"My job is to get books into the hands of readers. I can't do that without booksellers. . . . Writers always hear the word no. I daresay indie booksellers hear the word no a lot, too. I plug my ears. I have to hear yes inside. Here is where you come to hear people say yes."--Garth Stein, author of The Art of Racing in the Rain, speaking at the Booksellers Banquet during last weekend's Great Lakes Independent Booksellers Association trade show in Cleveland.
At a hearing yesterday in Federal District Court in Manhattan, Judge Denny Chin set November 9 as the date when "Google and its partners must submit a revised settlement for the court’s preliminary approval," the New York Times wrote.
The Justice Department, which had expressed its concerns about the settlement to the court last month (Shelf Awareness, September 21, 2009), "said it hoped the agreement could be saved because of its many benefits to readers and scholars." The Times reported that, "In a statement at the hearing, Michael J. Boni, a lawyer who represented authors, said the parties hoped for a final hearing on the modified settlement in late December or early January. To meet that schedule, Mr. Boni asked the judge to allow Google and its partners to shorten the period for accepting comments or objections from all parties affected by the amendments. Judge Chin broadly agreed. 'I think everyone has a pretty good idea of what is on the table.'"
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Are some of the big fall books already losing steam, and what does that portend for the holidays? The New York Times examined Nielsen BookScan numbers for a couple of the leading titles, including The Lost Symbol by Dan Brown, whose sales "last week fell by 47%, to 214,000 from 401,000. True Compass, Senator Edward M. Kennedy's memoir, sold 39,000 copies last week, down 43% from the previous week's tally of 69,000. And over all, according to BookScan, book sales were down about 4% compared with the same week last year."
The Times wondered whether these titles "or any of the other big fall books from heavyweights like Mitch Albom, Pat Conroy, E. L. Doctorow and Audrey Niffenegger were helping booksellers to overcome the sludgy economy."
"How many of the fall books are people holding off buying themselves and hoping to get them as gifts?" asked Gerry Donaghy, new book purchasing supervisor at Powell's Books, Portland, Ore. "Maybe that's just optimism."
"A lot of people buy books because they don't know Uncle Harry's shirt size, so at the last minute it's either books or candy," said Larry Kirshbaum, a literary agent and former publishing executive. "There's no question that the business is in a lull right now, but I do think it's a little early because the real Christmas business is still a month, maybe six weeks away."
Mitchell Kaplan, owner of Books & Books, with stores in southern Florida and the Cayman Islands, told the Times that Senator Kennedy's memoir was likely to appeal "to gift-buying customers." But he added that "the biggest successes were often books from unknown authors that built slowly by word of mouth."
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It has been a week since Super Thursday in the U.K., when a "deluge of 800 new hardbacks hit bookshops," the Guardian reported, noting that "it was a translated crime novel by the late Swedish journalist Stieg Larsson which saw off celebrity autobiographies from the likes of Ozzy Osbourne, Peter Kay and Chris Evans to jostle its way to the top of the book charts."
The Girl Who Kicked the Hornets' Nest finished second on "the U.K.'s book charts last week, selling 34,152 copies in just three days, according to book sales monitor Nielsen BookScan. It came in behind Dan Brown's thriller The Lost Symbol, which remained in the number one spot for the third week in a row with sales of 79,008 copies," the Guardian wrote.
Super Thursday week book sales increased by 180,000 units compared to the week before, and an extra £3.6 million (US$5.74 million). "It's the first big week of Christmas book sales," said André Breedt, BookScan research and development analyst. "It's the starting pistol for Christmas."
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Harvard University has purchased the archive of the late John Updike, a "celebrated member of the Class of 1954 who kept a Harvard library card and frequently visited the campus to research the contemporary culture that enlivened his acclaimed fiction," according to the Boston Globe.
“John Updike is a terribly important American, given his cultural and literary achievement," said William Pritchard, author of Updike: America's Man of Letters. "It's an extraordinary thing that his university is where his papers have landed."
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With a four-million-copy first printing for the fourth book in the Wimpy Kid series, Dog Days by Jeff Kinney (Abrams/Amulet), to be released next Monday, October 12, can we really still call the kid "wimpy?"
