Julia Child's Bestseller

Thanks to the recently released movie Julie & Julia, Julia Child's Mastering the Art of French Cooking, a book first published 48 years ago, is the #1 bestseller on the August 30th New York Times list in the advice and how-to category. According to the New York Times, Mastering the Art of French Cooking sold 22,000 copies in the most recent week tracked by Nielsen BookScan. Knopf, the book's publisher notes this "is more copies than were sold in any full year since the book’s appearance."

While it's not uncommon to see books, even old books, get a sales boost from movies, this instance is surprising. Child's 752-page, $40 cookbook is loaded with full-fat, time-consuming, and difficult recipes, many of which demand strange ingredients.

M.J. Rose Challenges Author Compensation

In an editorial at Publishing Perspectives, M.J. Rose, the bestselling author of The Memoirist among other novels, argues that Publishers Must Change the Way Authors Get Paid. Under the old paradigm, in exchange for advances and a share of the profits from their books, authors wrote the books and left the marketing and publicity efforts to the publishers. That paradigm has shifted, and many authors are now expected to participate, and sometimes even to fund, the publicity for their books. From extensive book tours to visits to book groups to hosting book giveaways on their websites, authors are more involved than ever in marketing.

Rose thinks this author participation is generally a good thing—"people do buy more of something when they know it exists." On the flip side, however, the author compensation scheme has not adjusted to reflect an author's new marketing obligations. Here's the crux of Rose's argument:

[T]oday the author’s marketing/PR effort is often equal to or even greater than what the house is doing. ... We now have a situation where publishers are financially benefiting from the author’s efforts but the author is still getting paid the old way, without regard to how much we personally invest. There’s just no consideration for the checks we’re writing out of our own pockets for marketing or PR services. Accordingly, it’s blatantly and patently unfair for us to invest in our own books and then wait for our advances to earn out based on the same royalties rates we’ve always gotten. Be it $2,000 or $20,000, the money we invest should be discounted from the advances we’re paid, allowing us to earn royalties faster based on an honest up-front expenditure by the publisher. And, it goes without saying, we should be getting a higher royalty rate. After all, we’re doing more than writing our books, we’re business partners as well.

While I'm sympathetic to Rose's point, I'm not sure her solution is workable. Publishers are having a hard enough time staying afloat these days without asking them to pay a higher royalty rate or to credit authors' expenditures against their advances.

I've long suspected the root of the problem lies in the illogically large advances paid for certain hot titles, advances that will surely never pay out. Just a handful of unsupportable seven-figure advances can cripple even the largest publishing houses. I'd rather see advances go down across the board and publishers' publicity budgets go up. With those changes, it might then make sense to increase authors' royalty rates, particularly for those authors who actively publicize their own books.

Author Charged with Shooting Father

Lisa Ann Reardon, a Michigan novelist and author of Blameless, Billy Dead, and The Mercy Killers, has been charged with assault with intent to murder. As reported in ClickOnDetroit, Reardon shot her father in the leg and buttocks with a shotgun and then fled in her car.

$1 Million Wine Book

Have £640,000 (~$1.12 million) to spare? Love wine? Check out The Wine Opus, scheduled to be published in a limited edition of only 100 copies by British publisher Kraken Opus sometime next year. At 850-pages, The Wine Opus is an overdose of wine information, but the real feature is a list of the 100 best wineries in the world. Purchasers of the book will receive six bottles of wine from each of the 100 best wineries. Karl Fowler, publisher of Opus Media, commented: "Whoever buys the books will instantly have an incredible wine collection. … Some wineries we expect to be included have waiting lists of 16,000 people for some wines." If you’re interested, you’d better hurry. 25 of the 100 copies are already spoken for.

Oprah's Next Pick?

Oprah will be announcing her 63rd book club selection on Friday, September 18th. As usual, the pick is shrouded in mystery. The Newtonville Books Community Blog reports that the book will be a Little, Brown trade paperback priced at $14.99, with an announced first printing of 500,000 and ISBN # 978-0-316-08637-0. Based on that limited information (namely the publisher, the format, and the price), EarlyWord expects the pick to be Say You're One of Them by Uwem Akpan. That book was released in hardcover on June 9, 2008 and in trade paperback (for $14.99) on July 15, 2009. EarlyWord notes, “Besides having the correct publisher, price and format, the book is about one of Oprah’s hot-button issues.”

