In a roundup of reaction to the introduction of the Kindle DX, one of whose target markets is college textbooks, NACS's Campus Marketplace graded the program for the e-reader at six colleges and universities incomplete. "Each school is still working out the specifics of its pilot program," it wrote. "It appears preliminary planning didn't take into account such logistical issues as financial aid, returns, and access for disabled students."

At Case Western Reserve University, the Kindle DX will be used by about 50 undergraduates taking chemistry, electrical engineering and computer science courses. At Arizona State University, some honors students will use the e-readers. Princeton's pilot is sponsored by the University Library and the Office of Information Technology and will involve scanning of some material for the students, who are in three courses. At Reed College, students in three or four humanities and social science classes will be offered the choice of using a Kindle or traditional textbooks.

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To help save attendees' and exhibitors' travel costs, the National Association of College Stores is reducing the length of next year's CAMEX show in Orlando, Fla., to four days from its traditional five, Campus Marketplace reported. The show will now take place March 12-15.

"The new four-day schedule will provide a high-quality and valued program while reducing NACS members' travel costs," said Hugh Easley, NACS's v-p, meetings and expositions. "Those attending will not see a decrease in the number of hours they can spend on the trade show floor."

Under the new schedule, the trade show and educational panels will overlap somewhat on Saturday, March 13. 

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Today HarperOne launches the Little Black Book, which lists author-experts on various subjects. Claudia Riemer Boutote, v-p, associate publisher, said that the house had put together the database over the past five years and that it's been popular with the media and events planners--who have wondered if it could be delivered to them electronically. Et voila.

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The latest book ordering scam reported by several booksellers features a few twists: the order for President Obama's books--in hardcover--comes from a local address, and the orderer wants a list of all the store's inventory.

As Kenny Brechner, owner of DDG Booksellers, Farmington, Me., put it on NEIBA's list serve: "Poor Bill Clinton. Barrack seems to have finally put the scammers off My Life. In any case, these are old school scams: a gmail account, a stolen credit card and thou. The only wrinkle is using a U.S. address instead of direct to Nigeria."

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We's happy to report/
That the New York Times/
Has found a special bond:/
New Jersey and poetry.
Who the @#$! knew?!

--Joisey Boy

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BEAcycle built for two.

Publisher Richard Hunt and online marketer Kara Pelicano of Keen Communications (Menasha Ridge Press, Clerisy Press and Wilderness Press) will take a green approach to their BookExpo America commute in Manhattan this year. According to Pelicano, they "will be pedaling a tandem bicycle (and whistling showtunes) between their accommodations and the Javits Center. In addition to saving money and promoting National Bike Month, the two are doing their share for cleaner air and going green."

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The Miami Herald called West Kendall Bookshelf, Miami, Fla., "a hidden treasure of great deals."

''Sensibly it's a bookstore but in reality it's an institution,'' said Steven Elliot, owner of the used bookshop. "The store is more of a community center--a place where the customers know one another and where they know the employees as well, and I'm proud of it.''

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CSI--Textbook Buyback. The Lawrence Journal-World reported that a "bookstore rivalry was interrupted by Kansas University police Thursday, after someone in a limousine threatened to kill a bookstore worker."

"The altercation stemmed from two rival bookstores attempting to get customers for the book buyback period," the police report observed.

Public Safety Office spokesman Capt. Schuyler Bailey told the Journal-World that University Book Shop, a private bookstore, "had rented a limo and was giving students rides for selling back their books." A passenger in the limousine allegedly "threatened to kill" an employee KU Bookstore, the university’s official bookshop, "if he didn't stop following them."

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Congratulations to Kelly Amabile, bookseller and events manager at WORD bookstore in Brooklyn, N.Y., who has begun to work part-time, too, for the New Atlantic Independent Booksellers Association.

Besides her work as a bookseller, which included more than a year as events and marketing manager at Book Culture in Manhattan, Amabile has experience in nonprofit management, higher education development, public relations, communications and marketing. She worked eight years in prospect research at Loyola College in Maryland, Baruch College and the Johns Hopkins Institutions, where she was assistant director of development research for four years.

She also provides independent research, writing and editing services for clients that include the National Geographic and the National Academy Foundation. Her freelance writing has appeared in National Geographic Traveler, Transitions Abroad and online at World Hum and Gadling. She is a volunteer for the Independent Booksellers of New York City (IBNYC) and was a board member of the Village Learning Place in Baltimore.

 

During March, book sales fell 17% to $388.4 million as reported by 84 publishers to the Association of American Publishers. For the year to date, book sales are down 6.8% to $1.625 billion.

The numbers are in line with the sales drops reported recently by some of the publicly traded publishers but are bigger falls than the Census Bureau reported for bookstores (bookstore sales were estimated to have fallen 1.3% to $999 million in March and are estimated to be down 4.1% to $4.242 billion for the year to date).

