A Quick Tip for Comics Fans

While scrolling through Journalista this morning, I came across this link:

[Review] Craig Fischer on Eddie Campbell’s seminal post-adolescent reverie, The King Canute Crowd. (Above: sequence from the book, ©2000 Eddie Campbell.)

...which proved to be an interesting, slightly academic look at one of my all-time favorite comics, but one written more for those familiar with the book than those who are not.

It also contained this paragraph and its embedded link :

There's plenty of literature about adolescent rebellion--do they still make high school kids read The Catcher in the Rye and A Separate Peace?--but it seems to me that the art dries up once the rebel disconnects from repressive structures like boarding schools and dysfunctional families. Once the rebel achieves a degree of freedom, his or her goal becomes existential and contemplative ("How will I live my life?") and questions like these don't lend themselves as easily to dramatic treatment as, say, conflicts between a priggish schoolmaster and a smartass student. There are authors, though, who make "How will I live my life?" a major theme of their work: Joyce explores how difficult it is to fly above the nets of "language, nationality, religion," for instance, and Kerouac's Dean Moriarty exemplifies the dangers inherent in the quest for freedom. (Warren Ellis has a sharp commentary on some of the connections between On the Road and Canute.)

Ellis' article takes a different approach to Fischer's. It's a review of sorts, disguised as memoir. While browsing around in a comic book shop, Ellis' friend hands him a copy of the collected Alec comics, and off Ellis goes, remembering his initial impressions of the book, as well as his feelings about it's updated form and content.

An excerpt:
These are the stories of Eddie's life in the Southend area, drinking at the King Canute. Eddie is Alec McGarry. Danny Grey's real name is Bob Grey. It's autobiographical fiction with the names changed, which seems to allow Eddie an essential distance to do it right. And it skirts all the usual pitfalls of autobio fiction. It shows life being lived. This may have to be explained to mavens of American autobio comics. This is not the same as Chester Brown beating off, or Julie Doucet being pathetic, or the awful spectacle of Harvey Pekar just doing nothing worth looking at for years on end. And it's not the same as Dennis Eichhorn's autobio stuff, which was genuinely interesting and engaging but never really used the medium very well. This is one of the great instinctual masters of the medium taking everyday life and showing it being lived, showing people achieving and losing and changing and loving and hating, making the living of life glorious and riveting - life as we remember it when we look back on it.

This is the article you'll want to read if you've never read Alec: The King Canute Crowd. If'n you have read it, then this is the article that you should make your friends read in order to get them reading it as well.

Wow. Two great pieces about one great comic. What a wonderful way to spend a lunch break.

Book News, In Brief

The pointless debate is over. Nabokov's son is going ahead with his plans to publish pop's unfinished book, despite pop's deathbed pleas to the contrary. According to Junior, Senior's ghost appeared before him and said, "You’re stuck in a right old mess. Just go ahead and publish." No, seriously -- this is what the jerk claims happened.

I swear to God, those folks saying that the media is controlled by liberals aren't seeing the same press releases that I am. Via Reuters: Americans are among the world's most 'Bible-literate' people...the poll...also showed Americans were most willing to donate money to spread the message of the Bible. This follows last month's headline that the Bible is America's favorite book. Yeah, right. May lightning strike them down.

A St. Mary's, PA book club has just finished its 800th book -- after 48 years of regular meetings. These avid reading spring chickens find Cormac McCarthy to be the "most fascinating new writer that (they've) read in a long time," and once, when a book order was delayed, they held a meeting discussing an issue of MAD magazine. Truth be told, they sound better than most of the book clubs I've been to.

Book News, In Brief

If less and less people are reading books every year, why are more and more people writing them? Rachel Donadio discusses.

If comics publishers want better press for their books, why aren't they providing better PR? Laura Hudson critiques the phenomenon, then offers a handful of helpful tips.

