In It For The Money

800-CEO-Read is a website aimed at corporate fat cats who, when not enslaving underage workers and exploiting natural resources, love to read. While I can in no way recommend their online sales service ( as it surely pales in comparison to ours...at least I hope it does), I do give the thumbs-up to their daily blog. On it, they not only provide their own reviews of the latest business-oriented literature, they also showcase lengthy book excerpts, offer pithy quotes, and best of all, make lists!
This past Wednesday, Todd Sattersten, CEO of the CEO website, posted a reading list for executives that he 'guarantees will help you be more productive and make smarter decisions.'
I'm going to give you the titles, but for the reasons as to why each one was chosen, you're going to have to click here.

1. Competitive Strategy by Michael Porter
2. Execution by Larry Bossidy, Ram Charan, and Charles Burck
3. In Search of Excellence by Tom Peters and Bob Waterman
4. Good to Great by Jim Collins
5. The Effective Executive by Peter Drucker

Wait a minute. Where's The Winner Within by Pat Riley and The Art of War by Sun Tzu? I could've sworn that Def Jam/Rockafella Records CEO, Jay-Z, has said that they're the hustler's handbooks.

News Bits, In Brief

Harry Potter may not make lifelong readers out of children, but it's responsible for at least one enterprising child's life of crime. This past week, French police arrested a 16 year old boy who had been posting his own translation of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows online. While the rest of the free world has spent the past two weeks shaking their heads at the anti-climactic way Rowling chose to end the series, the book's French publisher, Gallimard, will not be releasing the book until October 26th.

The Sydney Morning Herald tempts a slap across the face from Mr. Darcy's frilly glove when it dares to ask, Where's the Sex in Jane Austen's Sensibilities? My initial response was a dismissive, 'What do you expect? She was British.' But then, so are the subjects of our next News Bit...

Via Boing Boing: Alan Moore and Melinda Gebbie discuss their erotic comic, Lost Girls, over at SexTV. (Don't say we didn't warn you: this video contains sexually explicit material. It may not be appropriate for children, Jane Austen fanatics.)

News Bits, In Brief

Starbucks Strikes Back: 'You Sell Coffee In Your Bookstores, We'll Sell Books In Our Coffee Shops'

Concerned that caffeine is no longer providing enough of a pick-me-up for their clientèle, Starbucks is making the next selection in their book program a collection of 50 inspirational stories. Listening Is An Act of Love, along with its accompanying CD, will be sold in US Starbucks locations beginning on November 8, 2007.
While bookstores the world over lament this newest corporate competitor, what the hell were they expecting? If we had all just stuck to books and left the coffee and pastries to the coffee and pastry people, maybe none of this would be happening.


Big Deal Means Big Dollars For Big Eyed Comics Characters

The William Morris Agency has signed Tokyopop to represent the publisher's original intellectual property for film, television, digital, merchandising, and game development. Stu Levy, Tokyopop's CEO and Chief Creative Officer says, "We are excited to join forces with WMA as we further develop the Tokyopop brand worldwide. This partnership takes us one step closer to realizing our dream of merging the leading edge of manga entertainment with Hollywood."
Well, just so long as they don't make a movie of that awful Courtney Love comic book.


Tired Of Their Good Reputation & Critical Accolades, Penguin Asks Rock Stars To Design Their Book Covers

The results are, quite predictably, horrid. The Guardian UK has the details.

The Murder That Refused To Die

What a year! First OJ announces that he's written a book 'imagining' his wife's murder, titled If I Did It. Then, following a huge media frenzy and a medium-sized public outcry, the book gets cancelled. (Quick question: Does anyone know if Simpson got to keep the $3.5 million advance?) Immediately after this is reported to the press, the Goldman family -- kin to the male murder victim, and one of the loudest voices calling for the book's cancellation -- files suit, asking for the publishing rights. Fast forward eight nail-biting months to last week, when the courts ruled in favor of the Goldmans' claim. As if on cue, the Juice re-appeared, saying that his 'hypothetical account of killing his ex-wife' was actually invented by a ghost writer and 'filled with errors that he refused to correct for fear of appearing to be guilty of the crime.' Okay, so even if that is true, why would OJ choose to come clean about it now? In hopes of killing sales (pun intended) when the book finally does hit stores. After all, who wants to pay hardcover pricing on a fake murder confession?! But that's not the end of the story. No, not nearly. This past Monday, the book's ghost writer, Pablo Fenjves, stepped forward for his fifteen minutes. This is his statement: "The whole book, the whole idea for a book, originated with O.J. Simpson and a couple of his handlers."
One can only wonder how Simpson will respond to this false allegation and obvious attempt to besmirch his good name. Murder, perhaps? Or worse -- another book.