The strongest categories were e-books, which more than doubled in sales, children's hardcovers (shout out to Stephenie Meyer!) and the college market.

Among AAP categories:

• E-books rose 110.4% to $10 million.
• Higher education rose 20.2% to $50.3 million.
• Children's/YA hardcover rose 6.7% to $51.7 million.

• Adult mass market dipped 4.3% to $65.4 million.
• University press hardcover slipped 7.8% to $5.1 million.
• Religious books dropped 11.4% to $44.1 million.
• Children's/YA paperback fell 14.1% to $44.3 million.
• Professional and scholarly dropped 17.1% to $37.8 million.
• Adult hardcover fell 19.4% to $80 million.
• University press paperback fell 20.7% to $2.8 million.
• Adult paperback dropped 35.8% to $89.1 million.
• Audiobooks dropped 43.3% to $7.6 million.

 

Far out.

From May 25 through June 8, which coincides with BEA, Macy's flagship store at Herald Square in New York City will display 175 photographs from the book The Sixties by Robert Altman (Santa Monica Press) in its street-level windows. The "Summer of Love" retrospective is part of the annual Art Under Glass exhibition.

The window displays are curated by Altman and "conceptualized" with Macy's. The windows will also showcase Macy's fashion and accessories "inspired by the hippie aesthetic of the late 1960s and early 1970s," when Altman, a longtime Rolling Stone photographer, took many of these pictures. This summer marks the 40th anniversary of Woodstock.

Altman will sign copies of The Sixties on May 26 at Macy's.

The display includes photos of Aretha Franklin, Country Joe MacDonald, Crosby, Stills and Nash, Elton John, Grace Slick, Jerry Garcia, Dennis Hopper, George Harrison, the Grateful Dead, Iggy Pop, Jane Fonda and Peter Fonda, Janis Joplin, Joan Baez, Joni Mitchell, Linda Ronstadt, Pete Townsend and Tina Turner.

 

Earlier this month, Novella Carpenter, whose Farm City: The Education of an Urban Farmer comes out June 11 from Penguin Press, hosted Bay Area booksellers at her farm in Oakland, Calif., (no kidding!), where she grows crops and raises chickens and goats. Here Carpenter introduces Paul Yamazaki of City Lights Books to one of several two-day-old kids. She also served food raised and grown on the property.

Photo: Lindsay Wood.

 

A panel called How to Get a Job Like Ours (in 63 Easy Steps), sponsored by the Young Publishing Group of the AAP and the ABA's Emerging Leaders, takes place Wednesday, May 27, at 5:30 at the Hotel ABA, aka the Marriott Hotel in Brooklyn.

Panelists are Geoff Kloske, v-p and publisher of Riverhead Books, and Geoff Shandler, editor-in-chief of Little, Brown, who will talk about book publishing today in a Q&A moderated by Ed Nawotka from Publishers Weekly.

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Following is the third annual BEA Emerging Leaders party, which takes place on Wednesday, May 27, 7-9 p.m. at the Last Exit Bar, 136 Atlantic Ave., in Brooklyn. The Young Publishing Group of the AAP is invited, too. Authors attending include Peter Terzian, editor of Heavy Rotation: Twenty Writers on the Albums That Changed Their Lives (HarperCollins); Margot Berwin, author of Hothouse Flower (Pantheon); and Ben Greenman, author of Please Step Back (Melville House).

To RSVP for the panel or party: e-mail ypglunchreservations@hotmail.com by 5 p.m. this Wednesday, May 20.

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Sasquatch Books has one of the more unusual BEA "giveaways." John Skewes, creator of the Larry Gets Lost series for children, will sketch bookstores for the first 40 booksellers who bring a photograph of their stores to the Sasquatch booth (4408) on Friday, May 29.

Skewes will sketch and autograp Larry Gets Lost posters in the booth on Saturday from 10 a.m.-noon. Bookstore sketches will be available for pickup on Saturday beginning at 10 a.m.

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On Thursday, May 28, from 11 a.m.-Noon, Mike Shatzkin, founder and CEO of Idea Logical Company, looks at the future of book publishing in a session called Stay Ahead of the Shift: What Product-Centric Publishers Can Do to Flourish in a Community-Centric Web World. "He challenges the most basic assumptions we have always accepted--that a book is 'finished' when an author turns it in, that audiences are mostly reached through intermediaries, even that publishing is about products--and paints a believable picture of a completely different media and content world which, he maintains, is coming whether publishers like it or not. . . . Individual title marketing, which worked through a bunch of 'usual suspects' that hardly changed year to year, has become a game of Whack-a-mole, with new blogs and social networks popping up for every book between the time you get a manuscript and the time you print a book. And sales channels and how you reach them are shifting with new online accounts sprouting while many brick-and-mortar accounts are dying and catalogs, sales conferences, reps dedicated to bookstores, and even 'publishing seasons' themselves are endangered species."

