Cool idea of the day: The Ossining (N.Y.) Public Library has begun an online literary magazine,
The Ossining Review of Books.
The first issue includes a list of Ben Cheever's five favorite books
set in Westchester County, N.Y. (Only one of the handful is by his
father, John, who lived in Ossining for many years.) Check it out at
www.ossininglibrary.org.
---
Carl Lennertz, the man who has written some of the most entertaining
newsletters in the industry both at Random House and now at
HarperCollins--not to mention his sparkling Book Sense comments--is
entering the blogosphere, as he put it. He has a site
of his own, sponsored by Harper, where he can keep us all informed and
amused on a range of topics, particularly the dynamics of word of mouth
for books as well as for music, movies, theater and art. Catch Carl online
at
publishinginside.net.
---
Another of our favorite people in the industry, Tina Jordan, is joining the
Association of American Publishers as
vice-president. She had been director of public relations and special
events at BookExpo America, where she has worked since Reed Exhibitions
took full control of the show in 1997.
She replaces Kathryn Blough, who is becoming a teacher. Jordan will be
responsible for, among other things, the trade executive committee, the
Smaller and Independent Publishers Group, the Get Caught Reading
campaign, the industry statistics program and educational programs.
---
Yet another good friend, Larry Portzline, who has been working fulltime on
bookstore tourism
(in addition to his fulltime day job with the Pennsylvania
legislature), is showing he's human. After three years, he will take a
sabbatical from bookstore tourism for at least three months--if not
more--although he will continue to work on starting up the National
Council on Bookstore Tourism, planning a few bookstore trips in the
Harrisburg area and putting together a panel at BEA.
We wish Larry a good rest but hope he comes back soon.
---

This coming Sunday, January 8, and again on January 22,
Striper Wars by Dick Russell (Island Press, $26.95, 159720908) will appear as bedside reading on the hit TV show
Grey's Anatomy.
According to a very happy Kathleen DeBoer, director of sales and marketing at Island Press, the show's
set design shopper saw the book at a bookstore and liked the cover. She
read the jacket and thought it perfect for the show character Derek,
aka Dr. McDreamy.
---
British citizens are visiting public libraries more but taking out
fewer books, which "appears to suggest that visitors are using their
local libraries for research or for multimedia facilities rather than
for their traditional purpose of book lending," yesterday's
Guardian reported. Visits to U.K. public libraries rose last year for the third year in a row.