Author Du Jour: Chester Himes

Biography
(courtesy of wikipedia.com)

Chester Himes was born in Jefferson City, Missouri on July 29, 1909. He grew up in a middle-class home in Missouri and in Ohio (and) attended East High School in Cleveland Ohio. While he was a freshman at Ohio State University in Columbus Ohio, he was expelled for a prank. Years later, he entered prison for armed robbery. In prison, he wrote short stories and had them published in national magazines. Himes stated that writing and publishing was a way to earn respect from guards and fellow inmates, as well as avoid violence.

By the 1950s Himes had decided to settle in France permanently, a country he liked in part due to his critical popularity there. In Paris Himes was the contemporary of the political cartoonist, Oliver Harrington, and fellow writers, Richard Wright and James Baldwin.

Some regard Chester Himes as the literary equal of Dashiell Hammett and Raymond Chandler. Ishmael Reed says "[Himes] taught me the difference between a black detective and Sherlock Homes" and it would be more than 30 years until another Black mystery writer, Walter Mosley and his Easy Rawlins and Mouse series, had even a similar effect.

Works
(again, wikipedia.com)

Himes's novels encompassed many genres including the crime novel/mystery and political polemics, exploring racism in the United States. He wrote about African Americans in general, especially in two books that are concerned with labor relations and African American workplace issues. If He Hollers Let Him Go — contains many autobiographical elements—is about a black shipyard worker in Los Angeles during World War II struggling against racism as well as his own violent reactions to racism. Lonely Crusade is a longer work that examines some of the same issues. Cast the First Stone is based on Himes's experiences in prison. It was Himes's first novel but was not published until about 10 years after it was written. One reason may have been Himes' unusually candid treatment — for that time — of a homosexual relationship.

Himes also wrote a series of Harlem Detective novels featuring Coffin Ed Johnson and Gravedigger Jones, New York City police detectives in Harlem. The novels feature a mordant emotional timbre and a fatalistic approach to street situations. Funeral homes are often part of the story, and funeral director H. Exodus Clay is a recurring character in these books. The titles of the series include A Rage In Harlem, The Real Cool Killers, The Crazy Kill, All Shot Up, The Big Gold Dream, The Heat's On, Cotton Comes to Harlem, and Blind Man With A Pistol; all written in the period 1957-1969.

Cotton Comes to Harlem was made into a movie in 1970, which was set in that time period, rather than the earlier period of the original book. A sequel, Come Back, Charleston Blue was released in 1972. And For Love of Imabelle was made into a film under the title A Rage in Harlem in 1991.

My Personal Favorites
(care of me)

If He Hollers Let Him Go
I normally hate dream sequences, so I wasn't thrilled to see that every chapter in this book started with one. Funny thing is, they work wonderfully here. Instead of surreal space filler, the dreams act as a glimpse into the main character's mind, foreshadowing each progressively worsening day at his job at the south central L.A. shipyards.

Cast The First Stone
This book probably would've been a million seller had it taken place in a foxhole instead of 'the hole.' A prison novel that chronicles the minutia of life behind bars from the first day to the last, Cast's real strength lies in its uncensored examination of the complicated relationships formed by men living in prison.

News Bits, In Brief

This year, U.S. revenue for self-help books will exceed $600 million. While their effectiveness is debatable, publishers, at least, are feeling great.

Audio books are destroying book clubs everywhere! The latest divide among book lovers is not about what they are reading, but if they are reading at all.

This weekend saw a new push in the media for e-books. The 'library in your pocket' pitch was used for the umpteenth time, as well as a new 'save money and trees' angle aimed at politically minded, shallow pocketed college students.

