The Big Bad Book Blog

I like to Twitter. Really, I do. But sometimes I have these dark, nightmarish moments that the little Twitter bird is going to peck out my eyes and feed on my soul. And in these dark, nightmarish moments, the Twitter bird looks like this.

Literary agent Rachelle Gardner knows that selling your book is as much the challenge, pleasure, burden and fight of authors as of publishers. And this is why.

Titling is key for any book, but methinks these celebrity memoirs were much more focused on memorable kitch value then brilliant book names.

The Abbeville Manual of Style presents a wonderful interview with Ed Champion, host of The Bat Segundo Show and book blogger. And because he likes Victorian literature and mint juleps, I’m automatically a shameless fan.

Maybe Chris Anderson of Wired shouldn’t have named his new book FREE (subtitle: The Future of a Radical Price). He was certainly thinking ‘free’ when he cribbed several of his ideas from Wikipedia and then did not edit or change them, leaving word-for-word passages in the final copy of the book. Whoops.

With the recent debacle regarding J.D. Salinger’s attempted copyright of his character to prevent J.D. California’s publishing of a sequel at a standstill (a federal judge has placed a restraining order on publication of the sequel), people are asking… who cares? Apparently, Holden Caulfield is not quite as captivating to today’s teenagers as he was in yesteryears.  Yes, I thought he was angst-filled, snobbish jerk too.

Just when you thought book censorship was becoming a pastiche, angry citizens demand books be pulled from a summer reading list… or burned at the stake. In Illinois, Sherman Alexie’s THE ABSOLUTELY TRUE DIARY OF A PART-TIME INDIAN is remaining on the summer reading list for freshman at Antioch Community High School despite protests from several parents, while in Wisconsin Francesca Lia Block’s BABY BE-BOP nearly got a library sued over its accessibility, which has LGBT groups and free speech committees fighting to keep it from being burned.

Erin Miller of About.com gives us the first half of her “Best Books for 2009.” Agree? Disagree? I’m happy, but that’s because Guillermo del Toro’s THE STRAIN is sitting happily on said list.

Dick Cheney has just signed a deal with Simon & Schuster to write his memoir, which is anticipated to be published in spring of 2011. One might be curious if certain news-making incidents involving hunting companions will be included, but that doesn’t exactly fall into the realm of Washington politics.

Please don’t talk about sex… write about it. Times Online asks us: Who writes best about sex? Discussed? Taboos, full-frontal, the Kama Sutra, fantasies, the erotic lexicon, and more.
And not only that, but provides some tailor-made articles:

• How to write sex: a woman’s tips
• How to write sex a man’s tips

My new favorite agent-blogger, Chip MacGregor (what a name!), gives us an overview of ten items detailing where the publishing industry will be in 5 years. I don’t know about you, but I’m willing to put money on most of these.

The Royal Society is offering a £10,000 prize to writers of science books, proving that popular science is, well, popular. The shortlist is out, so if you haven’t started already, illuminate your mind.

A blog we recommend for all you comic, graphic novel and manga readers, one of the best resources out there is Publishers Weekly’s The Beat, the News Blog of Comics Culture by Heidi MacDonald. Chock full of news, links, YouTube videos, comic reviews and recommendations, this is an excellent resource for the casual reader and avid collector alike.

Perhaps it is not quite literary, but in an age of democracy, there are still kings. And when those kings pass, the elegant ways in which we remember them are worthy of any book. The King of Pop is dead, and TIME presents a beautiful article on the glory, the revulsion, the sadness and the eccentricity surrounding the rise and fall of Michael Jackson by means of a literary reference—the endearing but heartrending man-child, Peter Pan.

A little late coming out, but never fear! Here is your list of interesting, weird and relevant book-news from the big bad book blog:

Derbhile Dromey of the Irish Independent gives us the pick of the litter: the ten best bookshops in the world.

What do Chengguan, Jai Ho!, Mobama, Phelpsian, Quendy-Trendy, Wonderstar, and Zombie Banks have in common? They are all competing to become the one millionth word added to the Oxford English Dictionary.

For the pop-song-writer in you, there are a few things you just shouldn’t write (or sing) about. Incidentally, these are all great topics for your next great novel.

Women, girls, ladies, chicks: summer is here! And with it, a new collection of books for every taste, of every genre, to tantalize and intrigue and humor us all.

Now step aside, ladies. Farahad Zama may be the next big name in romance, and he’s not afraid to play like a man. He’s already become the first man to win the Melissa Nathan award for romance fiction.

They’re calling it a thoughtcrime, but what is the line between stealing, borrowing and repurposing content for your own writing? George Orwell’s 1984 has been accused of lifting ideas from an earlier Russian novel, WE.

Memoirist and poet Kamala Das, whose soulful writings of India and women’s sexuality made her famous and controversial, passed away at age 75.