Consider the Kid's other achievements: since the April 2007 publication of the launch title, Diary of a Wimpy Kid, more than 25 million books in the series are in print in the U.S. and at least 30 countries. The books have made a variety of bestseller lists. And, the Wimpy Kid is Hollywood-bound: a movie is underway with Fox 2000 studios and is due out next April.
For this latest release, more than 3,000 stores participated in a pre-sale campaign, which included event kits with materials created by Jeff Kinney, such as reproducible sheets with Wimpy Kid games and trivia, a T-shirt to be raffled off and temporary tattoos.
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The Beyoğlu Sahaflar Used Book Festival, "conveniently located in Istanbul's central Taksim Square . . . is rich enough to make any bookworm feel like they are in paradise," the Hurriyet Daily News and Economic Review reported.
"There are regular customers and visitors from last year. It is becoming a traditional event," said Nedret İşli of Turkuaz, a used and antique bookseller in the Galata district. "Old books see the light of day. The trade artisans economically benefit [from the event]. And it is instrumental in terms of forming new [book] collectors and [book] fans."
He compared his craft with "selling mirrors in a country of blind people. It is difficult to find books in good shape; it is difficult to find old books; it is also difficult to get these books to those interested in them."
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"My books are a subject of much discussion," Roger Ebert wrote in the Chicago Sun-Times. "They pour from shelves onto tables, chairs and the floor, and Chaz observes that I haven't read many of them and I never will. You just never know. One day I may--need is the word I use--to read Finnegans Wake, the Icelandic sagas, Churchill's history of the Second World War, the complete Tintin in French, 47 novels by Simenon, and By Love Possessed. That 1957 best-seller by James Could Cozzens was eviscerated in a famous essay by Dwight Macdonald, who read all the way through that year's list of fiction best sellers and surfaced with a scowl. It and the other books on the list have been rendered obsolete, so that his essay is cruelly dated. But I remember reading the novel late, late into the night when I was 14, stirring restlessly with the desire to be by love possessed. I cannot throw out these books."
Appropriately there were many references to paths and journeys at the opening of the Rubin Museum's exhibition featuring The Red Book, Carl Jung's long unpublished journal of inner exploration that has just been released in a remarkable edition by Norton ($195, 9780393065671/0393065677).
Sonu Shamdasani, editor and one of the translators of The Red Book and a Jung scholar, said that "on the human level, the book can be read as the story of how one man, a leading figure of our time, lost his way in the middle of life's journey, such as Dante faced at the beginning of the Commedia, and what he did to find his way."
After decades of being "governed by rational directed thinking," Shamdasani continued, Jung began writing The Red Book in 1914 as a way "to explore his fantasies and to think mystically." For 16 years, Jung wrote in the book regularly, then stopped. "He spent the next 30 years trying to come out of it and describe it rationally."
The Red Book helped Jung found a new cosmology and find meaning in his own life. "It will transform the reading of Jung's work," Shamdasani said. "And secondary interpretations of Jung during this period, including biographies, will have to be rewritten." Asked if the book would lead to different interpretations of Jung's work, Shamdasani said that instead, The Red Book will lead to "more understanding of his work."
Noting Jung's well-known ambivalence about publishing the book, Shamdasani said his goal in editing it was "quite simple: to produce a work that would be in a form Jung would have approved."
The huge, elaborate, leather-bound book that resembles a medieval illustrated manuscript was painstakingly scanned and reproduced by DigitalFusion and printed by Mondadori. See DigitalFusion's trailer on the making of the book. Shamdasani stated that a book so true to the original was technically not possible as recently as 10 years ago.
Don't miss the ur-book (above), which has spent almost all of its existence either in the Jung family home or a safe deposit box in Zurich. It and related material will be on display at the Rubin Museum at Seventh Avenue and 17th Street in New York City until January 25. As part of the exhibition, the Museum is putting on a series of conversations, pairing a psychoanalyst with people like Alice Walker, David Byrne, Adam Gopnik and Cornel West, among many others, who will respond to some of the dreamscapes in The Red Book.
This really is worth a visit. Seeing the original The Red Book feels like looking at the original Declaration of Independence or the MS of any classic novel or perhaps the Ten Commandments themselves.--John Mutter
Today on Fresh Air: David Hoffman, author of The Dead Hand: the Untold Story of the Cold War Arms Race and its Dangerous Legacy (Doubleday, $35, 9780385524377/0385524374).