I hate his artwork and loathe his writing, but I never fail to read his delusional interviews. The comics creator you love to hate, Rob Liefeld, talks independent publishing, Image Comics and his Youngblood series at Newsarama.com.

SF - No Boundaries

I helped to start a Science Fiction Book Club which has been meeting each month for the past 10 years. The club moved with me through three bookstores to finally reside here at the Inkwell. When the SF book club comes up in conversation with random customers at the bookstore, I know I'm going to face incomprehension and be told that this person "doesn't read that stuff." SF is more popular than ever in movies, comics, TV, and yes, even books. It's this popularity that has driven the uninitiated to assume the worst about SF (damn George Lucas.) I used to try to defend/explain the quality that exists in this diverse genre, but now I just change the topic of conversation. I swear I'm not bitter...

A short piece about Race and SF was featured in the Boston Globe recently. Since it is so brief, only the surface is scratched, but at least it gets the conversation started -

"It's an area of fiction that has allowed writers to tackle sensitive issues of race and culture. "It has always been the safe genre to talk about those issues," Harry says, "or it had been for years until there was a lot more tolerance for bringing those things up in the mainstream."
But some in the speculative-fiction community complain that a number of their white contemporaries no longer tackle these subjects." -Boston Globe

The article was noticed by one of our club members, and since then there have been several smart email responses from our group. No doubt this will come up at our next meeting, and I'm looking forward to the discussion.

Comic Book News Bits, In Brief

Top Shelf announces details of two new Alan Moore releases for 2008 and 2009. Click here (and then scroll all the way down to the bottom of the page) to read all about the new League of Extraordinary Gentlemen book, as well as Moore's 'practical grimoire of the occult sciences,' The Moon and Serpent Bumper Book of Magic.

Naruto mania has yet to die (and now the critical accolades are pouring in). From BookPage.com: "On top of selling more than 2 million copies nationwide, the manga series received the most nominations in the inaugural American Anime Awards; was awarded the genre's first ever Quill Award in 2006 for Best Graphic Novel; and has appeared frequently on the USA Today Top 150 bestseller list. The televised "NARUTO" is the most popular show on Cartoon Network for boys ages 9 to 14."

Comicon, as told by the bloggers. The Comics Reporter has rounded up an extensive collection of links to various blogs chronicling San Diego's movie, er, comic book convention. Read what such luminaries as Neil Gaiman, Alison Bechdel and Peter David did on their promotional tours, er, summer vacations.

Gimme Gimmicks!

In yesterday's News Bits, In Brief (Um, did we really need that link? The post is located immediately following this one.), I cold dissed some fool's attempt to hype his novel by claiming to have written it on his cell phone. But was I too harsh on him? Have such gimmicks become necessary in order for products/art/etc. to stand out in today's information age?
Listed below are a few more examples of new and unusual ideas that authors and publishers are using to promote their books.

Via BoingBoing: TankBooks "pay homage" to the "monumentally successful" packaging of cigarettes with their line of literary classics. Tank is releasing books by Rudyard Kipling, Joseph Conrad, Leo Tolstoy and Franz Kafka in cardboard cartons the same size as a pack of cigarettes, complete with cellophane wrapping.

Via adgabber: "This guerilla campaign, in which a cup of coffee is stirred by an invisible hand or clairvoyant's effort, drew eyes to the book sitting alongside it. We'll let you guess which book it was for. Beware: the quality of the video is crappy, and the content itself is very long and very boring. And we don't know why it is that people, drawn to the stirring cup, touch the book and not the spoon. Is this psychological? Do they imagine there's some recipe locked deep in the hundreds of pages that will help them create their own vicarious stirring effects?"

(The sad part of this eye-catching alternative to everyday advertising? This viral video is quickly making its way around the web, yet no one knows what book it's hyping!)

Via MediaBistro: While we've got you in the coach potato position, click this link to see comics maestro Eddie Campbell's (Alec, Bacchus, From Hell) flash animation ad for his new book, The Black Diamond Detective Agency. Honestly, I can't fault this one. It's actually quite effective.

