Shelf Awareness for Tuesday, November 13, 2007


Quarry Books: Yes, Boys Can!: Inspiring Stories of Men Who Changed the World - He Can H.E.A.L. by Richard V Reeves and Jonathan Juravich, illustrated by Chris King

Simon & Schuster: Broken Country by Clare Leslie Hall

Little, Brown Books for Young Readers: Nightweaver by RM Gray

G.P. Putnam's Sons Books for Young Readers: The Meadowbrook Murders by Jessica Goodman

Overlook Press: Hotel Lucky Seven (Assassins) by Kotaro Isaka, translated by Brian Bergstrom

Letters

Book Rage in Canada--An Eyewitness Account

Heather Cook, a freelance writer, editor and photographer, writes:

I have personally witnessed book rage in Calgary, Alberta. At a local Chapters that I frequent several times a week, an older man walked up to a store associate and held out a book, asking, "How much?" The associate calmly looked at the book, found the correct price and responded, "$36.95." The man, who acted as though this was the first time ever he'd noticed a different price, rudely insisted that he should get the book for the cheaper, U.S. price on the cover. The employee handled it wonderfully: he whipped out a flyer from his back pocket saying, "But here's a flyer that gives you a discount if you spend more than $35 today." This diffused the situation somewhat--at least enough so that the customer swiped the flyer out of the employee's hand and skulked off, book in hand to the till.

 


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News

Notes: Harry in Deutschland; Holiday Internet Offers

Harry Potter und die Heiligtümer des Todes is a record breaker. Bookseller.com reported that the German-language edition of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, which went on sale Saturday, October 27, sold more than one million copies in the first 24 hours, "marking a 13.5% lift on sales of the previous title. The English-language original sold 500,000 copies on the launch day and has sold more than a million copies to date."

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"This year, Internet retailers are dangling a more-generous assortment of offers--including free shipping, web-only discounts and gift wrap--to motivate impulse buys from shoppers concerned about falling home values and higher gasoline prices," the Wall Street Journal writes.

Consumers are expected to spend $33 billion online between Thanksgiving and Christmas, according to Forrester Research, up 21% from last year. Predictions for holiday sales in general are less rosy--a 4% gain to $474.5 billion is below the 10-year average annual growth rate of 4.8%.

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Long hours, low (or no) wages and deep commitment are required of young people working in the British publishing industry, and some just don't like the deal. A lively discussion ensued in the wake of Katherine Rushton's Bookseller.com post last week, which opened provocatively and with a nod to Jane Austen: "It is a truth universally acknowledged that the lower rungs of publishing are populated by young, middle-class, Oxbridge girls in want of a decent salary."

The flurry of responses inspired a follow-up in which Rushton shared reader comments and suggested that "concern over low pay in publishing is prompting junior publishing staff to consider leaving their jobs."

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The "secret librarian handshake" has been revealed at last by junior high school librarian Brad Barker in the Modesto Bee: "At special ceremonies, librarians bump their right forearms together as a sign of solidarity (some baseball players known as the Bash Brothers stole this move from us). After the forearm bump, we touch thumbs and twist them as a symbol for the Dewey Decimal point."

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Once upon a time, the Guardian challenged three authors--Hilary Mantel, Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie and Audrey Niffenegger--to write "fairy tales fit for the 21st century."

Mantel's ends like this: "I cannot say that they all lived happily ever after. In a country where people walk around with their heads under their arms, is that likely? But I can say that, having found her soul in a cupboard, and having recognised herself at last, the princess prepared for a happy death. As I do, and so I hope do you, and so I hope do we all. Amen."

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Tim Nast and Phillip Titolo, first-year law students at the University of Connecticut, have organized Maplewood Books for Humanity, "collecting hundreds of books and paying to send them to schools in English-speaking African nations," according to the Hartford Courant.

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The difficulties of self-publishing are explored in today's Wall Street Journal.

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Congratulations!

Effective tomorrow, Angela Bole is leaving the Book Industry Study Group, where she has worked for three years, most recently as associate director, to become events manager in John Wiley & Sons' professional and trade division.

In a note about the change, Bole said that she and BISG executive director Michael Healy, who joined the organization a year ago, have been working on a transition since September and a successor should be announced shortly. At least week's BISG annual meeting, Healy praised Bole for her "tremendous work over three years," adding that she "made my transition into my role much more easy than it otherwise would be."

 


GLOW: Berkley Books: The Seven O'Clock Club by Amelia Ireland


Cool Idea of the Day: Rediscovered Bookshop's Baker's Dozen

Rediscovered Bookshop, Boise, Idaho, will co-host the Baker's Dozen, an event featuring 13 local authors reading from their work and serving up recipe cards for their favorite treats.

