Update: Amazon Yanks 5,000 Kindle Titles In Fight Over Terms | paidContent

Update: Amazon Yanks 5,000 Kindle Titles In Fight Over Terms | paidContent.

Amazon (NSDQ: AMZN) has turned off the buy button on nearly 5,000 Kindle titles from distributor Independent Publishers Group after IPG refused to capitulate to Amazon’s demand for better terms.

See also:  Why Amazon’s Kindle Battle With IPG Matters

Book Bits #153 – ‘The Starboard Sea,’ Top Romances, Philippa Gregory, Scriptwriting and other tips

Good Morning. Today is Thursday, February 23, 2012, and you have reached “Book Bits,” the six-days-a-week listing of links to recent book news, features, reviews and writing tips. The links come from blogs, zines, the online editions of print magazines and newspapers, and other web sites. However, I do try to omit newspapers with paywalls and membership requirements. If you click on a link and find a paywall requirement to view the basic story, please let me know.

1. News: Gannett Building Paywalls Around All Its Papers Except USA Today – “The vogue for digital paywalls sweeping the news business has made it all the way to the top: Gannett, the nation’s largest newspaper publisher, is planning to switch over all of its 80 community newspapers to a paid model by the end of the year, it announced during an investor day held in Manhattan Wednesday.” – Forbes
2. News: Crusading US publisher Barney Rosset dies, by Hillel Italie – “Barney Rosset, the fiery and fearless publisher who introduced the U.S. to countless political and avant-garde writers and risked prison and financial ruin to release such underground classics as “Tropic of Cancer” and “Lady Chatterley’s Lover,” has died. He was 89.” – Associated Press
3. Review: Snowflake and Different Streets, by Eileen Myles, reviewed by Saehee Cho – “There’s a low mumble of sweetness threading the collection—an eagerness to see the secret radiance in everyday things. It feels youthful and tenuous and it makes me a little nervous. The work is in constant negotiation between Myles’ spontaneous delight and the threat of that delight burning off. ” – HTMLGIANT
4. News: Happy birthday, Edward Gorey! And more book news - “Happy birthday, Edward Gorey! The gleefully macabre author andillustrator would have been 87 Wednesday (had he not died in 2000). His work lives on, as do the fur coats — A.N. Devers bought one at auction– that Gorey used to wear to the ballet, along with Converse sneakers.” – The Los Angeles Times
5. Lists: 13 Ways to Impress an Agent – “Admit it, you’ve been trying to crack the code for getting an agent’s attention, whether in a query or a face-to-face meeting. You’ve been searching high and low for the secret to making an agent sit up and say ‘Wow!’” – Rachelle Gardner
6. News: IPG No Longer Selling E-Books Through Amazon – “In the first public case of a publisher or distributor outside the ranks of the big six houses pushing back against Amazon’s aggressive efforts to get better terms from its book suppliers, Independent Publishers Group recently refused to change its terms with Amazon and as a result, the online retail giant is no longer selling digital editions of books distributed by IPG” – Shelf Awareness – For more information, see the Chicago Tribune Story here.
   
7. Interview: 1/2 Dozen for Amber Dermont (“The Starboard Sea”) – “The power of the wind and water always remind me of what it feels like to be young and out of control. That feeling has never left me. As I began work on my novel, The Starboard Sea, I kept returning to that emotion ” – Baggott * Asher * Bode
8. Writing Ideas: How much of yourself is hidden in the characters in your book? by Pat Bertram – “Freud thought every role in a dream was played by the dreamer, and in a way, that’s the way my books are….Here are some other authors’ responses to the question about much of themselves are hidden in their characters.”
9. Lists: Top Romance Stories by The Romance Reader – “The Romance Reader polled its readers to come up with the 100 Top Romance Stories. All told, over 1500 books by over 500 authors were nominated. There are actually 109 books on the list, since a number of books received an equal number of votes.” – Consuming Books
10. Writer’s How To: How to Eat a Whale, by Art Holcomb – “Scriptwriting – the crafting of screenplays, teleplays, stage plays, radio plays, comic books, commercials, lyrics and the like – are some of the most powerful story forms in our lives.” – Writing Forward
11. Viewpoint: Two Good Books: Elizabeth Hand’s Available Dark and Edward St. Aubyn’s At Last, by Lev Grossman – “In Hand’s thriller, we see what Lisbeth Salander would look like in 30 years, if she were tall, blonde and plausible. St. Aubyn’s latest further proves that he might be the most underrated novelist writing in English.” – Time Magazine
12. Review: Wish You Were Here, by Graham Swift – “Jack meant it when he wrote, “Wish you were here,” on a postcard to Ellie, the girl who lived on the adjacent Devon family farm, a seemingly banal sentiment that gains gravitas as this subtly powerful novel unfolds.” – Booklist
13. Feature: Reading a book really is better the second  time round – and can even offer mental health benefits, by Rob Waugh – “Reading a favourite book for a second time often feels like a different experience – now scientists say that it actually IS different. The habit of watching films or reading books multiple times encourages people to engage with them emotionally. ” – Daily Mail
14. Writer’s How To: What To Write First When Writing Fiction, by Beth Hill – “This is not a discussion of where a story should start but where a writer should start. Start writing, that is.” – The Editor’s Blog
15. Feature: Star-Crossed: Charles Dickens and Sinclair Lewis, by Kevin Frazer – “Each issue the Star-Crossed column chooses two or more writers who were born during a particular month and talks about their work” – Bookslut
16. Essay: Travel Reading by Gillian Polack – “When I was traveling last year, I collected a bunch of books on my netbook, just in case I was stranded somewhere with nothing to do. This didn’t happen. I worry incessantly about travel and undertake great preparations and sometimes, just sometimes, they’re not needed. The process, however, of collecting the electronic books taught me a lot about what books were important to me. It also taught me what books I find comforting when I’m worried about the world.” – BiblioBuffet
17. Viewpoint: The Great American Novel; Will there ever be another? by Roger Kimball – “A couple of years ago, I was asked to give a talk about “The American Novel Today.” It wasn’t my first choice of topic, frankly, partly because I read as few contemporary novels as possible, partly (here we get into cause and effect) because most of the novels that get noticed today (like most of the visual art that gets the Establishment’s nod) should be filed under the rubric “ephemera,” and often pretty nasty ephemera at that.” – The Weekly Standard
18. Upcoming: ‘Changeling’ by Philippa Gregory, by Deirdre Donahue – “Here is an exclusive preview of Philippa Gregory’s upcoming historical novel, her first aimed at the young adult audience. Scheduled for release on May 22 from Simon & Schuster, Changeling opens in 1453 Rome.” – USA Today
19. Feature: In an age of Kindles, Harcourt Bindery sticks to tried-and-true book methods, By Chelsea Sheasley – “The Charlestown, Mass. bindery still makes books by hand, using a 19th-century production model.” – The Christian Science Monitor
20. Quote: In Memoriam: Barney Rosset: “But his legacy, both in literature and in the cinema, is profound and enduring. His example and his exertions prove that freedom is indissociable—that there’s no such thing as political freedom in the absence of free artistic expression; that freedom involving matters of sex is as central to a just society as the right to ideological expression. Rosset both advanced and embodied, sincerely and bravely, the crucial modern recognition that the personal is political.” – Richard Brody for “The New Yorker”
21. Review: Pat Nixon’s Lover, and Other Stories; A clever comic novel [“Watergate”] tells the (fictional) tales of Watergate’s peripheral characters, reviewed by John Dickerson – “One of my mother’s favorite pictures was of Alice Roosevelt Longworth standing in our front hallway. Known as “the other Washington monument” for her wit, cunning, and endurance, Longworth famously owned a pillow that read, “If you can’t say something good about someone, sit right here by me.” The oldest daughter of Teddy Roosevelt lived to be 96, surviving a double mastectomy, 13 administrations after her father’s, and the end of an era where Washington was both powerful and cozy. I never knew her, but after reading Thomas Mallon’s clever, surprising comic novel Watergate (Pantheon) I feel like I do.” – Slate
22. News: Dirt Rag Wins 2012 Aveda Environmental Award for Magazines – “Aveda and the Green America Better Paper Project named the winners of the 2012 Aveda Environmental Award for Magazines. Dirt Rag, a mountain biking magazine, earned this year’s top spot. Kansas City’s green living publication Greenability landed the runner-up nod, and GRIT completes the top trio as finalist.” – Folio Magazine

GoneReading donates 100% of its profits toward literacy projects and new libraries. GoneReading has added to new merchandize for people who love reading. How about a cool tee shirt with a design like the one shown here? For the next 30 days, you can use the following coupon code for a 25% discount on all products except for the bookends. Visit www.gonereading.com and when you check out, enter: MALCOLMS25

Book Bits #152 – Journalists killed in Syria, LA Times Book Prize Finalists, ‘The Quiet Twin,” tips and news

Welcome to “Book Bits” for February 22, 2o12, the birthday of Canadian novelist Morley Callaghan (1903 – 1990), a prolific writer whom critic Edmund Wilson called “the most unjustly neglected writer in the English language.”