The Amazon listing for the pick says it’s a $23.99 hardcover with an ISBN of 978-0-316-08636-3. Publishers Lunch has this analysis:

[I]t's worth noting that Little, Brown prices very few of its hardcover titles at $23.99, which narrows the list of potential candidates considerably to the following books published between January 2008 and August 2009:

• Amigoland by Oscar Casares (August 10)
• Crow Planet: Essential Wisdom from the Urban Wilderness by Lyanda Lynn Haupt (July 27)
• This Wicked World by Richard Lange (June 30)
• Do Over! by Robin Hemley (May 11)
• The Man's Book: The Essential Guide for the Modern Man by Thomas Fink (May 6)
• Secrets to Happiness by Sarah Dunn (March 25)
• Eat, Drink and Be From Mississippi by Nanci Kincaid (January 6)
• The Book of Calamities: Five Questions About Suffering and Its Meaning by Peter Trachtenberg (August 27, 2008)
• The Bible Salesman by Clyde Edgerton (August 11, 2008)
• Undiscovered Country by Lin Enger (July 3, 2008)
• Say You're One of Them by Uwem Akpan (June 9, 2008, with trade pb published at $14.99 on July 15, 2009)

Notice any overlaps? I think The Bible Salesman is also a likely pick. It's scheduled for paperback publication in September at $13.99, but I wouldn't blame Little, Brown for bumping up the price by $1 if it's an Oprah pick.

Netherland, The Movie

The Telegraph reports that Oscar-winning director Sam Mendes has asked playwright Christopher Hampton to adapt Joseph O’Neill’s Netherland into a screenplay.
Hampton wrote the screenplay for Ian McEwan's Atonement. Hampton views the adaptation of O’Neill’s book, which is partly about playing cricket in New York City, as a challenge:

I quail at the idea of adapting it. This is a very difficult project, I know that. … I don't think it is possible to make cricket clear to people who don't understand the game. But luckily there isn't very much ball-by-ball stuff in this novel and it is actually more popular in the US than we imagine it is.

A Story a Day

Beginning yesterday with "Swimming" by Lauren Grodstein, FiveChapters.com is publishing a short story each day for fifteen days. If that's too much for you to keep up, come back after September 7th when FiveChapters will return to its usual practice of publishing a short story in five parts each week.

The Trend in Jacket-less Hardcovers

The New York Observer reports on the trend of publishing hardcovers without dust jackets. I’m a big supporter of this idea. Dust jackets are annoying. When they’re not getting in the way of turning pages, they’re getting lost, torn, or wrinkled. And no matter how beautiful a jacket is, I can’t shake the feeling that it’s not really part of the actual book, which is often a bland, monochromatic object.

Publishers like McSweeney’s and Open Letter have been experimenting with jacket-less hardcovers for some time now, but this fall season will see some of the larger publishers getting into the game, including Farrar, Straus and Giroux (No Impact Man by Colin Beavan) and Viking (Bicycle Diaries by David Byrne). Eli Horowitz, the managing editor at McSweeney's, describes jacket-less hardcover designs as a way to fuse the cover design with the physical book, creating a single, integrated object: “Even well-designed jackets often feel like advertisements, not actual parts of the object. … Jackets carry all the design, but they feel disposable and often are disposable, the first part of a book to get torn or creased or trampled." Charlotte Strick of FSG agrees: "I don't know if I even completely understand why that is. Maybe there's something permanent about it, that kind of makes it feel substantial and special and gives it a certain integrity." Viking’s Paul Slovak sees jacket-less designs as a way to compete with e-books: "At a time when there are other forms that people can buy books in, it becomes more important than ever for the physical book to look really attractive."

Crossing the Hudson by Peter Stephan Jungk (a review)

Crossing the Hudson
3.5 out of 5: Crossing the Hudson, written by Peter Stephan Jungk and admirably translated from the German by David Dollenmayer, is a philosophical novel exploring the relationship between parents and their children. On his way to join his wife and two children at their vacation home on Lake Gilead just outside of New York City, Gustav Rubin is delayed when his international flight makes an unscheduled overnight stop in Iceland for engine trouble. Exhausted and frustrated, he finally arrives at John F. Kennedy International Airport to reunite with his mother, who lives in an apartment on Central Park West and is joining Gustav’s family at the lake. The pair heads towards Lake Gilead in a rental car, only to be trapped for hours in a monumental traffic jam on the Tappan Zee Bridge, which crosses the Hudson River at one of its widest points.

What follows is a dreamy meditation about the lasting effect of Gustav's parents on his sensitive and impressionable personality. The bridge gives Gustav “the feeling of being transported into a floating, dreamlike state.” As if in a dream, Gustav scrolls through memories of his recently deceased father Ludwig, and he and his mother share a strange hallucination (or is it real?) demonstrating Ludwig's continuing power over his family. Gustav recognizes that, over the course of his adult life, “the foundation of his existence remained Father and Mother.” Gustav’s vital father has sapped his self-assurance and his energy:

Father’s fantastic, everlasting capacity for hope, his unbearable kindness, completely robbed his son of confidence. Ludwig’s immense productivity often rendered Gustav powerless. The more enterprising the father, the quieter and more worn out the son.

Gustav's vapidity and his mother's overbearing personality were constant annoyances, as was the plot contrivance of a seemingly endless traffic jam. Fortunately, a healthy amount of humor makes the hours spent on the bridge bearable. Crossing the Hudson is an interesting, if not altogether pleasant, examination of the power of parents over their children.