Norman Mailer’s former mistress has sold papers that include lengthy accounts of their sex life and hand-edited drafts of her writing to Harvard University, Mailer’s alma mater. Carole Mallory, an actress and writer, saved seven boxes of material she collected during Mailer’s weekly visits between 1983 to 1992, while Mailer was married to his sixth and last wife, Norris Church. "We’d have a writing lesson, we’d make love and then go to lunch in whatever order that would be, and I saved all the writing lessons," said Mallory, 66.
Seeing as how nothing ever became of Mallory's writing (despite her connections), I think it's safe to say that she was probably a better lover than a author. The fact that she sold the Mailer papers to Harvard (instead of simply donating them), leads me to believe that she's more of a gold-digger than a do-gooder.

This year's Orwell Prize winner has been announced. The details, via The Guardian UK: Britain's most prestigious award for political writing, the Orwell book prize, has been won by Raja Shehadeh's Palestinian Walks, a victory further distinguished by such strong competition that the judges felt the need to extend this year's shortlist. The subtitle of Shehadeh's book is Notes on a Vanishing Landscape, and it describes how over 40 years the West Bank he loves has been steadily taken over by Israeli settlements, and how the destruction of a beloved landscape mirrors the damage to Palestinian identity. Judges praised its combination of lyrical nature writing with understated political passion.

Bonus: To hear Raja Shehadeh discuss Palestinian Walks, click here.

The Collected Reviews of:The Library At Night

Christine Thomas reviews The Library At Night, a book sure to appeal to bookstore folk (as we're also obsessive collectors and catalogers). An excerpt: Alberto Manguel's new book is a vivaciously erudite justification for society's inexorable efforts to collect, order and store information. Inspired by the library he built in his French home, he explores the myriad levels on which a library functions and how readers interact with and in them.The book is divided into 15 categories, each chapter exploring the library in a different light -- as myth, survival, power, etc. Manguel revisits childhood bookshelves as well as libraries in ancient Egypt, Greece, Arab countries (including the legendary Library of Alexandria) and the personal book collections of Charles Dickens and Manguel's fellow Argentine Jorge Luis Borges (himself a librarian).

The Guardian UK also reviews TLAN, but focuses on a section of the book that will make most bookstore owners and employees cringe: Manguel is old, wise and sad enough to know that the future belongs to the users of the Kindle reading device and to oafish librarians who discard books as landfill after transferring their contents to disks or CD-Roms that may be illegible in a decade. He therefore likens his own library to the coffin of native earth that Dracula carries with him from Transylvania to London.
But wait, then it gets pro-pulp again: It's a good joke, but it's unjust. Milton said that a great book was 'the precious lifeblood of a master spirit': literally an infusion or transfusion of life, not a portable grave in which the undead quietly slumber. Reading, as Manguel knows, is 'a ritual of rebirth', which both invigorates the reader and awakens old books to new life. He shows what he means by describing his dreams of a fluid subliminal library, a place where the hero of Kafka's The Castle sails off in a quest for the Holy Grail on the whaling vessel from Melville's Moby Dick, then after a shipwreck lands on an island where, like Crusoe, he reconstructs civilisation by consulting the three bibles he has salvaged from the wreck. Books jump out of their jackets when Manguel opens them and dance in delight as they make contact with his ingenious, voluminous brain. He is not the keeper of a silent cemetery, but a master of bibliographical revels.

Still not convinced this book is worth picking up? Here are links to reviews in The Washington Post, The LATimes, and an excerpt of the book, care of Random House.

Book News, In Brief

Nobody hearts Mike Huckabee, but that isn't stopping him from writing a memoir about his failed election bid.


The Daily Cross Hatch has a review of Chris Ware's New Yorker exhibit. Thanks to The Comics Reporter for the tip.


Who doesn't love a list? Sarah Anderson and The Guardian UK rattle off The Top 10 Books About The Wilderness.


In addition to a good lawyer, Augusten Burroughs has enlisted the help of Patti Smith, Tegan Quin (of Tegan and Sara), Ingrid Michaelson, and Sea Wolf for the audio book version of his most recent 'memoir,' A Wolf at the Table. Their contributions form a soundtrack that is interspersed throughout Burroughs' reading of the book, and can be sampled here.