1. News: Two Western journalists killed in Syria, opposition activists say – “Two Western journalists were killed Wednesday in the Syrian city of Homs amid heavy shelling from government forces, opposition activists said. The Sunday Times of London said one of the journalists reportedly killed was reporter Marie Colvin — the only British newspaper journalist inside the embattled Homs neighborhood of Baba Amr. And French Foreign Minister Alain Juppe confirmed journalist Remi Ochlik was killed in a bombing. He was 28.” – CNN
2. News: 2011 Los Angeles Times Book Prize finalists announced – “What do Michael Ondaatje, Manning Marable and Stephen King have in common? They’re all in the running for 2011 Los Angeles Times Book Prizes. The finalists — five each, in 10 categories — were announced Tuesday. The 32nd annual prizes will be awarded at a public ceremony April 20 at USC’s Bovard Auditorium.” – The Los Angeles Times
3. Review: This Möbius Strip of Ifs, by Mathias B. Freese, reviewed by Malcolm R. Campbell – “Somewhat cautionary, occasionally prescriptive, and always uncompromising and unapologetic, This Möbius Strip of Ifs offers readers the observations of one man’s lifetime of bucking the system and seeking a harmonious environment for the ever-awakening psyche within.” – POD Book Reviews & More
4. Writer’s How To: Does “You” Come First or Last? by Mignon Forgarty – “Should she say, ‘You and John are invited to the party’ or ‘John and you are invited to the party’?” – Grammar Girl
5. News: North Jersey store owners speak out against Amazon tax break – “North Jersey store owners are vowing to fight any proposed legislation that would give the online retailer Amazon.com a reprieve from collecting state sales tax in return for opening two warehouses in New Jersey. The proposal has increased support for a nationwide sales-tax collection policy for all retailers.” – North Jersey
6. Feature: PP Appreciation: Jennifer Brown, Children’s Book Crusader – “The latest in our occasional series, ‘Publishing People We Appreciate,’ looks at Jennifer Brown, critic, editor, and children’s book crusader.” – Publishing Perspectives
7. Viewpoint: Consider David Foster Wallace, journalist, by Daniel B. Roberts – “There’s more to DFW than ‘Infinite Jest.’ On what would’ve been his 50th birthday, it’s time to honor his reporting” – Salon
8. Contest: Glimmer Train Short Story Award for New Writers, deadline February 29, entry fee $15, prize $1,500 and publication.
9. Essay: Reading Without Frontiers, by Lev Raphael – “My creative writing teacher in college gave me sweeping advice when I asked how I could become a good writer: ‘Read everything.’ And she smiled.” – BiblioBuffet
10. Review: The Quiet Twin, by Dan Vyleta, reviewed by Linda L. Richards – “When Dan Vyleta’s debut novel, ‘Pavel & I,’ was released early in 2008, I said that I could not imagine that a book of such staggering quality could be given less attention. Unfortunately, I was wrong. Vyleta’s second outing, ‘The Quiet Twin,’ out this month from Bloomsbury in the US and last year from HarperCollins Canada, has been given even less push and attention. Tragically — and almost unimaginably — it’s an even better book.” – January Magazine
11. News: Edward Willett’s Magebane shortlisted for Regina Book Award – “Magebane by Lee Arthur Chane (a.k.a. Edward Willett), published by DAW Books, has been shortlisted for the $2,000 Regina Book Award, for best book by a Regina author, in this year’s Saskatchewan Book Awards. The awards will be presented April 28. Willett won in this same category in 2002 for his YA fantasy novel Spirit Singer.” – via press release at SF Scope
12. Writing Ideas: Making and Learning From My Mistakes with PR, by M. J. Rose – “One of the most complicated discussions I have with authors – including myself – is about whether or not to hire an outside PR firm.” – Writer Unboxed
13. Feature: The Novelist Edits the Scientist – “It’s not unusual for the paperback edition of a book to include some corrections from the hardcover. What is certainly more startling is when the person acting as editor is Cormac McCarthy.” – PageView at The Chronicle of Higher Education
14. Essay: The Arcades Project: Martin Amis’ Guide to Classic Video Games, by Mark O’Connell – “Invasion of the Space Invaders, then, is the madwoman in the attic of Amis’ house of nonfiction; many have heard rumors of its shameful presence, but few have seen it with their own eyes. I recently discovered a copy in the library of the university where I work, and I don’t think the librarian knew quite what to make of my obvious excitement at this coup. ” – The Millions
15. News: Couple needs new home for 30,000-volume Rocky Mountain Land Library, by Electa Draper – “Two self-described bookish people with an unusual dream worked a quarter-century and amassed a 30,000-volume collection on “the land and people’s connection to the land” that could make any naturalist drool. It’s called the Rocky Mountain Land.” – The Denver Post
16. Viewpoint: Rule 1: Ignore Rules, by Lisa Lutz – “I have never read a book on writing, nor do I intend to. Though I have many writer friends who are strong proponents of studying their craft, I remain steadfastly against the how-to genre. ” – The Wall Street Journal
17. Review: “Hotel Iris” by Yoko Ogawa, reviewed by Liviu Suciu – “Hotel Iris” is a short but very compelling first person novel. I think that its distinctive voice makes it so good – lonely, overworked and generally neglected teenager Mari whose widow mother uses as unpaid labor to run their hotel Iris in a Japanese holiday resort by the sea.” – Fantasy Book Critic
18. News: Don DeLillo, Russell Banks finalists for PEN/Faulkner prize – “We’re proud to announce the five finalists for the 2012 PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction, America’s largest peer-juried prize for fiction:  Russell Banks for Lost Memory of Skin; Don DeLillo for The Angel Esmeralda: Nine Stories; Anita Desai for The Artist of Disappearance; Steven Millhauser for We Others: New and Selected Stories;  Julie Otsuka for The Buddha in the Attic. ” – PEN/Faulkner
19. Writing Ideas: Losing Yourself and Finding Some Chocolate: Beating the Writer’s Block – “Every writer has dealt with that massive, invisible beast that plants itself squarely on our desks, preferably in front of our computer screens, and leers at us in a mocking sort of way, just daring us to get anything accomplished.  Sometimes this beast teams up with Facebook or another soul-sucking website and we lose hours without knowing where they’ve gone.” – While We’re Paused
20. Film: First in Flight, by Perrin Drumm – “This year one not-so-predictable contender was announced: the unlikely audience favorite The Artist swept up ten Oscar nominations, including Best Motion Picture. If it wins it will be only the second silent film in history to win in the category. The other was Wings, a war film by William A. Wellman, which won Best Picture at the very first Academy Awards.” – The Paris Review
21. 

    Katherine Boo

    Quote: “[Katherine] Boo is slender and blond, with hands gnarled from rheumatoid arthritis (she didn’t sign books but stamped them with a special stamp); she doesn’t look hardy but oh what an amazing feat of determined reporting her book is. Boo spent three years in a slum in Mumbai called Annawadi, documenting the lives of some of the 80,000 families who squat on the land–garbage pickers, scavengers, entrepreneurs and thieves.” – Laurie Hertzel in “Last Night’s Fun: Katherine Boo at Magers & Quinn” in the Star Tribune

22. Feature: How to name a publisher: Three new publishers make clear the dilemmas facing anyone trying to brand a new imprint – “”Coming up with a name was far more difficult than we expected,” says co-founder Rosalind Porter of the birth-pangs of new publishing venture Union Books, also headed by Alex Clark and David Graham and due to be launched next week. ” – The Guardian

GoneReading donates 100% of its profits toward literacy projects and new libraries. GoneReading has added to new merchandize for people who love reading. How about a cool tee shirt with a design like the one shown here? For the next 30 days, you can use the following coupon code for a 25% discount on all products except for the bookends. Visit www.gonereading.com and when you check out, enter: MALCOLMS25

Book Bits #151 – Ann Patchett, new Faulkner editions, ‘The Book of Lost Fragrances,’ writing tips and news

Welcome to “Book Bits” for February 21, 2012. There’s a lot I could say about Stephen Colbert’s comments and questions for author and bookstore owner Ann Patchett on the Colbert Report. But really, there’s no need, for they speak for themselves. If you click on the link to listen to the interview, grab a glass of whiskey before putting on your earphones.