B&N Rediscovers

Barnes & Noble recently announced the launch of a new imprint, named Barnes & Noble Rediscovers. The imprint will publish out-of-print books in hardcover editions for a bargain price (between $9.95 and $14.95). The announcement was coupled with the release of the first 33 titles. Publishers Weekly reports "B&N will pick titles for the imprint based on feedback from company buyers and customers, examining searches on BN.com and on the instincts of editors." It will be interesting to see if this concept is successful. Marcus Leaver, president of B&N’s publishing subsidiary, Sterling Publishing, says:

The Barnes & Noble Rediscovers series opens a new door for us and a new window for writers and estates who have earned no income on their works for years. We plan to expand the capabilities of the program to include both e-book and print on demand options.

The Hunt Collection

The City Room blog at the New York Times reveals what happens to children's books at the Brooklyn Public Library that library officials determine to be offensive: They get sent to the Hunt Collection. The Hunt Collection resides "in a vault-like room accessible only to staff members." In a letter explaining its decision to banish the popular children's book Tintin au Congo to the Hunt Collection, the library described the collection as "a special collection of historic children’s literature that is available for viewing by appointment only."

I certainly don't condone book banning, but when a potentially-offensive children's book is at issue, perhaps a special collection is a good compromise. The book is still available to those willing to seek it out, but the extra step protects children from inadvertant exposure to something they might be offended by (or that their parents are trying to shield them from). Adult literature, however, is an entirely different story.

On Reading Slumps

At The Millions, Lydia Kiesling laments her “losing streak.” She just can’t seem to find a book she’s excited about this summer: “I read a novel that drags, and then another that drags, and then another, and before long I have spurned books in favor of internet television, Calvin and Hobbes, and puerile blogs.” As an example, V.S. Naipaul’s Bend in the River made Lydia “feel like I had taken a painkiller, laid down for a malarial nap in an unpleasant climate, and watched a revolution on TV.” Her other choices weren’t much better for her: Martin Amis’s London Fields (“like going on an elaborate and fast-paced scavenger hunt arranged by someone whom you suspect dislikes you”), Doris Lessing’s The Golden Notebook (“I was depressed for rather a lot of days”), and Roberto Bolaño’s The Skating Rink (lacking “lustre, and heart, like a last-minute writing exercise from a promising MFA student”).

It does all sound rather bleak. Has this ever happened to you? I don’t know if I’ve had such bad luck as Lydia, but the reading slumps I’ve had in the past have all disappeared in time, usually after finding a good, funny novel. If things get particularly bad, I drop everything and read one of my old favorites.

Love and Summer by William Trevor (a review)

Love and Summer: A Novel
5 out of 5: In this slim novel, the fourteenth from Irish author William Trevor, an illicit love affair develops in a provincial Irish town in the 1950s. The story unfolds slowly through shifting points of view, including that of the two lovers and other townspeople, the perspective often so close we feel we’re inside the characters’ minds. With constrained prose hinting at hidden depths of meaning, Trevor gracefully weaves together multiple view points. The effect is truly brilliant, calling to mind Virginia Woolf’s Mrs. Dalloway. Like Woolf’s classic, Love and Summer is a masterpiece of narrative structure.

The past haunts the characters populating this novel, whether it’s an aborted fetus, a tragic accident, a childhood love, or a once grand estate. Indeed, one mentally unstable character actually lives in the past, believing his wealthy employers to still need his services although the family departed decades ago. Trevor’s prose reflects this ever-present haunting. Everything “was done” or “had been.” About a person, it is said, “Her night was spent there,” about a dog, “Jessie she was called,” and about a nun, “Sister Agnes the geography nun had been.” Scattered throughout the novel, these inverted sentences impart an atmosphere of plaintive passivity. Trevor’s characters wallow in the murky swamp of their past regrets, never to break free and live a life filled with action verbs. A moving and beautifully told love story.

The Inverted Bookshelf

Looking for a weekend project? Want to liven up your book shelves? Try this inverted bookshelf, a do-it-yourself project posted on Instructables:

The inverted bookshelf turns a bit of your living room upside down as it hangs all of the books from the bottom instead of supporting them from below. It's a satisfying optical trick and doesn't damage any of the books. In fact, you can take books in and out of it whenever you want.

The creator of this project says, “I like to make things both useful and odd. The odd projects are usually more fun.” Indeed.

Atwood Gets Creative

Margaret Atwood is about to release her latest novel, The Year of the Flood, and she's livening up her book tour with a “live performance with original music.” The Toronto Star describes the planned show:

The hour-long performance will feature 14 hymns – one for each chapter – which Atwood wrote, to the music of L.A.-based composer Orville Stoeber. A three-person cast will perform along with a choir, all of whom will be local talent.

Atwood explains why this novel, her 13th, merits this innovation:

I felt this particular novel deserved a more complex presentation. It's also a great chance to work with other creative minds and see their interpretation of the story come to light.

Set for publication on September 22nd, The Year of the Flood is a sequel of sorts to Atwood's earlier novel Oryx & Crake and “is set in a future where the world has undergone dramatic change as a result of decades of environmental degradation.”

In conjunction with the book tour, Atwood is also blogging, complete with photos of dinner guests and witty comments. An interesting new way to sell books.