Hip Hop Book News, In Brief

Alana Wyatt -- the former Mrs. Mos Def -- is releasing a book about her life as a video girl and momentary marriage to Mos. Via SOHH.com: Wyatt was married to the Brooklyn-bred emcee (born Dante Smith) in a ceremony last year. Her book entitled, Breaking the Code of Silence, will detail her short lived marriage to Mos as well as her own life. Described as part biography, part cautionary tale, Wyatt writes of her rough upbringing in the book, aiming to educate and inspire other women and to promote independence.

Remember when Biggie sampled Diana Ross singing, "I'm coming out"? Well, certain sections of hip hop are about to sing a similar tune. Via HoustonVoice.com: We all know that rap and hip hop music hasn't always been friendly to the gays. Now Terrance Dean, a former MTV executive, is about to release his book, "Hiding in Hip Hop: On the Downlow in the Entertainment Industry," next month. From the press release: "Hiding In Hip-Hop" uncovers a hidden and well-known unspoken secret. Deep within the confines of Hip-Hop is a prominent gay sub-culture. A world that industry insiders are keenly aware of, but choose to ignore. According to Dean, 'This book is filled with intrigue, sexy celebrity bed partners, abundance of drugs, and of course, the down low/gay men and celebrities in the entertainment industry.'"

Women and Language ("an international, interdisciplinary research periodical publishing thought‑provoking essays and inquiries, book reviews, bibliographies, and more") is seeking submissions for a special issue dedicated to “Hip Hop’s Languages of Love.” The issue will focus on love in hip hop as it relates to language and gender, and will be published in the Fall of 2009. For more info, click here.

One last hip hop book news tid-bit, this one regarding recent Pulitzer Prize winner, Junot Díaz. In a recent interview with The Latino Daily News, Díaz describes the fast paced rhythm of his writing thusly: “I think it would be fair to say that I write in a definitely perico ripiao-meets dungeon-family hip-hop beats.” Rap heads will get the reference, the rest of you can Google it.

Recommended Viewing:Junot Díaz speaks to the rich folks at Google

Book News, In Brief

Sophie Dahl has everything a modern publisher is looking for -- a quirky writing anecdote, a pedigree name, and one hell of a dust jacket photo. Oh, and she wrote a novel, too. The AP's puff piece neglects to mention that until the seventh paragraph. (Boobs are distracting.)

From blinking lights to singing advertisements, the magazine industry is doing all it can to stay relevant in the internet age. But will successfully aping the sensory experience of the net cover for the fact that their 'breaking news' is actually days or even (gasp!) weeks old? The International Herald Tribune looks into it.

Oh, Amazon.com, you've done it again. Via Publisher's Weekly: Author Solutions, the Indiana-based parent company of subsidy publishers AuthorHouse and iUniverse, the company has acceded to Amazon.com’s recent demand that publishers’s print-on-demand titles be printed by BookSurge, Amazon.com’s POD subsidiary, if they wish to continue to make these titles available for sale on Amazon.com.

Recommended Viewing: Cult Pop Interview with Corey Redekop

Michigan public access show Cult Pop interviews Canadian author Corey Redekop about his novel Shelf Monkey, a satire of the world of television Book Clubs, low-wage bookstore employees, madness, and revenge.



Part 2

Book News, In Brief

The 42nd annual Nebula Awards (Science Fiction's answer to the Oscars) are being held in Austin, Texas this year. Sunday's Austin Chronicle had a brief bio of the award, along with an interview with an aspiring SF author who admits that the Nebulas are 'pretty incestuous' and definitely a case of 'who-knows-who.' The author still plans to attend, though, as "its a good chance to network with people – there'll be other authors there and agents and editors. I suppose I've been thinking, somewhere in the back of my mind, that I might take an agent or editor hostage long enough for Stockholm syndrome to set in."
Are you a sucker for this sort of thing? C'mere article. C'mere boy.

More and more websites are popping up that use Google Maps to chart where various movies/books/TV shows are set . The Guardian UK writes about one of the lit-related sites, GetLondonReading.co.uk. Click here to read.

