Notes: William Safire Dies; National Book Festival Draws a Crowd
Obituary Note: Author, Pulitzer Prize-winning columnist and "oracle of language" William
Safire died Sunday. He was 79. "There may be many sides in a genteel
debate," the New York Times
observed, "but in the Safire world of politics and journalism it was
simpler: There was his own unambiguous wit and wisdom on one hand and,
on the other, the blubber of fools he called 'nattering nabobs of
negativism' and 'hopeless, hysterical hypochondriacs of history.'"
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At the National Book Festival in Washington, D.C. Saturday, "book lovers turned out in record numbers . . . The gray morning couldn't dissuade 130,000 people from attending readings and signings on the National Mall between the Washington Monument and the Capitol," the Los Angeles Times reported, noting that author Junot Díaz "stood in a muddy field after his appearance, chatting in English and Spanish with a scrum of persistent, umbrella-carrying fans."
"I'll stay out here as long as these people are staying," he said. "I wanted to meet people who've read my book and are, in general, book lovers. For me, it's an honor to be here with them."
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In collaboration with the Hawai'i Book Publishers Association, the Honolulu Advertiser has launched hawaiireaders.com, which highlights the best books and authors of and about Hawai'i. The site will include blogs, feature articles and more.
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Scott Harris, owner of Everybody Reads, Lansing, Mich., told the Lansing State Journal he hopes his bookshop can "become a co-op within the next nine months. He believes the move will bring financial backing to the store and enable it to offer more services to customers."
"The entire intent of the store is to offer what we think is lacking in the community," he said. "The cash infusion will help us do that."
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Readers of Hudson Valley Magazine named Oblong Books & Music, Millerton, N.Y., the Best Bookstore in the Hudson Valley--for the fourth year in a row.
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U.K. booksellers are bracing themselves for "Super Thursday" on October 1, when "celebrity memoirs, thrillers and children's fiction bid for top spot as 800 books come out on one day," according to the Guardian. "There may still be three months left until Christmas, but for booksellers the battle for space in Santa's stocking starts here."
"It's nice to have a day that feels quite special, because it is a rare title that is truly big enough to be a publishing event in itself," said Julia Kingsford, head of marketing for Foyles bookstores. "But the inevitablility, with 800 books coming out on this one day, is that there will be things that are missed. There are an awful lot of books published, and not everything can be number one."
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At the University of Missouri-Columbia, the Espresso Book Machine is in the house--or, to be more precise, in the University Bookstore. According to student newspaper the Maneater, "bookstore spokeswoman Michelle Froese said she sees a great deal of potential in the machine . . . Froese said there are plans to work with faculty and staff to integrate introductions and notes into a line of books available for the machine, called University Classics."
"For example, we have a Mark Twain scholar at Mizzou," Froese added. "It would be a wonder to have him write an introduction, annotated notes, etc., to include with a series of Twain novels."
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As breaking news goes, this is probably not at the top of the list, but Entertainment Weekly's Shelf Life blog reported that J.K. Rowling has opened her own Twitter account, @jk_rowling, because, as she wrote in her opening tweet, "I am told that people have been twittering on my behalf, so I thought a brief visit was in order just to prevent any more confusion!"
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"Will you read Dan Brown's latest book?" the Reading Eagle asked people in Wyomissing, Pa., for its "Talk of the Town" segment.
"I don't know," said Joanne Gehret. "We got the book for the kid because he read the first one. But I don't know if he'll read it. You never know with teenagers."
"I might," added Amanda Hand. "I've just got done reading a lot of Stephen King books and I'm looking forward to reading more literature and getting in touch with history."
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Variety zoomed in on Carrie Kania, senior v-p and publisher of It Books and Harper Perennial, whose "job, in addition to continuing to overseeing four other HarperCollins imprints, [is] to pick the starmaking--and frequently star-driven--It vehicles that can capture the public's increasingly short attention span."
Kania commented: "The challenge is trying to identify the ones that aren't going to last for a minute and to get a public to come to it."
She added: "Being given the opportunity to start this imprint is like being picked to direct the Christmas play."
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Bloody book trailer of the day: Dracula the Un-Dead by Dacre Stoker and Ian Holt (Dutto). Stoker is the great-grandnephew of Bram Stoker; the book is based on plot threads and characters from Stoker's notes compiled while he researched and wrote Dracula.
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Bill Preston, formerly senior v-p of retail and international sales at Baker & Taylor, has joined Gardners Books, the U.K. book wholesaler, as v-p, North American business development. Preston will have offices in the U.S. and focus on Gardners's initiatives in the U.S. and Canada to retailers and publishers. Gardners offers same-day shipping to North American retailers and to consumers on the retailers' behalf.
Bob Jackson, commercial director of Gardners, praised Preston for his "considerable expertise, knowledge and a local contact to our customers in these markets," adding, "We look forward to Bill's involvement with our existing account customers and to building on Gardners's continued growth in the North American marketplace."
Preston may be reached at William.Preston@gardners.com.
Last Tuesday, Skylight Books, Los Angeles, Calif., hosted what it called the 
The literary basketball league sponsored by WORD bookstore, Brooklyn, N.Y., is ending its first, amazing season (
Shelton Johnson grew up in Detroit, became a U.S. Park Ranger in 1987, currently serves in Yosemite and is prominently featured in Ken Burns's new documentary, The National Parks, which began airing on PBS last night. His passion for Yosemite (see a