 

This morning on the Today Show: Curtis Stone, author of Relaxed Cooking with Curtis Stone: Recipes to Put You in My Favorite Mood (Clarkson Potter, $32.50, 9780307408747/0307408744).

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Today on Fox News's Glenn Beck show: Thomas Sowell, author of The Housing Boom and Bust (Basic Books, $24.95, 9780465018802/0465018807).

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Today on Fox News's Hannity: Jesse Ventura, author of Don't Start the Revolution Without Me (Skyhorse Publishing, $14.95, 9781602397163/1602397163). He's also on the View today.

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Today on the Diane Rehm Show: Colm Toibin, author of Brooklyn (Scribner, $25, 9781439138311/1439138311).

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Today on NPR's On Point: David Ignatius, author of The Increment (Norton, $26.95, 9780393065046/0393065049). He's also scheduled for Charlie Rose tonight.

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Today on the Bonnie Hunt Show: Bethenny Frankel, author of Naturally Thin: Unleash Your SkinnyGirl and Free Yourself from a Lifetime of Dieting (Fireside, $16, 9781416597988/1416597980).

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Tonight on the Daily Show with Jon Stewart: Newt Gingrich, author of 5 Principles for a Successful Life (Crown Forum, $22, 9780307462329/0307462323).

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Tomorrow morning on the Today Show: Charlie Todd, author of Causing a Scene (Morrow, $19.99, 9780061703638/006170363X).

Also on Today: Lisa Rinna, author of Rinnavation: Getting Your Best Life Ever (Simon Spotlight, $26, 9781416948636/1416948635).

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Tomorrow on the Diane Rehm Show: Barbara Bradley Hagerty, author of Fingerprints of God: The Search for the Science of Spirituality (Riverhead, $26.95, 9781594488771/1594488770).

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Tomorrow on NPR's All Things Considered: Andy Raskin, author of The Ramen King and I: How the Inventor of Instant Noodles Fixed My Love Life (Gotham, $26, 9781592404445/1592404448).

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Tomorrow on NPR's On Point: Edmund L. Andrews, author of Busted: Life Inside the Great Mortgage Meltdown (Norton, $25.95, 9780393067941/0393067947).

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Tomorrow on the View: Elizabeth Edwards, author of Resilience: Reflections on the Burdens and Gifts of Facing Life's Adversities (Broadway, $22.95, 9780767931366/076793136X).

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Tomorrow night on Larry King Live: Larry himself discusses his new book, My Remarkable Journey (Weinstein Books, $27.95, 9781602860865/1602860866).

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Tomorrow night on the Colbert Report: Walter Kirn, author of Lost in the Meritocracy: The Undereducation of an Overachiever (Doubleday, $24.95, 9780385521284/0385521286).

 

From last week's Indie bestseller lists, available at IndieBound.org, here are the recommended titles, which are also Indie Next picks:

Hardcover

Secret Son by Laila Lalami (Algonquin, $23.95, 9781565124943/1565124944). "Laila Lalami has written a wonderfully crafted novel--set in the slums of Casablanca--whose carefully wrought characters allow us to lift the veil of media headlines and to gain greater empathy and understanding of the competing protagonists in today's sundered world. Secret Son is an irresistible read."--Paul Yamazaki, City Lights Books, San Francisco, Calif.

Almost Home by Christine Gleason (Kaplan, $26.95, 9781607140498/1607140497). "Almost Home is a deeply moving read of Christine Gleason's medical experiences as a doctor with premature babies on the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit. As she describes a different baby in each chapter, the reader is able to see and be part of both the miracles and failings that can occur day to day on the NICU. Every page in Almost Home celebrates the extraordinary strength of these little babies and all involved in their care."--Jody Hughes, Lakewood Ranch Booksellers, Bradenton, Fla.

Paperback

The God of War: A Novel by Marisa Silver (Simon & Schuster, $14, 9781416563174/1416563172). "Twelve-year-old Ares Ramirez lives in a trailer on the desolate shores of California's Salton Sea, where he tries to take care of his handicapped brother. Silver is a gifted writer whose story of a young man struggling with the burden of responsibility takes us to places both in the landscape and in the heart that enrich us as readers and make us grateful for such storytellers."--Marian Nielsen, Orinda Books, Orinda, Calif.

For Ages 7-12

Emmaline and the Bunny by Katherine Hannigan (Greenwillow, $14.99, 9780061626548/0061626546). "Katherine Hannigan tells a lovely story about what makes a perfect world, about friendship, and about becoming a steward of your environment. Her illustrations alone are worth the price of the book."--Jeanne Regentin, Between the Covers, Harbor Springs, Mich.