The LATimes profiles a three man literary 'movement' that sells itself as rebellious, but actually sounds snooty as all get out. An excerpt: Outside of a few college towns, perhaps, it's hard now to embrace the cerebral unapologetically without a sense of irony, of operating a bit out of time. But that didn't stop Keith Gessen and some Ivy League-educated friends from launching, in 2004, the ambitious and pugilistic journal n+1, which was greeted by some as a kind of knowing, intellectual stunt. "Oh, no," Gessen, who has heavy brows and a wide Russian mouth, said one recent evening. "It wasn't a joke." That first issue was dedicated mostly to outlining what it opposed. "We were against the New Republic, we were against McSweeney's, we were against the war, we were against exercise," Gessen continued, sitting in a dive bar on the Upper West Side, where he once lived in an illegal sublet before decamping for Brooklyn, like most of the city's other literati. "And to this day we're against many things."
For the whole shebang, click here.

Disney Book News

Disney is seeking a ghostwriter for Miley Cyrus' upcoming autobiography. Via Detnews.com: She has only lived 15 years, but the folks at Disney Books want to detail the life and times of Miley Cyrus, reports OK! Since it is an autobiography, Miley will not be slaving in the wee hours of the night, texting her life story to publishers. Instead, they are seeking a ghostwriter for the honors.
Wait a minute. If Cyrus ain't writing it, is it still an autobiography?

Dustin Evans, the one-time artist of Disney Adventures' Pirates of the Caribbean comic strip (and colorist for the Gargoyles strip), is debuting a new comic book this summer, titled Imaginary Friends. According to Evans, Imaginary Friends, is "great for people who love ‘popcorn movies. There is a lot of action, comedy and great characters that drive the story. The plot revolves around six Imaginary Characters, being led by their fearless leader, Rex Montana, to save the world from certain doom. The question is can a clown, skeleton, pageant winner, deer-man, action hero and small child actually save the world?”
For the full scoop, click here.

Rick Riordan, author of Percy Jackson series, has signed a book deal with Disney. Via LA Business: Rick Riordan has signed a multi-book deal with Disney Publishing Worldwide (DPW) for an original fantasy series. Financial terms of the deal were not released...A new Web site, www.PercyJacksonBooks.com, will launch in the U.S. in April 2008 and will feature exclusive content, interactive games, tour information and related news. DPW is the world's largest publisher of children's books and magazines, with over 400 children's magazines published and 120 million children's books sold each year. Headquartered in New York, DPW publishes books and magazines in 85 languages in 75 countries, reaching more than 100 million readers each month.

The Dangerous Book for Boys is going to be be adapted for the big and little screens. A fact-based series featuring celebrity fathers and their sons is set to appear on British television later this year, while Disney has purchased the rights to make a film version...some day.
A lot more words (but not a whole heckuva lot more information) can be found here.

R.I.P. Aimé Césaire

Via Miami Herald: Aimé Césaire, an anti-colonialist poet and politician who was honored throughout the French-speaking world and was an early proponent of black pride, has died at 94. Césaire died Thursday at a Fort-de-France hospital where he was being treated for heart problems and other ailments, said government spokeswoman Marie Michèle Darsierès. He was one of the Caribbean's most celebrated cultural figures and was revered in his native Martinique, where his passing brought tears and spontaneous memorial observances.

Biography:
(Care of Poets.org)
Aimé Césaire was born June 25, 1913, in Basse-Pointe, a small town on the northeast coast of Martinique in the French Caribbean. He attended the Lycée Schoelcher in Martinique, and the Parisian schools Ecole Normale Supérieure and the Lycée Louis-le-Grand.

His books of poetry include Aimé Césaire: The Collected Poetry (University of California Press, 1983); Putting in Fetters (1960); Lost Bodies (1950), with illustrations by Pablo Picasso; Decapitated Sun (1948); Miraculous Arms (1946); and Notebook of a Return to the Homeland (1939).

He is also a playwright, and has written Moi, Laminaire (1982); The Tempest (1968), based on Shakespeare's play; A Season at Congo (1966); and The Tragedy of King Cristophe (1963).

About his work, Jean-Paul Sarte wrote: "A Césaire poem explodes and whirls about itself like a rocket, suns burst forth whirling and exloding like new suns—it perpetually surpasses itself."

