Chapter 316: Defeating Yourself

Time passed gradually, and with the efforts of everyone at Tsutaya Bookstore, the markets in various places also achieved good results.

By the end of January, second-hand chain bookstores were established one after another across the country, perfecting the publisher's warehousing network layout nationwide.

At the same time, under the constant efforts of the market department employees led by Kuda Kenichi, more and more bookstores sent orders.

These bookstore types also ranged from large to small.

Some are chain bookstore brands, some are large central bookstores, and some are independently operated personal bookstores, totaling nearly 5,000.

Without exception, after hearing that they could order books without advance payment, they increased the order quantity of books one after another.

Under a large number of orders, the printing plant under Tsutaya Bookstore had to work overtime all night to rush to print batches.

The newly printed books were arranged on the truck as soon as they came off the assembly line and sent to warehousing points across the country, and through the counting and batch packaging of the warehousing points, they were distributed to all bookstores again.

When counting at the end, everyone at Tsutaya Bookstore was surprised to find.

Some old books that had been published for more than a year and were already going downhill also had their sales increase significantly.

For example, works like *Death of a Detective*, *Negligent Homicide*, and *ZOO* also received orders of more than 50,000 to 100,000 copies respectively.

This made Akiwara Yuto a bit puzzled, and even suspected whether the distributors had deliberately played tricks in the channels before.

However, after asking a few, he found that it was really not the distributor's pot.

One is that Kuda Kenichi and others were too enthusiastic, constantly getting close to various bookstores, and proposed a certain discount for cumulative orders exceeding 5,000 copies.

So many bookstores were moved and increased their order quantity.

Second, with the approach of the Uemura Prize, more and more newspapers began to publish related news. As the candidate who is most hopeful to win the award, he naturally appeared in the newspaper as well.

So many readers who had not bought related detective works before also asked bookstore clerks about his works one after another.

This caused the total book output of Tsutaya Bookstore in January, which should have been the off-season, to reach 700,000 copies, nearly double the same period last year.

Akiwara Yuto put his heart down after hearing this good news.

However, soon, he fell into a "happy trouble."

Everything has advantages and disadvantages. The Japanese detective market only sells more than 10 million copies a year. Even if you squeeze the water, you can sell two or three million more copies.

So, if you evaluate this year's market based on current sales, Jingfan Publisher is already not worth mentioning.

But what to do next, is it possible that he will release new books in the detective market again?

But even if he released new books, the biggest competitor seems to be his previous works.

You can't keep playing the game of defeating yourself.

Having said that, he still has to leave a mouthful of rice for other detective writers!

Soon, he fell into deep thought, and time soon reached February 14th, the day before the Uemura Prize award ceremony.

As a candidate, Akiwara Yuto received the invitation letter early and arrived at a high-end restaurant in Kyoto on that day to participate in an industry gathering organized by the judging committee.

As an industry gathering, the judging committee invited a group of old writers.

But to be honest, they were all those "familiar faces," just like the Detective Writers Association changing places to hold meetings.

After he arrived, many writers showed different eyes, some were appreciative, some were envious, but a very small number were jealous.

After all, Akiwara Yuto had only debuted for two and a half years and already had such great fame.

And the Uemura Prize, the highest award in the detective literary circle, had also been basically designated as his.

Besides writers, there were also some officials from the Ministry of Education and people from the cultural circle at the scene. And after seeing Akiwara Yuto, they also gathered around enthusiastically.

Because of Akiwara Yuto's legendary color, they had always wanted to communicate with him in depth.

Unfortunately, Akiwara Yuto entrusted everything to Asano Aiko, and didn't even go to the club. Except for Tsutaya Bookstore's own people, others didn't even have a chance to meet.

Now that there was a chance, naturally they had to win him over.

Get familiar first, and if there is anything in the future, you can ask for help.

For these people, Akiwara Yuto didn't refuse anyone, and smiled slightly and exchanged business cards with each other, giving them enough face.

By the time the dinner was about to end, he had collected a large pile of business cards, so many that his pockets couldn't hold them.

"Akiwara, eat something."

Tamae Seto, who was also attending the party, walked over; she was wearing a traditional kimono and held up a plate of eel sushi to hand to Akiwara Yuto, and after Akiwara Yuto thanked her, he picked it up and swallowed it in one bite.

Because he had been dealing with people, he really didn't have much to eat, and his stomach was hungry.

"Akiwara, how do you feel now?" Seto Tamae asked him with a gentle smile.

Akiwara Yuto smiled lightly: "I must be a bit excited. But to be honest, my mentality is already very calm now."

In November, he knew that the feasibility of winning the award was very high. Compared with his *All She Was Worth*, other candidate works, whether in reputation or sales, were not worth mentioning.

As long as the judging committee wasn't crazy and had to consider the credibility and future of the Uemura Prize, they had to consider the opinions of the broad readers in the market.

Seto Tamae nodded: "Time passes so fast."

Akiwara Yuto listened to these words and couldn't help but think of what happened before.

Since his debut, he had experienced the Mantanshe Literary Prize, the Detective Writers Association Newcomer Award, and the Uemura Prize in the first and second half of 1993.

And these four awards had very dramatic events,

At the time of the Mantanshe Literary Prize, the gold medal that should have belonged to him was snatched away, and later Seto Tamae publicly supported him.

After that, he and Mantanshe officially headed for a split.

At the time of the Detective Writers Association Newcomer Award, he just casually adapted a piece and submitted it, but unexpectedly won the grand prize.

Taking the opportunity of delivering an acceptance speech, he scolded Mantanshe and vented his anger, and also left a turning point for solving the situation of being blocked.

And in the first half of last year, he was shortlisted for the Uemura Prize but didn't win because of the obstruction of the Honkaku school.

However, it was also after this that he won over the New Honkaku school, causing a split between the Honkaku schools.

And today, before this Uemura Prize, he had a conflict of interest with Jingfan Publisher again.

It can only be said that things are unpredictable!

Just when Akiwara Yuto was sighing, Seto Tamae looked at him and tentatively asked: "Akiwara, Mantanshe is preparing to sell *New*, are you interested?" ===== CHAPTER 317 =====