“I want to go on living even after my death!” proclaimed the young Anne Frank in her diary, and her wish continues to be granted. This year, the Anne Frank House Museum will be putting all of Anne’s diaries and papers on permanent display. The book based on her diaries continues to sell in dozens of languages around the world.

Get it right: it’s not angst, it’s dark. Teenagers today are eagerly reading books that discuss deep, disturbing and very adult subjects, including suicide, mental health, and physically-disabling accidents. Black is the new pink.

Consider the most significant problems facing the publishing industry today. Compare your thoughts to the Eighteen Challenges to Contemporary Literature at Wired.

Aspiring writers, fear not: the world at large is still rewarding the new and unknown. Debut novelist Michael Thomas has won the Impac Dublin prize, which is considered the “world’s richest literary award,” for his book MAN GONE DOWN.

The irony is obvious: a copy of Benjamin Franklin’s POOR RICHARD almanac has just sold at auction for over half-a-million dollars.

Remember how awkward it can feel to be the biggest kid in the room when you’re in elementary school? The Kindle DX is feeling it too. The debut of the larger-sized version of the handheld Kindle is pricier, wider, and—some say—ultimately less practical.

Hey, we don’t have short attention spa… BUTTERFLY! Harper’s senior editor Bill Wasik discusses the effects of the Internet on a new age of people. Decide for yourself what it means for readers.

Have a great week!

It’s a Big, Bad Book World returns!

This week(-ish) in publishing, we had what some would call the penultimate book-related trade show in the US: BookExpo America (BEA) 2009, which took place this year in Manhattan’s Javits Convention Center. Despite a healthy amount of fears on behalf of publishers, booksellers and authors alike about the economy and the size of BEA, a smaller show apparently did not detract in quality. In fact, many people stated that this year’s show was all about the indie.

Here are a healthy mix of BEA posts and articles from some of our favorite bloggers and news sites:

• BEA at Lit Soup with Jenny Rae Rappaport
• At Publishers’ Convention, Is the Writing On the Wall? at The Washington Post with Bob Thompson
• BEA 2009: A Bit of Déjà vu All Over Again at Booksquare with Kassia Krozser
• Book Fair Buzz Is Not Contained Between 2 Covers at The New York Times with Motoko Rich
• Some BEA Observations at Pubrants with Agent Kristin
• BookExpo America reveals an industry in transition at The Los Angeles Times with David L. Ulin
• #BEA09 at The 26th Story with Debbie
• Book Expo America: What to Read at Paper Cuts with Motoko Rich
• And several posts on BEA by the good people of The Abbeville Manual of Style

Feeling a little too old to start writing? Nonsense, says author Tess Geritsen. She has a wonderful post over at Murderati, AUTHORS CAN DIE WITH THEIR BOOTS ON, exploring those authors who didn’t hit the big time until they were past what many people would consider their “prime.”

J.D. Salinger is still alive. No, that’s not the news. Turns out that the 90-year-old author is coming out of hiding to stop a man writing under the penname J.D. California from supposedly publishing an unauthorized sequel of THE CATCHER IN THE RYE. The alleged sequel’s title? 60 YEARS LATER: COMING OUT OF THE RYE. Hmm. That’s all I’ll say about it.

David Eddings, the fantasy writer best known for his Belgariad series and its sequel, the Malloreon series, passed away at age 77.

Even in times of economic turmoil, some dreams are still coming true. For those of you who follow our dear Book Nerd (http://writtennerd.blogspot.com), you probably knew that she was a bookstore worker with dreams of owning her own shop. Now she will. Greenlight Book Store will be opening in Portland in September.

The 2009 Orange Prize for Women in Fiction has been awarded to Marilynne Robinson for her book, HOME.

What do Stephanie Meyers and Guillermo Del Toro have in common? Not much, except for their respective books on vampires. But Del Toro is one for a gruesomely creative brand of horror, and he’s opening up to TIME to discuss STRAIN, his new book.

Whether you like it or not, summer is here. The Washington Post gives us a list of summer reads to fill up those lazy summer days. Not that I have lazy summer days anymore.

It will be a heavily literary-based year at the 12 Annual National Queer Arts Festival in San Francisco. Check out their website to see the list of events, which are taking place in several venues across the city.

Celebrity smackdown: Google versus Amazon. What are they fighting over? You might have guessed it. E-books. Apparently Google doesn’t think Amazon should have an e-book monopoly. Now, don’t be snarky about it…

Writers and authors, experts in their fields, all gathered together in one convenient site? HarperOne, an imprint of HarperCollins Publishers, has launched their “The Little Black Book” website of just that. Definitely an interesting online resource concept. Environmentally friendly, too.