1. News: Patchett and Colbert on Bookselling, Bezos and Tire Irons – “Last night on the Colbert Report, Stephen Colbert and author and new bookseller Ann Patchett mixed it up as they talked about bookselling, Amazon and more. In his introduction, Colbert said, ‘Oooh independent bookstores. I should buy one of those on Amazon!’ And at one point, he asked, ‘Why would a writer open a bookstore? That’s like a rodeo rider opening a butcher shop.’” – Shelf Awareness
2. News: New editions commemorate Faulkner, by Carol Memmott – “Six works by acclaimed American author William Faulkner will be released in new commemorative editions in time for the fiftieth anniversary of his death this July.” – USA Today
3. Interview: Adam Wilson (“Flatscreen”) with Brad Listi – “Raves Sam Lipsyte:  ‘Adam Wilson is a gutsy, funny, and often beautiful writer, and Flatscreen is one of the most hilarious and commanding debuts I’ve read in a long time.’” – Other People
4. Feature: When E.B. White is also Grandpa, by Danny Heitman – “E.B. White’s granddaughter Martha keeps loving watch over a unique literary legacy.”  – The Christian Science Monitor
   
5. Film: How to Prioritize Your Oscar Week Movie-Cramming, by Jason Bailey – “Flavorwire is offering, as a public service, a priority ranking of the nominees for the major awards (Picture, Director, Actor, Actress, Supporting Actor, Supporting Actress), so you can sift through the 18 nominees and see what time will permit you to see. Let’s be clear: this list is only tangentially related to the actual quality of the films at hand (since, as we’ve discussed, the Oscars often don’t reflect that quaint notion). ” – Flavorwire
6. News: Lit Mag News & Bits: The latest on “New Madrid,” “The First Line,” and “Alimentum Journal” -  New Pages
7. Lists: 2 Ways to Make the Most of Goodreads, by Jane Friedman – “The recent Goodreads author newsletter offered a number of gems helpful for any author with an upcoming release.” – Being Human at Electric Speed
8. Writer’s How To: Don’t Be Negative About Negatives, by Mark Nichol – “A site visitor called attention to a sentence in one of my recent posts and asked, because it has two negatives, whether it is grammatically correct. The sentence in question? “In case you hadn’t heard, I couldn’t care less.”” – Daily Writing Tips
9. Review: The Book of Lost Fragrances by M.J. Rose – “Rose weaves Napoleonic history with that of China and the oppression of Tibet and then brings those ties even further back into history to Egypt and Cleopatra.  In addition to archeology, her characters delve into mythology, history, and hieroglyphics translation and more, creating an even denser and more mysterious novel than expected.” – Savvy Verse & Wit
10. News: Judi McCoy Loses Battle with Diabetes, by Barbara Vey – “Author Judi McCoy passed away on February 19th due to complications from diabetes.” – Publishers Weekly
11. News: Gabby Giffords’ husband to write children’s book – “Retired astronaut Mark Kelly, who collaborated with his wife, former U.S. Rep. Gabrielle Giffords, on her memoir, is writing a children’s book about a mouse that goes to space. ‘On my first space shuttle flight, we had 18 mice on board as experiments,’ Kelly said. ‘And 17 of them, as soon as we got into zero gravity, stayed latched on to the side of the cage. But one of them seemed comfortable through the whole mission, like he was enjoying it.’” – USA Today
12. Essay: Fiction’s Revenge, by William Deresiewicz – “Everybody always gets enraged when one of those sensational memoirs—I was a teenage transgendered prostitute; I was a part-white, part-Native American foster child in South-Central Los Angeles; I was fed through a concentration camp fence by a little girl whom I accidentally met again, and married, years later—turns out to be a hoax. But I always love it, because it demonstrates anew the irrepressibility of fiction.” – American Scholar
13. Review: The Whipping Club, by Deborah Henry – “Inspired by her heritage and research of the Irish Industrial School system, Henry’s auspicious debut chronicles a couple’s attempt to save their son from horrific institutions.”  – Kirkus Reviews
14. Feature: Joseph Roth’s Letters Reveal a Great Forgotten Writer, by Anthony Heilbut – “The great Austrian-Jewish writer Joseph Roth has undergone a slow rediscovery, but a new collection of his letters reveals him to be an urgent, necessary, and heartbreaking prophet.” – The Daily Beast
15. Viewpoint: Nice Bloggers Don’t Get the Girl, by Steven Lewis – “Being raised English presented considerable disadvantages to me as a writer and a blogger. The greatest of them was the English pride in understatement and self-deprecation.” – Mystery Writing is Murder
16. Bestsellers (hardcover fiction): The Sense of and Ending, by Julian Barnes; Death Comes to Pemberley, by P.D. James; Taken, by Robert Crais; The Art of Fielding, by Chad Harbach; Mockingjay, by Suzanne Collins – The Los Angeles Times
17. Essay: Biography on Film, by Carl Rollyson – “I discovered that Joseph McBride, a film historian, writing professor, and screenwriter, was about to publish Writing in Pictures: Screenwriting Made (Mostly) Painless. McBride learned his craft with the best, working with Orson Welles.” – Biblio Buffet
18. Review: Dancing with Memory: On Brian Castro’s Shanghai Dancing, reviewed by Colin Dickey – “Put simply, Shanghai Dancing is the best contemporary book in English that most Americans have never heard of. Castro’s ‘fictional autobiography’ follows Antonio Castro (whose biography shares much with Castro the author) –forced to leave Shanghai as a child, he returns 40 years later seeking an inheritance consisting both of money and stories.” – The Millions
19. News: Barnes & Noble To Take On Amazon (Again) With A New 8GB Nook Tablet – “Barnes & Noble will release a new 8GB version of the Nook Tablet on February 22. While the original Nook Tablet sported 16GB of onboard memory, the new version will feature the same amount as the bestselling Kindle Fire.” – TechnoCrunch
20. Quote: “Writing is alchemy…truly a tool of wizards, witches and sorcerers. It’s the magic wand, the incantation, the wave of the hand that transforms all…” – Mark David Gerson in “The Voice of the Muse: Answering the Call to Write”

GoneReading donates 100% of its profits toward literacy projects and new libraries. GoneReading has added to new merchandize for people who love reading. How about a cool tee shirt with a design like the one shown here? For the next 30 days, you can use the following coupon code for a 25% discount on all products except for the bookends. Visit www.gonereading.com and when you check out, enter: MALCOLMS25

Book Bits # 150 – Mysteries for Presidents Day, Wallis Simpson, Ad Council at 70, writing tips and reviews

Welcome to “Book Bits” for February 20, 2012. Here are today’s links:

