Beattie's Book Blog - unofficial homepage of the New Zealand book community

News from Galley Cat

2012-01-28T11:00:00.002+13:00

Facebook Timeline to Be Mandatory Soon

Facebook announced this week that the Facebook Timeline feature will be mandatory for all accounts soon, inspiring excitement, concern and a Jeffrey Koterba cartoon. Check it out: "Over the next few weeks, everyone will get timeline. When you get timeline, you'll have 7 days to preview what's there now. This gives you a chance to add or hide whatever you want before anyone else sees it." After editing... read more>>

Tom Isbell Lands 7-Figure Book Deal

Actor Tom Isbell has landed a seven-figure book deal at HarperCollins' children's division for a young adult fantasy trilogy. The first book is entitled The Hatchery. Literary agent Victoria Sanders negotiated the deal with acquiringeditors Alyson Day and Phoebe Yeh. A tentative publication date has been set for 2013. Isbell has starred in movies alongside Robert De Niro, Ed Harris and Harrison Ford. He has also written children's plays; he is currently adapting... read more>>

STUDY: Apple Has 58% Share of the Tablet Market

According to a new study from Strategy Analytics,the iPad is still the dominant tablet, but it has lost market share. The company estimates that Apple had a 58 percent share of the tablet market in the fourth quarter of 2011, down from 68 percent of the market in the same period the year before. Strategy Analytics director Peter King explained: "Global tablet shipments reached an all-time high of 26.8 million units... read more>>

First ever crime writing MA launched

2012-01-28T08:29:00.000+13:00

London's City University says creation of course is in response to student demand

Alison Flood - guardian.co.uk, Friday 27 January 2012

Den of crime writing ... City University in London. Photograph: David Levene for the Guardian

As the underworld steadily increases its grip on literary culture, City University in London is turning to crime, with the launch of an MA devoted to teaching crime fiction and thriller writing.
Launched in response to student demand, and to the growing popularity of the genre, the UK's first creative writing masters dedicated to crime and thriller novels is another harbinger of a "second golden age of crime writing".
The genre is the second biggest in the UK, according to official data, with sales of £87.6m in 2011, while debut thriller Before I Go to Sleep by SJ Watson topped the charts last week. The course will teach budding Agatha Christies and Ian Rankins everything from how to create suspense to new ways to tackle new crimes, thoroughly investigating all aspects of the genre, from police procedurals to psychological thrillers.
"Crime fiction is an increasingly popular genre. With writers like Tom Rob Smith and AD Miller appearing on Man Booker Prize long- and short-lists, the literary acceptance of the genre has never been higher," said programme director Jonathan Myerson, the novelist and playwright. "There is much talk that we are entering a second golden age of crime writing, though this time the country house has been replaced by the inner city estate. Social relevance is a major factor, as too is the quality and craftsmanship of the writing"
City already runs a masters on literary novels as part of its creative writing programme. Six years' worth of students have graduated, with six so far landing publishing deals. Tutors on the literary course include Sadie Jones, David Nicholls, Sarah Waters, Monica Ali, Naomi Alderman, Ronan Bennett, Sarah Hall, and Philip Hensher, and Myerson said he "would expect our tutors on the crime thriller MA to be of the same calibre". Authors are currently being approached, with the novelists Martyn Waites and Barry Forshaw already signed up.
"We take about 12 to 14 students each year on the literary course and would do about the same for the crime MA, and run them in parallel," said Myerson. "Both genres can learn from each other – literary novelists can learn an awful lot from the pacing of crime novels."
If the crime course takes off, Myerson said he would look at expanding the MA to include other genres. "We'll see how this goes, I think," he said. "Young adult would be the next market, though."

Fig Tree breaks with Lewycka cover style for new title

2012-01-28T08:26:00.000+13:00

27.01.12 | Charlotte Williams - The Bookseller

Penguin imprint Fig Tree is changing the famous retro Soviet-style cover for A Short History of Tractors in Ukrainian, as it prepares to reissue Marina Lewycka’s three backlist novels (£7.99 each) along- side her new hardback, Various Pets Alive & Dead (£12.99, 1st March).

Various Pets Alive & Dead is the story of a couple, Marcus and Doro, and of their children, who crave order, independence and wealth in defiance of their parents’ commune-dwelling, idealistic past. The new look uses bold fonts and stripped-back colour palettes, integrating objects from the novels into the lettering. Publisher Juliet Annan said that it was a big decision to move away from the original look as it was so successful: "We have had it since 2005; we felt we had to make a change.
"Not all of Marina’s books are about eastern Europe. Various Pets Alive & Dead only has one eastern European character, so now seemed a good time to make a break with the old look."
Annan promised the new title would appeal to existing fans and new readers, saying: "I think she writes extremely funnily, yet like all comedy it is extremely serious, there is a dark subject in every single book. She’s always got several hobby horses she is whipping on, and this novel is no different."

Keith Richards writes to his aunt

2012-01-28T08:23:00.000+13:00

In today's Delanceyplace excerpt - the letter below was written by eighteen-year-old Keith Richards to his Aunt Patty. It came to light in 2009 and had not been read by anyone outside the family prior to the recent release of his autobiography. In it, he describes meeting Mick Jagger in 1961. Almost immediately, they were regularly hanging out and "trying to learn how to do it." They went on to worldwide fame as the founding members of The Rolling Stones:

6 Spielman Rd

Dartford

Kent

Dear Pat,

So sorry not to have written before (I plead insane) in bluebottle voice. Exit right amid deafening applause.

I do hope you're very well.

We have survived yet another glorious English Winter. I wonder which day Summer falls on this year?

Oh but my dear I have been soooo busy since Christmas beside working at school. You know I was keen on Chuck Berry and I thought I was the only fan for miles but one mornin' on Dartford Stn. (that's so I don't have to write a long word like station) I was holding one of Chuck's records when a guy I knew at primary school 7-11 yrs y'know came up to me. He's got every record Chuck Berry ever made and all his mates have too, they are all rhythm and blues fans, real R&B I mean (not this Dinah Shore, Brook Benton crap) Jimmy Reed, Muddy Waters, Chuck, Howlin' Wolf, John Lee Hooker all the Chicago bluesmen real lowdown stuff, marvelous. Bo Diddley he's another great.

Anyways the guy on the station, he is called Mick Jagger and all the chicks and the boys meet every Saturday morning in the 'Carousel' some juke-joint well one morning in Jan I was walking past and decided to look him up. Everybody's all over me I get invited to about 10 parties. Beside that Mick is the greatest R&B singer this side of the Atlantic and I don't mean maybe. I play guitar (electric) Chuck style we got us a bass player and drummer and rhythm-guitar and we practice 2 or 3 nights a week SWINGIN'.

Of course they're all rolling in money and in massive detached houses, crazy, one's even got a butler. I went round there with Mick (in the car of course Mick's not mine of course) OH BOY ENGLISH IS IMPOSSIBLE.

"Can I get you anything, sir?"
"Vodka and lime, please"
"Certainly, sir"

I really felt like a lord, nearly asked for my coronet when I left.

Everything here is just fine.

I just can't lay off Chuck Berry though, I recently got an LP of his straight from Chess Records Chicago cost me less than an English record.

Of course we've still got the old Lags here y'know Cliff Richard, Adam Faith and 2 new shockers Shane Fenton and Jora Leyton SUCH CRAP YOU HAVE NEVER HEARD. Except for that greaseball Sinatra ha ha ha ha ha ha ha.

Still I don't get bored anymore. This Saturday I am going to an all night party.

"I looked at my watch

It was four-o-five

Man I didn't know

If I was dead or alive"

Quote Chuck Berry

Reeling and a Rocking

12 galls of Beer Barrel of Cyder, 3 bottle Whiskey Wine. Her ma and pa gone away for the weekend I'll twist myself till I drop (I'm glad to say).

The Saturday after Mick and I are taking 2 girls over to our favourite Rhythm & Blues club over in Ealing, Middlesex.

They got a guy on electric harmonica Cyril Davies fabulous always half drunk unshaven plays like a mad man, marvelous.

Well then I can't think of anything else to bore you with, so I'll sign off goodnight viewers

BIG GRIN

Luff

Keith xxxxx
Who else would write such bloody crap

Author: Keith Richards with James Fox
Title: Keith Richards - Life
Publisher: Back Bay Books
Date: Copyright 2010 by Mindless Records, LLC
Pages: 77-79

About Delanceyplace

Delanceyplace is a brief daily email with an excerpt or quote we view as interesting or noteworthy, offered with commentary to provide context. There is no theme, except that most excerpts will come from a non-fiction work, mainly works of history, are occasionally controversial, and we hope will have a more universal relevance than simply the subject of the book from which they came.

To visit our homepage or sign up for our daily email click here
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Just Google it! Questions dumb people ask online

2012-01-28T08:16:00.000+13:00

Check out the questions at CNN.

Why a Book Editor Becomes a Literary Agent

2012-01-28T08:12:00.000+13:00

Publishing Perspectives

Rebecca Carter (left) is leaving the editorial department at Random House to become an agent for Janklow & Nesbit. "My motivation comes from wanting to work with writers on editorial," she says.

Read her story.

DISCUSSION:
Who is More Responsible for a Book's Text, Agent or Editor?
Is the cliché that "editors no longer edit" overstated? Or does the job of shaping a book's text fall largely to the agent?

Frank Lloyd Wright archival reproductions now available at 1000Museums.com

2012-01-28T08:07:00.000+13:00

Art Knowledge News 26 Jan 2012

SCOTTSDALE, AZ.- The Frank Lloyd Wright Foundation announced a new licensing agreement with 1000Museums, the premier provider of archival reproductions from museums around the world. Now, with the help of print-on-demand technology, never-before-printed selections from the Foundation’s Archives will be available to admirers of Wright’s work. The Frank Lloyd Wright Foundation Archives is the most complete collection of materials related to a single artist housed under one roof anywhere in the world. Wright’s work ranged from residences designed in the Prairie style in the late 19th century, to modern works including 'Fallingwater', the 'Usonian Homes', and the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum in New York City in the late 50's.

Bloomsbury launches high-flying Circus

2012-01-28T08:04:00.000+13:00

27.01.12 | Benedicte Page - The Bookseller

Bloomsbury is to launch a new literary imprint, Bloomsbury Circus, to accommodate its expanding publishing.
The imprint—which sports an aerialist logo adapted from the publisher’s traditional Diana—will feature fiction and very select non-fiction, with a focus on fine writing. It will include both début writers and established novelists, like Liz Jensen and Patrick McGrath, but not authors from the more traditional end of Bloomsbury’s stable. Alexandra Pringle, Bloomsbury’s editor-in-chief, said its books would be "fresh and sometimes surprising", comparing Bloomsbury Circus to “Picador when it started off”.
The books will be trade paperbacks in an unusual, square-ish format (royal width and demi height), with flaps and high production values, and all priced at £12.99. There will be just one title a month in 2012, growing to four a month thereafter. Bloomsbury currently publishes 30–35 fiction titles a year, which will rise to 50 in 2012 with the new imprint.
Pringle said it was unusual for a publisher of Bloomsbury’s size not to have had additional imprints up to now. "With our new global Bloomsbury, we are publishing a lot of books with our cousins in America, and that has meant we are growing the list," she said.
“With fiction, you can’t successfully publish more than four titles a month because, selling into the fiction buyer, you have to have your lead, second lead, dark horse and a crime title. If you do more, you lose the focus. If we are going to grow, we have to do it in an exciting, imaginative way. This is a way we can grow, and continue to offer the service we do.”
Bloomsbury Circus’ launch titles include The Trapeze Artist by Will Davis, whose début, My Side of the Story, won the Betty Trask Award in 2007. The story, featuring a gay love affair in a circus setting, is "incredibly accomplished" and narrated in the past, present and future tenses, Pringle said. Meanwhile, New Zealand writer Emily Perkins’ The Forrests is "reminiscent of Virginia Woolf’s The Waves", telling of a woman’s life from birth to death "written in exquisite prose". Pringle said she had “the very highest hopes” for the novel, believing it has the potential to win a major prize.
Coming later on the list are novels from Liz Jensen and Jane Rusbridge, plus US début Wilderness by Lance Weller. All but one of the launch titles are being published with the US, and five of the first nine titles are US-originated.
Pringle said the imprint was intended to be very much one for the high street. "We hope Waterstones will love it, and it’s perfect for independents. It’s very much about the sort of books booksellers will read and recommend at Daunt’s, Foyles and Hatchards," she said.

Roald Dahl and CS Lewis among writers revealed to have refused honours

2012-01-28T08:02:00.001+13:00

Book2Book- Friday 27 Jan 2012

List of authors to turn down OBEs, CBEs and knighthoods also includes Aldous Huxley, Robert Graves and Evelyn Waugh. Photo left - Roald Dahl.

BBC

Guardian

Footnote: NZ poet Renee Liang suggested to me that a high percentage seem to be authors - interesting to muse on the reasons why, and whether there might be an equivalent list in NZ.

The Sex Diaries Project: What 1,500 Bedroom Diaries Can Teach Us About Sex

2012-01-28T07:57:00.000+13:00

Jan 27, 2012 - Jessica Bennett - The Daily Beast

What the not-so-private sex diaries of 1,500 Americans can teach us about relationships, love—and ourselves. Jessica Bennett on the new book The Sex Diaries ProjectArianne Cohen has learned a few things from poring over the sex diaries of 1,500 people.

For starters: relationships are a lot like careers. Sure, some of us work 9 to 5—but others stay home in pajamas all day, eating crackers in bed. It can get messy.

Second: Men and women aren’t all that different. (In fact, Cohen had trouble telling their diaries apart.) Except, perhaps, when it comes to one topic: porn. Men watch it. A lot.

Lastly—but perhaps most important—it turns out that what we think we know about American relationships and what we actually know are two wildly different notions. And what’s really going on is a lot less conventional than we might have imagined.

“There’s so much variation in how people do relationships,” says Cohen, a former magazine editor whose new book, The Sex Diaries Project: What We’re Saying About What We’re Doing, hits shelves next week. “We live in a society where there’s this idea that you’re either in a long-term relationship or taking steps to get there. But if you read diaries, what you find is, that’s not what a lot of people are doing.”
The full piece at The Daily Beast.

Image Source / Corbis

So Brilliantly Clever: Parker, Hulme and the Murder that Shocked the World

2012-01-27T16:30:00.001+13:00

Awa Press reports:

Last night a large space on the ground floor of Wellington Central Library was cleared to accommodate an unprecedented crowd who had turned up to hear Peter Graham speak about his new book, So Brilliantly Clever: Parker, Hulme and the Murder that Shocked the World. By 6pm with over 150 people present it was standing-room only. For over an hour and a half the spellbound audience listened to Graham describe the fascinating real-life events surrounding the 1954 murder of Honorah Parker in Christchurch by her teenage daughter Pauline and Pauline’s friend Juliet Hulme.

Graham then responded to numerous questions from the floor, including one from a retired policeman who wondered if Graham knew what had happened to the murder weapon. There was, Graham said, an unconfirmed report the half-brick had been used for some time as a paperweight on a detective’s desk in the Christchurch police station.

Afterwards, there was a long queue of people wanting Graham to sign the book, and, as commonly happens in his talks, a number turned out to have a long-term interest in or connection with the case. One woman showed Graham a caricature she had drawn of him during the talk.

So Brilliantly Clever, published by Awa Press in November, sold out before Christmas and an urgent reprint is now hitting bookstores. It was selected as one of the best books of the year by the Listener, Sunday Star-Times and Dominion Post and has been optioned for a television drama.

Photo courtesy Wellington Public Library.

Leading New Zealand Bookseller closing down

2012-01-27T12:32:00.003+13:00

From the Parsons Bookshop Auckland Newsletter January/February 2012

After 36 years of much fun and satisfaction selling books in Auckland and throughout New Zealand, Roger is retiring and Helen is morphing.

Roger says:

There are a number of mountains for me still to climb so I am off to Slovenia and Austria later in the year. Helen will run Parsons Library Supply from “The Alpine Hut” at home.

We have been unable to find someone to take over the shop.

So.... we now offer you the opportunity to obtain all those books you always wanted - at HALF-PRICE.

From 10am Saturday 28 January all existing stock is 50% discount.

We wish to thank you for all your support over many years.

Roger Parsons.

Please use any vouchers you may have.

A Little Parsons History:

Our New Zealand-wide business (50% mail order) has grown with the increasing interest and knowledge of New Zealand Art.

When Helen and I studied at Victoria University in the 1960's it was not possible to study Art History. Now the art world is a part of many kiwi lives. Our business was built on this interest.

Helen and I returned from overseas in 1975. I wished to move out of the diplomatic service - bookselling was a logical choice. Helen, as a young Mum had read every New Zealand book published in the Karori Library. My father, Roy Parsons, had the bookselling knowledge ( and the capital!). I had the passion to run our own business.

We started in large airy premises at the back of the National Insurance Building in Victoria Street in Auckland.

In the same year London Bookshop and the Book Corner came to Central Auckland. An article in the NZ Herald at the time questioned who would survive - we know the answer 36 years later.

From 1980 we also ran the Art Gallery Bookshop and Exhibition Shops in the Auckland Art Gallery.

In 1995 we moved in our current architecturally designed premises in New Gallery building.

The success of Parsons Bookshop Auckland has been very much the product of widespread support from our customers and from our well qualified and dedicated staff.

Bookselling has been our passion, our business and our livelihood. We have been very fortunate. And, somehow, Helen and I have succeeded in maintaining our personal and business partnership over all these years.

And from Helen:

At the end of last year we had builders around our home. One job was the refurbishing of our garden shed. It's now lined with plywood and fully wired and fit to live in.

And I'd been making noises about possibly doing 'order to order' library supply.

And suddenly it all fell into place over the last few days. Suddenly these two things literally came together......

From April 2012 I will work from home. I will morph into Parsons Library Supply. I will work from our garden shed, which we call ‘The Alpine Hut'. Photo below shows view from The Alpine Hut.

I will essentially do special orders for difficult to find titles - NZ, Maori & Pacific. I love sourcing those difficult titles. And I will continue supplying all NZ titles that I can find, to certain customers.

We do have standing orders for customers in place which can be carried on. I will also continue to send out lists of titles.

Roger says he will do the packing and write the cheques. It all sounds good fun. We're getting instant great responses from all our customers.

I also wish to thank our very dedicated and loyal staff. They have worked so hard for us; always with good grace and humour. Very special thanks to you all.

So....with kind regards.....

H.
PS This of course has no effect on Parsons Wellington which is owned and operated by Roger's siblings Julian and Beatrice

Parsons Bookshop Auckland

26 Wellesley Street East
Auckland 1010

New Zealand

Ph +64 9 303 1557
books@parsons.co.nz
www.parsons.co.nz
http://twitter.com/ParsonsBookshop

Footnote:The Bookman is feeling a little stunned by this news and I will write more about it during the next week.
At this stage .I will just wish Roger & Helen all the very best for the next stage of their lives and thank them most warmly for providing us with one of the best specialist art bookshops anywhere in the world and one of NZ's finest independent bookstores. We will miss you.