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Tomorrow morning on the Early Show: Alton Brown, author of Good Eats: The Early Years (Stewart, Tabori & Chang, $37.50, 9781584797951/1584797959).
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Tomorrow morning on the Today Show: Deborah Norville, author of The Power of Respect: Benefit from the Most Forgotten Element of Success (Thomas Nelson, $19.99, 9780785227601/0785227601).
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Tomorrow morning on Good Morning America: Rory Tahari, author of Lists for Life: The Essential Guide to Getting Organized and Tackling Tough To-Dos (Simon Spotlight, $19.99, 9781439124680/143912468X).
Also on GMA: Chris O’Dell, author of Miss O'Dell (Touchstone, $26, 9781416590934/1416590935).
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Tomorrow on Dr. Phil: Jean Twenge, author of Generation Me: Why Today's Young Americans Are More Confident, Assertive, Entitled--and More Miserable Than Ever Before (Free Press, $14.95, 9780743276986/0743276981).
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Tomorrow night on 20/20: Carmina Salcido, author of Not Lost Forever: My Story of Survival (Morrow, $25.99, 9780061210051/0061210056).
Also on 20/20: Valerie Bertinelli, author of Finding It: And Satisfying My Hunger for Life Without Opening the Fridge (Free Press, $26, 9781439141632/1439141630).
Book TV airs on C-Span 2 from 8 a.m. Saturday to 8 a.m. Monday and focuses on political and historical books as well as the book industry. The following are highlights for this coming weekend. For more information, go to Book TV's website.
Saturday, October 10
12-3 p.m. Coverage of the Brooklyn Book Festival, which was held September 13, includes events featuring Amy Goodman, Lewis Lapham and Naomi Klein. (Re-airs Sunday at 2:30 a.m.)
4:15 p.m. Gordon Goldstein, author of Lessons in Disaster: McGeorge Bundy and the Path to War in Vietnam (Holt, $16, 9780805090871/0805090878), talks about the Kennedy/Johnson national security adviser's role in the escalation of the Vietnam war. (Re-airs Sunday at 11:15 a.m.)
6 p.m. Encore Booknotes. In a segment that first aired in 1992, Neil Postman, author of Technopoly: The Surrender of Culture to Technology (Vintage, $13, 9780679745402/0679745408), noted the dependence of Americans on technological advances for their own security.
8:30 p.m. Michael Awkward discusses his book, Burying Don Imus: Anatomy of a Scapegoat (University of Minnesota Press, $24.95, 9780816667413/0816667411). (Re-airs Sunday at 2:15 p.m.)
10 p.m. After Words. Mimi Hall interviews Tom Ridge, the first Secretary of Homeland Security and author of The Test of Our Times: America Under Siege . . . And How We Can Be Safe Again (Thomas Dunne, $25.99, 9780312534875/0312534876). (Re-airs Sunday at 9 p.m. and Monday at 12 a.m. and 3 a.m.)
11 p.m. Tennessee Reed, author of Spell Albuquerque (AK Press, $18.95, 9781904859888/1904859887), recounts being diagnosed at an early age with a language based communication disorder and told she would never read or write. (Re-airs Monday at 1 a.m.)
Sunday, October 11
12 a.m. Robert Spector, author of The Mom & Pop Store: How the Unsung Heroes of the American Economy Are Surviving and Thriving (Walker, $26, 9780802716057/0802716059), presents the culture and mindset of independent entrepreneurs, showing how community support of the local merchant is sustaining the mom and pop store during the economic downturn. (Re-airs Sunday at 3:45 p.m.)
8 p.m. Colin Beavan talks about his book, No Impact Man: The Adventures of a Guilty Liberal Who Attempts to Save the Planet and the Discoveries He Makes About Himself and Our Way of Life in the Process (FSG, $25, 9780374222888/0374222886).
Samuel L. Jackson has agreed to star in Same Kind of Different as Me, adapted from the book Same Kind of Different As Me: A Modern-Day Slave, an International Art Dealer, and the Unlikely Woman Who Bound Them Together by Denver Moore, Ron Hall and Lynn Vincent.
Variety reported that Jackson will play Moore, "an ex-con drifter who develops an unlikely friendship with a wealthy Dallas art dealer named Ron Hall. The book . . . was optioned by Veralux Media in 2008. With Jackson aboard, the script is now being shopped for production financing."