1. News: Savannah (GA) Book Festival draws thousands, by Constance Cooper – “It was a nice, gray day to curl up with a good read. But bookworms — more than 9,000 strong — still crawled out to Telfair Square on Saturday for the fifth annual Savannah Book Festival.” – Savannah Morning News
2. Feature: Redesigning Lord of the Flies - “A competition inviting teenagers to come up with a new cover for William Golding’s classic novel produced some stunning results” – The Guardian
3. Review: That Woman: The Life of Wallis Simpson, Duchess of Windsor, by Anne Sebba, reviewed by Maria Puente – “Wallis Simpson — why ever are we talking about “that woman” after all these years? Blame Madonna, whose new movie, W.E., is about her. Or blame the new stage drama in London The Last of the Duchess, and the new novel Abdication set during the crisis. And blame the new biographies, including That Woman: The Life of Wallis Simpson, Duchess of Windsor, by British writer Anne Sebba.” – USA Today
4. Writing Ideas: Press Kit Ho-Hum, by C. Hope  Clark – After putting together her kit: “A teeny irritation niggled at me. Something wasn’t right. Here I was mailing a request to people I didn’t know, giving them all matching information, in hopes each would find me worthy. This was just like pitching agents and soliciting publishers. I needed to do one more thing.”
5. News: Variations on a Theme” Anthology Winners! First and second prize went to “Three Weddings” by Yat-Yee Chong and “The Gold Miner” by Judy Croome. The anthology will be published by The Literary Lab on March 15. Read the story for a list of the other authors and works to be included.
6. News: Writers’ Journal to Suspend Publication – “After months of searching for another publisher for WRITERS’ Journal (WJ) magazine to no avail, Val-Tech Media (VTM) has decided to cease publishing WJ. Our last prospects decided January 19, 2012, not to take on the publication. Until this time we operated as though some publishing company would continue with WJ. Unfortunately, no one has stepped forward. We thank you for your support over the years and hope WJ has helped you become better writers.” – Writers’ Journal
7. Review:  ‘Carl Van Vechten & the Harlem Renaissance’ by Emily Bernard, reviewed by Lynell George – “He counted the black literati of the era — among them Langston Hughes, Zora Neale Hurston, Countee Cullen, Nella Larsen, James Weldon Johnson — as collaborators and confidants. An idiosyncratic white man, of Dutch descent, Van Vechten dedicated his life’s work to, as Hughes once put it, “all things Negro” — literature, theater, ragtime, jazz and blues — nurturing art and alliances, but not without acrimony.” – The Los Angeles Times
8. Writer’s How To: Three Character Archetypes in Fiction, by Joe Bunting – Bunting focuses on the villain, the anti-hero and the fool. – Wordplay
9. Essay: Anthony Shadid was our Ernie Pyle, by Roy Peter Clark – “Anthony Shadid, dead at the age of 43, was our Ernie Pyle, a war correspondent who combined physical and moral courage with the eyes and ears of a great storyteller” – Poynter
10. Event: There’s just over a week left now before the closing of “Bullets Across the Bay: The San Francisco Bay Area in Crime Fiction,” an exhibit that opened in September 2011 at the University of California, Berkeley’s Doe Memorial Library. So if you haven’t yet visited that popular display, be sure to get in there by Wednesday, February 29.  Meanwhile, this coming Friday, February 24, will offer a concluding reception in the Morrison Library (inside Doe Library) from 6 to 8 p.m. A news release explains that the evening’s program will feature five local mystery writers–Mark Coggins, Janet Dawson, Diana Orgain, Sheldon Siegel, and Simon Wood–“reading selections from their favorite Bay Area crime and detective novels, followed by an opportunity for audience members to engage the readers and exhibit curators in Questions and Answers.” – The RapSheet
11. Feature: DVD Extra: ‘All Quiet on the Western Front’ – “A fully restored and digitally remastered All Quiet on the Western Front (Universal, not rated, Blu-ray book+DVD+digital copy, $40) is just out on home video. The hardcover book packaging includes rare photos, actor biographies, reproductions of lobby cards, posters, newspaper clippings and studio correspondence, and an introduction by film historian Leonard Maltin.” – USA Today
12. Feature: Careful With That Fire, Drinking And Litter: 70 Years Of The Ad Council’s Advice – The Ad Council turned 70 on Saturday. Take a look at some of its well-known campaigns. – NPR
13. News: Richard Blood, longtime NY newspaper man and journalism professor, dies in NY at age 83 – “Blood died of respiratory failure in Manhattan on Friday, according to his eldest son, Associated Press political writer Michael Blood.” – The Washington Post
14. Writer’s How To: Focus—What’s This Story About? by Beth Hill – “Focus is one element that keeps a story—any piece of writing—on track, that provides cohesion as well as direction.” – The Editor’s Blog
15. Interview: Sandra Levy Ceren’s Stolen Secrets, with Anne K. Albert – “My psychology practice took precedence over my writing time. What helped me most was a weekly three hour creative writing class that lasted several years, supplemented by a weekly mystery writers critique group also of long duration.”
16. Event: Book ’Em North Carolina, February 25, Jefferson Community College, Lumberton, NC – “more than 75 authors, including two New York Times bestselling authors, Carla Neggers and Michael Palmer, more than 24 award-winning authors, and authors of almost every genre for all ages under one roof to sell and sign their books, participate in panel discussions and talks, network and interact with fans one-on-one.”
17. News: Reuters’ U.S. News Push Signs on Yahoo, AOL, MSNBC.com – “Reuters introduced its general U.S. news service, Reuters America, in late 2010 with one client, the Tribune Co. Now three major portals — Yahoo, AOL and MSNBC.com — have signed on to Reuters’ U.S. news push. It’s a big step for a 160-year-old organization once known almost exclusively for business and financial news.” -  Editor & Publisher
18. Review: More Than Melancholy: ‘In-Flight’ Stories Soar, reviewed by Maureen Corrigan – “The Brits: You’ve got to hand it to them. The Empire may be long gone, but they still reign supreme when it comes to effortlessly exuding mordant wit. For anyone who savors the acerbic literary likes of Evelyn Waugh or the Amises, father and son, Helen Simpson is just the ticket.” – NPR
19. Viewpoint: Afraid of Your Child’s Math Textbook? You Should Be, by Annie Keeghan – “There may be a reason you can’t figure out some of those math problems in your son or daughter’s math text and it might have nothing at all to do with you. That math homework you’re trying to help your child muddle through might include problems with no possible solution. It could be that key information or steps are missing, that the problem involves a concept your child hasn’t yet been introduced to, or that the math problem is structurally unsound for a host of other reasons. ” – Chronic Sense
20. Feature: Hail to the Chief: Presidents’ Day Mysteries – “In honor of Presidents Day, I’ve updated my list of mysteries, thrillers, and crime fiction that feature the U.S. President. Hail to the Chief. This is not a definitive list by any means, and I welcome any additions.
    ” – Mystery Fanfare

Malcolm R. Campbell is the author of Celebrate Glacier National Park, a free e-book released last week by Vanilla Heart Publishing. Available as a PDF download, the 49-page book covers the famous red buses, the land, the personalities and the park’s history.

Campbell, who worked in the park while in college, wrote the articles for this e-book during Glacier’s 2010 centennial.

Book Bits #149 – Anthony Shadid dies in Syria, ‘Ten Thousand Saints,” Dustin Hoffman, and reviews

Welcome to “Book Bits & Notions” for Saturday, February 18. Here are today’s links:

1. News: New York Times Middle East Reporter Dies in Syria – “Anthony Shadid, the two-time Pulitzer Prize-winning foreign correspondent who died on Thursday at 43, had long been passionately interested in the Middle East, first because of his Lebanese-American heritage and later because of what he saw there firsthand.” - Editor & Publisher
2. Feature: A Sneak Preview—for Books, by Alexandra Alter – “Mark Sullivan’s new thriller starring a Robin Hood-like hero named Robin Monarch doesn’t hit bookstores until October, but he’s already angling to build a fan base.” – The Wall Street Journal
3. Interview: Eleanor Henderson (“Ten Thousand Saints”) with Brad Listi (podcast) – “Topics of conversation include:  Ithaca, Greece, bumper stickers, teaching, luck, children’s books, agents, revisions, rejections, editorial notes, Jim Rutman, Sterling Lord Literistic, the sales process, Lee Boudreaux, bedside manner, editorial tricks, pregnancy, anxiety, straight edge, Split Lip, fundamentalism, punk rock, nerds, dating, architecture, West Palm Beach, Virginia, Soul Asylum, freon, drugs, death, environmentalism, aging, hippies, convictions, savants, Georgia, and extreme moderation.” – Other People
4. News: The Unchained Tour Rides Again by Marc Schultz – “In its second time around, the Unchained Tour of Georgia became The Unchained Tour, as a stop in Jacksonville, Fla. officially made the band of traveling storytellers—“raconteurs” in the Unchained parlance—into an interstate phenomenon. The tour, an off-shoot of author/ringleader George Dawes Green’s storytelling series The Moth, first set sail in 2010 as a way to spread the gospel of live, face-to-face storytelling and to support the independent bookstores that provide a real-world forum for communities to gather over stories.” - Publishers Weekly
5. Feature: Barrett-Browning love letters go digital – “The eminent 18th-century English literary critic and polymath Samuel Johnson once wrote, “There is, indeed, no transaction which offers stronger temptations to fallacy and sophistication than epistolary intercourse.” Had Johnson lived long enough to read the correspondence between Elizabeth Barrett and Robert Browning, he might not have been so quick to decry the art of letter writing. This Valentine’s Day, the courtship letters of two of the most famous Victorian poets were made publicly available online. ” – The Christian Science Monitor
6. News: Forbes Among 30 Clients Using Computer-Generated Stories Instead of Writers, by Jason Boog – “Forbes has joined a group of 30 clients using Narrative Science software to write computer-generated stories.” – GalleyCat
7. Writer’s How To: Why Do Kids Say “Versing”? by Mignon Fogarty – “‘Versing’ is not as new as many people think, although we’ll get to the reasons that it might be spreading in a minute.” – Grammar Girl
8. Review: Liu Xiaobo: ‘No Enemies, No Hatred,’ Only Courage – “When Chinese dissident Liu Xiaobo was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 2010, an empty chair took his place on stage in Oslo. The guest of honor was serving an 11-year prison sentence for what the Chinese government deemed ‘incitement to subvert state power.’” – NPR
9. Feature: Big screen or small, Dustin Hoffman feels ‘Luck’-y – “The Oscar-winning actor says at age 74, he is fortunate to have landed such a richly written part in HBO’s new horse-racing series.” – The Los Angeles Times
10. Lists: Top Ten Books on the Environment: 2012, by Donna Seaman – “Public awareness of environmental concerns waxes and wanes, but science and nature writers remained on the case over the last 12 months, reporting on catastrophes overt and slow-brewing as well as efforts to do right by nature and ourselves.” – Booklist
11. Feature: Does the Internet boost freedom? We decide, book says, by Kristin Jones – “The Internet doesn’t bring freedom. Not automatically, anyway. That’s one of the main messages of Rebecca MacKinnon’s new book, ‘Consent of the Networked.’” – Committee to Protect Journalists
12. Interview: Five Questions for… Jeannine Hall Gailey, with Collin Kelley – “Both of my books deal with the good and bad side of female power, I think; becoming the Villainess involves more children and teen stories, and She Returns to the Floating World deals more with what happens after women grow up, get married, and change into foxes. ” – A Modern Confessional
13. Essay: The Wonderful and Terrible Habit of Buying Too Many Books, by Gabe Habash – “Last weekend, I found myself killing a Saturday afternoon at one of my favorite bookstores, McNally Jackson. I didn’t go with any specific book in mind. I walked out with four books: Stoner, A Meaningful Life, A Fan’s Notes, and The Intuitionist.” – PWexy at Publishers Weekly
14. Quote: “If we had a keen vision and feeling of all ordinary human life, it would be like hearing the grass grow and the squirrel’s heart beat, and we should die of that roar which lies on the other side of silence.” – George Eliot, from Middlemarch
15. Contest: Are You in the Running? If you haven’t already entered The Rap Sheet’s contest to win one of three free copies of Hilary Davidson’s new novel, The Next One to Fall, you’d better get cracking. Entries to this drawing will be accepted only until midnight this coming Sunday, February 19. All you need do to enter this competition is e-mail your name and postal address to jpwrites@wordcuts.org. And please write “Hilary Davidson Contest” in the subject line. We’re sorry, but this contest is open only to U.S. residents.  – The Rap Sheet
16. Review: The Fear Index, by Robert Harris, reviewed by Anna Mundow – “In The Fear Index, [Robert Harris] portrays a worldwide financial meltdown and individual mental breakdown while paying homage to Darwin’s writings, Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein, George Orwell’s 1984, and the cyber vision of Bill Gates. The result is an oddly triumphant hybrid: an irresistible thriller that is also a disquieting meditation on the nature of man and of man’s creations.” – Barnes & Noble Review
17. Essay: No Respect! by Nicki Leone - “So this is the column where I lose everyone’s respect. It’s no secret I love books, that reading is not just a past time for me but a career, a life’s pursuit. Books mean so much to me that I destroyed one house with the weight of my collection, and created something like a shrine in the best room of another.” – BiblioBuffet
18. Feature: China’s Murong Xuecun: Balancing Between Censorship and Dissent, by Olivia Snaije – “As China continues to crack down on dissenting voices coming from outspoken intellectuals, Murong Xuecun, one of the country’s most popular writers, is managing to balance on the tightrope between speaking out against censorship and the country’s political system, and remaining free to continue his writing career which has flourished ever since he distributed online his first novel, Leave Me Alone: A Novel of Chengdu, ten years ago.” – Publishing Perspectives
19. Review: The Guardians: An Elegy by Sarah Manguso, reviewed by “Dan Wickett – “The work starts off with a note about a newspaper carrying a story of a man jumping to his death in front of a train. Manguso then writes that were she a journalist, she’d have interviewed everybody she could find that was on that train, that she’d talk to the man’s family members and friends. But she’s not a journalist, and in fact, she was one of the man’s friends.” – Emerging Writers Network
20. Interview: The Dyer’s Hand, Geoff Dyer talks with A. S. H. Smyth – “One of the reasons so many nonfiction books are so boring is because what they’ve done, very diligently, is fulfill the terms of their proposals—they’ve written up their proposal, long-form, and often what this does is then set up a sort of serial deal, where the whole book can essentially be reduced back to the size of the original proposal! What I really like about this book is that the proposal would be turned down instantly: there’s nothing to propose. Nicholson Baker talks about the way in which the most successful nonfiction books are those that can be boiled down into an argument so that everybody can wade in with an opinion without having to undergo the inconvenience of having to read the book itself.” – Guernica
21. Feature: An Enlivening Heritage: Reintroducing Robert Coles, by  Jeff Kelly Lowenstein – “To understand Robert Coles’s two latest books, it helps to have seen his writing chair. Comfortable and unassuming, it sits with a blanket draped over it in the study of the three-story house in Concord, Massachusetts, where he and his late wife, Jane, raised their three boys. The wall opposite the chair features a gallery of framed black-and-white photographs of his personal heroes, many of whom appear in his books—here is William Carlos Williams, there is Walker Percy, and there, in the bottom row, is a smiling Bruce Springsteen, his arm around Coles’s shoulder, like a brother.” – The Common Review
22. News: Pat Conroy Speaks at Savannah, GA Book Festival – “New York Times bestselling author Pat Conroy held a book signing Friday night at the Trinity United Methodist Church on President Street.   Conroy, author of best sellers ‘The Prince of Tides’ and ‘The Great Santini’ gave a keynote address before signing around 200 books.    The festival continues throughout the weekend and features more than 40 authors in a variety of genres.”  – WSAV