Pinterest Tips for Writers

2012-01-27T11:03:00.000+13:00

By Jason Boog on Galley Cat, January 26, 2012

The social network Pinterest is growing quickly–users post images and links to a virtual pinboard and share visual thoughts with other readers.
Check it out: “Pinterest lets you organize and share all the beautiful things you find on the web. People use pinboards to plan their weddings, decorate their homes, and organize their favorite recipes. Best of all, you can browse pinboards created by other people. Browsing pinboards is a fun way to discover new things and get inspiration from people who share your interests.”
Follow this link to request a Pinterest invite. We spent some time exploring the network to find out how writers, readers and publishers could use the new site.
1. Post your favorite books on your personal Pinterest page. You can add nice images of all the books you love in your life. Be sure to follow the site’s rule: “Pinterest is designed to curate and share things you love. If there is a photo or project you’re proud of, pin away! However, try not to use Pinterest purely as a tool for self-promotion.”
2. Find other writers on Pinterest and follow their example. Novelist Shiloh Walker has a great Pinterest page, complete with sections for Characters & Clothing, Research & Scenes, and various themes from her books.
3. On your page, create separate “boards” (collections of visual links) about your influences. Just like a high school locker, this is a vivid way to show your readers what inspires you. The site offered this handy tip: “If you notice that a pin is not sourced correctly, leave a comment so the original pinner can update the source. Finding the original source is always preferable to a secondary source such as Google Image Search or a blog entry.”
4. Look for book recommendations or comment on other users’ libraries in the Film, Music & Books section.
5. Share beautiful writing tools, stationary, journals, books and other crafty items in the Gifts section of the site.
UPDATE: For publishers interested in learning more about the site, Chronicle Books added this comment: “We love Pinterest at Chronicle Books! It’s a great way to find and share inspiration around books and the topics you love. Here are our boards. And feel free to email me at community@chroniclebooks.com if you need an invite.”

Saturday Morning with Kim Hill: 28 January 2012 on Radio NZ National

2012-01-27T10:53:00.001+13:00

8:15 Kate Camp in Berlin

8:30 Marcus Chown: tweeting the universe

9:05 Sharad Paul: skin and books

10:05 Playing Favourites with John Jamieson

11:05 Michel Tuffery: Pacific projections

Producer: Mark Cubey

Wellington engineer: Carol Jones

Auckland engineer: Jeremy Ansell

8:15 Kate Camp

Kate Camp is the 2011 recipient of the Creative New Zealand Berlin Writers' Residency. She is the author of four collections of poetry, most recently last year's The Mirror of Simple Annihilated Souls (Victoria University Press, ISBN: 9780864736215), which won the Poetry category at the 2011 New Zealand Post Book Awards.

http://poetkc.tumblr.com/

8:30 Marcus Chown

Writer and broadcaster Marcus Chown is cosmology consultant of the weekly science magazine New Scientist. His many books include last year's Solar System (Faber/Touch Press, ISBN: 978-0-571-277771-1), developed from the Solar System iPad App. His new book, written with Govert Schilling, is Tweeting the Universe: Tiny Explanations of Very Big Ideas (Faber, ISBN 978-0571278435).

http://www.marcuschown.com/

9:05 Sharad Paul

Dr Sharad Paul (left-Glenn Jeffrey photo) is director of the Skin Surgery Clinic in Auckland, and teaches skin cancer surgery in Australia and New Zealand. He is the Chair of the Skin Cancer College of New Zealand, owns the Baci Lounge bookstore café, and his latest novel is To Kill a Snow Dragonfly (Fourth Estate India, ISBN: 978-93-5029-139-9). Dr Paul is a finalist in the 2012 Kiwibank New Zealander of the Year Awards.

http://www.skinsurgeryclinic.co.nz/

http://www.bacilounge.com/ http://www.nzawards.org.nz/NewZealanderoftheYear/tabid/27939/Default.aspx

10:05 Playing Favourites with John Jamieson

Dr. John Jamieson is Senior Translator for NZTC International. He began his career working for the Translation Service of the New Zealand Department of Internal Affairs, then worked as a freelance translator before joining NZTC in 1988, specialising in the translation into English of legal, financial and business documents from over 25 western and eastern European languages.

http://www.nztcinternational.com/

11:05 Michel Tuffery

Michel Tuffery, MNZM, is a New Zealand-based artist of Samoan, Rarotongan and Tahitian heritage. His Siamani Samoa suite of paintings, sculpture and multimedia installations addressing Germany's brief history in Samoa is currently on show at Pataka Museum in Porirua (to 19 February 2012). His next project, First Contact, is a giant digital artwork projected onto the western wall of the Museum of New Zealand Te Papa Tongarewa. First Contact has been commissioned as the opening night free public event at the New Zealand International Arts Festival 2012, and will run nightly for the duration of the Festival (24 February to 18 March).

http://www.micheltuffery.co.nz/

http://www.facebook.com/MichelTuffery

http://www.youtube.com/MichelTuffery

http://www.pataka.org.nz/image/tid/42

http://festival.co.nz/family-events/first-contact-2012/

First Contact 2012 PIC CREDIT Artist Concept Image by Mi

Preview: Saturday 4 February

Kim's guests will include Wael Ghonim, Ted Noten, Megan Salole and Antony McCarten.

Monday 6 February: Waitangi Day Special at Puke Ariki, New Plymouth
On Waitangi Day from 8am to midday, Kim Hill and Paul Diamond (Curator, Maori, at the Turnbull Library) will host a Korerorero at Ouke Ariki, with invited guests.
On Sunday 5 February at Puke Ariki, we will be recording a one-hour panel discussion that will play as part of that programme.

Members of the New Plymouth public are invited to come along and be part of the audience on both the Sunday and Monday. Entry is free, but seating is limited.

The 5 Books That Inspire the Most Tattoos

2012-01-27T10:42:00.000+13:00

PW - Gabe Habash -- January 24th, 2012

Source: Rate My Ink

What’s just as interesting as a tattoo is the story behind the tattoo, and that’s certainly true for the subcategory of tattoos that are inspired by famous literary works. We spent an untold number of hours combing the Internet’s two most extensive literary tattoo sites: Contrariwise: Literary Tattoos and The Word Made Flesh, then cross-checking the most frequently occurring tattoos with Google searches and Google image searches, all to get to the bottom of what books inspire the most tattoos and why. And though this isn’t a scientific ranking, it’s the closest anyone’s come to tabulating which books inspire the most tattoos, given the Internet’s evidence.
What you’ll find below shows a fascinating effect: as you look past the superficial design, you’ll find a wholly specific reason, wholly specific to the individual. It’s why one person can have an “I am nobody” tattoo from Sylvia Plath and someone else can have an “I am I am I am” tattoo from Sylvia Plath–it shows how we all treat stories and writing differently.
For the five titles link here.

Washington DC Named America’s Most Literate City

2012-01-27T10:34:00.000+13:00

By Jason Boog on Galley Cat, January 26, 2012

For the second year in a row, Washington DC has been named America’s most literate city. New York City has moved up to the 22nd place on Central Conneticut State University’s annual list.
Here’s more about the study that began in 2003: “Drawing from a variety of available data resources, the America’s Most Literate Cities study ranks the largest cities (population 250,000 and above) in the United States. This study focuses on six key indicators of literacy: newspaper circulation, number of bookstores, library resources, periodical publishing resources, educational attainment, and Internet resources.”
We’ve listed the top ten most literate cities below–what do you think? (Via Publishers Weekly)

Top Ten Most Literate Cities in America
1. Washington, DC
2. Seattle, WA
3. Minneapolis, MN
4. Atlanta, GA
5. Boston, MA
6. Pittsburgh, PA
7. Cincinnati, OH
8. St. Louis, MO
9. San Francisco, CA
10. Denver, CO

Salman Rushdie case shows importance of book festivals

2012-01-27T08:51:00.000+13:00

After this week’s Salman Rushdie controversy, Hay director Peter Florence asks: who should literary festivals give a voice to?

Sir Salman Rushdie has been told he is the target of Mumbai assassins Photo: GETTY

By Peter Florence, Director, Hay Festivals

The Telegraph - 26 Jan 2012

There are two sides to what happened in Rajasthan last week, when Salman Rushdie pulled out of the Jaipur literary festival, after death threats that turned out to be dubious – and both sides are true. On the one hand, almost everything everybody did made an ugly situation worse. The nadir was reached when the decision was made that Rushdie could not appear even onscreen as a moving image. The next logical step would be to ban cartoons of him.

The flipside is that everyone involved won something. Nobody died, and in a country of extreme volatility the police will regard this as a blessed relief. Rushdie is now much more famous in India than he was this time last week. The government can say that they respect the values of the Muslim community in an electoral battleground where they need to win. And festival organiser Sanjoy Roy’s team can enjoy the notion that people across the world have now heard of a literary festival in Jaipur. Even the Imam and his extremist followers can claim they prevented a writer from visiting his homeland...

So is this the end of freedom of speech in the world’s largest democracy? Should India hang its head in shame? Follow the hashtags. The overwhelming response from the wry, unbullyable and free-thinking Indian tweeters is, more or less: It’s about time I got round to reading The Satanic Verses – if it gets people so engaged, it must be worth looking at.

Banning books doesn’t work. Not if you want people not to read them. It has never worked. Lady Chatterley, Madame Bovary, Harry Potter, The Golden Compass, Animal Farm, The Lorax, The Da Vinci Code, Catcher in the Rye… There’s a pattern here, and it’s a mystery that politicians are too stupid to see it.

Would it have been different at the Hay festival? Maybe. I hope so. We have the luxury in Britain, fought for over hundreds of years of hard-won democracy, of being able to tool up in defence of Freedom of Speech. When we’ve had to provide security for an event here, we’ve done so to protect the rights of people whose opinions I deplore – the former Pakistani president and general, Pervez Musharraf and George W Bush’s mastiff, John Bolton.
Full piece at The Telegraph.

Why Salman Rushdie's voice was silenced in Jaipur - William Dalrymple

2012-01-27T08:21:00.000+13:00

A planned videolink with Rushdie at the Jaipur Literary Festival presented the directors with an impossible decision: cause a riot or uphold a vital principle

William Dalrymple - guardian.co.uk, Thursday 26 January 2012

The debate after the videolink with Salman Rushdie was cancelled. Photograph: Getty Images/Himanshu Vyas/Hindustan Times

On Tuesday afternoon this week I was faced with one of the most difficult decisions I have ever had to make.
It was the last afternoon of the Jaipur Literature Festival, of which I am co-director, and more than 10,000 people were milling around the grounds of Diggi Palace, the festival venue, eagerly waiting to hear Salman Rushdie speak by video link from London. For three weeks we had waited anxiously for this moment, ever since Maulana Abdul Qasim Nomani of the Deoband madrasa had called for the Indian Muslim community to oppose Rushdie's visit to our festival. For those three weeks we had been negotiating with various government agencies, the police, a spectrum of intelligence agencies and local Muslim groups to try to make sure that Rushdie could still be heard. Despite a great deal of pressure, we had kept our invitation open and had refused to back down from our position that Rushdie had every right to return to the country of his birth and to discuss his work.
Then at about one o'clock a large number of Muslim activists appeared in the property and gravitated to the back of the lawns where a huge crowd had gathered to hear the videolink. Some of them went into the central courtyard of the palace to make their namaz (pray), and according to some reports, the maulana in charge told his followers that if anyone was killed that day they would die a martyr. Then they sought out our producer, Sanjoy Roy, and told him that they were prepared to use any amount of violence in order to stop Rushdie's voice being heard. Others talked to the press: one told a reporter from the Times of India that "rivers of blood will flow here if they show Rushdie", while the Muslim Manch representative Abdul Salim Sankhla was quoted as saying: "We will not allow Rushdie to speak here in any form. There will be violent protests if he speaks." While all this was happening, some of the other activists were turfing school children out of their seats and intimidating festival guests.
The videolink was due to start at 3.45pm. At three o'clock, as Rushdie was already on his way to the television studio, as crowds were gathering, and as the number of activists/thugs was increasing alarmingly, Sanjoy, my co-director, the author Namita Gokhale and I were called to the security control room by the Jaipur commissioner of police. He had more bad news for us. As well as the activists gathering inside the festival venue, hundreds of protesters were now massing threateningly in the municipal gardens just outside. He was quite clear: the videolink could go ahead, they had the resources to make sure it wasn't interrupted, but "there would be violence in the venue and worse outside" if we didn't call it off. We asked what exactly this meant. He said that his officers had asked if they could use force, and that they were expecting "serious trouble". What might this entail? Lathi (truncheon) charges and police shooting? It was a possibility, he said.
What do you do in this situation? The crowd is getting restless, more and more protesters are entering the property, Rushdie is now sitting in the studio in London waiting to speak and Barkha Dutt, the gutsy Indian television host who is to interview him, is all set to begin. You have three to five minutes, maximum, to make a decision. If you give in to the intimidation, you put at risk all the principles upon which literary life is based: what is the point of having a literary festival, a celebration of words and ideas, if you censor yourself and suppress an author's voice? But equally, can you justify going ahead with a literary event, however important, if you know that you will thereby be putting at risk the lives of everyone who attends – including the authors who have come at your invitation and hundreds of school children and elderly people – as well as knowingly igniting a major religious riot in one of the most crowded towns in northern India with a long tradition of tensions between different communities?
That tradition of tension lay in part behind the problems we were now facing. In 2007, when literary events in Jaipur were still in their infancy, Rushdie was our first big international star, and his presence at the festival was a milestone for us. It raised our profile beyond anything we could have hoped or imagined. Rushdie came unannounced, with no bodyguards or police protection, and spoke brilliantly, sitting drinking tea and signing books for his fans, while giving avuncular advice to younger writers who had never met a writer of his stature. No objections were raised, no politicians got involved, no problems arose.
This time, however, the political situation in India is much more volatile. The 2012 festival happened to coincide with a razor-edge election in the all-important north Indian state of Uttar Pradesh, a poll in which the vote of the Muslim community was deemed to be crucial. It also came only four months after the Rajasthan government found itself in trouble with its Muslim voters after the Rajasthan police fired on a crowd of angry Muslim protesters at Gopalgarh, an hour's drive east of Jaipur, killing 10 people.
All this meant that when, at Rushdie's request, we announced his name on our website, and when Maulana Nomani of Deoband then called for Rushdie to be banned from India, not a single Indian politician was willing to state clearly and unequivocally that he was welcome in the country in which he was born, which he loved, which he had celebrated in his fiction and to whose literature he had made such a ground-breaking contribution.
Full story at The Guardian.

The future of books, today

2012-01-27T07:34:00.000+13:00

There is much talk of bright tomorrows for publishing at New York's Digital Book World expo, but how optimistic are readers?

Richard Lea - Thursday 26 January 2012 guardian.co.uk

Reading the runes about the digital future. Photograph: Ocean/Corbis

While we've all been thinking about Andrew Miller and the Costa's new enthusiasm short stories and Rushdie's troubles in Jaipur, in New York, publishers have been looking to the future.

Many reports from the Digital Book World conference are brimming with positivity, with the independent publisher Dominique Raccah singing the praises of books created "at the end of a community-building process", the author and futurist David Houle celebrating the astonishing fact that "more books [were] published this week than … in all of 1950" and Barnes and Noble's James Hilt suggesting that the flood of data sweeping through an industry which is finally catching up with the digital age "helps us all". But gloom isn't that far behind – optimism "wanes" when executives are asked about the future for publishing and readers alike.

When I phoned Neil Gaiman last week to ask him about the stramash over Apple's new iBooks Author app , he said publishing these days was like "the Klondike. Nobody knows what's going on. All they know is that there's gold in them thar hills and they want to try to get hold of it."

Gaiman gives "traditional publishing" five or "maybe 10 years … But that isn't going to mean fewer books. There'll be a lot more books – people will just find them differently." After seeing a Kindle in 2007 and downloading 14 books between waiting in the departure lounge and the plane doors being shut he's convinced electronic books will "dominate the world", but he wouldn't begrudge Apple a slice of his income. "You don't write books to make money," he said. "You do it because this is what you love doing." The music industry shows a possible future for publishing, he continued. "There are fewer rock stars travelling the world in their private jets than there were in the old days, but there's a lot more good music."

With Amazon's hit man on their trail and the customers they're all supposed to be focusing on signing up for Amazon's latest cult in droves, hearing the future of books being compared to the present travails of the music industry can only deepen publisher gloom. But what does it mean for readers? The future is coming, whatever device you're reading it on, but does Gaiman's future of "a lot more books" that you "find differently" fill you with despair or delight?

INFOGRAPHIC: Most Quoted Books of 2011

2012-01-27T07:28:00.000+13:00

By Jason Boog on Galley Cat, January 25, 2012

Bookstore owner and novelist Ann Patchett wrote the most quoted passage on Goodreads last year in State of Wonder: “Never be so focused on what you’re looking for that you overlook the thing you actually find.”
During the same period, City of Fallen Angels by Cassandra Clare was the most quoted book on Goodreads. Nearly 130,000 quotes were added to the social network last year–we’ve included a Goodreads infographic linking to all the most popular quotes of 2011.
If you want to share book quotes on Facebook, you can also follow this link to enable Goodreads on your Facebook Timeline. The new app connects with your Goodreads account, making the books and quotes you read a permanent part of your Facebook memories.

The New York (Mayor’s) Review of Books

2012-01-27T07:25:00.000+13:00

By MICHAEL M. GRYNBAUM - New York Times - Published: January 25, 2012

He controls a global publishing empire, but few would call him bookish. His city is a hotbed of writers and critics, but when it comes to literature, he pleads ignorance.

Librado Romero/The New York Times

Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg

"Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy," was written by John le Carré.

Jack English/Focus Features - Gary Oldman stars in the film adaptation of "Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy."

So it came as something of a plot twist last week when Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg, visiting a high school English class in the Bronx, confessed that he was not averse to a spy novel now and again.

“Have any of you ever read ‘Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy,’ by John le Carré?” the mayor, a touch of excitement in his voice, asked a classroom of wide-eyed 11th graders.

The reply came in the form of a deafening silence, but Mr. Bloomberg was unfazed. “I like spy stuff,” he said, then offered praise for another book by Mr. le Carré, “The Honourable Schoolboy”: “It’s 600 pages, it’s mostly description, there is almost nothing that happens. But it’s fascinating!”

Indulging in a tale of make-believe is rare for a time-is-money workaholic whose regular literary diet consists of periodicals (The Economist, The Financial Times, Aviation Week), political histories (“The Power Broker,” by Robert A. Caro), and entrepreneurial bibles (he has been known to hand out “The Innovator’s Dilemma,” by the Harvard Business School professor Clayton M. Christensen, to friends and colleagues).

Virtually the only other work of fiction publicly endorsed by the mayor has been “Johnny Tremain,” the 1943 patriotic children’s story that Mr. Bloomberg frequently cites as a favorite. His personal library now has several first editions, gifts from friends.

But most of the mayor’s reading material is news and nonfiction, according to aides, colleagues and friends who spoke about his habits. One former colleague, informed that the mayor had admitted to reading a novel, responded in shock: “That’s not the Mike Bloomberg I know.”

When Mr. Bloomberg began planning a run for the mayor’s office, his advisers gave him biographies of Fiorello H. La Guardia and Robert Moses. The mayor is currently reading “On China,” by Henry Kissinger, according to a City Hall spokesman; others said he had enjoyed histories of Prohibition, the Bronx in the 1970s, and World War I aviators.

The mayor likes his iPad, but prefers his books on the printed page. He reads at night and on the road. And in what appears to be a lifelong habit, he often tears out magazine articles that he wants to read later and carries around the torn pages in a folder.

Full story at The New York Times.

Random House and Sesame Workshop Step into Digital Reading

2012-01-27T07:20:00.000+13:00

By Karen Raugust - PW - Jan 26, 2012

Random House Children’s Books and Sesame Workshop are expanding their four-decade-plus licensing relationship, adding e-books and apps to their extensive Sesame Street print publishing program. The first of 19 initial ebook titles, Elmo Says Achoo! and Elmo’s Breakfast Bingo, were released on Wednesday.

“E-books are a major initiative for us,” says Chris Angelilli, v-p and editor-in-chief, Golden Books. “We want to publish licensed and original titles alike in every conceivable format for young readers.”