News Bits, In Brief

Vintage Classics has just launched 'Vintage Twins.' The concept is a simple variation on the if-liked-that-you'll-love-this bookseller routine. Two books (one old, one recent) covering (arguably) similar themes are shrink wrapped together for retail sale. Here are a few examples: Ripley's Game by Patricia Highsmith with Crime and Punishment by Dostoevsky, Haruki Murakami's Wind-up Bird Chronicle next to Alice's Adventures in Wonderland, Michel Houellebecq's Atomised with Gulliver's Travels, and Martin Amis's The Rachel Papers with Henry Fielding's Tom Jones.
Do any of you have any suggestions?

The headline reads, Man Writes a Book using his Nokia! The fact that neither the author or the book are named leads me to believe that I'd be better off buying the phone.

Hunter S. Thompson's widow is releasing a book this week. According to the press release, 'the book's mission is to introduce the world to the Hunter Thompson she lived and worked with and knew, rather than the drug-crazed persona he revealed in his writing.'
My only problem with this? The book is a scant 81 pages long. If that's all there is to contradict the thousands of pages of autobiographical gonzo-writing that Thompson produced...well, maybe he really was the drug-crazed persona he revealed in his writing.

Blog Bits, In Brief (the finest in book related blog posts, stolen whole)

BigBadBookBlog's Technicalities, Schmecnicalities:
"Manuscript preparation is a strange little detail in the publishing world. It’s the bane of authors, editors, and production artists alike. Today the majority of writers are working on computers, not typewriters. They’re working in sophisticated word processing programs, not simple-format software with few options. And as wonderful as these advances are, they’ve caused a bit of confusion and consternation, particularly for the editors and production artists who work with the manuscript down the line. So if you want your manuscript to be publisher-friendly or if you want your submission to be taken seriously, here are a few tips."

Bookslut's Jessa Crispin:
"A little book in France is causing a stir: Corinne Maier's No Kid: 40 Reasons Not to Have Children. And by "stir" I mean "annoying reviews written by women who feel they have to defend their decision to have children or point out how Maier is scarring her own children with the book." (And a few men.) She's also the author of Bonjour Laziness, a guide to working as little as possible. I think I like her."

Behind The Scenes - Bookselling

It's surprising that there aren't more books published about bookselling. Every independent bookstore would stock books on this topic! I've gathered a small collection of these titles and will post reviews here occasionally. Here's the first:

Shelf Life: Romance, Mystery, Drama, and Other Page-Turning Adventures from a Year in a Bookstore by Suzanne Strempek Shea (Beacon Press, 2004)

The tables are turned on author Suzanne Strempek Shea. She finds herself behind the counter of a bookstore selling books by other authors! It was an eye-opening experience for her to learn the routines of bookselling; unpacking boxes, receiving shipments, shelving, customers (some very quirky customers, indeed), displays, suggesting books, and of course, author events. It gave her a new perspective about the realities of independent bookstores, and when she went on her next national book tour, she had a foot in both trenches, author and bookseller. Shelf Life spoke to me particularly because it is about a bookstore in Springfield, MA that is set in a dying Mall. My first bookstore job was also in a Mall (in Massachusetts) that was half-closed. It generated an otherworldly aura...and Shea perfectly describes the apocalyptic feeling provoked by that environment. Shelf Life is an amusing must read, not only for booksellers, but for all writers. Also worth reading is Shea's charming novel, Selling the Lite of Heaven, which is also set in Western Massachusetts.

News Bits, In Brief

The most fearless paper in America, The Weekly World News, is dead. The always entertaining and informative supermarket tabloid was 28 years old. Send all sympathy cards, floral arrangements and cash donations to 'Bat Boy.'

Popular Mechanics has a list of The Top 5 Harry Potter Gadgets We Want (and Where You Can Find Them). While time-turners and magic wands are still only a thing of fiction, flying cars are only four years and $500,000 away.

Via Boing Boing: "Spiderman fan Andrew Farago was browsing...San Francisco's KAYO Books when he stumbled upon a Planned Parenthood issue of The Amazing Spider-Man from the 1970s...Thankfully, Andrew scanned and posted the whole comic."