The Idaho Statesman reported that the genesis for the event was a conversation between Laura DeLaney, the bookstore's co-owner, and local writer T.L. Cooper, who were searching for "ways to pull the spotlight onto writers right here in the Treasure Valley. . . . something that invited more genres and lesser-known names to the table." The Baker's Dozen authors will offer their readers an irresistible combo platter of well-seasoned words as well as the secrets to tasty pecan vanilla horns, Roman punch, toffee bars and more.

"Authors will be invited to talk about their own recipes for writing" said DeLaney. "It's about expanding horizons. You might find something you didn't expect to like, the book you're not even looking for."

 


Media and Movies

Media Heat: Manless in Montclair

This morning on the Today Show: Amy Holman Edelman, author of Manless in Montclair: How a Happily Married Woman Became a Widow Looking for Love in the Wilds of Suburbia (Shaye Areheart Books, $22, 9780307236951/0307236951).

Also on the Today Show: James Patterson, author of Double Cross (Little, Brown, $27.99, 9780316015059/0316015059).

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This morning on Fox Business News's Money for Breakfast: Tommy Lasorda, whose new book is I Live for This: Baseball's Last True Believer (Houghton Mifflin, $25, 9780618653874/0618653872).

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Today on the Food Network's Emeril Live: Masaharu Morimoto, author of Morimoto: The New Art of Japanese Cooking (DK Publishing, $40, 9780756631239/0756631238).

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Today on the Diane Rehm Show: Peter Heller, author of The Whale Warriors: The Battle at the Bottom of the World to Save the Planet's Largest Mammals (Free Press, $25, 9781416532460/1416532463).

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Today on All Things Considered: Rowan Jacobsen, managing editor of the Art of Eating magazine and author of A Geography of Oysters: The Connoisseur's Guide to Oyster Eating in North America (Bloomsbury USA, $24.95, 9781596913257/1596913258).

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Today on the View: Bill O'Reilly, author of Kids Are Americans Too (Morrow, $24.95, 9780060846763/0060846763).

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Tonight on the Charlie Rose Show: an appreciation of the late Norman Mailer.

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Tonight on the Daily Show with Jon Stewart, in a repeat: former U.N. ambassador John Bolton, author of Surrender Is Not an Option: Defending America at the United Nations and Abroad (Threshold Editions, $27, 9781416552840/1416552847).

 



Books & Authors

Attainment: New Books Out Next Week

Selected new titles appearing next Tuesday, November 20:
 
The UltraMetabolism Cookbook: 200 Delicious Recipes that Will Turn on Your Fat-Burning DNA by Mark Hyman, M.D. (Scribner, $29.95, 9781416549598/1416549595) features recipes for each phase of the diet.
 
Good Dog. Stay. by Anna Quindlen (Random House, $14.95, 9781400067138/1400067138) tells the tale of the author's black lab, Beau.
 
Born Standing Up: A Comic's Life by Steve Martin (Scribner, $25, 9781416553649/1416553649) chronicles the early life and career of a talented comedian.
 
An Inconvenient Book: Real Solutions to the World's Biggest Problems by Glenn Beck (Threshold, $26, 9781416552192/1416552197) gives Beck's conservative view of world events.

The Redbreast by Jo Nesbo (Harper, $24.95, 9780061133992/006113399X) is a new crime novel from the Norwegian author that delves into the period when the country was occupied by the Nazis and the government collaborated with Berlin.
 
Now in paperback:
 
Web of Evil: A Novel of Suspense by J.A. Jance (Pocket Star, $7.99, 9781416537731/1416537732).
 
Too Late to Say Goodbye: A True Story of Murder and Betrayal by Ann Rule (Pocket, $7.99, 9780743460514/0743460510).

 


Awards: Les Prix Medicis, Feminae

The winner of the Prix Medicis for a foreign work is Daniel Mendelsohn for The Lost: A Search for Six of Six Million, now out in paperback (Harper Perennial, $15.95, 9780060542993/0060542993), according to AFP.

The Prix Femina for foreign novel has gone to the British writer Edward Saint Aubyn for Mother's Milk, available here in paperback (Grove/Open City Books, $14, 9781890447427/1890447420).

The Prix Medicis went to La Strategie des Antilopes (The Strategy of Antelopes) by journalist Jean Hatzfeld, about what happened when 40,000 of the people who had committed the Rwandan genocide were allowed to return to their homes.

The Prix Femina was won by Eric Fittorino, another journalist, for his novel Baisers de Cinema (Cinema Kisses).