Random House is Sesame Workshop’s oldest licensee. “We’re very proud that books were the first licensed product for Sesame Street,” says Jennifer A. Perry, v-p worldwide publishing at Sesame Workshop. “Now we’re taking that longstanding program into the digital realm. It’s the next logical step.”

The initiative will focus on early learning and reading readiness titles, with digital editions available in all channels where Random House distributes e-books. The first raft of titles, to be released through June 2012, will be mostly Step into Reading books, along with some from the Happy Healthy Monsters series. “We publish a lot of board and novelty books, but those don’t translate as well to ‘e’,” Angelilli says.

Of the 19 initial titles, six have audio tracks—voiced by longtime Sesame Street actor Bob McGrath—and one is interactive, with the rest being read-alongs. The bulk are based on print titles, but some original e-books are planned as well, including a Step into Reading digital storybook app in the works now.

The digital-origin titles may eventually make their way into print. “Our hope is that we can work in both directions, both print to digital and digital to print,” Perry says.

Random House is the first of Sesame Workshop’s 30 print publishers to which it has granted e-book rights, but an announcement of a deal with a second publisher is forthcoming. “Where our publishers have a digital publishing program, we want to support that strategy,” Perry explains.

Meanwhile, the licensor has a number of digital-only e-book licensees, including Impelsys, which currently publishes 160 titles for Sesame Street’s own e-book site and the iOS platform; Callaway Digital Arts for the two bestselling Sesame Street e-book apps to date, The Monster at the End of This Book and Another Monster at the End of This Book, both available on iTunes; ScrollMotion for 10 iOS ebook apps to date; and Nokia Research Center for mobile apps that run on Nokia Lumia phones. As with the television show, the Workshop researches and tests all of its digital content and shares many of its findings with the industry at venues such as this week’s Digital Book World conference.

“Digital certainly plays a supplemental role in children’s reading,” says Perry, who notes that Sesame Workshop’s digital revenues are growing every quarter. “It’s all about storytelling, both in digital and print.”

Random House has acquired e-book rights from several of its other licensors aside from Sesame Workshop, including Mattel (Barbie) and Mattel’s newly acquired HIT Entertainment division (Thomas & Friends), Henson Productions (Dinosaur Train), Cartoon Network (Generator Rex), and Zinkia (Pocoyo).

“It’s true that most preschoolers don’t have their own Nook or Kindle, but their parents and caregivers do, and young kids are fascinated and mesmerized by digital devices,” Angelilli says. “It’s intuitive and comes naturally to them. It’s difficult to predict exactly where it will go, but e-books are an exciting new format and it’s impossible to deny their importance.”

2012 Hippocrates Awards for Poetry and Medicine

2012-01-27T07:10:00.001+13:00

One week to go to the 31st Jan deadline for entries to the 2012 Hippocrates poetry & medicine awards for unpublished poems on a medical theme of up to 50 lines written in English in either of 2 categories: an Open International Prize and a UK NHS-related Prize for an unpublished poem. With a 1st prize for the winning poem in each category of £5,000, the Hippocrates prize is one of the highest value poetry awards in the world for a single poem. In each category there is also a 2^nd prize of £1,000, 3^rd prize of £500, and 20 commendations each of £50. Anyone in the world may enter the Open category. The NHS category is open to UK National Health Service employees, health students, and those working in professional organisations involved in education and training of NHS students and staff. The Fellowship of Postgraduate Medicine is a major supporter of the 2012 Hippocrates Awards, which are also supported by the Cardiovascular Research Trust.

For these entries, medicine may be interpreted in the broadest sense. Themes for prize entries may include the nature of the body and anatomy; the history, evolution, current and future state of medical science; the nature and experience of tests; the experience of doctors, nurses and other staff in hospitals and in the community. Other topics might include experience of patients, families, friends and carers; experiences of acute and long-term illness, dying, birth, cure and convalescence; the patient journey; the nature and experience of treatment with herbs, chemicals and devices used in medicine. In the 2010 and 2011 awards, winning entries covered themes ranging from recollection of effects of his own stroke by New Zealand Poet CK Stead; to a relative’s experience of cancer; reflections on the early days of the NHS; and the impact of ageing.

Walcott and Hargreaves promote literacy for NLT

2012-01-27T07:03:00.000+13:00

26.01.12 | Charlotte Williams - The Bookseller

Theo Walcott, Owen Hargreaves and Joey Barton are among the football stars helping to promote reading this year through The National Literacy Trust's annual Premier League Reading Stars programme.
Each of the 20 players, one from each of the Premier League clubs, has chosen his favourite adult and children's titles, with choices including seven books by Roald Dahl, plus authors such as J K Rowling, Julia Donaldson and Dan Brown. Other choices include classics such as To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee, chosen by Tottenham Hotspur player Niko Kranjcar; The Count of Monte Cristo by Alexandre Dumas, chosen by West Bromwich Albion's Paul Scharner; and Dracula by Bram Stoker, chosen by Joey Barton of Queens Park Rangers.
More recent titles were chosen by Norwich City's David Fox who picked Operation Mincemeat by Ben Macintyre as his adult title, and Liverpool's Charlie Adam who chose May I Have Your Attention Please?, James Corden's 2011 memoir.
Theo Walcott picked his own children's book, TJ and the Hat-trick, and Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone by J K Rowling as his adult title, with Fulham player Mark Schwarzer choosing the children's title he co-authored, Megs and the Vootball Kids, as well as Destined to Live by Ruth Greuner. Stoke City Carlo Nash is the other author in the squad, choosing his book Family Adventures in Style, written with Dr Jill Nash, as his adult title.
The website will showcase 20 films featuring the players, who set 100 literacy challenges and explain why they chose their books and what they enjoy about reading. Children are offered prizes to complete the challenges, with a child who completes all 100 given the chance to win some signed memorabilia.
National Literacy Trust director Jonathan Douglas said: "Our research shows that a quarter of boys (28.3%) say that a sportsperson could inspire them to read. So getting footballers on board gives us a new and powerful strategy to get boys reading."
The programme, launched today at Arsenal's Emirates Stadium by player Theo Walcott and Her Royal Highness the Duchess of Cornwall, is delivered by the National Literacy Trust and funded by Arts Council England and the Premier League, and has run since 2003. This year, it has been funded to work with 1,000 schools and libraries in need, and will reach 30,000 young people. Any school or library can fund their own resource pack to take part.

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David Nicholls: 'I'm desperate that the next book shouldn't disappoint people'

2012-01-27T06:57:00.002+13:00

Tim Walker - The Independent - Thursday 26 January 2012

It's death to think about a perceived demographic when you write a novel. With One Day, I just wrote the book that I wanted to write; I didn't think "I might have to expand on this section to appeal to men" or anything like that. I was anxious that it might only make sense to people aged between 38 and 44, who lived in London and had been to university or had certain political and cultural experiences. Thankfully that turned out not to be the case.

Most of the books and films I love walk a knife edge between romance and cynicism, and I wanted One Day to stay on that line. I wanted it to be moving, but without being manipulative. I wanted it to be quite a big emotional book, funny and sad, and for people to respond out loud. That can be quite a nerve-racking thing to strive for. You don't want to tip over into mawkishness or be unamusing when you're trying to be funny.
One Day has quite a following among 17, 18 and 19-year-olds, which is interesting and unexpected. It obviously sums up people's anxieties about the future: their intentions and idealism. I think a connection with people's own lives is important [in a hit novel]. It's not necessary; some of the most successful books at the moment are fantastical and otherwordly. But the fact that people connected One Day very specifically to their own friendships, relationships, regrets and anxieties about getting older was important.
I've only ever been recognised in the street once. In Sweden, strangely. There's no photograph of me in the book. And as an actor I was uniquely bland and unmemorable.
I'm desperate that the next book shouldn't disappoint people, but there's an expectation that it might not be so well-read, that critics might be a little harsher, that anything which sells less than One Day might be perceived as disappointing. To sit down in the morning and for those to be the first thoughts in your head can make it difficult to write.
The only thing I know about the next book is that it won't be a love story set over 20 years. It may have a romantic element but it won't be primarily a romantic comedy. I'm 45 now and I have a family, so first dates and the awkwardness of relationships in your 20s are quite distant to me. I'm interested in mothers and daughters, fathers and sons. One thing that it will have in common with One Day is a mixture of comedy and dramatic material.avid Nicholls: 'A lot of novelists improvise, and I'm quite envious of that ability'
Full story at The Independent.

REED EXHIBITIONS, ORGANIZER OF BOOKEXPO AMERICA, PURCHASES BOOK BLOGGER CONVENTION

2012-01-27T06:43:00.000+13:00

Press Release

Annual Event Continues to be Co-Located with BookExpo America

Norwalk, CT, January 26, 2012: Reed Exhibitions has purchased the Book Blogger Convention, an annual day-long conference devoted to providing support, instruction, and social time for people who blog about books. The Book Blogger Convention was founded by Trish Collins of Hey Lady! Watcha Readin’? and Michelle Franz of Galleysmith, both devoted book bloggers who sensed a need for bringing the community of book bloggers together so that they might share information and learn from each other. In order to capitalize on the captive community of book industry professionals who attend BookExpo America (BEA), North America’s largest annual book industry gathering, the Book Blogger Convention was launched in 2010 in co-location with BEA. It will continue to be co-located with BEA and it will be fully integrated into the overall activity of the convention itself.

“We are delighted with this purchase and we look forward to advancing and building what Trish and Michelle have so effectively created in the Book Blogger Convention,” notes Steven Rosato, Show Manager for BookExpo America. “Trish and Michelle are devoted to their community and they have invested a tremendous amount of their own personal time and energy into building a major presence for their colleagues at BEA. We are pleased to be able to take this responsibility over for them and to build even greater recognition for the Book Blogger Convention by fully merging it with our BEA marketing efforts, programs, and attendee outreach.”

This year, the Book Blogger Convention will take place at the Javits Center on Monday, June 4 just as BEA is getting underway. Previously, the conference and reception were held just after BEA concluded. “We feel this positioning will provide greater continuity for the book bloggers and will afford them more opportunity,” notes Rosato. “This way, the book bloggers can attend their own event and then immediately participate in BEA or BlogWorld East which gets underway Tuesday, June 5 and which is also co-located with BEA.” Convention officials note that pricing for all events has been structured to allow easy access including an “All Access Super Pass” as well as a “New Media Super Pass”. Further details about pricing and how to attend individual events and/or any combination of events at BEA are available at:

http://www.bookexpoamerica.com/Register-Now/

The first Book Blogger Convention which took place in 2010 attracted just over 200 people and featured a line-up of speakers including online marketing specialists from most of the major publishing houses. Sponsorships by HarperCollins, Simon & Schuster, Hachette, Crown Publishing Group, Peachtree, and Unbridled Books reinforced the industry’s embrace of book bloggers. Attendance in 2011 grew to 340 people. “Book bloggers have emerged as a critical constituent in our universe,” concludes Rosato. “We look forward to serving them as thoroughly as possible in the years ahead.”

Caviar, Vodka, Books: Waterstones to Open Russian Mini-store

2012-01-27T06:35:00.000+13:00

Publishing Perspectives

Waterstones is to launch a Russian bookshop called Slova within its London flagship store, offering 5,000 Russian language titles and translations.
Read here.

DISCUSSION:
What Can Waterstones Learn from Russian Bookselling?
For a westerner, Moscow's bookstores can feel like returning to a lost world and, with a new Russian owner, Waterstones might benefit from their example.

Do-It-Yourself-Digital Book World Kit

2012-01-27T06:32:00.000+13:00

PublishersLunch

Whether you were there or not, some of the Digital Book World presentations and data are available online in a variety of forms.

It's very rare for us to use the phrase "must read," but Nielsen's white paper on The Link Between Metadata and Sales that accompanies president of Nielsen Book Jonathan Nowell's Wednesday presentation certainly qualifies. First presented at our Publishers Launch event in Frankfurt and now expanded and revised, it demonstrates with great precision the clear extent to which more quality metadata increases book sales (based on UK data). Fiction shows the greatest improvement when four key "enhanced" elements--short and long descriptions, review and author biography--are included in the record. Online sales for titles with all four of those pieces of information included are 178 percent higher.
PDF download

Verso Digital's survey of book-buying behavior is viewable here.

From futurist, author and Wednesday speaker David Houle--who is working with Sourcebooks on their just-announced agile publishing initiative--there is a free download of a special edition of his 2007 book THE SHIFT AGE. The DBW edition includes a new introduction tied to his speech and 15 of his past columns "that pertain to the the publishing industry and its move into the Shift Age."
Sourcebooks

At the Digital Book World site, a short video presents brief interviews with presenters including Ellen Archer at Hyperion, James McQuivey of Forrester, Steve Potash at OverDrive and Evan Ratliff from The Atavist.
DBW video

New Zealand International Arts Festival’s Writers and Readers Week Programme Announced

2012-01-26T18:31:00.001+13:00

A dynamic and diverse group of the finest international and national writers will converge on Wellington in March for the New Zealand International Arts Festival’s Writers and Readers Week (9-14 March). This eagerly anticipated Festival week begins with world-leading environmentalist Tim Flannery who will open the Town Hall Talks.

Inspirational feminist Germaine Greer will deliver a life and times session, and three-time Pulitzer Prize-winning New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman will give the closing address.
Wellington’s Embassy Theatre, home base for Writers and Readers Week, hosts an impressive array of writers discussing secrets and crimes, says Programme Manager, Anne Chamberlain. “Secrets about writing, secret histories, and secrets about exploring the world in fact, fiction and fantasy.”
Man Booker prize-winner Alan Hollinghurst discusses his recently released highly-acclaimed novel The Stranger’s Child; British biographer Selina Hastings reveals The Secret Lives of Somerset Maugham; Kate Grenville and Kim Scott dig deep into Australia’s past; German writer Jenny Erpenbeck explores Germany’s dark history; Columbian writer Juan Gabriel Vásquez discusses The Secret History of Costaguana; Ron Rash reveals life in the moody, rugged Appalachians and Kelly Link explores other worldly realms of fantasy and magic realism.
British screenwriter and playwright Robert Shearman discusses how he famously returned the Dalek to Doctor Who in 2005, in an episode initially viewed by 8.6 million people. This session includes a screening of his Dalek episode.

International best-selling Norwegian Jo Nesbø (right) heads up a crime strand including Scottish novelist Denise Mina and three of New Zealand’s own crime writers - Paul Cleave, Vanda Symon and Paul Thomas.
British poet and translator Michael Hulse, Toronto’s Poet Laureate Dionne Brand and New Zealand poet Harry Ricketts share their poetry. New Zealand’s first Poet Laureate Bill Manhire hosts a public poetry masterclass, and the famous dead poet is included in a session where Germaine Greer examines the life of women in Shakespeare’s day.

Where Were You in 72? brings together Germaine Greer, Marilyn Waring and Sandra Coney to discuss past, current and future social and political issues. Chris Bourke uncovers the history of New Zealand’s popular music and Auckland scientist Michael Corballis journeys around the human mind.
Image: Richard Haughton

New Zealand fiction writers include Patrick Evans delving into the imagined world of Janet Frame and Frank Sargeson, Fiona Farrell on working and living with the Christchurch quakes, and Paula Morris and Linda Olsson (left) discussing their life and work. Also featured are emerging writers Eleanor Catton, Hamish Clayton and Craig Cliff.

The Festival’s Art on the Move programme includes sessions with New Zealand’s Emerging Writers in Masterton and International Poets at Paekakariki Dionne Brand and Michael Hulse.

Tim Flannery (right - Photo Adam Bruzzone) will also address secondary school students at the Wellington Town Hall on Friday 9 March. Other Schools Day writers are Elizabeth Knox, American fantasy slipstream writer Kelly Link, and award-winning New Zealand young adult fiction writers Bernard Beckett and Jane Higgins.
Young Writers and Readers Day at Downstage Theatre on Sunday 11 March provides a rare opportunity to experience three of New Zealand’s most-loved children’s writers - Lynley Dodd, Gavin Bishop and Margaret Mahy.
Three lunchtime sessions at Downstage focus on the business of writing - Why Isn’t Theatre Dead Yet?, The Art of Translation and Are We the Last Real Book Readers?
The Town Hall Talks; Young Writers and Readers Day; Art on the Move; Schools Day; Bookmark Pass and Take Five Pass are on sale now. The multi-passes offer generous discounts to Embassy and Downstage sessions, with The Bookmark Pass entitling holders to a preferential booking period from Friday 27 January 2012. Public bookings for Embassy and Downstage sessions open at 9am on Friday 3 February.
Teachers can make Schools Day bookings directly through the Festival website (festival.co.nz/schoolfest). Tickets to all other Writers and Readers Week events are available through Ticketek.

Writers and Readers Week is supported by the Lion Foundation, Victoria University of Wellington, Unity Books, Museum Art Hotel, Australian High Commission, Canada Council for the Arts, Embassy of Spain, Goethe Institut, John F Kennedy Memorial Fellowship and Instituto Cervantes.

Rare book on birds sells for $7.9M

2012-01-26T18:31:00.000+13:00

Last week we mentioned the sale of a full-size, complete first edition of John Jmaes Audubon's The Birds of America which was coming up for auction at Christie's in New York. We can report that the book sold for $7.9 million to a private American collector. Francis Wahlgren, Christie's international head of books and manuscripts, said the $7.9 million sale on Friday was the third-highest price for a printed book at auction.

Christie's said the book was originally purchased by William Henry Cavendish-Scott-Bentinck, the fourth Duke of Portland sometime after 1838.

Book experts estimate that the entire first edition consisted of just 200 completed copies produced during an 11-year period. Christie's said 120 complete sets are known to exist with 107 in institutions and 13 in private hands.

Via - Ibookcollector © is published by Rivendale Press Ltd.

Captain Scott's fateful expedition to Antarctica

2012-01-26T16:07:00.000+13:00

From National Library of Scotland - via Ibookcollector

The story of Captain Scott's fateful expedition to Antarctica is being told at the National Library of Scotland (NLS) almost 100 years to the day that his party made it to the South Pole.

The team arrived at the Pole on 17 January 1912, only to discover a Norwegian flag. They had lost the race to Roald Amundsen who had beaten them by more than a month. All five of the British polar party lost their lives to the extreme Antarctic weather on the return journey.

It is a story of courage, selfless sacrifice and tragedy that has captivated generations. 'Scott's Last Expedition' which opened (12 January), features a wide variety of material from the NLS collections including a copy of Scott's published diary, photographs of the expedition, letters and newspaper cuttings from the time.

It commemorates all the men of the British Antarctic 'Terra Nova' expedition of 1910-1913 who found themselves hauling sledges in a race, not of their making, to reach the South Pole. It was a round trip of 1600 miles through one of the most hostile environments on earth.

The exhibition runs until 25 March at the National Library of Scotland, George 1V Bridge, Edinburgh EH1 1EW. Entry is free.

More realistic browse-flicking through ebooks demonstrated

2012-01-26T16:06:00.002+13:00

From John MacGibbon of Ngaio Press:

I far prefer browse-flicking through real books. (But note that the KAIST Institute of Information Technology has demonstrated a 'Smart E-Book Interface Prototype' that would let you more naturally browse through an ebook on the iPad. It lets you scan 20 or 30 pages at a time, do multiple page flips that are controlled by the speed of your finger swipe, and even holding your thumb on one page and flipping through the book with your fingers. There's a video demonstration here. It's something to look forward to on the iPad and other tablets, but I can't see it flying with the current crop of e-ink readers.)