Free Books for your Commute

If you're caught without a book on a NYC subway on the first Tuesday of the month, you're in luck. Buku Sarkar, founder of Choose What You Read NY, collects old books to redistribute in subway stations once a month. The Huffington Post describes the project as "part recycling effort, part recession relief, part literacy campaign, and all heart."

On the first distribution day, New Yorkers were skeptical of Sarkar's promise of "Free Books for your Commute," but within an hour Sakar had unloaded all 130 of the books she had available for distribution that day. Each of Sakar's books is marked with a green sticker, and Sakar hopes readers will return the volumes after they've finished reading them so they can be passed along to others.

Check out the website to support the cause with donations, either $$ or books.

Are You Addicted to Reading?

Apparently, some people are addicted to reading. Really, seriously addicted. It's not a chemical addiction, obviously, but reading can be a psychological addiction when it's used as a way to avoid reality. ReadingAddiction.com explains this (admittedly rare) phenomenon:

[R]eading is an addiction when it is used as a mechanism to avoid reality. A person can avoid facing life by reading all day. A person can also avoid facing themselves by reading all day. This is the only time that reading really becomes a problem. The idea of being addicted to books is tricky, because reading is generally considered to be a good thing. But we all know that too much of a good thing can be bad for you as well.

ReadingAddiction.com even gives some tips to help break a reading addiction:

• Engage the addict in alternate activities.
• Plan a vacation with a demanding schedule.
• Draw the addict out of themselves by enlisting their help with something.

Personally, I don't recommend the second tip. Who wants a vacation with a demanding schedule, anyway? And if you try to force such a thing on a reader, beware. You might get hurt.

Now that we're equiped with some tips (albeit dubious ones) for dealing with the problem, how do you know if you're addicted? This eHow page lists some questions to consider:

• How many book groups do you belong to?
• Do you still recognize your family members when you pull yourself out of a book?
• Have you gone into debt buying books?
• Do you sneak out of work to visit a bookstore or library, just so you can be surrounded by books?

If your answers are inconclusive (Are three book groups really too many?), try this quiz for a quick and definitive diagnosis. It will tell you if reading is merely your passion or if it's crossed the line to an unhealthy obsession. I was happy with my diagnosis: "You are not that crazy about reading novels. It is not an obsession for you." I'm not sure I agree with the first sentence, but the second sentence gave me some comfort.

For those of you who receive the opposite diagnosis, don't despair. You can commiserate with your fellow reading addicts at this chat group.

Alaska is Perfect for Reading

A couple weeks ago, I was fortunate to spend some time in Anchorage, Alaska. While there, I took the opportunity to explore the city's independent bookstores, and I wrote an article about it that's published in today's Publishing Perspectives. Here's an excerpt:

Before Sarah Palin you betcha’d her way into the cultural consciousness, Alaska was perhaps best known as the setting for the hit television show Northern Exposure. The cliche was that it was a remote, distant and icy land, a place marked not by the works of man but, rather, by his absence. The few people who lived there there dressed in heavy coats much of the year and had 10,000 words for snow.

As it happens, in Anchorage at least, there is a lively book
community with a personality all its own — unique, independent, and acutely mindful of their place amid the vast, all-encompassing nature that threatens to envelop them (there is a reason Jon Krakauer’s Into the Wild is the most famous book about Alaska). Indeed, with a climate dominated by long, dark winters, Alaska is perfect for reading.

See the full story here.

A Happy Marriage by Rafael Yglesias (a review)

A Happy Marriage: A Novel
4 out of 5: A Happy Marriage, Rafael Yglesias's most recent novel, chronicles the 29-year marriage of Enrique Sabas to Margaret Cohen in chapters alternating between the awkward beginnings of the romance and the weeks just prior to Margaret's untimely death from cancer. By constraining the story to its bookends (sprinkled with just a few events from the middle years), Yglesia gives himself room to write. The story captures the durability of this couple’s decades-long relationship, and, at the same time, progresses slowly through individual days, patiently layering details to create a nuanced world. This structure is a masterful solution to the problem of depicting a complex relationship without sacrificing either depth or length.

Each thread of this story offers its own rewards. The early thread is optimistic, often humorous, and strangely suspenseful, even though the outcome is predestined. The late thread is heartbreaking, filled with a morbid accounting of Margaret’s physical decline and the other unpleasant details of death, including a carefully managed schedule of last goodbyes. Yglesias's workmanlike prose focuses attention on the characters and maintains a quick pace without detracting from the unfolding tragedy. A Happy Marriage is a poignant portrayal of a relationship from its beginning to its end.

Yale University Press Cops Out

Yale University Press is publishing The Cartoons That Shook the World by Jytte Klausen, a book about the controversial Danish cartoons depicting Mohammed. The New York Times reports that the Press—after consulting “two dozen authorities, including diplomats and experts on Islam and counterterrorism”—has decided to exclude the cartoons from the book along with all other images of Mohammed. John Donatich, the director of Yale University Press, explains that the cartoons can be accurately described in words such that reprinting them would be gratuitous.