He is also the author of Discourse on Colonialism (1950), a book of essays which has become a classic text of French political literature and helped establish the literary and ideological movement Negritude, a term Césaire defined as "the simple recognition of the fact that one is black, the acceptance of this fact and of our destiny as blacks, of our history and culture."

As a student he and his friend, Léopold Senghor of Sénégal created L'Etudiant noir, a publication that brought together students of Africa and the West Indies. Later, with his wife, Suzanne Roussi, Césaire co-founded Tropiques, a journal dedicated to American black poetry. Both journals were a stronghold for the ideas of Negritude.

Césaire is a recipient of the International Nâzim Hikmet Poetry Award, the second winner in its history. He served as Mayor of Fort-de-France as a member of the Communist Party, and later quit the party to establish his Martinique Independent Revolution Party. He was deeply involved in the struggle for French West Indian rights and served as the deputy to the French National Assembly. He retired from politics in 1993.

A Selected Bibliography

Poetry

Cahier d'un retour au pays natal (1939)
Armes miraculeuses (1946)
Aime Cesaire, The Collected Poetry, Clayton Eshleman (Translator), (University of California Press, 1983)
Notebook of a Return to the Native Land, Clayton Eshleman (Translator), (Wesleyan Poetry, 2001)

Prose

Discours sur le colonialisme (Paris: Présence Africaine, 1953)
Discourse on Colonialism (Monthly Review Press, 1972)

An excerpt from "Notebook of a Return to the Native Land"
by Aimé Césaire
Translated by Annette Smith and Clayton Eshleman

At the end of daybreak. . .

Beat it, I said to him, you cop, you lousy pig, beat it,
I detest the flunkies of order and the cockchafers of hope.
Beat it, evil grigri, you bedbug of a petty monk. Then I turned
toward paradises lost for him and his kin, calmer than the face
of a woman telling lies, and there, rocked by the flux of a
never exhausted thought I nourished the wind, I unlaced the
monsters and heard rise, from the other side of disaster, a
river of turtledoves and savanna clover which I carry forever
in my depths height-deep as the twentieth floor of the most
arrogant houses and as a guard against the putrefying force
of crepuscular surroundings, surveyed night and day by a cursed
venereal sun.

At the end of daybreak burgeoning with frail coves, the hungry
Antilles, the Antilles pitted with smallpox, the Antilles
dynamited by alcohol, stranded in the mud of this bay, in
the dust of this town sinisterly stranded.

At the end of daybreak, the extreme, deceptive desolate eschar
on the wound of the waters; the martyrs who do not bear witness;
the flowers of blood that fade and scatter in the empty wind
like the screeches of babbling parrots; an aged life mendaciously
smiling, its lips opened by vacated agonies; an aged poverty
rotting under the sun, silently; an aged silence bursting with
tepid pustules, the awful futility of our raison d'être.

At the end of daybreak, on this very fragile earth thickness
exceeded in a humiliating way by its grandiose future--the vol-
canoes will explode, the naked water will bear away the ripe
sun stains and nothing will be left but a tepid bubbling pecked
at by sea birds--the beach of dreams and the insane awakening.

At the end of daybreak, this town sprawled-flat, toppled from
its common sense, inert, winded under its geometric weight of
an eternally renewed cross, indocile to its fate, mute, vexed
no matter what, incapable of growing with the juice of this
earth, self-conscious, clipped, reduced, in breach of fauna
and flora.

Book News, In Brief

Thanks to Amazon.com, kids now look at brick and mortar book shops as historical relics. Via MyFox St. Louis: When you think field trip, you might think of an outing at the St. Louis Zoo or the Science Center. But this group of seventh graders from Parkway Central Middle School found themselves heading someplace some of them had never been before, a bookstore.
I guess now would be a good time for the indies to apply for landmark status.

NYDaily News has a piece on the upcoming William Shatner autobiography, Up Till Now. The article includes a couple of tiny excerpts and a comments section where the nerds go crazy insulting each other in order to prove themselves the biggest Trekkie...er, Trekker.