The 2009 Nobel Prize in literature has been awarded to Herta Mueller, a Romanian-born German novelist, essayist and poet who was praised by the judges for depicting the "landscape of the dispossessed" with "the concentration of poetry and the frankness of prose."
BBC News reported that "Mueller, born in 1953, is renowned for her depiction of the harsh conditions under Nicolae Ceausescu's regime. . . . Her first collection of German language short stories, published in 1982, were censored in Romania. Mueller's initial works were smuggled out of the country, while in later years she was awarded several literary prizes, including Dublin's Impac Award in 1998."
The Guardian featured a more detailed look at her life and career, noting that her "latest novel Atemschaukel (Everything I Possess I Carry With Me) was published in August, and follows a 17-year-old boy who is deported to a Ukrainian labour camp. The Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung called it 'phenomenal, moving and humbling novel, perhaps the most memorable read of the autumn.'"
Autumn Day
Lord: it is time. Your summer was superb.
Lay your shadows on the sundials,
and in the meadows let the winds go free.
Command the last fruits to be full;
give them only two more southern days,
urge them on to completion and chase
the last sweetness into the heavy wine.
Whoever has no house will never build one now.
Whoever is alone now will long remain so,
will stay awake, read books, write long letters
and wander restless back and forth
along the tree-lined streets, as the leaves drift down.
--Marilyn Dahl
More sales rep favorites for the fall and early spring from the Pacific Northwest Booksellers Association trade show:
Jennifer Royce of Hachette favored Roses by Leila Meacham, a first novel by a retired schoolteacher (Grand Central, $24.99, January 2010). It's a Texas generational saga, "a different type of book for today," recalling Colleen McCullough's novels with well-developed characters. From the children's division, Nubs: The True Story of a Mutt, a Marine and a Miracle by Brian Dennis, Mary Nethery and Kirby Larson (LBYR, $17, November) is a winner. Nubs, an Iraqi dog of war, never had a home or a person of his own. His life changed when he met Marine Major Brian Dennis and underwent a 70-mile dangerous journey to find the Major after his division moved. Hankie time.
Hankies might also be required for Harper rep Diane Jackson's pick, but only for tears of laughter: I Shudder: And Other Reactions to Life, Death, and New Jersey by Paul Rudnick ($23, September). He writes like David Sedaris, and we can never have too much of that. Jackson also likes Shadow Tag, the new Louise Erdrich novel ($25.99, February 2010), and an August title, The Day the Falls Stood Still by Cathy Marie Buchanan ($24, Voice), about Niagara Falls in 1915 and a romance between a girl of privilege and a river man. Gabe Barillas from Harper unhesitatingly picked Jo Nesbø's The Devil's Star (Harper, $25, March 2010), saying it's well-plotted, complicated but not confusing, with a great villain--and "better than Stieg Larsson."
Diana Van Vleck from Penguin was passionate about The Postmistress by Sarah Blake (Putnam, $25.95, February 2010), which has a beautiful cover that seems to draw a love it/hate it reaction. We loved it and love the book. The Postmistress is set in the U.S and England during World War II, and Van Vleck says it has relevance to today's diasporas. Penguin colleague Bob Belmont was equally enthusiastic about The Ides of March ($16 paper, February 2010), a gripping tale of ancient Rome and political thriller. He said that the author, Valerio Massimo Manfredi, is a genius. Not to be outdone in the passion department, Patrick McNierney chimed in with The Surrendered by Chang-Rae Lee (Riverhead, $26.95, March 2010). It's a sprawling saga of a Korean family from the Korean War to the present. He says you can open it at any page and always find a perfect sentence.
Simon's Michael Croy said he was blown away by the new Audrey Niffenegger (Her Fearful Symmetry, $26, September), and thinks it will broaden her already wide audience. Another pick was Leviathan by Scott Westerfield, illustrated by Keith Thompson (Simon Pulse, $19.99, October), a YA title that he likened to Hugo Cabret but with more text. It's a steampunk novel (speculative fiction set in the age of steam power), a beautifully rendered adventure yarn. Rep Amy Schoppert concurred, saying that she also likes a kids' book, Guess Again by Mac Barnett, illustrated by Adam Rex ($16.99, September). It's "so freakin' funny" that even the most cynical person will laugh out loud, and reading it to kids will get you a puddle of laughing children. She said she likes another kids' book, All the World by Liz Garton Scanlon, illustrated by Marla Frazee (Beach Lane Books, $17.99, September), about the bigness of the world and our part in it. She likes it because it's not sappy and doesn't hit you over the head with its message.