Literary Saloon isn’t happy with the decision:

Gratuitous ?!? What, their next monograph on the Mona Lisa will make do with an accurate description of the painting in words ? Give me a break ! (And I have to wonder why an 'accurate description' would not be equally offensive -- beyond the suggestion that those who take offense are so sub-literate that they only react to crude drawings .....) … I generally admire what Yale University Press does, but this is both shocking and terribly disappointing.

Literary Tweeting

USA Today talks about “the newest form of literary self-promotion”—Twitter. Certain authors tweet for self-promotion (Philippa Gregory is tweeting this week in the voice of a character from her new novel), while others use it to complain about bad reviews (Alice Hoffman). Aravind Adiga, the Booker Prize winning author of The White Tiger, uses Twitter to connect with his readers so he can avoid book tours. There’s a lot that can be done in just 140 characters, and authors are trying it all.

Literary License is on Twitter ("literarylicense") but isn't particularly active.

OneWorld Classics: Bringing Sexy Back

I recently discovered OneWorld Classics, an English independent publisher launched in the spring of 2007. OneWorld has the laudable aim “to expand the literary canon in the English-speaking world through a series of mainstream and lesser-known classics, often by commissioning new translations.” In particular, OneWorld is looking to “redefine and enrich the classics canon by promoting unjustly neglected works of enduring significance.” Fortunately for those of us in the U.S., OneWorld’s publications are readily available here.

Perhaps the best thing about OneWorld's books is the extensive supplementary material provided within each book. Most editions contain photographs, notes, short pieces on the author’s life and works, and other relevant commentary. For poetry translations, all of OneWorld’s editions are bilingual.

Curious about OneWorld Classics, I recently picked up James Hanley’s Boy, a OneWorld edition published in 2007. Boy was first published in England in 1931, but, shortly after publication, the book was denounced as obscene and removed from circulation for more than 50 years. Like all OneWorld titles, this new edition of Boy includes useful supplementary material, including photographs of the author and his family, a history of Hanley’s life and works, and an excellent introduction by Anthony Burgess, whose concise synopsis of the book captures Boy’s bleakness:

A boy escapes from a tyrannical father by stowing away on a merchant vessel bound for Alexandria. He is ill-treated and sneered at by the crew, undergoes his sexual initiation in an Egyptian hotel, and then, writhing in the shame of syphilis, is put down like a sick dog by the ship's captain.

During his life, Hanley boasted he wrote the first draft of Boy in just ten days. Though other sources claim that may be an exaggeration, the book retains the immediacy and rough edges one would expect from a quick draft. What Boy lacks in literary graces, however, it makes up for in social significance. Boy revealed the horrible circumstances faced by many children from working class homes forced into the workforce at a young age. Hanley was prosecuted for obscenity for Boy, but, while the book addresses themes of sexuality, it's far from obscene. Rather, it reveals what many wished would remain hidden, and, for that crime, it was unavailable for decades. We are fortunate OneWorld is returning to life (and general availability) classics like this one.

Volume 13 of Indiespensable

Volume 13 of Indiespensable, Powell's subscription book club, was recently announced, and, for the very first time in Indiespensable history, the chosen book is a graphic book (in this case, a memoir): David Small's Stitches. I picked up an advanced review copy of this book at BEA this year, and it looks to be very well done. I'm looking forward to seeing the finished book.

Kudos to Powell's for trying something different. Indiespensable subscribers will receive a signed first edition of Stitches "in a custom slipcase exclusive to Indiespensable subscribers." Also included is an "advance reader's copy of a staff-picked book to be published this fall" and "Special gifts chosen by our staff."

Pynchon Bests Russo

At the Boswell Book Company in Milwaukee, Thomas Pynchon’s Inherent Vice outsold Richard Russo’s That Old Cape Magic 3 to 2, and Jonathan Tropper’s This Is Where I Leave You fell flat despite significant industry and critical buzz.

Daniel Goldin’s Boswell and Books blog reports:

For the second week in a row, there was energy in the store as folks came in to purchase the new novels by Thomas Pynchon and Richard Russo. In the end, the former outsold the latter by 50%. …

Still not selling is Jonathan Tropper's new novel, despite our over-the top rec in both our email newsletter and event calendar. This week Entertainment Weekly made a similarly bold proclamation, putting it on their must list and also giving it a big A-rated write up.

New Study Concludes Reading Boosts Optimism

A new study suggests that if you want to feel more optimistic, you should read more books. According to GalleyCat’s summary of the study, study respondents identified “books” as the number one "optimism booster." There’s no specificity regarding the types of books that provide this boost in optimism, however.

Untitled Covers

This is Penguin's cover for the UK anniversary edition of George Orwell's 1984. Cool...if your targeted readers are well-read and know what they're looking for.

