Shelf Awareness is taking a long weekend so this will be our last issue of the week. See you again on Monday!

(Apologies for the delay sending out today's issue. There was much last-minute news.) 

 

"Most people in the book business know they will not make a lot of money. There's never been a bubble burst here--we never had a bubble. We find other rewards. There are still poetry lovers. Just a few minutes ago, I had a conversation with someone about Robinson Jeffers and Emily Dickinson. That is a form of payment for me."--Christine Deavel, co-owner of Open Books: A Poem Emporium, Seattle, Wash., profiled in the Seattle Post-Intelligencer. (Incidentally the store does make money.)

In the second quarter ended August 4, sales at Barnes & Noble rose 7.6% to $1.2 billion and net earnings were $18.1 million, which includes $8 million from "previously unrecognized tax benefits" as well as savings from lower-than-expected distribution center closing costs. Without those extras, net earnings would have been $8 million.

Sales at stores open at least a year rose 4.4% in the quarter. Sales at B&N.com rose 17.9% compared to the second quarter of 2006.

It was no surprise that sales were "positively impacted" by Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows. B&N sold 1.7 million copies in its stores and 400,000 copies online through the quarter. Were there no new Harry, comp-store sales would have increased 1% in stores and 7.3% online. B&N predicts that third quarter comp-store sales will be flat to a low-single digit gain.

Other bestsellers in the quarter included The Reagan Diaries, Al Gore's The Assault on Reason, Conn and Hal Iggulden's The Dangerous Book for Boys, Walter Isaacson's Einstein, Khaled Hosseini's A Thousand Splendid Suns and Janet Evanovich's Lean Mean Thirteen.

CEO Steve Riggio said in a statement that "the new release schedule for the third quarter includes a few books that should generate significant media attention, including President Clinton's Giving, Alan Greenspan's The Age of Turbulence and Eric Clapton's The Autobiography."

During the second quarter, B&N bought back 500,000 of its shares for $19.5 million. So far this quarter it has bought another 1.2 million shares for $39.8 million. The company also opened four and closed two B&N stores as well as closed three Dalton stores. It now operates 792 stores.

We've heard sad news, although it's not been confirmed, that Grace Paley has died at age 84. A feminist, peace activist and teacher, Paley has been renowned for short stories in which some readers say nothing happens and others say everything happens.

Paley's work includes three short story collections, The Little Disturbances of Man, Enormous Changes at the Last Minute and Later the Same Day. All of these volumes have been assembled in The Collected Stories (FSG, $17, 9780374530280/0374530289), which was reissued in paperback in April as an FSG Classic. She also wrote poetry and nonfiction.

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The Borders Rewards program, which launched in February 2006, now has more than 20 million members and is adding 150,000 new members a week. In a statement, Borders CEO George Jones commented, "As membership builds, so does our capability to leverage the Borders Rewards database as a distinct advantage in introducing customers to new and important titles and promoting them."

Among other things, members receive the company's Shortlist weekly e-mail, which in part offers access to Borders's online video book club and to Borders Live at 01, author and artist events filmed at the Borders store in downtown Ann Arbor.

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Today's New York Times takes a surreal trip with Laura Albert aka JT LeRoy. At one point Albert says of life with her alter ego: "I'm totally aware it sounds wacky, but I never really thought of it in terms of right or wrong, truth or lie. It was more like two computer programs running in my head. There was him, and there was me."

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The BBC investigates new trends in crime fiction, including a new series of Agatha Christie comic books and the subgenre of exotic fiction.

One example of "those seeking to reinterpret crime fiction is Welsh author Matt Beynon Rees," BBC wrote. "The Middle East correspondent for the Scotsman and Time magazine has turned novelist with stories of an aging Palestinian teacher turned amateur sleuth," who makes his first appearance in The Collaborator of Bethlehem (Soho Crime, $22, 9781569474426/1569474427).

The BBC continued, "Detective stories can provide insight into an alien society, Rees says from his home in Jerusalem. 'I wanted to put across the reality of Palestinians' lives in a genre that would reach a lot of people, and not be based all around politics. Crime fiction is perfect to focus on the reality of life inside someone's head, which journalism can't show.' "

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Magdalen Nabb, British crime writer and author of children's books, died last Saturday, August 18, following a stroke. She 60 years old.

Nabb's most popular character was Sicilian-born police detective Marshal Salvatore Guarnaccia. Soho Press will publish the most recent title in the series, Death of a Dutchman, in November and Vita Nuova next June.

She also published 13 books for children and young adults, including The Enchanted Horse, which won the British Smarties Book Prize in 1993.