For today’s notions, a few of my favorite quotes. . .

• “Make it a rule never to give a child a book you would not read yourself.” ― George Bernard Shaw
• “You’ve got to jump off cliffs all the time and build your wings on the way down.” ― Annie Dillard
• “The first thing I do in the morning is brush my teeth and sharpen my tongue.” ― Dorothy Parker
• “If the world were merely seductive, that would be easy. If it were merely challenging, that would be no problem. But I arise in the morning torn between a desire to improve the world and a desire to enjoy the world. This makes it hard to plan the day.” ― E.B. White
• “May your trails be crooked, winding, lonesome, dangerous, leading to the most amazing view. May your mountains rise into and above the clouds.” ― Edward Abbey
• “There is no agony like bearing an untold story inside you.” ― Zora Neale Hurston
• “All men dream: but not equally. Those who dream by night in the dusty recesses of their minds wake up in the day to find it was vanity, but the dreamers of the day are dangerous men, for they may act their dreams with open eyes, to make it possible.” ― T.E. Lawrence
• “I tell my students to try early in life to find an unattainable objective.” – George Wald
• “Literature is strewn with the wreckage of those who have minded beyond reason the opinion of others.” ― Virginia Woolf

–Malcolm

contemporary fantasy for your Nook

Book Bits #148 – Three-book deal for self-published author, Diamond Dagger for Forsyth, reviews and how to

Welcome to “Book Bits” for February 17, 2012. I don’t have a clue why anyone, including the FBI itself, would want to read Steve Jobs FBI file.  According to the publisher (Skyhorse), we will learn about the “The Dark Side of Steve Jobs.” Yes, it’s public record. But no, I don’t want to learn about it because–being old school–I don’t think it’s any of my business, especially since Steve is not here to either (a) continue doing his purported dark side stuff, or (b) defend himself. Nonetheless, for $12.95 (0r $5.99 on Kindle), we can invade a man’s privacy beyond the grave.

1. News: Steve Jobs’ FBI File Now In Paperback, by Connie Guglielmo – “This is what happens when opportunity, capitalism and Steve Jobs collide: A week after the FBI posted its 1991 investigation of Apple’s co-founder as a PDF document that anyone can download for free, one publisher has turned the 191-page file into a paperback.” – Forbes
2. News: Publishers Score Win in International Piracy Battle, by Jim Milliot – “An international alliance of publishers and publishing associations has succeeded in getting a Munich court to serve cease and desist orders to the operators of two Web sites that have been illegally offering more than 400,000 copyrighted books for free. The operators, currently based in Galway, Ireland, are estimated to have earned over $10 million annually from advertising sales, donations and premium subscriptions.” – Publishers Weekly
3. Review: Writers Explore What It Means To Be ‘Black Cool’ - “In a new collection of essays, Black Cool: One Thousand Streams of Blackness, writers explore the definition of coolness within African-American culture. Writer Rebecca Walker edited the book and compiled a series of essays aimed to build a ‘periodic table of black cool, element by element.’” – NPR
4. Writer’s How To: A Quiz About Attribution, by Mark Nichol – “Punctuation associated with attribution — identification of the source of a statement — can, when used incorrectly, confuse rather than clarify communication. ” – Daily Writing Tips
5. News: Smashwords Has Published 100,000 eBooks, by Nate Hoffelder – “The self-publishing distributor Smashwords hit a new milestone earlier this week, just in time for its fourth anniversary. The world’s largest indie ebook distributor is now handling 100,000 eBooks from over 36,000 authors and publishers.” – eBookNewser
6. Writing Ideas: Allowing your story to happen, by Malcolm R. Campbell – “Over the years, I’ve come to think that events and ideas that seemingly come out of nowhere are often the most meaningful. And, they can send our lives and our stories off on the most surprising pathways.” – Malcolm’s Round Table
7. News: Authors Guild Calls Out Amazon for ‘Predatory Pricing’ – “The Authors Guild has added its voice to the debate about Amazon’s pricing policies. In a statement released on its blog yesterday, the group contended that ‘in Amazon’s hands, predatory pricing can be a particularly potent weapon.’” – Shelf Awareness
8. Essay: Should Two Constructions Diverge, by Jessica Love – “In his poem “Dust of Snow,” Robert Frost writes that a snow dusting Has given my heart / A change of mood rather than Has given a change of mood / To my heart. He does so out of attention to rhyme and meter, and probably also to avoid an awkward line like To my heart. But, as I described in last week’s column, even the non-poets among us make similar choices when determining how to phrase a sentence. ” – The American Scholar
9. Contest: Rachel Carson Sense of Wonder Contest – “The U.S. EPA, Generations United, the Dance Exchange, Rachel Carson Council, Inc., and the National Center for Creative Aging announce a poetry, essay, photo and dance contest. Entries must be from a team of two or more persons—a young person and an older person.” – Environmental Protection Agency
10. Viewpoint: Self-Publishing: Art or Business? by Dave Bricker – “Self-publishing educators tell you how to sell your book, but very few bother to ask if that’s a worthwhile pursuit. Tacking marketing on as the de facto second phase of writing a book places many worthy artists’ resources in jeopardy. How much time, money and energy should you put into marketing your book? The answer is found in an honest evaluation of where your work lies on the spectrum between art and business.”
11. Commentary: The Merging of Books and the Internet: Go Hard or Go Home – “We live in a time when only the largest assertions get any attention. Go hard or go home. It may be silly, but it’s true. And you can make those big assertions and they can be empty because, a year from now? Pretty much no one besides Jon Stewart will remember what you said.” – January Magazine
12. Interview: Carol O’Connell (“The Chalk Girl”) with Elaine Lies – “Green-eyed, blonde and tall, Kathy Mallory is respected and feared by the cops who work with her, described sometimes as a cat playing with a mouse and nicknamed ‘Mallory the Machine.’ Even her creator, author Carol O’Connell, says she’s not entirely sure how much she might actually like her own heroine in real life.” - Reuters
13. Feature: Kristin Hannah knows what women want in fiction, by Deirdre Donahue – “With her best-selling novels about strong women facing down whatever life throws at them, Kristin Hannah makes her fans cry. And they love her for it.” – USA Today
14. Feature: Tales From the Crypt, by Benjamin Schwartz – “Two books uncover the romance and adventure of archaeology.” (“The Leopard’s Tale,” by Ian Hodder and “The Road to Ruins” by Ian Graham) – The Atlantic
15. Interview: Nicole Baart (“Far from Here”) – “What intrigues me about the people left behind is that we can all relate. We’ve all experienced the loss of someone we love; we’re the survivors who have to somehow make it through. I loved writing about Dani’s journey because I felt like she was a journey because I felt like she was a sort of everywoman — we can all sympathize with her struggle.” – Bookreporter
16. News: Amanda Knox Inks HarperCollins Book Deal, by Jason Boog – “Amanda Knox will write a memoir for HarperCollins. According to the New York Times‘ sources, the deal was “for close $4 million.” The Seattle student was charged in the 2007 death of her former roommate Meredith Kercher while studying abroad in Italy, but was exonerated by the Italian court system last year.” – GalleyCat
17. Feature: Did they all live happily ever after? That’s up to you… by Dalya Alberge – “A new digital novel will overturn centuries of literary tradition by allowing readers to choose how they would like a story to end.  ‘99 Reasons Why,’ a 99-chapter family drama about obsession, offers a choice of 11 possible endings. The conclusion depends on the reader’s tastes and mood and on their answers to multiple-choice questions on colours, numbers and objects.” – The Independent
18. Review: Richard Mason on New Novel History of a Pleasure Seeker – “In his new novel Richard Mason evokes a lush, sexy pre-World War I Europe. He talks with Jane Ciabattari about how to write about sex and his new app. ” – The Daily Beast
19. News: Frederick Forsyth wins the 2012 CWA Diamond Dagger – “The CWA has today announced the 2012 winner of its prestigious Diamond Dagger award, with the honour going to thriller writer Frederick Forsyth.” – The Crime Writers Association
20. News: S&S Acquires Self-Pubbed ‘Life’s a Witch’ in Three-Book Deal, by Calvin Reid – “Since Publishers Weekly ran a story about Brittany Geragotelis, an unrepresented aspiring writer with a self-published YA novel and a huge online following, her life has taken a dramatic turn. Geragotelis’s novel, Life’s a Witch, self-published this fall via Amazon/CreateSpace, has been acquired at auction by Simon & Schuster Books for Young Readers in a three-book, six-figure deal that features an e-book prequel series to be released in 2012. Life’s a Witch will be published in fall 2013 and a sequel will be released in 2014. ” – Publishers Weekly