The Encroachment of the Buzz

In a thoughtful essay in the L.A. Times, David Ulin mourns "the lost art of reading." Ulin believes we're too distracted these days to give ourselves over to reading:

Reading is an act of contemplation, perhaps the only act in which we allow ourselves to merge with the consciousness of another human being. ... In order for this to work, however, we need a certain type of silence, an ability to filter out the noise. Such a state is increasingly elusive in our over-networked culture, in which every rumor and mundanity is blogged and tweeted. Today, it seems it is not contemplation we seek but an odd sort of distraction masquerading as being in the know. Why? Because of the illusion that illumination is based on speed, that it is more important to react than to think, that we live in a culture in which something is attached to every bit of time.

Ulin's comments about "the encroachment of the buzz" are particularly interesting:

These days, however, after spending hours reading e-mails and fielding phone calls in the office, tracking stories across countless websites, I find it difficult to quiet down. I pick up a book and read a paragraph; then my mind wanders and I check my e-mail, drift onto the Internet, pace the house before returning to the page. Or I want to do these things but don't. I force myself to remain still, to follow whatever I'm reading until the inevitable moment I give myself over to the flow. Eventually I get there, but some nights it takes 20 pages to settle down. What I'm struggling with is the encroachment of the buzz, the sense that there is something out there that merits my attention, when in fact it's mostly just a series of disconnected riffs and fragments that add up to the anxiety of the age.

The entire essay is worth reading. And, as I've mentioned before, I've seen more and more recognition of this kind of anxiety. Perhaps identifying the problem is the first step towards our collective healing.

Change Comes to the NEA

The new chairman of the National Endowment for the Arts, Rocco Landesman, has some interesting plans. A New York Times report of a recent interview has all the details. I’m particularly encouraged to hear Landesman plans to fight for his agency’s budget and will “focus on financing the best art, regardless of location.” I also like the concept behind a program Landesman called “Our Town,” which would provide incentives and subsidies to encourage artists to move to urban centers:

“When you bring artists into a town, it changes the character, attracts economic development, makes it more attractive to live in and renews the economics of that town,” he said. “There are ways to draw artists into the center of things that will attract other people.”

Although this is a difficult, if not impossible, theory to prove objectively, I tend to agree with it. I believe a critical mass of artistic people can enliven a city, and I hope Landesman’s Our Town program will be extended to writers.

(Via Three Percent)

Galley Giveaway: Beg, Borrow, Steal by Michael Greenberg

Other Press has generously offered to send two galley copies of Michael Greenberg's Beg, Borrow, Steal: A Writer's Life to readers of Literary License. Michael Greenberg is the author of the acclaimed memoir Hurry Down Sunshine. Beg, Borrow, Steal, a collection of brief essays, is scheduled for publication in September.

Book description (from the back cover): Beg, Borrow, Steal is an autobiography in installments, set in New York, where the author depicts the life of a writer of little means trying to practice his craft—or simply stay alive. He finds himself doctoring doomed movie scripts; driving trucks and taxis; selling cosmetics from an ironing board in front of a women’s department store; writing about golf, a game he never played; and botching his debut as a waiter in a coveted four-star restaurant. Central characters include the City of All Cities; Michael’s father, whose scrap metal business looms large; his elegant mother; his first wife, Robin, whom he met in a Greenwich Village high school; their son, Aaron, who grew up on the Lower East Side; a repentant communist who fought in the Spanish Civil War; a Chilean filmmaker in search of his past; beggars who are poets; a man who becomes a woman; and rats who behave like humans and cease to live underground. Greenberg creates a world where the familial, the incongruous, the literary, the humorous, the tragic, and the mundane not only speak to each other, but deeply enjoy the exchange.

If this sounds interesting to you, please e-mail me (litlicense AT gmail DOT com) with your name and address by this Friday, August 14th. I'll select two winners at random from the qualifying entrants. Sorry, but the quagmire that is international publishing rights limits this giveaway to those living in the U.S. Good luck!

In the Wake of the Boatman by Jonathon Scott Fuqua (a review)

In the Wake of the Boatman
3.5 out of 5: In the Wake of the Boatman begins with Puttnam Douglas Steward’s birth in November 1942 and continues for several decades, charting Putt’s tortuous path towards self-awareness. Along the way, Putt confronts a dizzying array of issues: father/son friction, homosexuality, transsexuality, war, alcoholism, death, loneliness, friendship, and romantic angst. This novel fully embraces its ambitious scope, including the ambiguity and loose ends that accompany any complicated life. Although his supporting cast is generally weak and often clichéd, Putt is a complex, realistic protagonist with enough emotional gravity to bind together this book’s sprawling pieces.

Generally, In the Wake of the Boatman is beautifully written, filled with lyrical and well-paced prose. At times, however, too many overwrought similes disrupt the flow. This is particularly apparent in the landscape descriptions (e.g., stars in the night sky are “like a light bulb shielded by a colander” and oaks look “like straight, single bristles on the curve of a well-shaven cheek”). Although In the Wake of the Boatman would have benefited from the killing of such darlings, it remains a nuanced and worthwhile portrait of a life struggling towards fulfillment.

Russo a Mysogynist?