News Bits, In Brief

Sniff, sniff. No, that's not the sound of someone crying. It's the sound of Keith Richards celebrating. According to TheObserver.com, Richards' autobiography is said to be the hottest book up for auction this summer. Publishers Harper Collins and Little, Brown are presently the leading bidders. The current marker? $7.1 million.

Authors looking to tour something besides bookstores and Wal-Marts are now visiting the offices of multi-million dollar corporations. Microsoft, Starbucks, Yahoo and Google are some of the US companies offering regular book events for employees. (We're never gonna get our class war, are we?)

What's the one thing on an airplane that's germier than the complimentary pillow and blanket? It might be the book that you just bought in the terminal! The Chicago Sun Times has announced that Powell's Books is now buying and selling used books at three of their international airport locations. Store manager Martin Barrett says, ''A lot of airport employees and airline crew members take advantage of this, but if a passenger shows up with a suitcase full of books to swap, that's fine, too." I read somewhere that Maxim and Penthouse are the two top selling magazines in airports. I really hope that they're not selling those secondhand, too.

News Bits, In Briefs, Boxers and Panties...

Although HBO's Sex In The City never took off in the Middle East (due in large part to Sarah Jessica Parker's camel-like bone structure), sex-centric chick lit is all the rage in Saudi Arabia. Inspired by the success of Rajaa Alsanea's 2005 novel, Girls of Riyadh, 'The Land of The Two Holy Mosques' has seen an explosion in the number of young female writers being published. According to the Reuters article linked to above, the literary output of Saudi Arabia has more than doubled in the last two years, with this hot new trend in 'veiled fiction' (wink, wink) accounting for much of the growth.

Gawker.com has named Luke Janklow their Hottest Straight Man In Book Publishing. Surprise, surprise: he's a rich, white New Yorker. But that's not all there is to this handsome heartthrob. He's apparently a rebel and a rock star, too. According to a March, 2004 article in W magazine, Janklow thumbs his perfectly sculpted nose at the book world's tweed-heavy traditions by wearing sneakers to the office(!), putting said sneaker-clad feet up on his desk(!!) and leaving an electric guitar lying around in plain sight of his adoring interviewer(!!!). Swoon.

Via ChicagoPride.com: The Advocate's list of The 100 Best Gay Novels. The only problem? The list was made in 1999. In other words, no Fight Club.

News Bits, In Brief

Insurance agent wins Hemingway look-alike contest. Larry Austin of Palm Harbor, FL took home the coveted honor. Runners up got promised part time Santa jobs in their local shopping malls.

Failed novelist succeeds as a prankster & plagiarist. A London lad looking for his fifteen minutes of fame sent eighteen publishers minutely altered chapters of Jane Austen novels. They were rejected or ignored by all but one publisher. I guess Austen's brand of writing is simply too Hollywood for today's literary world.

Speaking of Hollywood, since the Pirates of the Caribbean films have made them billions, has anyone thought to ask Johnny Depp to star in a film about book piracy? Sure, Depp's Secret Window and The Libertine weren't great book-related flicks, but what about Before Night Falls and Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas? Those were ill!

This last link is for The Inkwell's newest employee, Molly. It's An Adrian Tomine interview at TheComicsReporter.com. Read it when you get home, though. We're not paying you to play on the computer, damn it.

We'd Rather Be Reading Weekend

So the rest of the weekend is going to be blog-free...we've got some reading to do! Last night, we finished selling Harry Potter books at about 12:20 a.m., but stayed open another hour for the stragglers. Some of us (poor Cristin) still had quite a drive to get home. So we're all a bit ragged today, but the sales must go on. In between working and sleeping, we've been reading. It's like a race. "How many pages so far?" is how we've been greeting each other today.

It's Finally Here...Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows

Tonight at midnight the final Harry Potter book goes on sale. We've been fielding questions all week about what we are planning, but mostly about whether we still have copies available.
Yes, we ordered plenty of books and are still accepting pre-orders.

The Inkwell will reopen Friday night at 10:30 PM after closing at our normal time of 9 PM. We need that hour and a half to prepare the store for the midnight sales rush. We will have extra staff on hand to keep the lines to a minimum. We are fast at processing sales, and you will have your precious copy of Harry Potter with very little wait. We will be serving free coffee to all those waiting in our line.