Malcolm R. Campbell is the author of Celebrate Glacier National Park, a free e-book released last week by Vanilla Heart Publishing. Available as a PDF download, the 49-page book covers the famous red buses, the land, the personalities and the park’s history.

Campbell, who worked in the park while in college, wrote the articles for this e-book during Glacier’s 2010 centennial.

Book Bits #147 – Chopping up Ms. Christie, ‘Charlotte’s Web,’ reviews and writers’ links

When I was young, a lot of my friends’ parents bought copies of Reader’s Digest Condensed books. That Reader’s Digest would mutilate books was bad enough; almost worse, though, was the fact that I knew people who bought them. While I’m happy to see those learning English are being given a chance to read “good stuff” (item 2), it pains me to see that rather than writing original material for them, the powers that be are destroying the original work of a well-known author.

Perhaps the resulting crime scene should be titled Death on the Style.

1. News: The Rumpus anonymous advice columnist Dear Sugar is anonymous no more. Sugar’s identity was revealed at the magazine’s Valentine’s event in San Francisco Tuesday night: it’s writer Cheryl Strayed. Strayed’s memoir “Wild: Lost and Found on the Pacific Coast Trail,” is coming from Knopf in March. – The Los Angeles Times
2. News: Agatha Christie cut down for language students, by Alison Flood – “New versions of 20 detective novels produced for ‘upper intermediate’ English language learners” – The Guardian
3. Lists: ‘Charlotte’s Web’ and 99 more ‘great’ kids books, by Bob Minzesheimer – “Charlotte’s Web, E.B. White’s 60-year-old novel about how a determined farm girl and a noble, vocabulary-building spider save a naïve runt of a pig, is No. 1 on a new list of the “100 Greatest Books for Kids.”" – USA Today
4. Feature: Big Brother, Thy Name is Facebook – “And so for now, people are still being allowed to blatantly promote their books, but unpaid reviewers are banned. Not just prohibited, but blocked — the links from her WordPress account and Networked blogs no longer post to her profile. And if she posts the links manually, her account will be suspended.” – Bertram’s Blog
5. News: Gal Beckerman Wins $100,000 Sami Rohr Prize for Jewish Literature: – “The Jewish Book Council today announced the winner of the 2012 Sami Rohr Prize for Jewish Literature, which recognizes the important role of emerging writers in examining the Jewish experience. The award of $100,000 – one of the largest literary prizes in the world – honors a specific work as well as the author’s potential to make significant contributions to Jewish literature.” Beckerman’s When They Come for Us We’ll Be Gone: The Epic Struggle to Save Soviet Jewry is nonfiction about Jews in the Soviet Union. – Jewish Book Council
6. Viewpoint: Q&A: Are booksellers selling more books, or is the pie getting smaller? by Steve Weber – “In general, I think the trend has been down for book sales since 2006, partly because of the economy — and partly, I’m guessing, because the average person is reading fewer books per year because they are doing other activities during their free time. ” – Selling Books
7. Review: Writing in Pictures by Joseph McBride – “One thing is clear throughout the book: McBride knows this territory. He shares his information with the assurance and polish of someone who understands the way there.” – January Magazine
8. Writer’s How To: “Slink,” “Slunk,” “Slinked” by Mignon Fogarty – “Different online dictionaries provide different advice about the past tense of “slink”:” – Grammar Girl
9. New Titles: New Lit on the Block :: Beecher’s Magazine  – “Beecher’s Magazine is the graduate student-run literary journal at the University of Kansas (KU) MFA program. The print annual has an editorial board, which for 2011-2012 includes Iris Moulton and Ben Pfeiffer (co-editors); Mark Petterson (fiction); Amy Ash (poetry); and Stefanie Torres (nonfiction).” – NewPages
10. News: Dory Previn, Oscar-Nominated Songwriter, Dies at 86 – “Though perhaps best known as the former wife of collaborator Andre Previn, she was an accomplished musician in her own right. ” – The Wrap
11. Interview: New Voice: Megan Bostic on Never Eighteen, with  Cynthia Leitich Smith – “Pre-contract revision was rigorous. I’d written the novel during National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo). For those of you who aren’t familiar with NaNoWriMo, it’s a nationwide event in which writers challenge themselves to write a 50,000 word novel in the month of November (yes, writers are masochists and a bit mad).” – Cynsations
12. Viewpoint: Publishers’ Desk: Display or Misplay? by Victoria Strauss – “Over the past few months, I’ve gotten a number of questions from writers who’ve received spam–excuse me, invitations from a website called Publishers’ Desk. Its motto is ‘Bringing Authors and Publishers Together,’ and it describes itself thus (I’m reproducing this at length because the style and syntax should tell you something).” – Writer Beware
13. Review: “99 Girdles on the Wall,” by Elena Louise Richmond – “In Elena Louise Richmond’s candid and well-written memoir, 99 Girdles on the Wall, her mother’s girdles symbolized everything that was constraining in a childhood governed by an alcoholic father, an emotionally disturbed mother, and an infinite number of Christian fundamentalist imperatives.” – Malcolm’s Round Table
14. Retreat: June Writing Retreat: 8 days in Umbria, Italy, June 17-24 – “As with all our retreats, you just need to get yourself to the final destination, and we’ll take care of the rest—well, all the complicated stuff that is. The writing, exploring and creating… that’s up to you.” – Write By the Water
15. Essay: The Fact of a Poem, by Jake Adam York – “Earlier this week, while there were some interesting—and interestingly broad—reactions to the excerpts from the forthcoming/arriving book The Lifespan of a Fact by John D’Agata and Jim Fingal printed in Harper’s and by KR Writer’s Workshop’s own Dinty Moore and here at Salon and at The New Yorker), I was reading in a parallel vein the Paris Review interview of W. H. Auden from 1974. The interview opens on an interesting note:” - The Kenyon Review
16. Review: The Quality of Mercy by Barry Unsworth – “Barry Unsworth has prepared some interesting specimens of eighteenth-century humanity in The Quality of Mercy. He takes characters from wildly different social strata – a slave-dealing capitalist, an abolitionist lawyer, a light-starved coal miner, a fiddler escaped from prison – and puts them under a microscope to expose the subtle workings of their minds and morals. ” – BookBrowse
17. Essay: Why Bookmarks, by Lauren Roberts – “Why do people collect bookmarks? What is it about these tiny pieces of paper, metal, and fabric that attract us to seek out and to collect and care for them?” – Bibliobuffet
18. Lists: 6 things we learned about journalism from Social Media Week, by Jeff Sonderman – “In two Social Media Week panels Tuesday in Washington, D.C., O’Reilly Media’s Alex Howard (better known as @digiphile) posed good questions to journalists from major news outlets (Politico, ABC News, Huffington Post and Gannett) and representatives from major tech companies (Facebook, Twitter and Google). Their answers revealed how technology and social media are changing campaigns and the media coverage of them in 2012.” – Poynter

Malcolm R. Campbell is the author of Celebrate Glacier National Park, a free e-book released last week by Vanilla Heart Publishing. Available as a PDF download, the 49-page book covers the famous red buses, the land, the personalities and the park’s history.

