The Net Book Agreement
How British Publishers Fixed the Price of Every Book for a Century

About this book:

For nearly a century, every new book in Britain carried a price tag that could not be haggled, discounted, or ignored. *The Net Book Agreement* tells the astonishing true story of how the country’s publishers and booksellers built a legally sanctioned cartel that fixed the retail price of every title—from Victorian triple-deckers to modern bestsellers—and defended it against world wars, government inquiries, and the fundamental laws of free-market economics. It is a saga of high-minded cultural idealism and ruthless commercial enforcement, where the argument that "books are not baked beans" became the shield for a trade-wide price-fixing ring that lasted from 1900 to 1995.

Drawing on deep archival research and vivid courtroom drama, this book introduces the visionaries and villains who shaped the literary landscape: Frederick Macmillan, the architect who imposed order on Victorian chaos; the radical bookseller John Chapman, who enlisted Charles Dickens to smash the first price cartel; and Terry Maher, the Pentos executive whose 1990s mutiny triggered the cartel’s spectacular collapse. You will witness the *Times* Book Club wars, the Restrictive Trade Practices Act showdown, the rise of Waterstones and the supermarket discounters, and the final, fatal arrival of an obscure Seattle startup named Amazon.

At its heart, this is a battle for the soul of reading itself. Was the Net Book Agreement a noble subsidy that preserved poetry, philosophy, and the high-street bookshop? Or was it a protectionist racket that inflated prices, stifled innovation, and treated the reading public with contempt? As algorithmic pricing and retail monopolies once again rewrite the rules of how we buy books, *The Net Book Agreement* offers a gripping, essential prehistory of the present—revealing why the price of a book has never been just a number, but a statement of what a society believes culture is worth.