This would help get around a huge drawback to ebooks. The video is quite impressive. The YouTube demo link is in the text above, but in case it doesn’t work, here it is again: http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=rVyBwz1-AiE

Brian Phillips on that Hierarchy of Book Publishing - New Zealand's Top twenty...

2012-01-26T12:52:00.000+13:00

Hard to resist responding to that earlier post on Beattie's Book Blog this morning…
Whilst I agree with most of Kauri Bookends’ selections I would venture to add a few more..
In no particular order [as they say on the X factor] I would offer:

*The two Fionas – Farrell (right) and Kidman (left). Wonderful women writing wonderful books

*Carole Beu – if all booksellers were as active and enthusiastic we would sell more books….
*The retirees – especially David Elworthy, Ros Henry and Bob Ross. They may no longer be involved in commercial publishing but all continue to do ‘bookish’ things. Long may they flourish.
*The broadcasters – especially Kim Hill and a special mention for the incomparable Elizabeth Alley.
*Jill Ewing at Random House. This company is regularly voted Distributor of the year by booksellers. Jill runs Random’s distribution. Enough said.
* Belinda Cooke at New Holland – quietly running a small but perfectly formed company.
* The third party book distributors – big and small – without them many smaller publishers would have no cost-effective way of getting their books into the marketplace. As I am a naturalised Cantabrian special mention must go to Nationwide Books at Oxford.
* Those who run Writers Festivals throughout the country. Love them all.

*Finlay Macdonald (left). Also Guy Somerset, Philip Matthews, Iain Sharp (right) and David Eggleton.

Peter Wells starts out on his next quest, his next book

2012-01-26T12:34:00.001+13:00

(The gates to Napier's historic Prison)

Peter Wells, author of the widely praised biography of Colenso, 'The Hungry Heart', used his blog to talk through his writing and research methods while writing the book. In this way readers of his blog shared the experience - both the sudden joys of finding an illuminating fact, or the longeurs when he seemed not to be making headway or even lost his way.
He is now starting out on his next quest, looking at the defence of Te Rau Kereopa, called Kaiwhatu 'The Eye Eater'. Te Rau Kereopa was the Hau Hau prophet warrior who ate the eyes of the Rev Carl Volkner in 1865, thus becoming an object of media hysteria in the 1860s Pakeha world. Two dissidents chose to stand by his side, offering insight and support. These were two remarkable early Pakeha New Zealanders - the French-born nun Sister Mary Aubert and the Cornish-born William Colenso.

Wells was awarded the Michael King Fellowship in 2011 to write a book on the subject. The book is titled 'Sparrow on a Rooftop'.

Readers can follow the journey of his search on http://www.peterwellsblog.com/

(The gates to Napier's historic Prison)

Peter Wells, author of the widely praised biography of Colenso, 'The Hungry Heart', used his blog to talk through his writing and research methods while writing the book. In this way readers of his blog shared the experience - both the sudden joys of finding an illuminating fact, or the longeurs when he seemed not to be making headway or even lost his way.

He is now starting out on his next quest, looking at the defence of Te Rau Kereopa, called Kaiwhatu 'The Eye Eater'. Te Rau Kereopa was the Hau Hau prophet warrior who ate the eyes of the Rev Carl Volkner in 1865, thus becoming an object of media hysteria in the 1860s Pakeha world. Two dissidents chose to stand by his side, offering insight and support. These were two remarkable early Pakeha New Zealanders - the French-born nun Sister Mary Aubert and the Cornish-born William Colenso.

Wells was awarded the Michael King Fellowship in 2011 to write a book on the subject. The book is titled 'Sparrow on a Rooftop'.

Readers can follow the journey of his search on http://www.peterwellsblog.com/

How Dr. Seuss Got His Start 'On Mulberry Street'

2012-01-26T12:34:00.000+13:00

by NPR Staff - January 24, 2012

Seventy-five years ago, before Theodor Geisel rocked the culinary world with green eggs and ham or put a red-and-white striped top hat on a talking cat, Geisel (whom you probably know better as Dr. Seuss) was stuck on a boat, returning from a trip to Europe.
For eight days, he listened to the ship's engine chug away. The sound got stuck in his head, and he started writing to the rhythm. Eventually, those rhythmic lines in his head turned into his first children's book: It was called And to Think That I Saw It on Mulberry Street.
The story, which turns 75 this year, is about a boy named Marco who wants to tell his father an interesting story about what he saw that day on his walk home from school — but the only thing Marco has seen (other than his own feet) is a boring old horse and wagon on Mulberry Street.

Courtesy Random House Children's Books

Marco laments:

That's nothing to tell of,
That won't do of course ...
Just a broke-down wagon
That's drawn by a horse.
That can't be my story. That's only a start.
I'll say that a ZEBRA was pulling that cart!
And that is a story that no one can beat,
When I say that I saw it on Mulberry Street.

Soon Marco's imagination is running wild — the zebra morphs into a reindeer, and the wagon becomes a golden chariot and then a fancy sleigh.

Courtesy Random House Children's Books

Read full story at NPR

The $5 Poetry Shot

2012-01-26T12:28:00.000+13:00

David Houle: “There were more books published this week than there were in all of 1950″

2012-01-26T10:14:00.000+13:00

By Dianna Dilworth on Galley Cat,January 25, 2012

At Digital Book World conference in New York this week, publishing experts have been revealing some very poignant data. For instance, today, author and futurist David Houle said, “There were more books published this week than there were in all of 1950,” he said.
eBookNewser has been covering the event for the past two days. Yesterday, Kelly Gallagher, VP, publishing services at R.R. Bowker, gave a presentation in which he revealed that eBook sales increased 17% in 2011, a bit less than people might have imagined at the conference last year.
eBookNewser has more: “Interestingly, 74% of book buyers have never bought an eBook, though 14% of these people own either a tablet or an eReader. ‘They may have gotten them as a gift, but haven’t used them yet,’ said Gallagher.”

Competition captures Burns

2012-01-26T10:03:00.001+13:00

By Charmian Smith, Otago Daily Times, Thu, 26 Jan 2012

Dunedin has a special relationship with Scottish poet Robert Burns, so it's not surprising the city celebrates his birthday with an annual poetry competition. Charmian Smith talks to one of the judges, 2011 Otago University Burns Fellow Fiona Farrell.

Robbie Burns (1759-96) was one of the rare poets who encapsulated the mood of his time, Fiona Farrell says. She and Michael Harlow judged this year's Robert Burns Poetry Competition, which is a collaboration between the Dunedin Public Libraries and the Dunedin Burns Club.
"They become the voice of that time and they encapsulate that time - he obviously did that, and he spoke to people, and still does, in a way that has enormous emotional power. I think that's what poetry does, at its best, it gathers up the mood of the time, the mood of people and expresses it through the individual but it speaks to the whole. I suppose I was looking for poems that were heading in that direction," Farrell says.
In judging the competition, she and Harlow were looking for poems that followed the spirit of Burns but were not pastiche, that did not just mimic Burns' Scots dialect or where the impulse to write the poem was not clear, she says.
"What we were looking for, I suppose, was poetry that took the qualities that made Burns' poetry vivid for his contemporaries, so it would be written from a strong passionate feeling, it would have a sense of place, it would have passion, and not poetry that is a kind of fake tartan phoney Scots written in 21st-century New Zealand."
Full story at the Otago Daily Times today.

Judge Fiona Farrell and published-poet winner Lynne Hill at the Robert Burns Poetry Competition prizegiving yesterday. Photo by Craig Baxter.

2012 Australian Indie Awards shortlist announced

2012-01-26T09:40:00.000+13:00

Australian Bookseller and Publisher - 25 January, 2012

The shortlisted titles in each category are:

Fiction

Caleb's Crossing (Geraldine Brooks, HarperCollins)
The Street Sweeper (Elliot Perlman, Random House)
Foal's Bread (Gillian Mears, A&U)
Five Bells (Gail Jones, Random House)

Nonfiction

Worse Things Happen at Sea (William McInnes & Sarah Watt, Hachette)
Notebooks (Betty Churcher, MUP)
After Words: Post Prime Ministerial Speeches (Paul Keating, A&U)
A Private Life (Michael Kirby, A&U)

Debut fiction

Past the Shallows (Favel Parrett, Hachette)
All That I Am (Anna Funder, Penguin)
The Roving Party (Rohan Wilson, A&U)
Watercolours (Adrienne Ferreira, HarperCollins)

Children's

The Jewel Fish of Karnak (Graeme Base, Penguin)
The Little Refugee (Anh & Suzanne Do, illus Bruce Whatley, A&U)
The Coming of the Whirlpool: Ship Kings 1 (Andrew McGahan, A&U)
The 13-Storey Treehouse (Andy Griffiths, Macmillan).

The Indie Awards recognise independent booksellers' favourite Australian authors from the past 12 months. Category winners are chosen by 'expert panels' of readers and independent booksellers. Independent booksellers from around the country then vote on the 'Book of the Year'.
The category and overall winners will be announced on 10 March at the Leading Edge Books conference in Melbourne.
Last year's Book of the Year winner was The Happiest Refugee by Anh Do (A&U).

Hierarchy of Book Publishing - New Zealand Top twenty...

2012-01-26T07:45:00.000+13:00

Following my post yesterday on the international Hierarchy of Book Publishing Kauri Bookend has left a new comment suggesting his/her NZ top twenty. My thanks to Kauri Bookend. Here it is for your amusement and/or comment with a few pics I have added:

1. Unity Books Auckland and Wellington: Simply the best
2. Bill Manhire : Done more to raise the quality of NZ Fiction and Poetry than anyone else
3. Geoff Blackwell : Shame he isn’t running one of the local multi-nationals. He should be
4. Lloyd Jones : Our pre-eminent novelist with a five star track record.
5. The Editors: especially Barbara Larson, Jane Parkin and Anna Rogers: Making good books better.

6. Neil Cross{Wellington]: Lead writer on Spooks, creator of Luther, author of nine great books including the Booker listed Always the Sun. Photo-SST
7. The other independent booksellers: apart from that grumpy bugger in Timaru.
8. The Reps- a diminishing breed but still a vital link between publishers and booksellers who care.
9. Karen Ferns – keeping Random House head and shoulders above the rest.
10. Neil Hyndman – proving it is possible to make real money out of publishing.
11. The Agent – Ray Richards. Are there any others?

12. Tony Fisk – probably the smartest MD in NZ Publishing – why isn’t he Prime Minister?
13. The team at Craig Potton – Carrying the flag for quality small publishers after the disappearance of Godwit, Shoal Bay, Tandem, Longacre and Mallinson Rendell
14. Bill and Phil [Noble and King] University Booksellers Supreme
15. Publishers – The Magnificent Seven : Harriet Allan, Fergus Barrowman, Jane Connor, Sam Elworthy, Nicola Legat, Rachel Scott, Bridget Williams. Quality rules.
16. Elizabeth Knox : An author with a great depth and breadth of talent and a hard-won international reputation
17. Joan Mackenzie : Has it in her power to make a real difference for New Zealand Publishers. I am sure she will use it wisely

18. Maurice Gee: now why hasn’t he been knighted?
19. The bloggers: especially Rachel King, Vanda Symon, Chris Bourke, Auckland and Christchurch libraries. Oh alright – also that Beattie chap.
20. The readers – where would be without them??

What’s the Hurry?

2012-01-26T07:27:00.000+13:00

A book was launched last night regarding the use of urgency by the New Zealand House of Representatives has already resulted in changes to parliamentary procedure.

What’s the Hurry? Urgency in the NZ Legislative Process 1987-2010 (VUP, Wellington, 2011) is the result of a major research project at Victoria University’s Faculty of Law and was funded by the New Zealand Law Foundation. The Project researchers (Claudia Geiringer, Polly Higbee and Professor Elizabeth McLeay) examined the use of urgency in the New Zealand House of Representatives over a 24-year period – from 1987-2010.

Questions the Project addressed included: what exactly is urgency and why do politicians use it? How much is it used? What factors constrain its use? In particular, to what extent has MMP had an effect on the use of urgency? Why, if at all, should we be worried about urgency, and in what circumstances? How robust is the regulatory framework that governs the use of urgency? Should it be amended and, if so, how?

In essence, urgency enables the government to extend the sitting hours of the House and to prioritise certain items of business to be conducted within those hours. As such, it is an extremely important tool for governments seeking to progress their legislative agendas. On the other hand, urgency also enables governments to dispense with the various stand-down periods (or breathing spaces) between the different stages of the legislative process and, indeed, to dispense with the select committee stage in its entirety. The use of urgency, therefore, raises issues of considerable significance for the quality and integrity of New Zealand’s lawmaking processes. Urgency motions can be a means to foreshorten democratic deliberation – both amongst parliamentarians and with the wider community.

“The Urgency Project found that, during the 24-year period of the study, urgency was relied on with regularity by governments of all stripes,” says Project researcher, Claudia Geiringer. “But its use was not distributed evenly across various parliaments and governments.” The study showed that the MMP voting system constrained somewhat the extent to which governments could resort to urgency but that two post-MMP governments bucked that trend: the 1996-1999 National-led government and the 2008-2011 National-led government. “For that reason, we reached the conclusion that the current constraints on the use of urgency were inadequate and that amendments to Parliament’s Standing Orders (its self-imposed rules of procedure) were desirable in order to better regulate the use of urgency,” says Geiringer.

Earlier this year, the Project made a submission to Parliament’s Standing Orders Committee, which was conducting its tri-annual review of the Standing Orders. The Committee issued its report in September and made recommendations in line with some of the Project’s suggestions. These recommendations have now been adopted by the House.

In particular, the Standing Orders Committee recommended that the House be able to sit for extended time to pass bills through a single stage, without having to resort to urgency to achieve this. The Urgency Project had suggested that an “extended time” provision of this kind would enable urgency itself to be reserved for situations of genuine urgency in relation to a particular bill. The Project anticipated that this would promote better public and media scrutiny of the use of urgency and, therefore, stronger disincentives against its misuse.

What’s the Hurry? concludes with an extended analysis of the Standing Orders Committee’s recommendations. The authors welcome the amendments to the Standing Orders but express the view that the changes do not go far enough. In particular, the authors express concern that the regulatory framework fails to constrain effectively the most democratically troubling use of urgency: to bypass the select committee stage of legislative scrutiny.

VICTORIA UNIVERSITY PRESS
PO Box 600, Wellington
www.vuw.ac.nz/vup

25 Things I Learned From Opening a Bookstore

2012-01-26T07:18:00.000+13:00

From Open Salon

jlsathrer -

I'm a lawyer in my past life, who got the kids through college and decided to try something different and a little more fun. A used book store sounded like a good idea, so that's where I am for now. I just hadn't counted on a recession or E-readers and am a little afraid there's going to be a third act. In the meantime, I have plenty to read and a little time to write. Not a bad way to spend a day.

1. People are getting rid of bookshelves. Treat the money you budgeted for shelving as found money. Go to garage sales and cruise the curbs.
2. While you're drafting that business plan, cut your projected profits in half. People are getting rid of bookshelves.
3. If someone comes in and asks where to find the historical fiction, they're not looking for classics, they want the romance section.
4. If someone comes in and says they read a little of everything, they also want the romance section.
5. If someone comes in and asks for a recommendation and you ask for the name of a book that they liked and they can't think of one, the person is not really a reader. Recommend Nicholas Sparks.
6. Kids will stop by your store on their way home from school if you have a free bucket of kids books. If you also give out free gum, they'll come every day and start bringing their friends.
7. If you put free books outside, cookbooks will be gone in the first hour and other non-fiction books will sit there for weeks. Except in warm weather when people are having garage sales. Then someone will back their car up and take everything, including your baskets.
8. If you put free books outside, someone will walk in every week and ask if they're really free, no matter how many signs you put out . Someone else will walk in and ask if everything in the store is free.
9. No one buys self help books in a store where there's a high likelihood of personal interaction when paying. Don't waste the shelf space, put them in the free baskets.
10. This is also true of sex manuals. The only ones who show an interest in these in a small store are the gum chewing kids, who will find them no matter how well you hide them.
11. Under no circumstances should you put the sex manuals in the free baskets. Parents will show up.
12. People buying books don't write bad checks. No need for ID's. They do regularly show up having raided the change jar.
13. If you have a bookstore that shares a parking lot with a beauty shop that caters to an older clientele, the cars parked in your lot will always be pulled in at an angle even though it's not angle parking.
14. More people want to sell books than buy them, which means your initial concerns were wrong. You will have no trouble getting books, the problem is selling them. Plus a shortage of storage space for all the Readers Digest books and encyclopedias that people donate to you.
15. If you open a store in a college town, and maybe even if you don't, you will find yourself as the main human contact for some strange and very socially awkward men who were science and math majors way back when. Be nice and talk to them, and ignore that their fly is open.
16. Most people think every old book is worth a lot of money. The same is true of signed copies and 1st editions. There's no need to tell them they're probably not insuring financial security for their grandkids with that signed Patricia Cornwell they have at home.
17. There's also no need to perpetuate the myth by pricing your signed Patricia Cornwell higher than the non-signed one.
18. People use whatever is close at hand for bookmarks--toothpicks, photographs, kleenex, and the very ocassional fifty dollar bill, which will keep you leafing through books way beyond the point where it's pr0ductive.
19. If you're thinking of giving someone a religious book for their graduation, rethink. It will end up unread and in pristine condition at a used book store, sometimes with the fifty dollar bill still tucked inside. (And you're off and leafing once again).
20. If you don't have an AARP card, you're apparently too young to read westerns.
21. A surprising number of people will think you've read every book in the store and will keep pulling out volumes and asking you what this one is about. These are the people who leave without buying a book, so it's time to have some fun. Make up plots.
22. Even if you're a used bookstore, people will get huffy when you don't have the new release by James Patterson. They are the same people who will ask for a discount because a book looks like it's been read.
23. Everyone has a little Nancy Drew in them. Stock up on the mysteries.
24. It is both true and sad that some people do in fact buy books based on the color of the binding.
25. No matter how many books you've read in the past, you will feel woefully un-well read within a week of opening the store. You will also feel wise at having found such a good way to spend your days.

Charles Dickens's world of home interiors

2012-01-26T07:10:00.001+13:00

Charles Dickens wasn't just a stickler for the intricacies of plot and character development. Home decoration was also a lifelong obsession, writes Hilary Macaskill

Hilary Macaskill
guardian.co.uk, Tuesday 24 January 2012

Charles Dickens in his study at Gad's Hill Place. Photograph: Everett Collection / Rex Feature

It was only when I read his article on wallpaper that I realised a hitherto unappreciated aspect of Charles Dickens: his interest in interior decor. Charles Dickens at Home, the book I was writing about the houses and areas where he'd lived, took on a much more literal meaning.
That article, "Household Scenery", for Household Words, the journal Dickens launched in 1850, comprised 6,000 words on all sorts of wall covering from tapestry to gutta percha (a solution to rising damp) but focused mainly on wallpaper, in more aspects than one could have imagined. It was one of the journal's "process" pieces, on the manufacture of familiar domestic items such as pottery. But it also exhibited his personal taste, alluding to "what we owe to the designers of good paper hangings", and including his impressions of American ways of wallpapering, gleaned from his 1842 tour with his wife, Catherine.
Dickens recounted how they stood "in perplexed contemplation of our chamber wall", musing on the bad joins and disregard for matching patterns. He even gave his own idea for a wallpaper design: "a hanging which, being dark near the floor, becomes gradually lighter towards the ceiling. At present," he went on, "decorators depend on a dark carpet and a light ceiling to give the effect indicated by decorative principle and required by a trained eye, some aid being given by a dark skirting board, and a cornice of light and bright colors; but there seems to be no reason why the hangings on the walls should not do their part."
Dickens had more than a journalistic interest in the subject. From his time at 48 Doughty Street, his first house and now the Charles Dickens Museum, his firm views on interior decor were apparent. The drawing room, restored to its appearance during his tenancy from 1837-1839, shows the changes he made, with the then-new fashion of "new-papering" to the floor after removing the dado rail, and the shade of pink chosen for the woodwork.
He clearly enjoyed home-making – and shopping. Early in his relationship with Catherine, for example, he wrote with satisfaction of preparations for her visit to Furnival's Inn, his first independent home, describing his purchases of "a pair of quart Decanters, and a pair of pots, a chrystal Jug and three brown dittos with plated tops, for beer and hot water, a pair of lustres and two magnificent china Jars – all, I flatter myself, slight bargains".
Full story at The Guardian

The Guardian Dickens walk four: Heart of the City
Follow a walking route through the City of London to see key sites from Charles Dickens' novels – with Jon Henley and Veronica Horwell

Canongate bags Gray short stories

2012-01-26T07:07:00.000+13:00

24.01.12 | Benedicte Page - The Bookseller

Canongate is to publish the complete short stories of Lanark author Alasdair Gray, after editorial director Francis Bickmore bought world rights in a deal with Zoe Waldie at RCW and Bill Swainson at Bloomsbury.