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Tor Books will offer its first podcasts--from the 65th World Science Fiction Convention in Yokohama, Japan, August 30-September 4.

Tor publisher Tom Doherty and senior editor Patrick Nielsen Hayden will send daily podcasts during the convention that will include interviews with authors and editors. The podcasts will be available for download from iTunes, Yahoo and Google, through RSS, and on Tor's website.

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If you're still working on that novel, you're in good company. According to the Guardian, a new YouGov poll reported that more Britons "would rather be a writer than anything else." The Guardian even offers a bit of helpful advice for would-be authors: "So, by all means, write, if you enjoy it. But, if you value your sanity--and that of any readers--keep it to yourself. Keep the dream; just don't give up the day job."

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Effective next Monday, August 27, Silverback Books and its imprint, Fitway Publishing, will be distributed exclusively by Ingram Publisher Services.

Silverback Books, which has headquarters in San Francisco, Calif., and a backlist of more than 200 titles, publishes books on food, cooking, lifestyle and wellness topics and offers a custom publishing service for authors. Last year Silverback acquired Fitway, which publishes architecture and design, biography and passion titles.

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Tantor Media, which specializes in unabridged audiobooks, has moved to a larger location in Old Saybrook, Conn., as part of an expansion of its list and sales efforts, including a new library sales force. Tantor plans to open a U.K. branch this year to oversee international sales.

The new headquarters is next to the company's production and warehouse facility.

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Randall McKenzie has been named national sales manager at AtlasBooks, a division of BookMasters. He formerly worked at BookWorld, Meredith, and Health Communications and has managed national accounts for more than 20 years. Besides overseeing the sales force, he will be responsible for new marketing strategies.

Founded in 2001, AtlasBooks, Ashland, Ohio, distributes small- and mid-sized publishers.

This morning on the Today Show: Susan Spicer, author of Crescent City Cooking: Unforgettable Recipes from Susan Spicer's New Orleans (Knopf, $35, 9781400043897/1400043891).

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Today on NPR's Morning Edition as part of the Crime in the City series, Laura Lippman, whose latest book is What the Dead Know (Morrow, $24.95, 9780061128851/0061128856), introduces listeners to Baltimore, Md., the city in which her mysteries are set.

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This morning on Fox & Friends: Mark Schapiro, author of Exposed: The Toxic Chemistry of Everyday Products and What's at Stake for American Power (Chelsea Green, $22.95, 9781933392158/1933392150). 

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Today on KCRW's Bookworm: Michael Ondaatje, whose most recent book is Divisadero (Knopf, $25, 9780307266354/0307266354). As the show put it: "Michael Ondaatje's novels come together through a combination of obsession and intuition. He works in the dark, not knowing where he is heading, juxtaposing disparate materials, noticing echoes and recurrences. We explore the mysterious convergences in this novel--convergences that link a family ranch in contemporary California with the life and works of a forgotten French poet and novelist. How does Ondaatje come to know what his work is ultimately about?"

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Today on the Diane Rehm Show: Jonathan Kozol, author of Letters to a Young Teacher (Crown, $19.95, 9780307393715/0307393712).

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Today on NPR's Fresh Air: Jamie Tarabay, NPR's news bureau chief in Baghdad and author of A Crazy Occupation: Eyewitness to the Intifada (Allen & Unwin, distributed by IPG, $17.95, 9781741146509/174114650X).

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Tonight on the Daily Show with Jon Stewart: Lt. Col. John Nagl, co-author of The U.S. Army/Marine Corps Counterinsurgency Field Manual (University of Chicago Press, $15, 9780226841519/0226841510).

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Tonight on the Colbert Report: Joe Klein, whose most recent book is Politics Lost: From RFK to W: How Politicians Have Become Less Courageous and More Interested in Keeping Power than in Doing What's Right for America (Broadway, $12.95, 9780767916011/0767916018), recently released in paperback.

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Tomorrow morning on NPR's Morning Edition: Michael Connelly, author of The Overlook (Little, Brown, $21.99, 9780316018951/0316018953).

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Saturday on Face the Nation: Elizabeth Edwards, wife of presidential candidate John Edwards and author of Saving Graces: Finding Solace and Strength from Friends and Strangers (Broadway, $14.95, 9780767925389/0767925386).

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On CBS Sunday Morning: Pattie Boyd, author of Wonderful Tonight: George Harrison, Eric Clapton, and Me (Harmony, $25.95, 9780307393845/0307393844). Boyd was married first to Harrison and later to Clapton.

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On Weekend Edition Sunday: Tim Green, former NFLer and author of the YA novel, Football Genius (HarperCollins, $16.99, 9780061122705/006112270X).