In a recent Newsweek review of Richard Russo’s new novel, That Old Cape Magic, reviewer Jennie Yabroff asks, “Is Author Richard Russo A Misogynist?” Yabroff’s review—which is subtitled “He might have won the Pulitzer Prize for fiction, but his female characters are flat, contrived, and maybe even insulting.”—has made a lot of people very angry.

Edward Champion posts “An Open Letter to Newsweek’s Richard Smith and Jon Meacham” that concludes:

I demand an explanation for how you could allow so many mistakes and so many curdish and tone-deaf observations to pass through your ratty cheesecloth.

The Elegant Variation thinks:

labelling a hard working (and from what we've heard, generally decent) writer with the label misogynist simply because he doesn't write fully realized dimensional female characters - perhaps he's simply a writer who's reached the limit of his gifts - is a cheap shot that's beneath Newsweek. It's irresponsible and disheartening. The race to the bottom has a new frontrunner.

Bethanne Patrick at The Book Studio has a less enraged, but equally thoughtful, response. Personally, I’ve read a fair amount of Russo, and I agree with the dissenters. Misogynist he is not. In Yabroff’s defense, though, Russo’s female characters aren’t his strength.

Chavez’s “Revolutionary Reading Plan”

Under a new “Revolutionary Reading Plan,” Chavez is giving away tens of thousands of free books to Venezuelans. According to a BBC report, when first announcing the Plan in April of this year, Chavez commented, "Read, read, read, read. That should be our slogan for every day." Chavez hopes the books, which include Cervantes’s Don Quixote and Hugo’s Les Miserables, will "promote reading for the construction of socialism and humanist values."

Dissenters worry the free books are part of a secret indoctrination program, a kind of “thought police.” Controversial titles distributed under the Plan include Marx’s The Communist Manifesto, Selected Speeches of Hugo Chavez, and State Terrorism in Colombia. Others argue that giving away free books does nothing to actually promote reading the books. Perhaps the strangest part of the Plan is the “book squadrons”:

These are basically roving book clubs that are intended to encourage reading on the metro, in public squares and in parks. Each squadron wears a different colour to identify their type of book. For example, the red team promotes autobiographies while the black team discusses books on "militant resistance".

Isn’t a group of people wearing black and carrying books on militant resistance a bit intimidating?

(Via GalleyCat)

Dewey Snags $2 Million Deal

In September 2008, Dewey: The Small-Town Library Cat Who Touched the World, co-authored by Vicki Myron and Bret Witter, moved up the bestseller lists faster than a cheetah chasing its prey. Betting on the public’s continuing love for books about the “amazing relationships between cats and their people,” Dutton just bought a Dewey sequel by Myron for a rumored $2 million. Publishers Weekly reports the new book will be titled Dewey's Nine Lives, will publish in fall 2010, and “will also feature new stories about Dewey himself.”

Starter Pynchon

Over at Slate.com, Jonathan Rosenbaum has an intelligent review of Thomas Pynchon’s Inherent Vice. Rosenbaum considers Inherent Vice in the context of the full Pynchon canon, finding this latest novel loaded with “retreads” that are “cheap thrills” rather than “fresh historical insights.” Rosenbaum criticizes Inherent Vice for “playing by most of the genre rules” and including “most of the usual mystery staples” with only “debatable” success as a genre piece. While Rosenbaum’s criticisms are certainly fair, in my view, they’re also overly harsh.

I agree that Inherent Vice sticks too close to its chosen genre and, as a result, sacrifices some Pynchonian depth, but I disagree that the novel is no more than “a modest diversion.” The welcome additions of a suspenseful plot and a bumbling, big-hearted protagonist, along with many fewer “huh?” moments, make Inherent Vice a delight to read. The fact that it’s less ponderous and more accessible than Pynchon’s previous novels doesn’t make it less accomplished. While a critic has labeled Inherent Vice as “minor Pynchon,” I prefer to think of it as "starter Pynchon.” As such, it serves an important, and needed, role within the Pynchon canon.

(See my full review of Inherent Vice here.)

Everything Matters! by Ron Currie, Jr. (a review)

Everything Matters!: A Novel
4 out of 5: Just before Junior is born, an authoritative voice in his head informs him a comet will crash into the Earth in exactly thirty-six years, one hundred sixty-eight days, fourteen hours, and twenty-three seconds, on June 15, 2010, at 3:44 p.m. EST, killing all people on the planet and ending the world as we know it. Thus begins Ron Currie, Jr.’s imaginative novel about a boy who grows into a man while wondering if anything he says or does matters. While Junior wanders through life in an existential (and often alcoholic) haze, his story, and that of his family and closest friends, unfolds through ever-shifting points-of-view, each character contributing new perspectives and different truths to create a rich, many-layered story.

Everything Matters! is full of fallible humanity, swinging wildly between moments of hilarity and deep tragedy, and maintaining a quick pace throughout. Even setting aside the book’s end-of-the-world premise, several key plot twists strain credulity. The oversaturated whirlwind that is Junior’s life will delight obliging readers and disappoint those preferring a more credible story. The quite brilliant final section of this novel demonstrates how everything we do does, in fact, matter and, at the same time (as revealed in one, final, bizarre plot twist), does not make a damn bit of difference.

