at all was an accomplishment. Pity some of the Hachette rights folk, who decided to train it after flights were cancelled and ended up stranded in a railway station in Ghent.

On the IPG stand, though, it was a resounding “Jawohl!” to FBF. “I love Frankfurt, I really do,” Bridget Shine enthused. “It’s the same every year and that’s a good thing. Our IPG dinners are always a joy.” Even the food? Here the trade body’s boss countenance darkened, perhaps thinking of the previous night’s gloopy Grüne Sosse, or that pinnacle of Hessian cuisine, Handkäse mit Musik. “The company is always wonderful,” she said. Boldwood’s boss, Amanda “30-million copies sold” Ridout, happened by to chime in on the love-fest: “It’s great, and I haven’t been for five years. But why haven’t they changed the carpets?”

But who wouldn’t delight in the glory of FBF? Well, one of the UK book trade’s dearly departed. And by that I mean someone who has left the industry, which is the same as dying (if your belief system means that expiring will send you to some sort of paradisal elysian fields). That would be Jo Unwin, the former superagent to the stars, who proclaimed on the platform formerly known as Twitter: “Many things are thrilling in my new life but few as much as not having to go to the Frankfurt Bloody Book Fair.”

How rude! Though the responses to Unwin might suggest she is not alone in this view. Publisher turned bestselling author/illustrator Louie Stowell chimed in: “I managed to dodge Frankfurt in my 15-odd years in publishing and I feel that has been a great blessing, but even second-hand I know the pain.”

And then there was the oft-mooted criticism of book fairs in general, with the dreaded trade press trying to whip up enthusiasm about deals being concocted in the febrile atmosphere of the LitAg—or, to be more accurate, months ago in lengthy acquisition meetings. Novelist Anna Mazzola wrote to her followers: “Reminder to writers reading Bookseller articles about ‘significant pre-empts’ and 10-way auctions... You can achieve the same effect simply by poking a sharp pencil into your eye.”

Let’s ignore the fact that Anna Mazz is no stranger to being the subject of a few of these rights stories (she’s repped by the Mighty Mushens, after all). But, c’mon! The hype-train is what we’re here for. Frankfurt is a slog. The noise, the airless lack of light of the LitAg, which probably makes a CIA black site seem full of hygge-charm. (Remember hygge? There were tons of pre-empts and auctions about those books ages ago.) But Shine is spot on, too. It’s the same every year, but it’s still great. Or, at least we still keep coming...