Every Short Story by Alasdair Gray will include his entire oeuvre in the short form from 1952 to 2012, namely 75 stories, 12 of them new, and illustrated throughout by the author. Work from his six previously published collections will also be included in the anthology. The book will be published in August as a £30 hardback, alongside the paperback of his "autopictography", A Life in Pictures.
Bickmore said: “This is going to be a lavish and wonderful book, and a landmark from one of the world’s most important writers. I am passionate about Gray’s stories and feel evangelical about getting others reading them too.
'There’s such an astonishing range, from sexual comedy to science fiction, social realism to flights of fancy, but they all share Gray’s generosity of spirit, his sense of humour in adversity and a desire that our culture flourish by telling the truth.
'I believe future historians will find in Gray a visionary of the stature of Blake, Scott or Joyce.”

U.S. digital reader ownership doubled over holidays

2012-01-26T07:03:00.000+13:00

Amazon's Kindle Fire tablet computer, right, is displayed with an Apple iPhone 4. Scott Eells | Bloomberg

Reuters -First published Jan 23 2012 - Salt Lake Tribune

The number of Americans owning a tablet computer or e-reader nearly doubled over the holidays as Kindles, Nooks and iPads proved to be popular gifts, a new study found.

In early January, 19 percent of Americans surveyed owned an e-reader, up from 10 percent in December, with identical results for tablets, according to a report released on Monday by the Pew Internet and American Life Project.

As a result, the percentage of Americans owning at least one digital reading device rose to 29 percent in January from 18 percent, according to the survey.

Amazon.com Inc. and Barnes & Noble Inc. each introduced new tablets and cheaper versions of their Kindle and Nook devices, respectively, ahead of the holidays, while Apple Inc.’s iPad continued to be popular.

The report also found that men and women were equally likely to own a device but that ownership was more likely among people of higher education and higher income.

The figures are from several surveys conducted by Pew. The first, pre-Christmas survey of 2,986 Americans 16 and older was conducted in November and December, while the second and third surveyed about 2,000 adults in January.

Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Licenses Amazon NY's Adult List for New Imprint

2012-01-26T06:59:00.006+13:00

PublishersLunch

The deal that Amazon Publishing's New York adult line has been mentioning to agents since it started acquiring has formally come to pass: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt has executed a broad "print licensing agreement" and will issue the unit's entire list in print form in North America, including through Amazon.com itself. HMH will publish the books under a distinct new imprint, called New Harvest. (There is some confusing wording in the press release, so you should be clear on two points: HMH is licensing rights and will be the print publisher, not just the distributor, and the HMH editions will be the print versions available via Amazon.com.)
The deal applies to adult books only from Amazon New York. HMH already has a first-look option on print rights for the Amazon West Coast imprints, and will continue to publish any titles picked up through that arrangement through their Mariner line. One agent doing business with Amazon surmised that "it allow HMH to publish more books, without the risk of putting upfront advances on their side of the deals." The new agreement does not cover the children's titles from Marshall Cavendish that Amazon has a deal to acquire.
Under the new agreement, like any licensee, it is expected that HMH has control over the format and pricing of their print editions. With Amazon New York's first list set to debut this September, HMH publisher Bruce Nichols says he does not expect to add any dedicated staff immediately for New Harvest, and anticipates adding personnel only modestly as the Amazon NY program builds. He indicates that publicity for the titles will be handled by Amazon's new team.
As a licensed HMH imprint, rather than a distribution agreement with print books physically published by Amazon, the arrangement may affect how retailers approach stocking the titles that Amazon NY has been signing, including high-profile books by Tim Ferris, Penny Marshall, Deepak Chopra and James Franco. For those who want to carry the high-profile titles, it allows them to do business with HMH rather than a retailing competitor. To clarify another important point of confusion, an Amazon executive confirms to us that the New York list will be made available in all major ebook formats as well; the titles will not be Kindle-exclusive (contrary to how the Amazon West Coast ebooks have been handled so far). Amazon has not finalized the technical and vendor details for how those general market ebook files will be handled yet.
That decision will put Barnes & Noble in an interesting position on the New Harvest print list as well as the ebook editions, however they come to market. In the past, BN spokesperson Mary Ellen Keating has said "our policy is that unless we receive all formats of a title to make available to our customers, we will not sell those physical titles in our stores." BN chief merchandising officer Jaime Carey has said that "to sell and promote the physical book in our store showrooms, and not have the ebook available for sale would undermine our promise to Barnes & Noble customers to make available any book, anywhere, anytime." Those statements certainly imply that BN would carry product that is available to them in both physical and digital form.
As an additional, practical consideration, the licensing agreement with HMH also spares Amazon creating any sales tax nexus via additional warehouses or sales reps.
As a licensing arrangement, it does naturally raise questions about how authors' compensation will be handled (since under a standard print sub-license, the originating house would retain a substantial share). Amazon New York publisher Larry Kirshbaum says that "the authors get full royalties," however (after any earn-out, we would expect). In the press release, Kirshbaum notes, "Our goal has been, and remains, to introduce authors to as many readers as possible. This new agreement with Houghton Mifflin Harcourt enables us to broaden our distribution and get our books into more readers' hands."
Tangentially, as some reports have noted, Moody's downgraded their rating on the debt of Houghton Mifflin Harcourt last week, to Caa2 from Caa1, with a "negative" outlook.

Scots literature to be made compulsory part of school exams

2012-01-26T06:57:00.000+13:00

Scots text will be a compulsory part of school exams from 2014. Published on Wednesday 25 January 2012 - The Scotsman

ALL pupils taking Higher English exams will be required to answer a question on Scottish texts, Education Secretary Michael Russell said today.

The announcement, coinciding with Burns Night, confirms the Scottish Government’s acceptance of the recommendation from the Scottish Studies Working Group, and Higher English will include a specific element on Scottish texts from 2014/15 onwards.
Currently students have the option of answering a question on a Scottish text, however this new measure will make this a compulsory part of the exam.
Mr Russell said: “Our country has a rich and world-renowned literary tradition and it is fitting to be able to make this announcement on Burns Night, when we celebrate the national bard.
“Scotland’s contribution to literature is marked down the generations, Burns, Walter Scott and Robert Louis Stevenson have provided work that has lasted the test of time, along with contemporary writers like Irvine Welsh and Liz Lochhead.
“We want our children and young people to have the chance to learn about our literary tradition and to inspire the future generations of Scottish writers.”
Scotland’s Makar Liz Lochhead, who is the national poet, said: “In common with just about every English teacher, academic, and certainly every fellow writer that I’ve consulted informally for their opinion, I am delighted that Scotland seeks to ensure that some Scottish texts are included in the literature taught in our schools. And that it will be a requirement to answer an examination question on at least one of these.
“Remembering that such texts may be in English, Scots-English, Scots, or any mixture of these, may come from any historical period, including the present, and are certainly not required to reflect a chauvinistic or uncritical view of Scottish society, it can only benefit our future citizens to so engage with their own culture.”

Pure takes Costa after judging 'wrangle'

2012-01-26T06:54:00.002+13:00

Andrew Miller has won the £30,000 2011 Costa Book of the Year for his sixth novel Pure (Sceptre), set in 18th-century Paris, as the annual award announced a new short story category for next year.
Miller triumphed over bookies' favourite Matthew Hollis' biography category-winner Now All Roads Lead to France (Faber) at a ceremony in London last night (24th January). Pure also beat poet laureate Carol Ann Duffy's The Bees (Picador); Christie Watson's debut novel Tiny Sunbirds Far Away (Quercus); and debut children's author Moira Young's Blood Red Road (Marion Lloyd Books). The category winners were each awarded £5,000 in December.
Chair of the final judging panel Geordie Greig said: “Pure is a rich and evocative historical novel which engrosses with its vivid portrait of pre-revolutionary France," describing the novel as a "memorable gothic tale of morality and mortality". However he was frank about a "forceful wrangle" among the judges, with many of the panel backing Hollis' biography of poet Edward Thomas for the prize. "The decision did not happen seamlessly and unanimously," he acknowledged, describing Hollis' book as "an incredibly subtle and brilliant biography".
Miller thanked agent Simon Trewin and Sceptre publisher Carole Welch, whom he called "the best editor in London".
Pure is already the bestselling title of the Costa category winners, having sold 7,768 copies since its win in December, according to Nielsen BookScan. Sales rocketed 2,350% over the past month thanks to its win and the release of its mass-market edition tying into the book's selection for the Waterstones Book Club. The next bestselling title is Tiny Sunbirds Far Away, which has sold 3,286 copies since the win in December.
The new Costa Short Story Award will run in association with the Costa Book Awards: Novel, First Novel, Biography, Poetry and Children's Book, but will not be judged alongside them for the overall Book of the Year prize. The competition will be launched later this year.

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Wary but Determined, Publishers are Preparing for the Digital Future

2012-01-26T06:51:00.000+13:00

PW- by Calvin Reid - Jan 24, 2012

The transition to digitization continues in book publishing, an industry that is both susceptible to digital disruption, but also positioned to benefit tremendously from it, according to Forrester Research analyst James McQuivey who kicked off this year's Digital Book World conference. That said, a survey conducted by Forrester in collaboration with Digital Book World found that while 82% of publishers were optimistic about digital, the number was down from 89% last year. Indeed only 28% of those thought their own company would be stronger in the future, down from 51% last year.

The decline has a lot to do with a realization of hard work ahead for publishers to adapt to the new digital environment, according to McQuivey. He also offered these figures: 25 million people in the U.S. own an e-reader; 34 million people own tablets and eight million homes have at least two tablets. While publishers may be a bit daunted, they are rapidly organizing their firms for digital: 75% of publishers have an executive level person responsible for digital; 63% report that digital skills are formally integrated into all departments; 69% of the publishers expect to increase digital staffiing in 2012, while 22% expect overall company staffing to go down in 2012.

McQuivey said that "the love affair with apps is officially over," noting that while 75% of the publishers surveyed produce apps, 51% said they cost too much to produce, only 19% believe apps will change the future of books and 15% say apps represent significant revenue for them.

Looking forward into 2012 McQuivey said 54% of publishers believe print sales will continue to decrease although only 5% believe it will decrease "significantly." Book executives also believe Amazon and other online-only retailers will sell 41% of all e-books in 2012 (and Amazon doesn't care if it resets all the pricing downward). E-books sales are expected to increase 130% by the end of 2012. And 70% of the publishers surveyed believe that in the future publishers must have a direct customer relationship of some kind--and 66% of publishers expect to invest in acquiring customer data.

Eighty-five publishing companies took part in the survey.

A Novelist Appraises China, Then and Now

2012-01-26T06:50:00.003+13:00

Publishing Perspectives

Duncan Jepson's new novel 'All the Flowers in Shanghai' gives western readers a glimpse into China's psyche, where tradition can take precedence over reason.
Read here.

DISCUSSION:
Do We Need the Term ‘E-book’ Any Longer?
The term 'e-book' distinguishes format, but it may also be prejudicial in so far as it has come to equate "cheap and ephemeral" with books to many consumers.

Corporate: Apple Sold 15.4 million iPads in First Quarter; Meredith Buys AllRecipes.com

2012-01-26T06:39:00.001+13:00

PublishersLunch

Apple reported record earnings for the first quarter of its fiscal year, ending December 31, and beat Wall Street expectations so handily the stock was halted after hours Tuesday, rising more than $30 a share. The company sold 15.4 million iPads and 37 million iPhones during the quarter on net income of $13.1 billion, and $43.4 billion in revenue. Profits more than doubled compared to the first quarter of 2011.

Apple sold over 40 million iPads in 2011, and has moved more than 55 million units since launching in early 2010.
Release

Though Random House was among the four reported final bidders (along with Amazon) vying to buy AllRecipes.com from Reader's Digest, in the end the buyer turned out to be more in line with expectations, as Meredith bought the online recipe repository for $175 million. That's almost three times what Reader's Digest paid for the site in 2006 (and more than what Google paid last year for Zagat's.) The NY Post says the site is "modestly profitable on revenues of just under $30 million," but it leads the field with over 25 million monthly unique visitors. Meredith said they expected the sale to close later this quarter and that the acquisition "should drive incremental revenue and profit growth starting in fiscal year 2013." They also expect fiscal 2012 earnings to drop by about 10 cents a share.
WSJ

In the UK, consistent with their 10-week sales report in November, WH Smith said in a brief trading updatethat sales for the past 21 weeks, ending January 21, declined 6 percent on comp basis at their high street stores, and fell 5 percent overall.

Torbay tī kōuka: A New Zealand tree in the English Riviera

2012-01-25T19:59:00.000+13:00

In Torbay tī kōuka, photographer Wayne Barrar looks at how the New Zealand cabbage tree has been relocated, hybridised and utilised to redefine a new domestic landscape: the South West of England.

Defying the normal direction of ecological colonialism, the cabbage tree was introduced to Britain as an exotic specimen plant in the nineteenth century. Its tropical appearance and temperate hardiness made it a natural fit for the South West into the twentieth century, particularly as the Torbay area positioned itself as a UK tourist destination – the ‘English Riviera’.

The cabbage tree (tī kōuka, Cordyline australis) now appears extensively through the South West. It is so closely identified with the area that, as the ‘Torbay palm’, it is one of the area’s key promotional symbols, and it is often presumed to be a native English plant.

Wayne Barrar’s photographs begin by positioning tī kōuka at home in New Zealand, before going on to consider the plant in this new setting. The work extends his long-term interest in the way people alter their environment, expand the limits of nature and live in increasingly constructed landscapes.

The photographs are accompanied by essays by New Zealand writers Philip Simpson and Peter Simpson, outlining tī kōuka’s botanical, ecological, and cultural histories.

Torbay tī kōuka: A New Zealand tree in the English Riviera

Photographs by Wayne Barrar

With essays by leading writers Peter Simpson and Philip Simpson

Foreword by Liz Wells

Published by University of Plymouth Press

With the support of the College of Creative Arts, Massey University

December 2011

ISBN 9781841022970

64 pages plus one gatefold

Softbound 200 x 240mm. $34.95 (incl GST).

Available from good booksellers or order from the office of the School of Fine Arts, Massey University, PO Box 756, Wellington 6140, New Zealand; phone Ilka Kapica - (04) 801-5799, ext 62337; email i.kapica@massey.ac.nz

Wayne Barrar, an Associate Professor at the School of Fine Arts, Massey University. is a photographer whose work has been widely exhibited in New Zealand and internationally. His books include Shifting Nature (Otago University Press, 2001) and An Expanding Subterra, published in 2010 by the Dunedin Public Art Gallery in association with his currently touring exhibition.

Hierarchy of Book Publishing The Top 100 (circa 2012)

2012-01-25T15:35:00.001+13:00

This is a must read post on the "On Public Relations" blog. Hilarious and totally entertaining.

Link below to read all 100.

1). Brand-name authors (still)

Stephen King (since 1974)
John Grisham (1989)
Patricia Cornwell (1990)
Jodi Picoult (1992)
Nicholas Sparks (1996)
Jennifer Weiner (2001)
Etc.

2). Self-published authors with proven track (developing)

J.A. Konrath (since 2004)
John Locke (2009)
Amanda Hocking (2010)
Brittany Geragotelis (2011)
Etc.

3). Amy Einhorn’s hair™

4). Authors who have been to Heaven, met God

Todd Burpo
Tim Tebow

5). GEORGE R.R. MARTIN

A Game of Thrones
A chick who hatches dragons from her vagina
I never meet women like this

6). Intern assigned to company twitter feed

7). Intern assigned to company tumblr feed

8). SUZANNE COLLINS

The Hunger Games
March 23, 2012

9). American Cheerleader Magazine

See #2, Brittany Geragotelis

10). The Chairmen, Publishers, and Editor-in-Chiefs (still)

Sonny Mehta, Knopf – handsome, smokes, drinks, spent time in Australian jail, rarely talks or responds to email
Michael Pietsch, Little Brown – not as handsome as Sonny, practitioner of Bikram, mostly clean track with minor indiscretions (smoking a bone with Keith)
Jonathan Galassi, FSG – complicated, a poet
Karp, S&S – now wants to be addressed only by his last name, a real Yenta
Do they have one at Harper Collins? (checking on this)
Etc.

Link here to read all 100.

Birds of Clay by Aleksandra Lane - an invitation

2012-01-25T15:22:00.000+13:00

VUP and Unity Books warmly invite you to the launch of Birds of Clay by Aleksandra Lane, to be launched by Chris Price.

With by wild gypsy music from Melbourne band Vardos & mesmerising acoustic sounds by Arsen Karalic

Saturday February 11th, 6.30pm,

Thistle Hall, 293 Cuba Street,

Te Aro, Wellington.

Birds of Clay flies from the northern to the southern hemisphere,

bringing with it a suitcase full of edgy Balkan politics and surrealism.

Poignant and fierce, these are poems that surprise at every turn.

– CHRIS PRICE

$30, Paperback, Victoria University Press

http://www.victoria.ac.nz/vup

Vintage Pippi Longstocking Comics Coming This Fall

2012-01-25T14:59:00.002+13:00

By Jason Boog on Galley Cat,January 24, 2012

Drawn & Quarterly will publish translations of vintage Pippi Longstocking comics this fall. The series will reprint comics written by children’s author Astrid Lindgren, drawn by Ingrid Vang Nyman and translated by Tiina Nunnally.
Rabén & Sjögren Agency negotiated the deal with acquiring editor Tom Devlin. The comics were first published in Sweden between 1957 and 1959, running in Humpty Dumpty magazine–expanding on the story book adventures of Pippi Longstocking.
Here’s more from the release: “The original illustrator for the chapter books, Vang Nyman was a very talented children’s book illustrator and an avant-garde champion of the importance of children’s literature who insisted that art in children’s books needed to meet the same aesthetic standards as art in any other medium. Sadly Vang Nyman never achieved international success, and tragically committed suicide in 1959 due to mental health issues, while Lindgren went on to become one of the world’s best loved writers with over 145 million books sold worldwide.”

Ora Nui 2012; Maori Literary Journal

2012-01-25T14:57:00.001+13:00

I mentioned this new publication yesterday but didn't have a cover image at the time. I have it now, it is impressive I'm sure you will agree.

Arts Foundation News on Mister Pip.

2012-01-25T13:39:00.001+13:00

The Iranian Book News Agency advises, Laureate Lloyd Jones’s Mister Pip has been translated into Persian by Farideh Ashrafi. The book is to be marketed by Amout in Iran.