An Improbable Success Story

Tara Books—an independent publisher of picture books for adults and children based in Chennai, South India—specializes in books made entirely by hand. Here's an excerpt from Tara's 2008-2009 catalog:

The texture, colour and smell of a handmade book lures the senses back to the experience of reading for pleasure. Created in our Chennai workshop, our handmade books are made using screen-printing and letterpress processes, which we have pioneered over the last fifteen years. ... [O]ver a dozen skilled craftspeople from local villages produce books that are entirely made by hand. Using handmade paper (made from a mixture of cotton cloth waste and tree bark, rice husk or grass), they individually screen-print or letterpress each page of every book. Run on fair trade practices, more than 160,000 handmade books have been born and bound in our workshop so far. ... Our handmade editions are cultural objects: accessible, as well as affordable, for book lovers around the globe.

If you'd like to know more, a recent story in the Globe and Mail features this publisher that's been "hugely, implausibly successful" in the international market. The story covers Tara's founding as well as its unusual and refreshing governing principles.

I'm the proud owner of two of Tara's recent publications. The first—Nurturing Walls—presents the art from the walls of Meena tribal homes in Rajasthan. The book's images are a mix of photographs of the Meena women painting along with screen-prints of the painted images themselves. The book also includes two informative articles, one explaining the tradition and the other the technique of the paintings.

The second Tara book in my collection—The Circle of Fate—is an illustrated Hindu parable of destiny and love. This slim book is filled with intricate illustrations, screen-printed in bright, stunning colors on thick, handmade paper. The parable finishes with this "truth":

The world is a never-ending cycle, where everything has a time and place. Even a thing of exquisite beauty must come to an end and be re-born as something else. There is a pattern. If you want to change it, you must act in the way your heart dictates. But in the end, it is you who belong in the pattern. It does not belong to you.

Each of these books would make a perfect and unique gift for a booklover, or treat yourself to one. Both are available from Amazon for under $30. After all, how many books do you own that are entirely handmade?

Britain’s Most Prolific Library Book Reader

The Guardian identifies Louise Brown as “Britain’s most prolific library book reader.” Brown, a 91-year-old woman from southwest Scotland, is about to borrow her 25,000th book. When you consider that Brown borrowed her first book in 1946, that’s an average of almost 397 books per year, or over 7 books per week. Brown’s favorites include “Mills & Boon romances, war stories and historical dramas.” After 63 years of borrowing library books, Brown’s never incurred a fine for an overdue book.

I Got Lucky

I recently ordered a hardcover copy of Marilynne Robinson's Home for my personal library. I paid $16.50 for it from Amazon. When the book arrived, I discovered it's the first printing of the first edition, not exactly what I was expecting for a year-old book that was a finalist for the 2008 National Book Award and the winner of the 2009 Orange Prize. I was even more surprised to fine the author's original signature on the title page! I can't figure out how it happened, but I feel pretty lucky. Signed, first editions of Home are going for about $50 these days, not counting shipping.

The Unit by Ninni Holmqvist (a review)

The Unit
3.5 out of 5: In the dystopic world of The Unit, 50-year-old women and 60-year-old men who haven’t yet contributed to society by marrying, having children, or holding down useful careers are deemed “dispensable.” Such dispensables are spirited away to secured Units where they participate in medical experiments and organ donation—first a kidney or a cornea, and, after a couple years, a “final donation.” On her 50th birthday, Dorrit Weger, a solitary, childless writer, is transported to the Unit, a carefully controlled paradise filled with lush gardens, diverse entertainments, and lavish buffets. The close-knit community inside the Unit sparks an emotional reawakening within Dorrit, though it might be too late. Ultimately, Dorrit must make a difficult decision: Will she embrace life and fight for freedom, or will she accept the quiet death dictated by society?

Holmqvist’s eerie vision raises the question of what, if anything, we owe to society in return for our right to exist. Written in unadorned prose (nicely translated by Marlaine Delargy), The Unit is straightforward, suspenseful, and fast-paced. Holmqvist meticulously details life on the inside, down to the array of flowers in the winter garden and the quality of simulated daylight in the rooms. While the details add to the overall creepiness of this dystopia, Holmqvist spends too much time on the setting at the expense of character development. Overall, The Unit is a chilling and entertaining, if somewhat simplistic, exploration of a future where people must prove their worth to society or die.

Translation News

Chad Post has an interesting article at Publishing Perspectives about the approximate 10% decline in original translations being published in 2009. An excerpt:

The easy answer is the economy. It’s true that translations cost more to publish than books written in English, and in a time of belt tightening (and absolutely wretched book sales for any title not featuring a vampire or a zombie), it’s easy to peg the cost of a translator as something to purge from the budget. Beyond that, publishers tend to perceive translations as being “more risky” than other books.

Let's hope the trend reverses in 2010.