[Many thanks to IndieBound and the ABA!]

 

The Blue Hour: A Life of Jean Rhys by Lilian Pizzichini (Norton, $29.95, 9780393058031/0393058034, May 26, 2009)

Opening lines of books we want to read:

Foreword

In the summer of 1912 the French perfumer Jacques Guerlain concocted a scent from musk and rose de Bulgarie with a single note of jasmine. He intended his new scent, which he called L'Heure Bleue, to evoke dusk in the city. The blue hour is the time when heliotropes and irises in Parisian window boxes are bathed in a blue light and the well-groomed Parisienne prepares for the evening.

For the novelist Jean Rhys, the blue hour was also the hour when the lap-dog she saw herself as being during the day turned into a wolf. Dogs hunt best during twilight. Underneath our surface sophistication lurks a predator. Jean Rhys was always concerned with what lay beneath the top notes. In Quartet, her first novel, set in Paris, a young female character, smarter and bolder than her heroine, is wearing L'Heure Bleue by Guerlain. Rhys' heroine absorbs the woman's scent as though in breathing it in she can capture her rival's self-possession.

The scent itself is dusky, as though bought from an old-world apothecary on a forgotten street in Paris. Its hints of pastry and almonds make L'Heure Bleue a melancholic fragrance, as though in mourning for a time passed by. The curves of the Art Nouveau bottle, the stopper, in the form of a hollowed-out heart, allude to the romance of the years leading to the First World War. The story Jean Rhys told in Quartet describes the last days and weeks of a relationship, the loss of love and safety, and, implicity, the death of old Europe. L'Heure Bleue was her favorite pefume, and The Blue Hour is an attempt to re-capture her life.

--Selected by Marilyn Dahl

 

The Armies by Evilio Rosero, translated from the Spanish by Anne McLean, won the Independent Foreign Fiction prize. Author and translator share the £10,000 (US$15,181) award.

Boyd Tonkin praised the winner in the Independent: "Gentle in voice but ferocious in impact, The Armies tells the story of the destruction of a small highland town by the rival bands of soldiers, guerrillas and paramilitaries that have plagued rural Colombia for so many bitter years. Immaculately pitched and paced, Anne McLean's English version does it lavish justice."

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The James Tait Black Memorial prize shortlists for biographers and novelists have been announced. The Guardian reported that the two winners of £10,000 (US$15,181) awards will be announced at the Edinburgh Book Festival in August.

Biography finalists:

• Edward Carpenter: A Life of Liberty and Love by Sheila Rowbotham
• Arthur Miller by Christopher Bigsby
• A Strange Eventful History: The Dramatic Lives of Ellen Terry, Henry Irving and their Remarkable Families by Michael Holroyd
• Gabriel García Márquez by Gerald Martin
• Marc Chagall Jackie Wullschlager

Fiction finalists:

• A Mercy by Toni Morrison
• Sputnik Caledonia by Andrew Crumey
• Pilcrow by Adam Mars-Jones
• A Case of Exploding Mangoes by Mohammed Hanif
• The Secret Scripture by Sebastian Barry

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The three finalists for the Amazon Breakthrough Novel Award, sponsored by Amazon and Penguin Group, are:

Ian Gibson, Victoria, B.C., for Stuff of Legends, "a comic fantasy about heroism and celebrity, where a 15-year-old boy's fondest wish is granted and he is teamed with his idol, warrior hero Jordan the Red, to defeat villains, monsters and demonic armies."

James King, Wilton, Conn., for Bill Warrington's Last Chance. "In the novel, Bill Warrington tries to reestablish ties with his estranged children after he is diagnosed with Alzheimer's disease. After several attempts at a reunion fail, he decides to kidnap his 15-year-old granddaughter, April, so that his children will be forced to talk to each other--and to him--as they attempt to 'rescue' April."

Brandi Lynn Ryder, Napa, Calif., for In Malice, Quite Close. "The novel opens in 1979 San Francisco, where an unlikely relationship forms between 15-year-old Karen, who longs to escape her abusive father, and wealthy art collector Tristan Mourault. Tristan gains Karen's trust and she soon adopts a new identity as his daughter, sending the two on an extraordinary odyssey that spans 15 years and two coasts."

Through this Thursday, May 21, the public can read excerpts of the books as well as critiques by a panel of publishing professionals and then vote for their favorites on amazon.com/abna. The panelists were authors Sue Grafton and Sue Monk Kidd, literary agent Barney Karpfinger and Penguin Press editor-in-chief Eamon Dolan.

The Grand Prize winner, who receives a publishing contract from Penguin and a $25,000 advance, will be announced in New York on Wednesday, May 27.