 


Book Brahmins: Russ Marshalek

Russ Marshalek is marketing and publicity director for Wordsmiths Books, Decatur, Ga. Writing this in third person, he feels quite self-conscious as a result of the pervasive pretentiousness usually associated with the revelation that an author is penning his or her own bio. He is also embarrassed that, despite his minor in feminist theory, he chose to say "his or her" instead of "her or his." That's another matter entirely.

Marshalek, referring to himself by last name only in this part, because to reverse and be merely "Russ" would imply a self-image on par with Prince, Madonna or possibly even Amy (Sedaris--there's only one Amy), is 25. Born in Albany, N.Y., and raised in Marietta, Ga., Russ (oh, see, there's the switch) studied English and communications at Oglethorpe University in Atlanta. After serving a brief stint as a remedial reading teacher in Las Vegas, Nev., he's been in new media publicity and marketing since his freshman year of college. Though he's spent a good deal of time in the music industry (where he "cut his teeth," whatever that means), books have always been his first love.  He's been involved in the formation of the concept that is Wordsmiths Books since the beginning and remembers it involving a lot of caffeine and a few very beloved ideas. Here he answers, in the first person, questions we put to people in books:

 
On your nightstand now:

On The Road: The Original Scroll (reading right now); Earthly Pleasures by Karen Neches (she's a close friend of the store, so though this really isn't usually my thing, I'm going to give it a whirl and hopefully get a two-tissue cry from the whole affair); People of the Book by Geraldine Brooks.

I recently finished Brock Clarke's Arsonist's Guide to Writers' Homes in New England and LOVED it--after I finished and the characters had time to percolate in the coffeepot of my brain. I also just finished Stephenie Meyer's Eclipse. God, how I love that series.
 
Favorite book when you were a child:

Ferdinand the Bull, when I was really young.

Your top five authors:

This is ordered arbitrarily and is RIGHT NOW--my top five change depending upon what area of the literary pool my head's in at the moment: Bret Easton Ellis, James Joyce (I really do enjoy reading Joyce), Marisha Pessl (she's a genius), Joan Didion (I recently re-read all her essays and fell in love again). And, uh, honestly, my boss, Zach, is a pretty damn good writer. I've been shopping his book, Anointed, around, and it's really good--Christopher Moore gets beaten up outside Douglas Adams' house while Naomi Klein lectures them both.
 
Book you've faked reading:

Suite Francaise by Irene Nemirovsky. I meant to read the entire thing and I recognize both the historical and literary importance of the work, but every time I crack those covers, sleep overtakes.
 
Book you are an evangelist for:
 
Shauna Seliy's When We Get There. This simple, short, little novel beats with such a heart that it's hypnotic, compelling and healing all at once. This is literary comfort food.

Book you've bought for the cover:

Vincent Lam's Bloodletting and Miraculous Cures should count--though I didn't buy my copy, I would for that cover.

Book that changed your life:

Ulysses. Really. I've never read anything the same way.

Favorite line from a book:

"People are afraid to merge . . . on freeways in Los Angeles."--Less Than Zero by Bret Easton Ellis. If I'm overly vocal in regards to my love for any one author, it's Easton Ellis. I think this one says all that needs be said about the human condition.

Book you most want to read again for the first time:

Special Topics in Calamity Physics by Marisha Pessl. I want that wry exploration of language and the world all over again.

 


The Bestsellers

Mystery Bestsellers in October: The IMBA List

The following were the bestselling titles during October at member bookstores of the Independent Mystery Booksellers Association. (By the way, the organization has one of our favorite slogans: "connecting criminally inclined readers with arresting mysteries.") 

Hardcovers

1. Kissing Christmas Goodbye by M.C. Beaton
2. An Ice Cold Grave by Charlaine Harris
3. Dexter in the Dark by Jeff Lindsay
4. Blonde Faith by Walter Mosley
4. The 47th Samurai by Stephen Hunter
4. Midnight Rambler by James Swain
7. Voices by Arnaldur Indridason
8. Interred with Their Bones by Jennifer Lee Carrell
9. Now and Then by Robert B. Parker
9. World Without End by Ken Follett

Paperbacks

1. Beating the Babushka by Tim Maleeny
2. Find Me by Carol O'Connell
3. The Thirteenth Tale by Diane Setterfield
3. Motif for Murder by Laura Childs
3. Holmes on the Range by Steve Hockensmith
6. Dying to Be Thin by Kathryn Lilley
6. The Fright of the Iguana by Linda O. Johnston
6. Darkly Dreaming Dexter by Jeff Lindsay
6. Tapped Out by Natalie Roberts
6. Stealing the Dragon by Tim Maleeny

[Many thanks to the IMBA!]

 


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