Titles discussed on Afternoons with Jim Mora

2012-01-25T13:26:00.000+13:00

I chatted to Jim yesterday about the following titles on his popular Radio NZ National programme:

Food Rules – an eater’s manual – Michael Pollan. He was at the Auckland Writers & Readers Festival two years ago when his paperback edition of this book was a best-seller worldwide. Now the publishers Penguin US have put out an illustrated hardback edition. The illustrator is Maira Kalman a well-known NY artist and illustrator whose work I love so of course I just had to buy this gorgeous new hardback edition.

The Culinarian – a kitchen desk refrence – Barbara Ann Kipfer – Wiley - - filled with food trivia and history as well as being a genuine reference book, a compendium if you like – a food glossary

As Always – the letters of Julia Child & Avis Devoto – Houghton Miflin – Published last year – the fascinating correspondence between Julia Child and her “pen pal” and literary mentor. Julia Child has always been famous among foodies but in the US now there seems to be an insatiable appetite for all things Julia spurred on no doubt by the movie Julie and Julia.

Appetite for Life – the biography of Julia Child – Noel Riley Finch –Anchor Books – published 1999 – bought second hand at The Book Barn upstate NY – mint condition $4 !

Molto Gusto – Easy Italian Cooking – Mario Batali – Harper Collins. He is the guy who Bill Buford wrote about in HEAT a best-selling memoir some years ago.Arguably the most famous Italian chef in the US, a larger than life character who is a regular on the Food Channel. Harper Collins NZ released the first title last year and are about to release his latest, a follow-up called Molto Batali - Simple Family Meals (NZ$45) (left). I'm planning to use his Fettucine with Peas and Pancetta recipe later this week. These are easy to follow recipes, all beautifully illustrated.

NEW AND INTERESTING - RECEIVED IN THE MAIL OVER THE HOLIDAYS - A HIGHLY VARIED RANGE OF SUBJECTS

2012-01-25T13:25:00.000+13:00

MATESHIP WITH BIRDS

Carrie Tiffany

Picador - $29.99

Here is the back cover blurb:
On the outskirts of an Australian country town in the 1950s, a lonely farmer trains his binoculars on a family of kookaburras that roost in a tree near his house. Harry observes the kookaburras through a year of feast, famine, birth, death, war, romance and song. As Harry watches the birds, his next door neighbour has her own set of binoculars trained on him. Ardent, hard-working Betty has escaped to the country with her two fatherless children. Betty is pleased that her son, Michael, wants to spend time with the gentle farmer next door. But when Harry decides to teach Michael about the opposite sex, perilous boundaries are crossed.
Mateship with Birds is a novel about young lust and mature love. It is a hymn to the rhythm of country life – to vicious birds, virginal cows, adored dogs and ill-used sheep. On one small farm in a vast, ancient landscape, a collection of misfits question the nature of what a family can be.
About the Author:
Carrie Tiffany was born in West Yorkshire and grew up in Western Australia. She spent her early twenties working as a park ranger in the Red Centre and now lives in Melbourne, where she works as an agricultural journalist.
I do remember greatly enjoying her first novel, Everyman's Rules for Scientific Living (2005), which was shortlisted for numerous awards including the Orange Prize, the Miles Franklin Literary Award, the Guardian First Book Award and the Commonwealth Writer's Prize, and won the Dobbie Award for Best First Book (2006) and the 2006 Western Australian Premier's Award for Fiction. Mateship with Birds is her second novel.
This one is now in the bedside pile!

PASSIONATE MARRIAGE
Keeping Love & Intimacy Alive in Committed Relationships
Scribe - $36.00
The publisher says:
The greatest sexual pleasure and emotional fulfilment in a person’s lifetime is possible in the middle and later years, when he or she has developed a mature sense of self and found genuine intimacy with another person. That’s the exciting message of this daring and pioneering work, which challenges couples to work together on the sexual and emotional blocks that hold them back from total satisfaction with each other.
As you open the pages of this book, you’ll meet couples who share the same predicaments and obstacles as you and your partner. With humour, compassion, and unusual candour, Dr Schnarch and the couples address the intimate secrets of their marriage, revealing ideas and techniques that are directly applicable to your own relationship.
With a new preface by the author for this updated edition,Passionate Marriage is a respectful, erotic, uplifting, and spiritual guide dedicated to making love and intimacy a reality for every couple. It’s a book to read and reread often for inspiration and enlightenment.

About the author: Dr. David Schnarch is a licensed clinical psychologist and certified sex therapist, and the author of numerous books and articles on intimacy, sexuality, and relationships. He is the director of the Crucible Institute, and his work has attracted clients and students from across the globe.Passionate Marriage is a perennial bestseller, offering the general public his revolutionary approach in a pragmatic and easy-to-understand form. Dr Schnarch lives and works with his wife, Dr Ruth Morehouse, in Colorado.Website:http://desirebook.com/

BRIEFCASE
John Adams
AUP - $24.99
From the publisher's website:

WARNING: contains legal documents and poems.

After an argument with his wife, Verity, Jason Button threw a stapler which struck her on the face. Is he guilty of violent assault? Or was it just a matter of bad luck?
Briefcase, the first book of poetry by Judge and poet John Adams, is a mélange of poems – in traditional and experimental forms – and other texts: affidavits, police reports, a sudoku puzzle, court transcripts, a menu, wills and commentaries.
A disordered novella in legal documents, brutal and amusing by turns, Briefcase superbly explores the role of language as a vessel for truth and an implement of justice.
About the Author
District Court and Family Court judge at Auckland by day, John Adams also has a Masters in Creative Writing from The University of Auckland and is a poet by night. He is a long-time author of legal texts – such as the Butterworths Family Law series. The first draft of Briefcase was written during his Masters year in 2009.

SWITCHED
Amanda Hocking
TOR - $22.99
Praise for the Trylle Trilogy by Amanda Hocking:
Named as one of the Guardian’s Book Power 100 2011

‘Her character-driven books, which feature trolls, hobgoblins and fairy-tale elements and keep the pages turning, have generated an excitement not felt in the industry since Stephenie Meyer or perhaps even J. K. Rowling’ The New York Times

‘A Tolkien of our times’ Wall Street Journal

‘I started reading Switched in the evening one night and stayed up until 3am because I didn’t want to put it down. I had to be at work the next day and all I could think about was going home and finishing the book

Yes, it’s that good’ A Tale of Many Reviews

‘I ate this book up. I could barely put it down before bed, and was also trying to sneak time in my busy morning to read some extra sentences. This was an awesome first book in a series that I’m dying to read. Amanda please write the next one soon. I’m dying!!’ Midnight Glace Reviews

‘I loved this book! . . . I highly suggest you take a look at this book if you want to read some fantasy that leaves you panting for the next installment’ The Light Under The Covers

‘This series has a bit of everything – magic, myth, action, romance . . . ah, the romance! There is something so appealing about forbidden love, especially when it leads to a happily-ever-after. I have to say, I love the way this ended. Of course, I won’t give spoilers, but the ending was perfect’

Diary of a Bibliophile

About the author:
Amanda Hocking is twenty-six years old, lives in Minnesota and had never sold a single book before 15 April 2010. She has now sold her millionth. Her books have been a self-publishing phenomenon – according to the Observer, Amanda is "the most spectacular example of an author striking gold through ebooks". In her own words, Amanda is an Obsessive Tweeter. John Hughes mourner. Unicorn enthusiast. Red Bull addict. Muppets activist. Fraggin Aardvarks guitarist. Author of the USA Today bestselling books the Trylle Trilogy.
amandahocking.blogspot.com/

A LIVELY DEATH
Lessons from a son in spirit
Heather Carpenter - $24.99
Wooden Shed Publishing
To lose a child in this world is to suffer unfathomable grief, and when Heather Carpenter’s 24-year-old son, Kiet, died in a skateboarding accident, her life changed in an instant. Suddenly the ‘bottomless pit of despair’ opened up before her.

At the same time, however, she received a gift – she realised she could embrace the wonderful possibility that her son was alive in spirit and reaching out to provide comfort and love. Drawing on the lessons learnt, and on Heather’s personal reflections and observations, A Lively Death charts a journey of the heart and of the spirit, articulating a relationship without boundaries and a love that transcends death.

About the author

Heather Carpenter PhD lives on a small vineyard in Hawke’s Bay, New Zealand, with her husband Brett. They have four children, aged 28–34 years. Heather is a career consultant, counsellor and educator with a strong interest in exploring human potential, and writes whenever possible.

Wooden Shed Publishing Services Ltd
9 John Road, Stanmore Bay, Auckland 0932 NZ
09 424 7272 • 021 607 694
www.woodenshed.co.nz / email: shedpub@gmail.com

GIFFITH REVIEW 35
Surviving - Random Acts of Nature and Man
Text-Griffith University - $36

NZ contributors in this latest edition of Australia's literary journal include:
Nic Low with a perceptive look at shifts in Christchurch, from the built environment to community and family dynamics
Lloyd Jones captures a Christchurch moment in his poem 'Suddenly'
Sydney Smith pieces together her family's Moriori heritage and the fall-out from generations of conflict and reconciliation

Other major contributors include Tom Griffiths on a new language for disaster prevention and management; Mara Bún discusses designs for sustainable recovery; Michael Gawenda on the media's responsibilities; and Kathy Marks reflects on the trials of Pitcairn Island.

OTAGO CENTRAL RAIL TRAIL - an easy guide
Brian & Diane Miller
Lifelogs Ltd. $15.00

Over 10,000 people complete the trail each year, (and over half of them are Aucklanders), but too many ride each section without stopping to enjoy the side-trips. This compact illustrated guide packed with useful facts, cross-sections, easy-to-digest information and suggested side trips will enhance your experience on the trail.

This pocket-sized guide is so full of useful facts and easy-to-digest information that it should find a home in the pocket of every track visitor.
A book to buy before the trip and to use as you do the trail.
The first section explains why Central Otago is so special, with an overview of natural history – geology, climate, plants and animals. Photos help bikers identify the common plants and animals. The human history is equally fascinating – the first travellers, the squatters, the discovery of gold and the building of the Otago Central Railway on which the trail is built.
The cross-sections of each part of the trail along with maps of main towns and surrounding areas make it easy for ‘trail trippers’ to plan their movements. Includes tips for good lunch spots, fun quiz questions to enliven these breaks, locations of ‘loos.’…. Also web-site links, an “Events Calendar” for those who want to link their trip to regional activities, hints for taking better photos and biking tips.
Lifelogs Ltd.,
PO Box 39
Dunedin 9054
Ph 03 4761 453
Fax 03 4761 454
brian@brianmiller.co.nz

PRIVATE GAMES
James Patterson and Mark Sullivan
Century - $37.99
Private, the world’s most renowned investigation firm, has been commissioned to provide security for the 2012 Olympic games in London. Its agents are the smartest, fastest, and most technologically advanced in the world, and 400 of them have been transferred to London to protect over 10,000 competitors who represent more than 200 countries.

The opening ceremony is still hours away when Private investigator and single father of twins, Nigel Steele, is called to the scene of a ruthless murder. A high-ranking member of the games’ organizing committee and his mistress have been killed. It’s clear that it wasn’t a crime of passion, but one of precise calculation and execution.

Private Games is an action-packed 422 page thriller that brings the splendour and emotion of the Olympics to a wildly powerful climax. If you are still at the beach be sure to grab this one, the perfect holiday or plane read.

About the author:

James Patterson is one of the best-known and biggest-selling writers of all time. He is the author of some of the most popular series of the past decade — the Alex Cross, Women’s Murder Club and Detective Michael Bennett novels — and he has written many other number one bestsellers including romance novels and stand-alone thrillers. He lives in Florida with his wife and son.

James is passionate about encouraging children to read. Inspired by his own son who was a reluctant reader, he also writes a range of books specifically for young readers. James has formed a partnership with the National Literacy Trust, an independent, UK-based charity that changes lives through literacy. In 2010, he was voted Author of the Year at the Children’s Choice Book Awards in New York.

SPOT'S FUN FIRST WORDS - a slide-and-see book
Eric Hill
Board Book - Frederick Warne - $17.99

Young Spot fans (aged say 2-4 years) will love sliding the colourful pictures to show the words underneath.

THE FIELD
Bill Nagelkerke
ACHUKA Books
Digital List Price $0.99c

Admired children's writer and former librarian Bill Nagelkerke has this time written a work of speculative fiction aimed at upper primary, intermediate and early high school students. I guess you would call it a novella. I read it on my Kindle, (the first time I have reviewed an e-book by the way), in a bit over an hour. It has a strong religious theme,(think Marian apparitions),which might be off-putting for some but it is well written and compelling as you would expect from a writer of this calibre.

Achuka Books is the brainchild of Michael Thorn, a foremost commentator on children's literature, and a highly rated blogger, and I gather this is the first title contracted and published on his newly launched Achuka e-books.

Megaupload – likely the tip of the iceberg in internet piracy

2012-01-25T13:12:00.000+13:00

From the PANZ newsletter

Publishers, booksellers, authors – think the issues raised by the Kim Dotcom/Megaupload piracy case are not relevant to the book trade?

Think again.

Sam Elworthy, whose PANZ portfolio includes advocacy, says that file sharing sites like Megaupload and others already make pirated books available in large numbers.

“Digital piracy has a real impact on publishers’ ability to produce books when they are not getting a fair return on the investment they make in each publication. And it hurts our authors too. We have been working hard in New Zealand to make e-books readily available at a fair price, and with suitable copyright protection, so that these sites can’t just give away our intellectual property.”

Megaupload Limited and Vestor Limited along with seven individuals are believed to have generated more than US$175 million in criminal proceeds and caused more than half a billion dollars in harm to copyright owners. Eighteen domain names have been seized.

Four of the seven, Kim Dotcom (aka Kim Schmitz), Bram van der Kolk, Finn Batato, and Mathias Ortmann are currently held by the New Zealand courts awaiting extradition proceedings to enable them to be tried in the US.

This action is among the largest criminal copyright cases ever brought by the United States and directly targets the misuse of a public content storage and distribution site to commit intellectual property crime.

Sam Elworthy notes “Digital piracy isn’t just happening somewhere way off shore. It is happening right up the road from where we live and it’s impacting New Zealand books, music and films. For publishers it reinforces the importance of an active digital strategy and a wary eye so that you can take action when your titles start showing up as free downloads.”

DUNEDIN SOUNDINGS PLACE AND PERFORMANCE Edited by Dan Bendrups and Graeme Downes

2012-01-25T12:18:00.000+13:00

The ‘Dunedin Sound’ of the 1980s is a phenomenon known throughout the world. But what does Dunedin musicmaking sound like in the 21st century?
Dunedin Soundings features writing from musicians,composers and scholar/practitioners. They discuss genres as diverse as brass band, opera, classical, Indonesian gamelan,jazz, rock and more, the intricacies of the composition and lyricwriting processes, digital remixing, and scoring for film and TV. Together, they reveal the ways in which these supposedly separate music fields have the potential to inform and stimulate each other.
The theoretical thrust of the book is that performance and composition practices constitute a process of research. The writers are practitioners who are recognised nationally and internationally for their contributions to New Zealand music across genres, including composer Anthony Ritchie, the Verlaines’ Graeme Downes and Emmy-nominee Trevor Coleman.
This book is for everyone with a serious passion and wide-ranging intellectual curiosity for music, and anyone wanting an insider’s glimpse into music-making in Aotearoa New Zealand.
Dan Bendrups is Senior Lecturer in Music at the Queensland Conservatorium, Griffith University,
Brisbane. He plays the trombone and has performed in a wide range of contexts internationally.
Graeme Downes is Senior Lecturer in the Department of Music at the University of Otago and a member
of Dunedin rock band the Verlaines.

RRP $40.00 / £24.50 UK
Otago University Press
www.otago.ac.nz/press

Costa book award: Andrew Miller wins for sixth novel, Pure

2012-01-25T10:54:00.001+13:00

Vivid tale of life in pre-revolutionary Paris beats Matthew Hollis's biography of Edward Thomas to £30,000 prize cheque

Mark Brown, arts correspondent
guardian.co.uk, Tuesday 24 January 2012

Costa book of the year winner Andrew Miller. Photograph: Abbie Trayler-Smith

A vividly told story of life in pre-revolutionary Paris on Tuesday won the 2011 Costa book award in what turned out to be a bitterly fought two-way tussle between fact and fiction.
Andrew Miller was given one of the UK's most prestigious literary prizes – along with a £30,000 cheque – at a ceremony in London for his sixth novel, Pure.
The judging chair, Geordie Greig, said "there really was a fierce debate" during the 90-minute judging discussion. "There was quite bitter dissent and argument to find the winner. The debate was prolonged with passionate views over two books."
Those two were Pure and Now All Roads Lead to France, Matthew Hollis's gripping and moving biography of war poet Edward Thomas.
Full report at The Guardian.

And photos taken at the event.

Hugo’ Nominated for 11 Academy Awards

2012-01-25T10:25:00.000+13:00

By Jason Boog on Galley Cat, January 24, 2012

Martin Scorsese‘s award winning adaptation of The Invention of Hugo Cabret by Brian Selznick has lead the Academy Award nominations this year, earning 11 Oscar nominations.
We’ve embedded the trailer above–what did you think of the film? Earlier this year, we wrote about Selznick’s personalized tours of the American Museum of Natural History.
The Best Picture nominees included a host of adapted novels. Below, we’ve linked to free samples of books adapted into Best Picture-nominated films.
Free Samples of Novels Adapted into Best Picture Nominees
The Invention of Hugo Cabret by Brian Selznick
The Descendants by Kaui Hart Hemmings
The Help by Kathryn Stockett
Moneyball by Michael Lewis

War Horse by Michael Morpurgo
Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close by Jonathan Safran Foer

Northwest booksellers “pushback” against Pearl’s deal with Amazon

2012-01-25T07:14:00.000+13:00

by Dennis Johnson - Melville House

“There’s been pushback,” says America’s most famous librarian (and former indie bookseller), Nancy Pearl, about the announcement (see our earlier report) that she would be publishing a line of reprints with Amazon.com‘s publishing imprint.
Pearl, famous for being an ardent champion of public libraries and independent bookstores—two things Amazon is fairly famous for not being ardent supporters of—tells Lynn Neary in this story on NPR’s Morning Edition that the pushback has been “that I’ve gone over to the dark side and allied myself with these people who are destroying the book business as we know it.” (Full disclosure: I’m quoted in the story expressing surprise at Pearl’s deal with Amazon.)
Pearl doesn’t describe the “pushback” in any more detail than that (she’s only quoted saying how happy the Amazon offer made her and her agent—telling word, that) but a front page report in her hometown newspaper, the Seattle Times, does:

The reaction from the brick-and-mortar bookshops — which have struggled first against competition from the big-box chains, and then the price-cutting Amazon — was immediate.
By Friday, some 50 store managers and owners had emailed Thom Chambliss, executive director of the Pacific Northwest Booksellers Association in Eugene, Ore.
That’s a sizable number, considering the group has 160 to 165 total members.
“Consternation,” is how Chambliss describes the content of the emails.

Full story at Melville House.

Cairo International Book Fair opens

2012-01-25T07:09:00.000+13:00

Finally here: Cairo International Book Fair opens with cautious optimism

The first day of one of the largest book fairs in the Middle East - cancelled last year due to Egypt's revolution - opened today with remarkable public interest and optimistic publishers

Mary Mourad reporting , Monday 23 Jan 2012 - ahramonline

Report here.

The Costa prize's unexpected cliffhanger

2012-01-25T07:04:00.000+13:00

Is the Costa book of the year poised to go to a poetry collection for the third year running?

