Bet the Farm

I think astrology is baseless blather: not that there couldn’t be some cause and effect between the gravity of the stars and planets and whatever else in going on in astrological “readings,” but being able to predict anything concrete about life on this earth from such gross measurements seems implausible at very best.

But that’s just me. Publishers Weekly Daily newsletter reports this:

Astrologer Susan Miller, the author of Planets and Possibilities (Warner) and best known for her popular, free Web site, AstrologyZone.com, offered the following predictions for publishing in 2003:

The publishing industry is about to bloom again, thanks to Saturn’s impending departure from Gemini, where it’s been positioned as a thorn in the publishing industry’s side since April 2001. On June 3, 2003, Saturn, the planet of constriction, delays and depressed conditions, will leave Gemini, the sign of communication. Once we reach June, new economic conditions will allow for a period of impressive publishing expansion. Saturn won’t be back to Gemini for 29 years so the future truly looks bright for all the communications industries.

Saturn’s exit from Gemini would be enough to any of us make us smile, but there’s even more reason to be excited about the industry’s prospects for prosperity in the year ahead. Jupiter, the planet of good fortune and growth, will move into an earth sign for the first time in four years in late August 2003. Jupiter always brings a plethora of opportunity and a promise of growth, but this time the news is especially favorable for publishing.

Jupiter will enter the literary sign of Virgo on August 27, 2003, for a 13-month stay. Book sales should begin to climb as the public becomes more interested again in books. Virgo is a highly intellectual sign with very high standards of excellence. The novels that succeed will be ones with complex, well-developed characters and tightly structured plots.

Virgo also rules health, fitness and homeopathic remedies, herbs and wholesome, fresh foods, so books in these areas should do well, too.

The book business should also be boosted by Uranus’s move to Pisces. The emphasis on this sign, Pisces, will also increase interest in books dealing with spirituality, religion, inspiration, philosophy, theology, poetry and Eastern disciplines. (Zen Buddhism, meditation and yoga are but three examples of the latter. Pisces rules these type of disciplines as well as other influences from the Orient.) While these categories have represented a successful trend for some time, with the advent of Uranus in Pisces, this area will virtually explode–you haven’t seen anything yet!

Next year’s burgeoning arts scene won’t just produce a new hodgepodge of old tricks and recycled genres, but rather a genuinely new expression of our times, something so unique and creative that the style that emerges could become the template for the entire era.

Well there you have it.