This is for the folks still forgiving Bush for the war in Iraq and the current economy. Via Publisher's Weekly: President Bush’s proposed 2009 budget eliminates all the funding for Reading Is Fundamental’s book distribution program that has, since 1966, provided more than 325 million books to more than 30 million underprivileged children.
Now will you vote to impeach?

Out Of Tragedy Comes Frivolity

Via The Canadian Press: LITTLE ROCK, Ark. — Emmy Cherry died with her parents when a tornado struck their home Feb. 5, but soon their spirits will live on in the children's book series she loved so much. Emmy, 10, will become Brightspirit, a beautiful silver tabby featured inside the fantasy world of the "Warriors," a series about cats that battle inside their magic forest home.

Aw...that's one step up from 'kiss and make it better.'

Random Assortment of Podcast Links

Inkstuds holds a marathon interview with Jimbo creator, Gary Panter. Parts 1, 2, 3.

Authors On Tour Live has Benjamin Black over for a reading of his newest novel, The Silver Swan.

The Harvard University Press interviews Sudhir Alladi Venkatesh, author of Off the Books: The Underground Economy of the Urban Poor.

Just to be fair, here's a Yale Press podcast with Daniel J. Solove, author of The Future of Reputation, Gossip, Rumor, and Privacy on the Internet.

Book News, In Brief

Publisher's Weekly linked to this last week, but we're list whores so we're gonna go ahead and link again: The 25 Books to Remember from 2007

How cool would this have been? Osamu Tezuka, the godfather of modern of modern manga and anime, almost worked with Arthur C. Clarke. According to this piece at IO9, Stanley Kubrick had wanted Tezuka to serve as the art director of 2001!

Either the author's an assh*le or the book really sucks. Via KomoTV.com: 1 killed, 1 injured in shootings after Dr. Dre book signing party.

The idea of Snoop Dogg releasing a line of children's books may seem strange until you realize that he's already marketed himself via action figures, power drinks, doggie treats, porno dvds and his own brand of hot dog. What's strange is that it took him this long to get to kids' lit.

At last, a refreshing alternative to all of those 'Indie Bookstores are Disappearing' articles: 'Corporate Bookstores Are Dying' articles!

Books on the Nightstand

Michael Kindess and Ann Kingman, two of our favorite sales reps (Random House), have a new blog called Books on the Nightstand. Now the whole world, not just New England booksellers, has the opportunity to partake of their special blend of passion, insight, and sheer enthusiasm for books! Listening to their podcasts made me want to take the day off and read for the next 10 hours straight. They are that persuasive when talking about books and authors that they love. Check out their blog & podcasts the next time you crave a good book. (Two books I'm adding to my must read list based on their suggestions are: Any Human Heart by William Boyd and Peace by Richard Bausch.)

Book News, In Brief

The GuardianUK responds to HarperCollins' recent announcement regarding their new "no-advance" imprint, and asks would-be/wanna-be authors: Is writing really worth it any more?

Life isn't fair. While your self-published memoir has been removed from Amazon, nine year old Alec Greven's ten page book, How to Talk to Girls, is getting published by HarperCollins. Go tie the noose. Rocky Mountain News has the details.

Entertainment Weekly has posted a brief piece titled Comic Books: The One That Hooked Me! In it, fifteen comics luminaries (including Jaime Hernandez, Jessica Abel, Brian Michael Bendis, Warren Ellis, and Chris Ware) name the comic books that first drew them to the art form. Slide show included!

Penguin has revealed their secrets to making ho-hum hardback sellers into paperback bestsellers. Here's a taste, via the AP: Relying on luck, instinct and determination, Penguin has mastered the paperback blockbuster, taking a book already out in hardcover and giving it the kind of promotion once reserved for a new release: prominent store placement, author tours, online marketing, appeals to book clubs and community reading organizations. The key, says Penguin paperback sales head Norman Lidofsky, is identifying a book that could become a "word-of-mouth" seller, a conversation starter (and) a reading group favorite.

Book News, In Brief

A recent poll finds that America's favorite book is the Bible. I guess these folks never read that part about lying being a sin.