Privacy laws, fourth amendment rights, and the comic book world are colliding in the case of Christopher Handley, an Iowa comic collection who pleaded guilty to the possession of obscene images, in the form of Japanese manga he collected. Now the Comic Book Legal Defense Fund and big names like Neil Gaiman are involved as well. Heidi MacDonald at PW’s The Beat breaks it down.

Rachelle Gardner, literary agent, has a post authors should check out: Help Your Fellow Writers. Because we’re all in this together.

Shakespeare’s sonnets, published by Thomas Thorpe, turned 400 years old this week. Not that he’ll be remember for them, of course.

Ever pondered a sequel to a famous book? I know I have, and by God, who wouldn’t love to know what happened to those wonderfully wacky cast of characters in Animal Farm? Now you too can have a chance to be part of a never-written literary masterpiece, over at BOOK: The Sequel.

BEA mania has hit the world! BookExpo America (BEA), the “largest book publishing event in North America,” will be held this year from May 28-31 at the Jacob K. Javits Convention Center in New York City. Will you be there?

Is it censorship or common sense? UK publishers first acquired, than shied away from, Sherry Jones’s novel The Jewel of Medina, about Muhammad’s child bride. Take a look at both sides of the argument on controversy and censorship.

You never thought you would live to see it, but you just might: a battle of epic proportions between the Abbeville Manual of Style and the Chicago Manual of Style. Epic beatdown or friendly brawl? Only time (and grammar buffs) will tell.

Agent Kristen over at Pub Rants presents some intriguing answers to the question of query submissions from the editors at St. Martin’s Press that should be of interest to any first-time author consider a query.

A COOL-er and more accessible version of the e-reader than Kindle or the Sony Reader? Entrepreneur Neil Jones has just created the i-Pod-esque Cool-er reader, which is bare bones, straightforward, and cheaper. Plus it comes in multiple pretty colors.

Social publisher Scribd launched its beta of the Scribd Store, allowing anyone to upload and sell their works.

Robert McCrum over at The Guardian takes issue with some  myths about a literary age that we apparently never had, and he wants us all to understand what’s so great (or not great) about to supposed golden age versus now. As he so eloquently put it, we’ve always had plenty of “cultural crap” coming down the tube.

Have a wonderful Memorial Day weekend!

• Amazon.com doesn’t believe in trends. The newest version of the Kindle, known as the DX, is actually larger than the one preceding it. Is technology flowing backwards? Think again. The new, larger screen is customized for newspapers and magazines.

• The Times Online asks its readers a penetrating question in the wake of popular children’s and young adult fiction: should these books be more multicultural?
• Sci-fi geeks and design nerds, rejoice! Check out Penguin’s fantastic display of its classic and modern science-fiction book covers.
• Opinions are mixed on the casting decision for a(nother) big-screen adaptation of Robert Louis Stevenson’s Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. The actor chosen for the iconic role(s)? None other than Keanu Reeves. Stop sniggering, you.
• Life isn’t all bleak, doom and gloom for the big name publishers. The top five American trade publishers (including Penguin, Random House, Simon & Schuster, HarperCollins, and Hachette) had a revenue stream of over four and a half billion last year. The written word is not dead yet, folks.
• Even after death, a writer can speak. In this case, David Foster Wallace, who wrote Infinite Jest (given the honor of the All-Time 100 Greatest Novels according to TIME Magazine), has one last hurrah: his unfinished novel The Pale King is being published by UK house Hamish Hamilton. Check out an impassioned blog post about the subject at the Penguin Blog.
• Cormac McCarthy, author of All the Pretty Horses and The Road, has won the PEN/Saul Bellow Award for lifetime achievement in American fiction, while Steve Coll, author of The Bin Ladens, received an award for nonfiction.
• Nothing better to do during a hot summer day then stay inside with the air conditioning and read a book. (It’s nothing less than sweltering here in Austin and we’re not even in mid-May). Check out USA Today’s list of summer books to beat the heat.
• Marilyn French, feminist author and writer of The Women’s Room (and often cited for her misinterpreted famous quote, “my goal in life is to change the entire social and economic structure of Western civilization, to make it a feminist world”) passed away at age 79.
• How best to entice kids to read? Easy. Give them bucketloads of Greek mythology. (As a kid, I would have been thrilled to Hades by this). Read here about Rick Riordan, author of the Percy Jackson & The Olympians series, who is defying a bleak economy with a print run of 1.2 million copies of the fifth and final book in his series.
• Check out this brilliant piece from Publetariat on authors, publishers and publicity in the modern era. What are the differences between self-published, independently published and works from a major house?
• Celebrity writer deathmatch: Jodi Picoult vs. Dan Brown. Is the pot calling the kettle black, or is this a legitimate, err, attack on fame? Vote or die.

Have a great weekend!