Campbell, who worked in the park while in college, wrote the articles for this e-book during Glacier’s 2010 centennial.

Book Bits #146 – Whitney Houston e-books, ‘Mercury’s Rise,’ writing tips, features and book news

Welcome to “Book Bits,” published six days a week with links for readers and writers to reviews, essays, how to, features and news. On this day in 1898, an explosion sank battleship USS Maine in Cuba’s Havana harbor, killing 260 of the fewer than 400 American crew members aboard. At the time, the cause was ruled to have been a mine; many years later experts determined a fire in the ammunition hold was the cause.

When William Randolph Hearst sent artist Frederic Remington to Cuba to cover the rebellion against Spanish rule for the New York Journal, Remington cabled asking to be recalled since there was no rebellion. Heart sent Remington the now famous telegram: “Please remain. You furnish the pictures, I’ll furnish the war.”

1. News: Shriver to write book about Special Olympics athletes – “Special Olympics CEO Tim Shriver is taking time off to write a book about the athletes he says have changed his life. Shriver says he hopes to tell the stories of the Special Olympics athletes in a way that will promote greater understanding of people with intellectual challenges.” – Associated Press
2. News: Whitney Houston’s death spurs deluge of new Kindle e-book titles – “As news of pop star Whitney Houston’s death began to circulate, a number of enterprising authors sat down and got busy at their keyboards. The fastest workers managed to publish their Kindle e-books the very day Houston died: six new titles about her in Amazon’s Kindle store bear Feb. 11 as their publication date. By the time the weekend was over, another eight had been added to the list.” – The Los Angeles Times
3. Review: “Dark Eden” by Chris Beckett, reviewed by Liviu Suciu – “In talking about Dark Eden, there are two different aspects that need to be considered, namely literary quality and sfnal scope. In short, Dark Eden is superb as a literary novel but something I’ve seen many times before as sf or (pre) historical fiction and not only that, but its scope is very limited since there is only so much you can do with a primitive society as sense of wonder and big picture – in other words the attributes that define high class sf – go.” – Fantasy Book Critic
4. Writer’s How To: Jack of all Trades? That’d Be an Editor, by Beth Hill – “No, you don’t have to be an expert in every field. But when you recognize that those fields exist, you’re already ahead when you begin to edit.” – The Editor’s Blog
5. Viewpoint: Authors and Twitter, by M. J. Rose – Anne Trubek, in her article about authors’ benefits from Twitter, “goes on to quote clever tweets from writers that may draw additional readers to their books and to describe ways that writers can collect reader feedback, presumably as a type of market research. I think it’s great that social media offer writers whose books aren’t necessarily getting a big push from their publishers a way to connect with readers directly. But I have questions about what seem to be the underlying assumptions of the article.” – Buzz, Balls & Hype
6. Essay: Building a Writer’s Nest, by A. L. Kennedy – “It’s easy to ignore your surroundings when lost in the world of words, but they can make the writing life a lot more agreeable” – The Guardian
7. Review: Mercury’s Rise by Ann Parker – A Consideration and A Rumination – “In her books Ann Parker manages to carry us to 1880′s Colorado with a tactile sensuousness that pervades her prose and seamlessly sets us in the slipstream of her story.  It is this ability to physically place us in the midst of her characters lives that makes reading her a joy as well as a journey.” – Poisoned Pen Bookstore
8. News: Excerpt: ‘The Comedy is Finished’ by Donald Westlake – “Donald E. Westlake fans have one final mystery to crack, more than three years after the crime writer’s death at age 75. The Comedy is Finished, Westlake’s last unpublished manuscript, will be released on Feb. 21 by Hard Case Crime.” – USA Today
9. Feature: San Francisco Chronicle’s building: news makes way for arts, by Maura Judkis – “Newspapers are getting smaller and smaller, and the cubicles within them are growing emptier and emptier. At the same time, the buildings that house those empty newspaper cubicles are getting more and more expensive. The San Francisco Chronicle’s parent company has come up with an elegant solution: It is renting out the space in its historic 1924 building to Intersection for the Arts, a local performance and visual arts nonprofit.” – The Washington Post
10. Event: Lisa See reads and signs the paperback release of her NY Times bestselling novel Dreams of Joy, Friday, February 24, noon – 1:30 p. m.at Flyleaf Books, Chapel Hill, NC
11. Ideas for Writers: History is the Foundation for Any Novel, by C. Hope Clark – “When we contemplate history as writers, we think of historical romance, period novels, time travel sci-fi, nonfiction travel guides, textbooks, and magazine features. However, I propose that all authors must study history to create the best prose, no matter what genre they write.”
12. News: Bookstore Sales Fall 15.6% in December; Down 0.8% for 2011 – “December bookstore sales fell 15.6%, to $1.7 billion, compared to December 2010, according to preliminary estimates from the Census Bureau. For the year, bookstore sales fell 0.8%, to $15.53 billion. Total retail sales in December rose 5.9% to $459.8 billion compared to the same period a year ago. For full year, total retail sales rose 7.7% to $4,689.7 billion.” – Shelf Awareness
13. Essay: In “Notes from the Spectrum,” Katherine Hauswirth takes a look at characters with diagnoses in Sharon Heath’s “The History of My Body” and Jonathan Safran Foer’s “Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close” – BiblioBuffet
14. Upcoming: A Perfect Blood by Kim Harrison (Harper Voyager, $26.99, 9780061957895) is the 10th book of the supernatural Hollows series. – Shelf Awareness
15. Review: Michael Saler’s ‘As If,’ on literary ‘virtual realities,’ by Michael Dirda – “In effect, ‘As If’ explores the rewards of participatory fandom, concentrating on three groups: the devotees of Sherlock Holmes, especially the famous literary and dining club called the Baker Street Irregulars; the connoisseurs of H.P. Lovecraft and his Cthulhu Mythos; and the scholarly enthusiasts of J.R.R. Tolkien’s Middle Earth.” – The Washington Post
16. Writer’s How To: 25 Subordinating Conjunctions, by Mark Nichol – “If you’re having trouble developing sentences with sufficient variety to keep your writing fresh, take a ride on A WHITE BUS. No, I’m not shouting at you; A WHITE BUS is a mnemonic initialism that reminds you about a set of conjunctions with which you can begin dependent clauses.” – Daily Writing Tips
17. Viewpoint: Teaching Creative Writing, by Paula Marantz Cohen – “The creative writing classes I teach generally start out as love fests, with everyone praising everyone else’s creativity and unique voice. Then begins the sensitive process of talking about what’s wrong with their work.” – The American Scholar
18. Viewpoint: Judging Books by Their Covers: U.S. Vs. U.K., by C. Max Magee – “We thought it might be fun to compare the U.S. and U.K. book cover designs of this year’s Morning News Tournament of Books contenders. Book cover design never seems to garner much discussion in the literary world, but, as readers, we are undoubtedly swayed by the little billboard that is the cover of every book we read.” – The Millions
19. Feature: Anatomy of a Tear-Jerker, by Michaeleen Doucleff – “Why does Adele’s ‘Someone Like You’ make everyone cry? Science has found the formula” – The Wall Street Journal
20. Viewpoint: Writing to the End, by Randy Mitchell – “For every great beginning, there must be an even better ending. Makes sense, right? If you can’t actually see that final shootout, those lovers either running into each others arms or being torn apart along that beach, or experience that intended inspirational message which you’ve worked so hard to convey during the previous three hundred pages of text, then it’s time to explore elsewhere; just let your mind wonder toward a new beginning.” – The Inspirational Writer
21. Feature: Poet Elizabeth Bishop: The Brownie Recipe – “Elizabeth Bishop was one of the earliest to recognize the proto-hipster qualities of baking from scratch, after the 1920s inventions of Betty Crocker mixes and Wonder Bread made it unnecessary. ” – Paper and Salt
22. Interview: Anthony Giardina on ‘Norumbega Park’ with Andrew Martin – “I was a witness, as a young boy, to my father’s desire to move us up, in our case from a working-class neighborhood to a brand-new neighborhood of houses that men built for themselves—my father and his cronies, Italian-American working-class guys who had made some money. They literally blasted into this hill in Waltham, Massachusetts, this area that had just been woods, and they built these houses that I can see now were just basic split-level structures
23. Upcoming: Master criminal Dr. Fu-Manchu, who became famous in a series of novels by Sax Rohmer, published between 1913 and 1959, is making his long-overdue return in a new set of paperback reissues from Titan Books. The first of these are expected to appear this month. – The Rap Sheet

Malcolm R. Campbell is the author of Celebrate Glacier National Park, a free e-book released last week by Vanilla Heart Publishing. Available as a PDF download, the 49-page book covers the famous red buses, the land, the personalities and the park’s history.