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, August 25

4:30 p.m. History on Book TV. Dan Kurzman, author of A Special Mission: Hitler's Secret Plot to Seize the Vatican and Kidnap Pope Pius XII (Perseus, $26, 9780306814686/0306814684), contends that a deal was struck with the pope to remain silent about the Holocaust in return for the safety of the Vatican.

6 p.m. Encore Booknotes. In a segment first aired in 1997, Frank McCourt discussed Angela's Ashes (Scribner, $14.95, 9780684842677/068484267X), which chronicled the author's childhood in an impoverished section of Limerick, Ireland, as well as the gift for storytelling he inherited from his father .

8 p.m. Yuri Felshtinsky, author of Blowing Up Russia: The Secret Plot to Bring Back KGB Terror (Encounter Books, $25.95, 9781594032011/1594032017), argues that Russian president Vladimir Putin is using the Russian secret service to preserve his power and transform Russia back into an authoritarian state. (Re-airs Sunday, August 26, at 11 a.m. and Sunday, September 2, at 12 a.m.)
 
9 p.m. After Words. Peter Prichard, president of the Newseum, interviews Scott Gant, author of We're All Journalists Now: The Transformation of the Press and Reshaping of the Law in the Internet Age (Free Press, $26, 9780743299268/0743299264). Gant asserts that bloggers and others he terms "citizen journalists" follow in the tradition of early pamphleteers such as Thomas Paine and should be afforded the same legal rights and privileges as traditional journalists. (Re-airs Sunday at 6 p.m. and 9 p.m.)

Sunday, August 26

6:30 a.m. Roosevelt Reading Festival. Elizabeth Borgwardt, author of A New Deal for the World (Belknap, $35, 9780674018747/0674018745), argues that under the New Deal, for the first time, the interests of the people were placed before the interests of national government.

9:30 a.m. Glenn Greenwald, author of A Tragic Legacy: How a Good vs. Evil Mentality Destroyed the Bush Presidency (Crown, $24.95, 9780307354198/0307354199), argues that President George Bush's good vs. evil world view won him supporters after 9/11 but has since backfired in Iraq, Iran and on the domestic front. (Re-airs Monday at 6:30 a.m.)     

12 p.m. In a discussion with Rick Kogan of the Chicago Tribune at Maxim's in Chicago, Karen Abbott, author of Sin in the Second City: Madams, Ministers, Playboys, and the Battle for America's Soul (Random House, $25.95, 9781400065301/1400065305), recounts the history of Chicago's Everleigh Club, a brothel operated by sisters Minna and Ada Everleigh from 1900 to 1911.

1 p.m. From FreedomFest in Las Vegas, Richard Viguerie, author of Conservatives Betrayed: How George W. Bush and Other Big Government Republicans Hijacked the Conservative Cause (Bonus Books, $24.95, 9781566252850/1566252857), asserts that President Bush and other "big government Republicans" have betrayed conservative policies and describes how conservatives can take their party back.

1:50 p.m. Mike German, former FBI undercover counterterrorism agent and author of Thinking Like a Terrorist: Insights of a Former FBI Undercover Agent (Potomac Books, $26.95, 9781597970259/1597970255), describes the mindset of the terrorists he has encountered and suggests ways for the U.S. government to more effectively fight them.

3:30 p.m. Public Lives. Steven Bach, author of Leni: The Life and Work of Leni Riefenstahl (Knopf, $30, 9780375404009/0375404007), explores the life of the German filmmaker, whose best-known works, Triumph of the Will and Olympia, were produced during the Nazi era.

If ever there were a boy book, this is it. John Milton, 13 years old at the opening of this funny first novel set in 1990 South Africa, earns his nickname when his dormmates at boarding school discover that his "willy is tiny and [his] balls haven't dropped yet." Spud and his seven bunkmates are quickly deemed the "Crazy Eight" for their outlandish antics, such as sneaking out for a midnight swim or breaking into the kitchen to steal 10 kg. of stewing meat (then browning it on a portable gas cooker in their dorm room). While some readers may wish to skim the asides about Spud's senile grandmother (dubbed Wombat), they likely won't care about the rather rambling structure, which simply follows the chronology of the first-year diary Spud keeps. All of the requisite boarding school events are here: Rambo, the he-man and de facto leader of the Crazy Eights, has an affair with the (married) drama teacher; Vern Blackadder (aka Rain Man) becomes the house scapegoat for all cruel pranks; "Fatty" overeats and continually breaks his personal best for fart duration.