After critics kicked the cutie-patootie out of her last book, Rosie O'Donnell is back with another. The new book, Crafty U, is a critic-proof collection of family friendly crafts and projects.

Winston of Churchill: One Bear's Battle Against Global Warming may have won the 2008 Green Earth Book Award, but if you think that means that your kids are gonna like it, you've been smoking too much green earth.

In an effort to distract newspapers from printing any more negative notices regarding their attempted monopoly on print on demand services,Amazon.com has announced a writing contest for Harry Potter fans. If you're bored enough to write a 100 word essay that answers the probing questions
1. What songs do wizards use to celebrate birthdays?
2. What sports do wizards play besides Quidditch?<
3. What have you learned from the Harry Potter series that you use in everyday life?
you might be eligible to win a trip for two to London, England to touch Amazon.com's $4 million copy of The Tales of Beedle the Bard -- one of seven, handwritten and illustrated copies J.K. Rowling produced as a complement to the Harry Potter series.
For contest details, click here.

Book News, In Brief

According to The Washington Post, the Clintons have earned $109 million since leaving the White House. While half of that is Bill's cash for whoring himself out at various speaking engagements, over $30 million is from the couple's bestselling, quickly forgotten books.

Not content with crushing bookstores (new and used) and print on demand companies (large and small), Amazon.com is now aiming their death rays at the British book publishers. Via Times Online: An online price war for books has broken out, pitching Amazon against some of Britain’s biggest publishers. Amazon is angry that Penguin, Bloomsbury and others are discounting titles on their websites, encouraging customers to buy direct instead of using the online retailer.

A Combination Unsolicited Editorial & Unedited Solicitation

You want to know why folks like James Frey, J.T. Leroy and (my personal favorite) Margaret Seltzer all lie about their lives in an effort to get published? Because books these days are being hyped less for their stories than they are for the stories behind the stories. Case in point: When Reuters announced the winner of Penguin's American Breakthrough Novel writing contest yesterday, they opened the article with this: A New Orleans bartender who survived Hurricane Katrina won an "American Idol"-style competition on Monday after the public voted online for his book to be published by Penguin Group. -- a.k.a. the backstory of the dude that won. Only after this unnecessary pulling of the heart strings did they get around to this: Bill Loehfelm, who won a $25,000 contract, wrote "Fresh Kills" during the day while bartending at night. It is about the murder of a man on a New York City street corner that reunites his estranged and abused children. -- a.k.a. the actual plot of the book itself. Sorta makes you wonder what the point of this article actually was, don't it? If you think that I'm exaggerating (and that the whole thing is nothing more than a case of poorly placed paragraphs), here's how the article ends: The other finalists included a North Carolina woman who completed her novel while commuting to and from her job at Macy's department store, a Connecticut pediatrician who wrote her book after hours and a Kansas computer programmer who has been writing on the side for the past 20 years. No, it doesn't conclude with the winning author's future plans or the submissions deadline for the next A.B.N. contest or even the date when the winning book is going to be published. It ends with three more woe-is-me, look-at-me, save-it-for-Oprah bio blurbs.

Call me, Margaret Seltzer. All is forgiven.

Book News, In Brief

Illustrator Andy Bigwood won the Best Artwork accolade at this year's British Science Fiction Association Awards ceremony. It was for the cover of disLocations - a collection of nine stories written by some of the UK's best new and established science fiction authors - and depicts a "curved landscape, distorting energies and a damaged planet." Personally, I think it looks like a cheap, print on demand design.
Speaking of which...

The Authors Guild is looking into Amazon.com's new print on demand policy, as they are concerned over its many anti-trust and monopolizing aspects. From their press release: Once Amazon owns the supply chain, it has effective control of much of the "long tail" of publishing. Since Amazon has a firm grip on the retailing of these books (it's uneconomic for physical book stores to stock many of these titles), owning the supply chain would allow it to easily increase its profit margins on these books: it need only insist on buying at a deeper discount -- or it can choose to charge more for its printing of the books -- to increase its profits. Most publishers could do little but grumble and comply.
For more info, hit up the good folk at Publishers Weekly.