You can get a degree in it, did you know ? Nothing to do with burning numbers onto cattle, to do with Brands, as in Microsoft or Coca-Cola. But there have been very very few recognisable brands in book publishing - recognisable, that is, to the book buying public not to other publishers. Penguin is a brand we have known for donkeys' years. So were its sidekick brands, Puffin and Pelican. The old ( very old) Victor Gollancz yellow-jackets for their science fiction and detective story lists were a recognisable brand. People have bought both Penguin and VG for the brand because they trusted it but VG has long gone and Penguin is so changed nobody would recognise it as a brand any longer.

I think it`s fine that book buyers don`t care, nay, do not even notice,  who publishes a book if they want to buy/read it. In the same way, I don`t think they are a bit interested if an author they enjoy as, say, a crime novelist, decides also to write cookery books. Some of the crime readers will never buy cookery books anyway, and vice versa, some may buy both but are they confused ? Of course they are not confused.

As you know, I can nevr be pinned down for long as a writer but am constantly having a bash at new genres. Sometimes, the readers have a bash with me, as it were, sometimes they do not. 'I like your literary novels but I`m afraid I never read crime.'  Or 'I read crime but I can`t get along with those literary novels.' 'My children are enjoying your children`s book. I didn`t know you wrote anything else.'  So I have some overlap but a lot of compartmentalized readers. Because just as they do not notice who has published a book, readers probably do not often notice that a writer whose crime novels they enjoy also writes chic-lit. Or Guide Books. 

But publishers panic, especially in America and other countries than the UK. They say they have got readers thinking I am a writer of ghost stories and here I go, producing a crime novel ; the readers just won`t be able to follow. Oh please. Stop patronising your book buyers, stop assuming they haven`t the wit to follow if an author pops up in another genre. If Ian Rankin turned his hand to science fiction tomorrow, would you be confused ? No, I thought not. Unless he chose to write under another name, as some do. Joanna Trollope is also Caroline Harvey, writer of historical romances.

If it is all about the bottom line, then publishers should just say so and stop blaming the book buyer.  If it is about not liking one of my books in a different genre, just say so, I don`t mind. But stop telling me the public will be confused.