Claire Armitstead

Tuesday 24 January 2012 guardian.co.uk

Costa contender? Carol Ann Duffy. Photograph: Murdo Macleod

Last year's rumpus over the Booker long- and shortlists has left the Costa prize to claim a high ground which it has in the past been at pains to avoid. Robert McCrum wrote on Sunday about the "uncool oddness" of the prize, which is now in its 41st year. "More populist than Man Booker, but not as cool as Orange," he said, "it still hasn't outgrown its parochial, ale‑house origins as the Whitbread prize".
This may be an accurate summary of the prize's reputation, but it doesn't take account of its recent history. The overall prize has been taken by a poetry collection for two years in a row. Poetry usually does badly in generalist prizes and there's no question that part of the appeal of both collections lies in the autobiographical stories they tell – Christopher Reid's A Scattering was about the death of his wife, while Jo Shapcott's Of Mutability dealt with her treatment for breast cancer. But when the two leading contenders for this year's prize – Carol Ann Duffy's collection The Bees and Matthew Hollis's biography of poet Edward Thomas, Now All Roads Lead to France – also involve poetry, something is clearly going in.
Like Reid's winning volume, The Bees deals with personal loss – in this case, the death of Duffy's mother. It's a timely and elegantly patterned collection and would, I think, make a fine winner, were it not for the pressure against the prize going to poetry three times in a row, a pressure that may militate indirectly against Hollis's biography of Edward Thomas, too.
So who will take it? Having seen Anthony McGowan's Guardian review of Blood Red Road, I'm inclined to discount this children's book winner as a serious contender, and Christie Watson's Tiny Sunbirds Far Away hasn't so far shown the form one would expect from a first novel that also deserves to be named book of the year. This leaves Andrew Miller's Pure, a novel of the French revolution which didn't figure at all on any of last year's other prizes, but which comes from a writer of considerable pedigree to whom few would bregrudge an award. Now where have I heard that before?

Publishers And Booksellers See A 'Predatory' Amazon

2012-01-25T07:01:00.001+13:00

by Lynn Neary - January 23, 2012 - npr books

iStockphoto.com

January 23, 2012

Booksellers and publishers are worried that Amazon is going to devour their industry. The giant online retailer seems to have its hands in all aspects of the business, from publishing books to selling them — and that has some in the book world wondering if there is any end to Amazon's influence.
Publishers have a problem when it comes to discussing Amazon: They may fear its power, but they are also dependent on it, because like it or not, Amazon sells a lot of books. But lately, the grumbling about Amazon has been growing louder, with some in the book industry openly describing Amazon's tactics as "predatory."
Publishers have long complained about Amazon's pricing policies; it sold e-books at cut-rate prices in order to win customers for the Kindle. Now, explains Joe Wikert, general manager and publisher at O'Reilly Media, Amazon is undercutting competitors by selling e-readers, like the new Kindle Fire, at a loss.
"The word 'predator' is pretty strong, and I don't use it loosely," he says, "but ... I could have sworn we had laws against predatory pricing. I just don't understand why that's not an issue — because that's got to be hurting other device makers out there in trying to capture this market."
Full story at npr books

A convert to the Kindle e-reader - John MacGibbon of Ngaio Press writes

2012-01-25T06:57:00.000+13:00

I’m a convert to Amazon’s Kindle eReader.

But not a convert from ink and paper.
No, my switcheroo was from the iPad, which is much touted by Apple and its acolytes as the ultimate ereading machine. For about a year, nearly all my personal book reading had been on the iPad, either using Apple’s own iBooks app or the free Kindle app that can be added to the iPad.

My Kindle Touch. This is Amazon's premium e-ink reader.

Since last November, I haven’t read a single book on the iPad. I’m in no hurry to read any more, for two main reasons: one, the Kindle’s reflective ‘e-ink’ screen is easier on my eyes, and two, it’s summer and I like to read in our bright back porch where reflections on the iPad’s glossy glass screen make reading nigh impossible.
(Note: most of my comments here about the Kindle would apply to other ereaders that use e-ink – e.g. the Kobo, Sony Reader and (not available in New Zealand) the Barnes and Noble Nook. Essentially they all have the same screens, made by E Ink, and they differentiate themselves in other ways. The Kindle is the overwhelming market leader. Note that the Kindle Fire model, announced with much fanfare late last year, doesn’t use e-ink, but has similar screen technology to an iPad. )

An iPad showing the iBooks application.

At first sight, iPad ereaders have an aesthetic edge. Their screen is closer in size to a real book, at 9.7 inches (diagonal) compared with the Kindle’s six inches. Superficially, ebooks on the iPad look more like the real thing. They have more elegant fonts, pages that turn realistically and book design niceties like running heads. Navigating around an ebook collection and administering it is much faster and slicker on an iPad.

iPad ereaders go beyond both real books and Kindle books, in letting you change background ‘paper’ colour – even letting you put the display into inverse with white text on a black background – useful if you don’t want to disturb your partner in bed. And of course iPad ereading will always shine (pun intended) where the ambient light level is low. The display is a backlit computer screen whereas the Kindle has a reflective screen that needs external light, just like a paper book.
It was the iPad’s's backlit display that mainly turned me toward the Kindle. The iPad is…sort of…OK, but the Kindle is just nicer to read for extended periods. Kindle fonts are clunky compared with the iPad, but they are more readable. They just sit nicely like real printed type, on a non-reflective shimmerless background. The Kindle screen seems small at first, particularly if you’ve made the font fairly big. But I get sucked into that little screen…sucked into the book itself…more than reading a real paper book. A new and compelling reading experience. For me it’s just a better way of reading any book that is all or mostly text, like novels and many non-fiction titles.
There is still an honoured place for printed books that are heavy on illustration and good design. I like handling them and I like reading them. I far prefer flicking through them. And I earn my living producing them so yes, there has to be an honoured place for them!
But for most other reading, give me an ebook any day. I know, I know…electronics and plastic can never replace the feel and smell of real paper, real binding and the general ‘handle’ of an ancient and loved cultural icon. Well crap. I don’t care how beautifully put together the paper version of the latest Booker Prize winner is – I’ll read it on my Kindle, thanks. I will spare a thought for bricks and mortar libraries and bookshops, but sorry – in the end, utility trumps.
John's full piece on his blog here.

Australian Booksellers’ bonanza

2012-01-25T06:48:00.000+13:00

Posted Date: 23/01/2012 - By Inside Retail

Some Australian book retailers have experienced Christmas sales as high as 50 per cent above 2010 figures thanks to the collapse of the Borders and Angus & Robertson business in 2011.

According to a post-Christmas survey conducted by Bookseller+Publisher newsletter, a massive 80 per cent of retailers reported improved sales compared to 2010. Another 10.5 per cent said sales were about on par with just 9.5 per cent reporting a sales decline.
Inside Retail has heard anecdotal reports from some book retailers that sales growth has been as high as 50 per cent where competition has been taken out of the local market due to the RedGroup Retail collapse last year.
More than 50 per cent of booksellers described the 20111 Christmas as “excellent” in the survey and a further 45 per cent as “good”, almost certainly making the nation’s book retailers the most satisfied of any retail group at the year’s end.
It’s not all rosy, however. As the Nielsen BookScan data recorded, 2011 book sales were down 12.5 per cent in value and 7.1 per cent in volume - to an estimated 60.4 million books.

As Bookseller+Publisher reports: “While sales data from before Christmas indicated that the market share previously held by RedGroup in Australia had been lost altogether, the market overall appears to have recovered some of these sales, albeit quite late in the piece.”
According to the BookScan data, sales tracked very close to ex-RedGroup 2010 sales figures until the week ending December 17 where they began to climb - tracking higher than ex-RedGroup 2010 figures until the end of the year.
While a large percentage of the RedGroup sales appear to have been lost to the industry (or perhaps transferred online) the balance has gone to those retailers remaining. About 95 per cent of stores connected to chains have reported a sales increase, with Dymocks the biggest benefactor, while just 40 per cent of independents have reported growth.

Shortlists revealed for British Science Fiction awards

2012-01-25T06:41:00.001+13:00

Alison Flood
guardian.co.uk, Tuesday 24 January 2012

British Science Fiction awards shorlistee China Miéville. Photograph: Sarah Lee for the Guardian

Former winners China Miéville and Christopher Priest vie with Lavie Tidhar, Adam Roberts and Kim Lakin-Smith

A murder mystery that unfolds within a travel guide is up against a far–future reimagining of the Fall myth as former winners of the British Science Fiction award for best novel Christopher Priest and China Miéville clash on this year's shortlist.
Priest's The Islanders is a travel guide to the Dream Archipelago, a world distorted by "temporal gradients", while Miéville's Embassytown is set on the distant planet of Arieka, "where there are shallows, dangerous juts and matterbanks of everyday space in the always", and where humanity is clashing with the planet's natives, "insect-horse-coral-fan things". The two award-winning authors are up against newcomer Lavie Tidhar's debut novel, Osama, set in a world without terrorism where private detective Joe is hired to find the obscure author of novels about Osama Bin Laden.
The shortlist is completed by Kim Lakin-Smith's Cyber Circus, the story of a floating circus of bio-engineered freaks in a post-apocalyptic future, and by Adam Roberts's By Light Alone, set in a world where humanity has been modified to photosynthesise sunlight with its hair, putting an end to hunger.
The shortlists are picked by nominations from the British Science Fiction Association membership, with Terry Pratchett's new Discworld novel Snuff and Charles Stross's Rule 34 just missing out on a place in the final five, according to awards administrator Donna Scott.
"It's no real surprise to see China Miéville riding high, with nominations in both the best novel and best short fiction categories – his popularity doesn't seem to detract from his sheer coolness," Scott said. Miéville is shortlisted in the best short fiction category for a story, Covehithe, which was commissioned by guardian.co.uk/books as part of an Arts Council-funded series of stories on the subject of oi. "His writing is both entertaining and jolly clever and he seems to scoop up so many awards I'm sure his mantelpiece is a nightmare to dust. Christopher Priest is another writer who has garnered a lot of mainstream respect, and both his and Adam Roberts novels seemed to be very popular from the start of nominations."
Niall Harrison, editor-in-chief of speculative fiction magazine Strange Horizons, called this year's line-up "strong, with ambitious, varied, and politically challenging novels" from both new and established writers. "I'm particularly pleased to see Lavie Tidhar's Osama, which reimagines contemporary narratives about terrorism as literal alternate worlds," he said.
The winners of the British Science Fiction Awards will be announced in April, at Eastercon in London.

Best Novel
Cyber Circus by Kim Lakin-Smith (Newcon Press)
Embassytown by China Miéville (Macmillan)
The Islanders by Christopher Priest (Gollancz)
By Light Alone by Adam Roberts (Gollancz)
Osama by Lavie Tidhar (PS Publishing)
Best Short Fiction
The Silver Wind by Nina Allan (Interzone 233, TTA Press)
The Copenhagen Interpretation by Paul Cornell (Asimov's, July)
Afterbirth by Kameron Hurley (Kameron Hurley's own website)
Covehithe by China Miéville (The Guardian)
Of Dawn by Al Robertson (Interzone 235, TTA Press)
Best Non-Fiction
Out of This World: Science Fiction but not as we Know it by Mike Ashley (British Library)
The SF Encyclopedia, 3rd Edition ed. John Clute, Peter Nicholls and David Langford (website)
Review of Arslan by M J Engh, Abigail Nussbaum (Asking the Wrong Questions blog)
SF Mistressworks, ed. Ian Sales (website)
Pornokitsch, ed. Jared Shurin and Anne Perry (website)
The Unsilent Library: Essays on the Russell T. Davies Era of the New Doctor Who (Foundation Studies in Science Fiction), ed. Graham Sleight, Tony Keen and Simon Bradshaw (Science Fiction Foundation)
Best Art
Cover of Ian Whates's The Noise Revealed by Dominic Harman (Solaris)
Cover and illustrations of Patrick Ness's A Monster Calls by Jim Kay (Walker)
Cover of Lavie Tidhar's Osama by Pedro Marques (PS Publishing)
Cover of Liz Williams's A Glass of Shadow by Anne Sudworth (Newcon Press)

Issue Eight of Poetry Notes available now

2012-01-25T06:37:00.001+13:00

The eighth issue of the newsletter from Poetry Archive of New Zealand Aotearoa is available now for download as a pdf. Inside Poetry Notes, Summer 2012, vol. 2, no. 4: Mark Pirie on Don Bradman’s 1932 New Zealand visit and poems; classic New Zealand poetry by Bill O’Reilly (1898-1959); music review: Fagan and the People, Admiral of the Narrow Seas; New Zealand poetry donations made to the Poetry Library, London; new release by PANZA member: Out of It by Michael O’Leary; donate to PANZA through PayPal; recently received donations; about the Poetry Archive.

http://poetryarchivenz.wordpress.com/2012/01/19/issue-eight-of-poetry-notes-available-now/

Summer catalogue update

The Poetry Archive of NZ Aotearoa (PANZA) recently reached 5,000 titles.

Thanks to all those who have donated to the Archive over the past year. The PANZA catalogue has now been significantly updated to reflect many new acquisitions in December and January.

The summer update includes the receipt of 12 boxes of New Zealand poet and editor Louis Johnson’s international literary magazines, including substantial New Zealand material such as issues of Graham Lindsay’s Morepork journal, a complete set of Robert Thompson’s Image and a complete set of Landfall up to the 1980s. Thanks to Cecilia Johnson for this kind donation.

The Archive began in February 2010 with around 3,000 titles and has grown substantially in the past year. PANZA would particularly like to thank Auckland poet, editor and novelist Alistair Paterson, Wellington poet/publisher Mark Pirie, Wellington publisher Roger Steele and the late New Zealand anthologist, poet and memoirist Harvey McQueen for their sizeable contributions to the fast-growing collection.

A full list of donations is listed in each issue of Poetry Notes, the PANZA newsletter.

http://poetryarchivenz.wordpress.com/2012/01/24/summer-catalogue-updatepanza-reaches-5000-titles/"

Apple sells 350,000 textbooks in three days, analyst says

2012-01-25T06:34:00.001+13:00

by Don Reisinger January 23, 2012 - CNET

Have 350,000 digital textbooks been downloaded already?

(Credit: Josh Lowensohn/CNET)

Since digital textbooks are still in their infancy, it might be tough to determine success in that market just yet. But so far, it appears Apple is doing quite well.
TheiPhone maker reportedly sold 350,000 digital textbooks through its iBookstore in just its first three days of availability, Global Equities Research has revealed, according to All Things Digital, which obtained the data from the analyst firm. Global Equities Research monitors textbook downloads through its own "proprietary tracking system," All Things Digital said today. The firm doesn't disclose how that system works.
Last week, Apple unveiled digital textbooks for its iPad. The books, which are coming through major textbook publishers McGraw-Hill and Pearson, among others, allow for far more interactivity than physical editions. The textbooks come with video, 3D images, instant glossaries, and the ability to highlight and add notes. In addition, Apple is charging $14.99 or less for the high school textbooks available so far, making them more affordable than their traditional counterparts.
Full story at CNET.

And report from All Things D

The Black Project wins graphic novel prize

2012-01-25T06:31:00.000+13:00

Gareth Brookes' The Black Project has won Myriad Editions' first competition for a graphic novel in progress, with judges including novelist Ian Rankin choosing Brookes' work from a shortlist of seven.
Graphic novels commissioning editor Corinne Pearlman, who judged the prize alongside Rankin, graphic novelists Bryan Talbot, Ed Hillyer and Hannah Berry, and cartoonist Steve Bell, described the winning book as "funny macabre". It will be published by Myriad in 2013.
The Black Project is about a boy, Richard, who begins making girlfriends out of clothes and objects. The book uses illustrations combining embroidery, print making and lino cuts. Pearlman said: "We had an incredible shortlist and we felt all the submissions were extremely publishable.
"We weren't expecting a fait accompli, and we want to work with Gareth to make it into something both he and we are proud of. Working on it together was part of the prize."
Brookes studied Fine Art at the Royal College of Art, but started making small press comics in 2006.

French Comics Pirates Scan 30,000+ Titles, Offer Translations

2012-01-25T06:15:00.000+13:00

Publishing Perspectives

A new study reveals that pirates are offering tens of thousands of high quality illegally scanned comics in France to meet market demand for digital editions.
Read here.

DISCUSSION:
SURVEY: Are Book Pirates Fulfilling Unmet Demand?
One way to look at piracy is as a response to unmet demand. Is this accurate? Or is it a convenient excuse for illegal, predatory activity?

eNews: Kobo Formally Launches in the Netherlands; Survey Says Tablet Market "Not Set In Stone"

2012-01-25T06:11:00.000+13:00

PublishersLunch

After soft-launch in Holland late last year, Kobo's will formally roll out their ebookstore there on January 30 with "thousands of Dutch titles," while Dutch retailer Libris Blz will sell the Kobo Touch for €129. "Through our new partnership with Libris Blz, we're confident our expansion into the Netherlands will be a huge success," Kobo ceo Michael Serbinis said in a statement. "Kobo's focus has always been to bring e-reading and e-books to people everywhere around the world. By launching in the Netherlands, and bringing e-reading to the passionate Dutch reading community -- we are one more country closer to delivering on that promise."
Release

Also just announced, digital comics publisher Graphicly has launched a digital self-publishing platform focused on visual storytelling. Working on a flat-fee charge, the service distributes not only to Kindle, Nook and iPad, but also to Facebook. The service is pitched at creators of children's books, comics and graphic novels, illustrated and art books and magazines.

Sourcebooks also announced its new Agile Publishing Model (APM), which will allow for the rapid and interactive development of books, ebooks, videos, and other materials by its authors so that the publishing process happens faster with real-time customer feedback. APM will launch in fall 2012 with ENTERING THE SHIFT AGE by futurist David Houle (who will be presenting at DBW Wednesday) with Sourcebook planning to release several related ebooks and other materials from Houle as part of the APM over the upcoming months.

"The traditional publishing model -- long schedules, creating in a vacuum, lack of involvement with the readers of the end product -- drives some authors crazy," ceo and publisher Dominique Raccah said in a statement. "This model is a great fit for experts who are highly immersed in their field and where the field is evolving rapidly."

As part of a wave of new data on trends in tablet ownership, The Boston Consulting Group released the results of a survey they conducted of 8,700 individuals in 8 countries that makes the not-exactly-bold claim that Apple won't always dominate the tablet market. What consumers are willing to pay varies across countries: in the US, customers said a multipurpose tablet price of between $140 to $240 was idea, up $35 since 2010. In Europe, however, consumers said a price point of between $250 and $350 - an average increase of $100 from 2010 - was optimal, and Chinese consumers surveyed were willing to pay from $280 to $440 for a tablet, or $185 more than in 2010.

BCG also found evidence of cannibalization as approximately one third of US respondents are considering buying an e-reader, with half considering purchase of a tablet instead of a netbook or portable media device. Approximately half of American non-owners surveyed said they intend to buy a tablet or an e-reader in the next year, with that number higher in every other country surveyed save Japan. And more consumers want to use tablets for work (right now it's mostly for consumptive activities like games, email, and social networking) but slower speeds and the absence of a Windows-based device on the market were cited as key drawbacks.

Cathay Pacific Travel Media Awards 2012

2012-01-24T20:40:00.001+13:00

The Cathay Pacific Travel Media Awards deadline is just next week, Friday 3 February. There are terrific prizes for travel writers and travel photographers.

We’re very keen to encourage entries for our newest award categories – the NZ Maori Tourism Award for the Best Travel Story about a Maori Tourism Experience and the NZ Maori Tourism Award for the Best Travel Image that captures the essence of Maori. As this is the first year we have run these two Maori cultural awards the Travcom committee have decided to open these categories to stories and images published within the last three years, i.e. from 1 January 2009 to 31 December 2011.