Spud's credibility and the fresh way in which he describes the milestones of growing up make him a winning narrator, as when, for instance, he records his first kiss with a beautiful girl he calls the Mermaid: "After a moment's shock my own tongue met hers and we were joined in a mad tongue wrestle of love." (In an example of how well van de Ruit plays for laughs, this page of Spud's diary later winds up on the house notice board.) Larger world events unfold in the background, such as de Klerk's speech to Parliament about the dismantling of apartheid (February 2, 1990) and Nelson Mandela's televised release from prison on February 9. Yet they also believably take a back seat to simply surviving dorm life. Spud enjoys singing as much as cricket, befriends teachers as well as peers, and witnesses love and death--all with a healthy dose of humor. This book will make the rounds of boys' locker rooms everywhere.--Jennifer M. Brown

The top-selling sex guide at AbeBooks.com this year is not out of print, as we inadvertently stated yesterday. Intended for Pleasure: Sex Technique and Sexual Fulfillment in Christian Marriage by Dr. Ed Wheat and Gaye Wheat (Revell Books, $19.99, 9780800717360/0800717368) is in its third edition! Our apologies.

 

Carl Lennertz, v-p, independent retailing, at HarperCollins whose blog is publishinginsider.net, reports from this year's Denver Publishing Institute.

Rocky Mountain high?

More like Rocky Mountain hot and dry. Yes, my week teaching marketing at the Denver Publishing Institute coincided with a major heat wave, and one had to drink a lot of water. Rumor is that the angles of the cool new Denver Art Museum make you dizzy; I just needed more aqua.

I enjoyed both the museum and a pilgrimage to buy some vintage vinyl at Wax Trax the day before I was to start yakking away. This was my second time taking on, with his most generous blessing, Richard Hunt's famous weeklong marketing gig, so I was calmer this year but still nervous enough to rewrite all my notes. I also had to allot more time for e-marketing: blogs, e-cards, MySpace and Facebook, and ebooks, as well as increase the time to discuss the changing retail and media world as well as the rise of the paperback original.

The Denver Publishing Institute was started 30 years ago by Elizabeth Geiser, a marketing exec from Macmillan, Gale and Bowker, and she is a dynamo!! She oversees a four-week course for 100 college grads looking to get into publishing, mostly in editorial, but some are also considering sales, marketing and publicity. The first two weeks are hands-on editorial-heavy, from acquisition to line editing, kicked off by keynoter Larry Kirshbaum, always a treat. (Week four involves interviewing with visiting HR folks from small and large publishers, plus a visit to the offices of Fulcrum.)

The third week is marketing week, and I go on all day Monday, poor kids, to lay the groundwork and to get the students started on creating marketing plans on a budget for a list of 10 books. Guest speakers appear the rest of the week. Carolyn Schwartz of BDD and Kathleen Spinelli of Brand-to-Books teach ad/promo Tuesday morning, and Pete McCarthy of Random does online marketing Tuesday afternoon. Wednesday morning means publicity led by Scott Manning, and in the afternoon, the students get to witness an actual sales call, albeit on stage, between Cathy Langer of Tattered Cover and David Waag, a commission rep for Karel/Dutton. Thursday involves the future of libraries and online.

Friday is marketing plan presentation day, along with the introduction of a surprise guest author--the author of one of the 10 books the students have been working on. This year, we brought in Gordon Campbell, an attorney whose debut thriller, Missing Witness, was discovered by Betsy Burton of the King's English, Salt Lake City, Utah, and is being published this fall by Morrow. Gordon was smuggled into the back of the auditorium halfway through the morning and then sprung on the class, who went nuts. They loved his book and were so flattered he would show up just for them. We had an impromptu ARE signing on the spot.

The highlight for me is the enthusiasm of these students for publishing, and they are the faces of the future, especially as they are so tech-savvy and hear about books themselves in all the new ways. There is plenty of time to talk in class during breaks and--flashback--over lunch in the cafeteria. (The food is better than in my time. They have salad now!) The students are both realistic and idealistic about the business, but they want to be in it, which is great.

A highlight of this year--and a point of sadness--was the impending retirement of Elizabeth. She is handing over the running of the Institute to Joyce Meskis of the Tattered Cover. Joyce runs the Institute next year, along with co-director Jill Smith (who is also a museum administration expert) and administrator Sandra Bond (who is also a literary agent), two wonderful, smart presences for the students and teachers the entire month.

Elizabeth, thank you so much! There are hundreds of students in your debt. You guided them into publishing positions these many years, giving them the big picture and not just the view of their chosen areas. It should be noted that Elizabeth is the editor of The Business of Book Publishing, a basic text on publishing, and, in 1988, she was honored for the accomplishments of her professional career and for "her role as an industry educator" by being inducted into the Publishing Hall of Fame. THAT is cool!