The Random House people spanned the spectrum of genres with their picks. Dandy Conway chose All Unquiet Things, a literary YA thriller a la Veronica Mars, written by Anna Jarzab (Delacorte, $17.99, January 2009). David Glenn, aka Mr. Enthusiasm, was over the moon about a summer book from Justin Cronin, The Passage (Ballantine, $25, June 2010), the first of a trilogy. He couldn't believe the scope and majesty of this 700-page vampire novel, he said, succinctly summing up his feelings with "Holy crap!" A slighty quieter response came from Katie Mehan, but with no less fervor, when she talked about two books: Claiming Ground by Laura Bell (Knopf, $24.95, March 2010). "It's the best kind of memoir writing. Wyoming, Big Horn Basin. Dogs. Sheep. How can you go wrong?" The other is from Henning Mankell, The Man from Beijing (Knopf, $25.95, February 2010). Not a Kurt Wallender, it's set in China and Africa, and is "an amazing weave" of mystery, politics and the global economy. Valerie Walley chose Union Atlantic, a debut novel from short story writer Adam Haslett (Nan A. Talese, $26, January 2010), which is also a favorite of ours. She calls the story about a young banker and a retired teacher--equally strong-willed--and a troubled high-school senior, amazing, powerful and evocative.
John Dally from Houghton Mifflin Harcourt was unequivocal about picking Robert Stone's story collection, Fun with Problems ($24, January 2010). Why? "It's Robert Stone." Enough said.
Scholastic's Chris Satterlund was in a scary place with her favorite reads. Shiver by Maggie Stiefvater ($17, August) is a beautifully written novel about werewolf love; she read it in one sitting and cried. Possessed by Kate Cann ($16.99, February 2010) is a first novel, a straight-up ghost story, that actually frightened her--she stopped reading it while she was on the road, waiting until she got home to finish. On a more cheerful note is Testing the Ice, a true story about Jackie Robinson and his fear of water by his daughter Sharon, lushly illustrated by Kadir Nelson ($16.99, October).
Cindy Heidemann from PGW loves Jarretsville by Cornelia Nixon (Counterpoint, $15.95 paper, September). She called it a Civil War novel that's not a "Civil War novel," but mostly a love story set in a post-Civil War border town. Another love story she picked is February by Lisa Moore (Black Cat, $14.95 paper, February 2010), based on a real oil rig disaster off the Grand Banks. "Helen and her family will stay with me forever."
Kurtis Lowe of Book Travelers West chose The Elements: A Visual Exploration of Every Known Atom in the Universe by Theodore Gray (Black Dog and Leventhal, $29.95, October). He said he "hasn't seen a science book come along in a long time that's as engaging as this." He also liked The Girl Who Fell from the Sky by Heidi W. Durrow ($22.95, February 2010), Algonquin's second Bellwether Prize title (the first was Mudbound). And from Workman, he selected BananaGrams by Joe Edley ($8.95 paper, September), a little book of puzzles inspired by the game Bananagrams. Don't know it? Check out the website. Not only is it masses of fun, but the creator has stories about how sales of the game saved some bookstores from going under. Hyperbole? Maybe, but everyone we've played it with raves about it and we know that it's a bestselling sideline at many bookstores.
Another great sideline comes from the Vashon Island Coffee Roasterie. Do people like coffee? Are you selling the Twilight series at all? Uh huh. Then these four new blends inspired by the series would make a great addition to your Twilight display and your bottom line: New Moon Rising, Bella's Blend, La Tua Cantante,and Volturi Italian Roast. The packages have lovely, eerie labels, the coffee is organic, fair trade, shade grown, and most is bought from small farming communities. And it's good. Mary Kay Rauma, director of sales and marketing at the Roasterie, says, "Edward Cullen would call us the Aston Martin of coffees. Check them out here.
This makes us think of our favorite title from PNBA, containing words of wisdom that send us in search of a cup of New Moon Rising and a well-lit room: Never Slow Dance with a Zombie by E. Van Lowe (Tor Teen, $8.99, August). And the book beat goes on.--Marilyn Dahl