All other awards entries must be published within the 2011 year (1 January 2011 to 31 December 2011). It might be helpful to have some more guidelines on the NZ Maori Tourism writing awards:

MAORI TOURISM STORY GUIDELINES

· The story should describe a Maori experience in which the tourist is able to participate, rather than just being an observer (such as a watching a concert). This can include discussion with Maori about the meaning and history of what they are seeing/doing (e.g. being shown around a marae, looking at carvings) as well as taking part in an activity.

· The experience should impart to the tourist an understanding of Maori culture: present-day and/or historical (so simply paddling a waka along a river, with no explanation of tradition, history, meaning, wouldn’t count).

· The Maori element may be just one component of a larger tourism experience, as long as it is authentic, meaningful and genuinely part of the experience, rather than just an add-on.

plus

ONLINE ENTRIES NEED PRE-APPROVAL

As this is the first time we’re opening up the awards to online content the Travcom awards sub-committee are pre-approving all entries from online sources. If you have a story or image that you would like to enter that was published on a third-party travel editorial website please send me the URL. I will send it onto the committee for their O.K.

Please be aware that all other competition conditions remain the same; i.e. the entrant must have been paid for their work, it must have been published within the 2011 year (1/1/2011 to 31/12/2011), and the entrant must be based in New Zealand. I will still require 1 x entry form and 2 x hard copies of each story. As many websites seem to print out in 8 point I encourage entrants to enlarge the type size so that it’s easier for our writing judges to read.

If you would like entry forms please let me know as I can email or post some to you.

It’s worth checking out the Tips on Entering on the Travcom website or if you have any queries please let me know and I’ll be happy to help.

Best wishes

Helen Davies

Travcom Administrator

Ph: (09) 6245707

Mob: 021 1781 384

www.travelcommunicators.co.nz

2012-01-24T15:10:00.000+13:00

Ora Nui 2012; Maori Literary Journal - $25.00

2012-01-24T15:06:00.003+13:00

Ora Nui is a brand new biennial Maori literary journal.

Established and emerging Maori writers are included.

Hinemoana Baker; Anton Blank; Marino Blank; Jacq Carter; Shelley Davies; Cath Dunsford; Amber Esau; Dr Lily George; Arini Loader; Chris Molloy; Robert Mokaraka; Paula Morris; Moana Nepia; Andre Ngapo; Kiri Piahana-Wong; Jean Riki; Vaughan Rapatahana; Reihana Robinson; Robert Sullivan; Alice Te Punga-Somerville; Munro Te Whata; Kirk Torrance; Rob Tuwhare; Kawiti Waetford; Taika Waititi; Briar Wood.

Editor and introductory essay, Anton Blank

Paperback $25.00

Available now at:

Parsons Bookshop Auckland, 26 Wellesley Street East

Auckland 1010, New Zealand

Phone +64 9 303 1557

books@parsons.co.nz

www.parsons.co.nz

http://twitter.com/ParsonsBookshop

2012-01-24T12:20:00.001+13:00

From Penguin Books Australia website via Pamela Gordon.

NZ International Arts Festival - WRITERS & READERS WEEK - PROGRAMME LAUNCHED 26 JANUARY!

2012-01-24T11:24:00.001+13:00

Writers and Readers Week is your opportunity to see some of the world’s finest writers and thinkers. The Town Hall Talks are on sale now - see acclaimed scientist, explorer and environmentalist Tim Flannery; spend an hour with fearless feminist Germaine Greer; or hear from Pulitzer Prize-winner Thomas Friedman. Get in quick to avoid disappointment. The full programme is announced on 26 January. Can't wait? See the line-up of writers on our website.

Tuesday Poem and Cher

2012-01-24T11:21:00.000+13:00

Tuesday Poem this week hosts US poet Dorinne Laux who writes poems about people like Cher and Mick Jagger, as well as about waitressing in the 60’s, about old boyfriends, about being a strong woman growing up in the 60's, about surviving in the millennium, and working through the existential issues that plague us all.

Editor this week, Philadelphian poet Eileen Moeller, says 'Laux is a poet beloved to many of us in the U.S., and one of our most generous, most effective teachers.'

After reading Laux' poems: Cher and Dark Charms check out the sidebar of Tuesday Poem for 30 Tuesday Poets and the poems they've posted, by themselves or others they admire. You'll find all sorts from DH Lawrence to newcomer Helen Lehndorf. Give it a go!

The Writing Bomb: Why No One Is Buying Your Book

2012-01-24T11:08:00.000+13:00

By achuka on January 23, 2012

Read This If You Are Thinking Of Self-Publishing
Blogger and inide-author Jeff Bennington writes:

You have to face the stark reality that you're not famous, you don't have a cult following, and you're not a New York Times bestseller, yet. One of the biggest obstacles for indie and small press authors to overcome is finding readers. You may have a great book cover, and your prose may be razor sharp, but lets face it, you are one in a million. Hundreds of thousands of books are published every year, and as a new/newer author, it's not likely that readers will search your name or title. Sigh. Depressing isn't it? Well, it can be, if you're subject to resignation. But if you are the type of person who sees an obstacle as an opportunity, you may have what it takes to climb out of the literary abyss and into the public arena. The problem with publishing is that unless you have a platform, or a method to reach out to readers, you are like a grain of sand on the beach. People will walk on you all day long, but never know you're there. If you publish on Amazon, your book is thrown into the ocean of ebooks and will splash around until readers start buying. When they purchase your book, it'll stay close to shore where other readers can see it. But if you don't plan for a beach party upon publication, your book will drift off to sea and eventually end up in the south pacific, stranded on a lifeless island.

And that is precisely why indie authors should give serious thought to submitting their work to ACHUKAbooks. If we select your title, we will do all the promotion and brand-building on your behalf.
Check out our Announcement page...
http://www.achuka.co.uk/achukabooks.php

Jack Gantos Wins the Newbery Medal

2012-01-24T10:20:00.000+13:00

By Jason Boog on Galley Cat, January 23, 2012

Dead End in Norvelt by Jack Gantos has won the prestigious John Newbery Medal at the American Library Association’s annual youth media awards.
A Ball for Daisy illustrated and written by Chris Raschka won the Randolph Caldecott Medal for the most distinguished American picture book for children. In addition, the Michael L. Printz Award for excellence in literature written for young adults went to Where Things Come Back by John Corey Whaley.
Finally the Coretta Scott King (Author) Book Award recognizing an African American author and illustrator of outstanding books for children and young adults: went to Heart and Soul: The Story of America and African Americans, written and illustrated by Kadir Nelson. The rest of the ALA winners follow below…

Coretta Scott King (Illustrator) Book Award:
Shane W. Evans, illustrator and author of Underground: Finding the Light to Freedom
Coretta Scott King – Virginia Hamilton Award for Lifetime Achievement:
Ashley Bryan
“Storyteller, artist, author, poet and musician, Bryan created his first children’s book in first grade. He grew up in the Bronx and in 1962, he became the first African American to both write and illustrate a children’s book. After a successful teaching career, Bryan left academia to pursue creation of his own artwork. He has since garnered numerous awards for his significant and lasting literary contribution of poetry, spirituals and story.”
Schneider Family Book Award for books that embody an artistic expression of the disability experience:
Children ages 0 – 8 “The Jury chose not to award a book in the category for because no submissions were deemed worthy of the award.”
Middle school award (ages 9 – 13) Close to Famous written by Joan Bauer and “Wonderstruck: A Novel in Words and Pictures,” written by Brian Selznick
Teen (ages 14-18) award The Running Dream written by Wendelin Van Draanen
Alex Awards for the 10 best adult books that appeal to teen audiences:

“Big Girl Small,” by Rachel DeWoskin, published by Farrar, Straus and Giroux
“In Zanesville,” by Jo Ann Beard, published by Little, Brown & Company, a division of Hachette Book Group, Inc.
“The Lover’s Dictionary,” by David Levithan, published by Farrar, Straus and Giroux
“The New Kids: Big Dreams and Brave Journeys at a High School for Immigrant Teens,” by Brooke Hauser, published by Free Press, a division of Simon & Schuster, Inc.
“The Night Circus,” by Erin Morgenstern, published by Doubleday, a division of Random House, Inc.
“Ready Player One,” by Ernest Cline, published by Crown Publishers, an imprint of the Crown Publishing Group, a division of Random House, Inc.
“Robopocalypse: A Novel,” by Daniel H. Wilson, published by Doubleday, a division of Random House, Inc.
“Salvage the Bones,” by Jesmyn Ward, published by Bloomsbury USA
“The Scrapbook of Frankie Pratt: A Novel in Pictures,” by Caroline Preston, published by Ecco, an imprint of HarperCollins Publishers
“The Talk-Funny Girl,” by Roland Merullo, published by Crown Publishers, an imprint of the Crown Publishing Group, a division of Random House, Inc.

Andrew Carnegie Medal for excellence in children’s video: Paul R. Gagne and Melissa Reilly Ellard of Weston Woods Studios, Inc., producers of “Children Make Terrible Pets.” The video is based on the book written by Peter Brown, and is narrated by Emily Eiden, with music by Jack Sundrud and Rusty Young, and animation by Soup2Nuts.

Margaret A. Edwards Award for lifetime achievement in writing for young adults: Susan Cooper, author of The Dark Is Rising Sequence: “Over Sea, Under Stone”; “The Dark Is Rising”; “Greenwitch”; “The Grey King”; and “Silver on the Tree.”
May Hill Arbuthnot Honor Lecture Award recognizing an author, critic, librarian, historian or teacher of children’s literature, who then presents a lecture at a winning host site: Michael Morpurgo
“Born in England, Morpurgo was teaching when he discovered the magic of storytelling and began writing. His books are noted for their imagination, power and grace. In 1976, he and his wife established the charity Farms for City Children. He is an officer of the Order of the British Empire and served as Britain’s third Children’s Laureate. His novel, “War Horse,” has wowed theater audiences in London and New York and movie audiences all over.”

Mildred L. Batchelder Award for an outstanding children’s book translated from a foreign language and subsequently published in the United States: Soldier Bear, written by Bibi Dumon Tak, illustrated by Philip Hopman, translated by Laura Watkinson
Odyssey Award for best audiobook produced for children and/or young adults, available in English in the United States: Rotters produced Listening Library, an imprint of Random House Audio Publishing Group, Random House, Inc., written by Daniel Kraus and narrated by Kirby Heyborne.
Pura Belpré (Illustrator) Award honoring a Latino writer and illustrator whose children’s books best portray, affirm and celebrate the Latino cultural experience:
“Diego Rivera: His World and Ours,” illustrated by Duncan Tonatiuh, is the Belpré Illustrator Award winner. The book was written by Duncan Tonatiuh and published by Abrams Books for Young Readers, an imprint of ABRAMS.
Robert F. Sibert Informational Book Award for most distinguished informational book for children: Balloons over Broadway: The True Story of the Puppeteer of Macy’s Parade written by Melissa Sweet

Stonewall Book Award – Mike Morgan & Larry Romans Children’s & Young Adult Literature Award given annually to English-language children’s and young adult books of exceptional merit relating to the gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender experience:
“Putting Makeup on the Fat Boy,” written by Bil Wright
Theodor Seuss Geisel Award for the most distinguished beginning reader book: Tales for Very Picky Eaters written and illustrated by Josh Schneider, is the Geisel Award winner. The book is published by Clarion Books, an imprint of Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.

William C. Morris Award for a debut book published by a first-time author writing for teens: Where Things Come Back by John Corey Whaley

Sargeson writers in residence announced

2012-01-24T10:01:00.002+13:00

Two leading

New Zealand

fiction writers have been announced as the recipients of the annual Buddle Findlay Sargeson Fellowship for 2012.

The two new fellows, David Lyndon Brown (right) and AnnaTaylor, will each spend five months in residence at the Sargeson Centre in central Auckland and receive a $20,000 grant.

Buddle Findlay National Chairman Peter Chemis says the fellowship continues to play a key role in developing

New Zealand

’s literary talent.

“We offer our congratulations to David and Anna and, as with so many high quality fellows who have gone before them, we’re sure they’ll make great use of the freedom from distractions the Sargeson Centre provides,” he said.

Anna Taylor completed a Master of Arts in Creative Writing at the International Institute of Modern Letters in 2006. Her writing has been published widely in literary journals and anthologies including Sport, Turbine, and The Penguin Book of New Zealand Short Stories (2009).

Anna’s first collection of short stories, Relief, was published by Victoria University Press in 2009 and won the 2010 NZSA Hubert Church Best First Book Award for Fiction.

“I feel incredibly privileged to be given this opportunity,” said Ms Taylor.

“Time and money are the two major obstacles when it comes to fitting writing into my life. This fellowship eases the financial pressure, as well as providing space and solitude to get words down on paper,” she said.

Ms Taylor said she would spend her time at the Sargeson Centre writing the second draft of a collection of three linked novellas.

David Lyndon Brown studied at the Elam School of Fine Arts from 1969 under the tutorage of Colin McCahon. He is the author of Calling the Fish and Other Stories (2001 University of Otago Press), Marked Men (2007 Titus Books) and Skin Hunger (2009 Titus Books).

David has also taught expressive writing to various groups including the elderly, mental health patients, recovering addicts, Maori and Pacifica writers and at the University of Auckland's Centre for Continuing Education.

Mr Brown said he is excited and honoured to have been awarded the fellowship.

“It’s every writer’s dream – an oasis of time. I have several projects in mind, some of which have been simmering for a while, and a recent trip to Samoa has also stirred something. When I am writing I become totally immersed and this fellowship will allow me the freedom to plunge with no distractions or diversions,” said Mr Brown.

About the Buddle Findlay Sargeson Fellowship

The Buddle Findlay Sargeson Fellowship is a national literary fellowship offered annually in partnership with The Frank Sargeson Trust. The fellowship provides the opportunity for outstanding published New Zealand writers to write full-time in residence at the Sargeson Centre, adjacent to the University of Auckland, with an annual stipend of NZ$40,000 (the stipend is shared if there are two fellows). The Frank Sargeson Trust established the fellowship in 1987 to commemorate Frank Sargeson and provide assistance for New Zealand writers. In 1997 Buddle Findlay became the commercial sponsor of the fellowship, and is proud to support the literary future of New Zealand. For more information please visit http://www.buddlefindlay.com/who-we-are/buddle-findlay-sargeson-fellowship

Do Tablet Apps and Ebooks Spell the End of Pop-Up Books?

2012-01-24T07:47:00.000+13:00

The Book Beast - It’s too early to say that pop-up books are dead, but it seems clear that a lot of the fun they presented has been channeled into ebooks and book apps for kids

Are pop-up books dying? We remember pulling our first paper tab and seeing a book miraculously come to life. But a lot of kids these days are getting that kick on iPads and other fancy tablets. Which makes one wonder if the steady stream of interactive ebooks aimed at kids means that this generation won’t have childhood memories of Pat the Bunny, Where’s Spot, or Peter Rabbit?

Anyone worried about the future can exhale—sort of. Pop -up books aren’t dead, they’ve just turned into book apps. The apps for, say, Peter Rabbit or Alice in Wonderland are the easiest to compare to old fashioned pop-up books, thanks to their traditional stylings and digital pull-tabs. They inhabit a strange middle ground between ebook and app: not strictly text but also not quite Angry Birds. They are what ebooks would look like if their illustrations came to life.

The other digital successors to old fashioned pop-ups are magazine apps, such as those for GQ and Esquire, with their interactive doodads, moving images, and digital easter eggs if you shake your screen just so.

Magazine apps and book apps for kids may be the new pop-ups, but that doesn’t mean we should go all Fahrenheit 451 just yet.

Pop - up book - Fred Dufour, AFP - Getty Images

Pop-up books, pretty much anything on paper that has moving parts or appears in 3D, first showed up in the 1300s but didn’t really start catering to kids until about 500 years later. In the 90s, thanks to some improved printing know-how and artistic gumption, things like The Daily Express Children’s Annual sprouted up. Innovators like Vojtech Kubasta in Prague and Waldo Hunt in the U.S. tried to blend high-level paper cutting with charming titles featuring Babar, Sesame Street, and Disney characters.
Full story.

COOKBOOKS I GAVE MYSELF FOR CHRISTMAS

2012-01-24T06:43:00.000+13:00

That I have a severe addiction to beautiful cookbooks is widely known but no matter how many gorgeous examples are sent to me by kind publishers for review some always slip through the net so Christmas gave me the chance to buy the following from that excellent indie bookstore UBS Canterbury while visiting there the week before our departure to the US. Now we are home again I have time to have a relaxing read of them and all three have proven enchanting. Next week I start cooking from them!

Cardamon and Lime - Recipes from the Arabian Gulf
Sarah Al-Hamad
Interlink Books - Paperback -$37.99

Bought, Borrowed & Stolen - Recipes & Knives from a travelling chef
Allegra McEvedy - Conran Octopus - Hardback - $60

SO FRENCH - a lifetime in the provincial kitchen
Dany Chouet with Trish Hobbs
Hardback - Murdoch Books - $80

Alain de Botton: a life in writing

2012-01-24T06:42:00.000+13:00

'The nirvana would be if the questions raised by Oprah Winfrey would be answered by the faculty at Harvard

Stuart Jeffries - guardian.co.uk, Friday 20 January 2012

De Botton: 'Is the purpose of rocket science to ask questions about rockets?' Photograph: Eamonn McCabe

^"My dad was a slightly stricter version of Richard Dawkins," says Alain de Botton. "The worldview was that there are idiots out there who believe in Santa Claus and fairies and magic and elves and we're not joining that nonsense." In his new book, Religion for Atheists, he recalls his father reducing his sister Miel to tears by "trying to dislodge her modestly held notion that a reclusive god might dwell somewhere in the universe. She was eight at the time." It's one of few passages in his unremittingly mellifluous and genteel oeuvre that sticks out with something like anger.
Before the interview, his publicists warned that De Botton didn't want to talk about Gilbert de Botton, Egyptian-born secular Jew and multimillionaire banker. He was especially keen not to discuss his father's business dealings and the repeated suggestion that his literary career was bankrolled with daddy's money.
But asking about De Botton's father is irresistible because Religion for Atheists is, he readily concedes, an oedipal book. "I'm rebelling," he says. "I'm trying to find my way back to the babies that have been thrown out with the bathwater." He's elsewhere described his father as "a cruel tyrant as a domestic figure, hugely overbearing". He was also surely crushingly impressive – the former head of Rothschild Bank who established Global Asset Management in 1983 with £1m capital and sold it to UBS in 1999 for £420m, a collector of late Picassos, the austere figure depicted in portraits by both Lucian Freud and Francis Bacon and an atheist who thrived without religion's crutch.
"He was extreme. I think it was a generational thing." And yet Gilbert, who died in 2000, now lies beneath a Hebrew headstone in a Jewish cemetery in Willesden, north-west London because, as his son writes pointedly, "he had, intriguingly, omitted to make more secular arrangements". Disappointingly, Alain doesn't explore in book or interview what intrigued him about that omission.
Instead, he connects his father's militant atheism to the affliction that he reckons made Dawkins and Christopher Hitchens so caustic in their bestselling attacks on religion. "I've got a generational theory about this. Particularly if you're a man over 55 or so, perhaps something bad happened to you at the hands of religion – you came across a corrupt priest, you were bored at school, your parents forced it down your throat. Few of the younger generation feel that way. By the time I came around – I'm 42 – religion was a joke.
"I don't think I would have written this book if I'd grown up in Saudi Arabia as a woman. It's a European book in the sense that we're living in a society where religion is on the back foot. It rarely intruded on my life."
Full piece at The Guardian.

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