Campbell, who worked in the park while in college, wrote the articles for this e-book during Glacier’s 2010 centennial.

Book Bits #145 – ‘Agents of Change,’ Kindle in Japan, e. e. cummings’ valentine, reviews and tips

Happy Valentine’s Day. Today’s “Book Bits” includes several romantic items. And, if you’ll click on the graphic of the antique Valentine’s card, you’ll be whisked over to a Malcolm’s Round Table post offering you a free PDF e-book of romantic fiction, nonfiction and poetry from the authors of Vanilla Heart Publishing.

Meanwhile, a lot of you will be unhappy to discover that the cities you live in aren’t very romantic. That’s what Amazon says (item 2) based on its sales data.

1. News: Amazon targets Apple’s iPad in Kindle ad – “Amazon has a new advertisement that lauds the e-ink styling of its traditional Kindle e-reader and the low price of its new tablet, the Kindle Fire. What’s the target? Apple’s iPad, of course, carried along by a dorky dude. The smart Amazon buyer is a bright-eyed bikini-clad mother of two.” – The Los Angeles Times
2. News: Most Romantic Cities in the U.S.: Based on Amazon’s sales data of romantic titles, the top five romantic cities in the U.S. are Knoxville, Alexandria, Springfield (MO), Orlando and Cincinnati. – from Shelf Awareness
3. Feature: E.E. Cummings: To My Valentine, by Anne Garner – “When Edward Estlin Cummings met Marion Morehouse in 1932, he was in the middle of a painful split from his second wife, Anne Barton. But loss soon gave way to what Cummings later described as ‘an ecstatic arrival.’” – New York Public Library
4. Interview: Guy Harrison, author of “Agents of Change” – “It’s about an amiable corporate manager, Calvin, whose dream job falls into his lap when he’s recruited by a secret worldwide organization that imbues its agents with uncanny abilities to empower and influence everyday downtrodden individuals. Disaster strikes for Calvin, however, when an elaborate scheme leaves him as a prime murder suspect…and his new employer is presumably to blame.” – Pat Bertram Introduces…
5. Lists: 10 books that guarantee romance, by John Charles – “Need to bring a little romance into your life for Valentine’s Day? Look no further than these new and soon-to-released novels.” – The Chicago Tribune
6. Festival: Amelia Island Book Festival, February 17-18, North Fifth Street, Amelia Island, Florida – “The festival opens with the Authors in Schools and Writers’ Workshop (featuring David Morrell) on Friday.” -  from BiblioBuffet
7. News: Amazon.com to launch Kindle in Japan – Nikkei – “World’s biggest online retailer Amazon.com Inc. will begin sales of its Kindle e-book readers in Japan, as early as April, for less than 20,000 yen ($260), The Nikkei said.” – Reuters
8. Feature: The Bomb and the General: A Vintage Semiotic Children’s Book by Umberto Eco circa 1966, by Maria Popova – “How symbols become symbols, or what keeping atoms in harmony has to do with language acquisition.” – Brain Pickings
9. Lists: 10 Questions to Ask Before Committing to Any E-Publishing Service, by Jane Friedman – “With an avalanche of new services promising to help writers self-publish or distribute their e-books even better and more profitably before, it’s imperative that writers educate themselves about how these services typically operate—plus read the fine print of any new service before deciding to commit.” – Writing on Ether
10. News: Shortlist announced for Romantic Novelists’ Association’s Awards 2012 – “Redesigned for 2012 to reflect the modern appetite for romantic fiction, The RoNAs encompass everything from side-splitting rom-coms to historical drama, from sassy heroines to Hollywood heart-throbs. This year’s awards are also the first adult fiction prize to include a specific category for Young Adult Romantic Novels.” – Romance Novelists’ Association
11. Review: The Lost Saints of Tennessee, by Amy Franklin-Willis, reviewed by Abby Plesser in Fight or flight for a working-class man – “In her powerful debut, Franklin-Willis expertly crafts a Southern novel that stands with genre classics like The Prince of Tides and Bastard out of Carolina.” – BookPage
12. Writer’s How To: Do You Use an Apostrophe to Make “OK” Past Tense? by Mignon Fogarty – “Many abbreviations are nouns (CD, HIV, ATM); it’s less common for them to be verbs. Examples of verbs include OK, OD (for overdose), ID (for identify), and IM (for instant message). Nouns don’t have a past tense; verbs do.” – Grammar Girl
13. Feature: Books On Screen: Our Favorite Bookish Love Scenes From Films – “In the early 90s, the bookish Belle’s interest in the Beast sees a sudden spike after touring his library, and in 1939, Scarlett O’Hara finally confesses her love for Ashley while surrounded by books. Here are some of the most memorable romantic movie scenes revolving around literature.” - The Huffington Post
14. Interview: Ben Marcus (“The Flame Alphabet”) with Brad Listi (podcast) – “Topics of conversation include:  David Markson, literary collage, Brown, Robert Coover, Ralph Waldo Emerson, literary backstabbing, history, suicide, Nicholson Baker, WWII, writing strategies, reviews, teaching, kids, reading, attention spans, dismissiveness, self-imposed rules, primal circumstances, publishing, Yaddo, MacDowell Colony, Austin, Chicago, sports, water skiing, and how a book begins.” – Other People
15. Feature: Read-alikes: Harlem Lights, by Brad Hooper – “The Harlem Renaissance is defined as the explosion of black arts centered in Harlem in New York City during the 1920s and 1930s. Today the Harlem Renaissance can be experienced through the significant works listed below, which emerged from that exciting time and place.” – Booklist
16. Feature: ‘My love for you is trending’: 16 Valentines for journalists from 10,000 Words, by Julie Moos – “The creative team at 10,000 Words has released its annual set of Valentines for journalists. This year’s collection of 16 cards includes old-school and new-school love.” – Poynter
17. Review: A Stellar Debut: ‘The Girls of No Return,’ by Erin Saldin, reviewed by Leila Roy – “The Girls of No Return is absolutely, completely gripping—once I’d started reading, I didn’t put it down, not even while I was giving blood—and despite its subject matter, it’s never exploitative.” – Kirkus Reviews
18. Feature: Why Foreign Rights are a Big Deal for Small Publishers, by Maria Jesus Aguilo – “As Director of Subsidiary Rights at Berrett-Koehler Publishers, one of the most common questions that I get from other independent houses is: ‘Are translation rights worth the effort?’ My answer is always a resounding ‘Yes!’” – Publishing Perspectives
19. Essay: The value of a quiet voice, by William Trevor – “For so long the poor relation of English letters, the short story finally came of age in the fiction of V S Pritchett.” – New Statesman
20. Viewpoint: The Orphan Master’s Son, Opium Nation, River of Smoke, and Extra Virginity – “At its very best, nonfiction is both stylistically beautiful and informative, and can make even the most mundane subjects fascinating. And, frankly, even when it’s imperfectly written it can still be really good. I’ve been thinking about fact that for awhile now, ever since the Times reviewed Tom Mueller’s Extra Virginity and said that that it was a ‘reminder of why subpar nonfiction is so much better than subpar fiction. With nonfiction at least you can learn something.’” – Bookdwarf
21. A Good Cause: Last October in Book Bits #59, I included an item about GoneReading, an organization that donates 100% of its profits toward literacy projects and new libraries. Since then, GoneReading has added to new merchandize for people who love reading. How about a cool tee shirt with a design like the one shown here? For the next 30 days, you can use the following coupon code for a 25% discount on all products except for the bookends. Visit www.gonereading.com and when you check out, enter: MALCOLMS25
22. Viewpoint: We will measure our loss, by Peter Brantley – “Last week was a hard one for readers, with Penguin pulling out of the library market by curtailing its agreement with Overdrive, possibly for allowing Amazon to directly lend files to patrons. It’s left a lot of us feeling markedly less charitable about large publishers.” – PWxyz at Publishers Weekly

Malcolm R. Campbell is the author of Celebrate Glacier National Park, a free e-book released last week by Vanilla Heart Publishing. Available as a PDF download, the 49-page book covers the famous red buses, the land, the personalities and the park’s history.

Campbell, who worked in the park while in college, wrote the articles for this e-book during Glacier’s 2010 centennial.