The New York Times is reporting that self-epublishing sensation Amanda Hocking appears close to a six-figure traditional publishing deal.

Agent Steve Axelrod is said to be shopping a four-book deal to publishers. The bids are “well over $1 million for world English rights,” according to two unnamed publishing sources who spoke with the paper. Publishers Weekly reports that the series is new and has never been published.

Hocking, 26, caused a stir in the industry in February, when three of her self-epublished young adult paranormals appeared on the USA Today bestseller list. All three were in the top 50.

According to USA Today, Hocking sold more than 450,000 copies of her nine titles in January alone.

On her blog, Hocking says her eight self-epublished books sell for between $.99 and $1.99 – and that she’s sold 900,000 copies of her books since April 2010.

Remember all of those e-readers folks got for Christmas? It appears the  people who received Kindles and other electronic reading devices got right down to using them. According to the American Association of Publishers, ebook sales spiked to an all-time high of almost $70 million in January.

The big news here is that more consumers bought ebooks in January than mass market paperbacks ($39 million) or hardcovers ($49 million). Trade paperbacks fell off 19 percent in January, but still outpaced ebooks, bringing in $83.6 million.

All in all, ebooks accounted for 23.5 percent of all trade book sales for the month. In December, ebooks brought in $49.5 million – about eight percent of all trade sales.

Read the full article from here.

It looks like everyone is still trying to figure out this whole ebooks thing. According to USA Today, the latest battle pits librarians against a respected publisher.

HarperCollins is limiting the circulation of library ebooks to 26 loans. After that, it’s digital midnight and the book vanishes. In order to continuing carrying the title, the libraries must lease the same title again for a fee. Facing their own budget constraints, some outraged librarians have decided to boycott HarperCollins. They’re using blogs, Twitter and other social media to get the word out.

Libraries generally lend ebooks out at a time like they do with tree-books. Some major publishers, like Simon & Schuster and Macmillan, don’t sell e-books to libraries.

According to the USA Today article, it’s just the latest dispute brought on by the explosion of ebooks. Publishers have gone up against online retailer Amazon over prices and publishers are wrangling with agents and authors over royalties and rights.

HarperCollins addressed the issue in on open letter to librarians. On its Library Love Fest blog, the publisher invites libraries to continue the discussion.

“We have serious concerns that our previous e-book policy, selling e-books to libraries in perpetuity, if left unchanged, would undermine the emerging e-book eco-system, hurt the growing e-book channel, place additional pressure on physical bookstores, and in the end lead to a decrease in book sales and royalties paid to authors. We are looking to balance the mission and needs of libraries and their patrons with those of authors and booksellers, so that the library channel can thrive alongside the growing e-book retail channel.”