Come join the final book festivities on Main Street starting at 4 PM and continuing until midnight!

Harry Potter Embargo Broken! Review Appears in the New York Times

Booksellers all had to sign several documents by a deadline promising not to sell (or even open the boxes of) Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows before July 21, 2007. So imagine the furor that has been sparked by an early review posted by Michiko Kakutani on the New York Times Website. As reported by Reuters, she says the book was bought in an undisclosed store in New York City on Wednesday, July 18th. J.K. Rowling is sorely disappointed.

New books set on Cape Cod

The Maytrees
By Annie Dillard
HarperCollins, $24.95
In this beautiful, powerfully moving novel, Pulitzer Prize-winning author Dillard displays penetrating insight into the human condition. Evocative, engrossing, and profound, this is a remarkable story about the unknowable, unbreakable bonds of love and family. Toby Maytree first sees Lou Bigelow on her bicycle in postwar Provincetown, Massachusetts. Her laughter and loveliness catch his breath. Maytree is a Provincetown native, an educated poet of thirty. In spare, elegant prose, Dillard traces the Maytrees' decades of loving and longing. They live among the nonconformist artists and writers that the bare tip of Cape Cod attracts.

We gathered a rich assortment of articles about Annie Dillard previously on the Inkwell Blog.

Barefoot
By Elin Hilderbrand
Little Brown and Company, $24.99
Another perfect beach read from the bestselling author of The Love Season. Its summer on Nantucket, and as the season begins, three women arrive at the local airport, observed by Josh, a local boy home from college. They're all trying to escape their problems, when Josh enters their lives and becomes a confidant and, eventually, something more. What a perfect summer pleasure Elin Hilderbrand provides..." - Nancy Thayer, author of The Hot Flash Club


Soaring With FidelBy David Gessner
Beacon Press, $24.95
An irreverent, absorbing, and insightful tale of one man' s adventures following the great 7,000-mile osprey migration across two continents. One September, after writing about ospreys on Cape Cod for years, David Gessner impulsively decided to follow the birds on their annual migration. Each fall these graceful raptors, with wingspans of up to six feet, cruise over the eastern United States, then soar over Cuba and winter in South America, returning north with the spring. In 2004, Gessner went along for the ride, traveling illegally into the mountains of Cuba and deep into Venezuela as he competed with the crew of a BBC documentary to be the first to follow the full migration, trailing the birds by car, boat, foot, and plane. He called his favorite osprey Fidel.
Soaring with Fidel is about the exhilaration of migration, but it is also a deeper meditation on the nature of human happiness. In describing the thrill of travel, the antics of these swashbuckling birds, and the cast of characters he meets (and drinks with) along the way- including scientists, students, tour guides, and an online group of birders- Gessner gives us a profound lesson in the importance of following what you love.
"From the tidal marshes of Cape Cod to jungle lakes in Venezuela, David Gessner lets nothing- not language barriers, not empty pockets, not steely-eyed Cuban bureaucrats or American embargoes- stop him from following the migration of the osprey. Just reckless enough to be lucky, Gessner wins over everyone he meets. Soaring with Fidel has wings."
- Scott Weidensaul, author of Living on the Wind

Visit David Gessner's website for more about his books.

The Lavender Hour
By Anne D. LeClaire
Ballantine, $13.95
Downsized from her teaching job, Jessie longs for a sense of renewal and decides to spend a year on Cape Cod, seeking to be cleansed by rushing ocean waters and comforted by the lavender hues of the setting sun. While there she volunteers with a local hospice program, where she meets Luke, a once proud fisherman whose life and body have been ravaged by cancer. Jessie' s presence is a great help to Luke' s mother, who has moved in to take care of her son.
After initial misgivings Jessie and Luke forge a deep friendship, and the former teacher is surprised to find herself opening up about her life, the loss of her father when she was a girl, her often difficult relationship with her mother, and her own battle with illness. When Luke makes a critical request of his new friend, Jessie must look deep within herself for an answer, knowing that her actions will have far-reaching effects on Luke' s family and forever change the bonds within her own.

Anne has many insights about the writing process. Visit her website to read more.