The Weitz Brothers Branch Out by Patrick Brown

Two very different literary adaptations somehow eluded Scott Rudin's greedy clutches and landed in the lap of American Pie writer/director/producers Chris and Paul Weitz. Chris Weitz has begun filming as both writer and director of The Golden Compass (IMDb), the first installment of Philip Pullman's His Dark Materials trilogy (Tom Stoppard, who did the initial drafts of the script, also gets a writer credit). The film has grand expectations, as New Line Cinema has bestowed upon it its most generous budget since Lord of the Rings. The cast includes Nicole Kidman, Daniel Craig (the blonde Bond), and Ian McShane, with newcomer Dakota Blue Richards playing the lead role. You may remember that Weitz angered fans of the book when he declared that the adaptation would avoid any mention of God and religion because, well, this is America, and in America, we don't mix God and Nicole Kidman.

The other Weitz brother, Paul, is hard at work on his adaptation of Nick Flynn's memoir Another Bullshit Night in Suck City (IMDb). The first order of business, I imagine, is neutering the title to something like, "Another Totally Awful Night in Really Bad City"? Or maybe just "Suck City"? Just a hunch.

(Update, Max adds: Reuters is now reporting that video games based on the His Dark Materials films are on the way.)

- C. Max Magee @ 8:34 AM ~ comments: 0 ~ Links to this post

 

Amazon Starts Book Club on Blog

Amazon is teaming with Penguin Classics to do a book club that will be hosted on a new blog at the site. The club will read books from the vast Penguin Classics catalog. Two cool things about this: 1. Penguin found the host of the book club, Kathryn Gursky, from a review she wrote of The Penguin Classics Library Complete Collection -- yes, she actually owns it -- and 2. she picked a fairly obscure book, Fifth Business by Robertson Davies, rather than an obvious Oprah-style pick. (via)

- C. Max Magee @ 10:39 PM ~ comments: 0 ~ Links to this post

 

An Essential Book for Foodies by Emre Peker

I finally read one of the essential books for foodies: Kitchen Confidential: Adventures in the Culinary Underbelly by Anthony Bourdain. Professionals in various fields that undertake writing and succeed always impress me. Bourdain is no exception.

Kitchen Confidential comprises personal reflections, culinary information and the dos and don'ts of the restaurant business. Bourdain's personal progression from rich kid to college dropout, Culinary Institute of America (CIA) student, junkie, cokehead, alcoholic, line cook, renegade chef, and finally the chef of the venerable Les Halles in New York is an interesting story all by itself. The personal accounts are frank and straightforward. Bourdain disparages and applauds, albeit silently, his actions at every turn. The reader sees that, like Bourdain, most kitchen crews are made up of misfits who chose the hard, chaotic and demanding life of working in a restaurant instead of holding down steady, predictable jobs.

Kitchen Confidential provides tips on what kind of kitchenware to use, little tricks to improve your dinner parties, and - most importantly for me at least - what not to order in a restaurant (hollandaise sauce, it turns out, is a pit of bacteria; the fish specials are mostly the chef's effort to unload old fish on you; if you order a steak well-done, chances are you will get the "tough, slightly skanky end of sirloin that's been pushed repeatedly to the back of the pile"). The stories paint the kitchen as a machismo hell where all talk and jokes revolve around cock and balls, an endearing term is "motherfucker," and women have to tough it out (or preferably give it right back to you, tenfold) to prove their worth.

Bourdain also reflects on the politics and demographics of a kitchen, the importance of the sous-chef, gathering information about employees, keeping a good inventory, and dealing with distributors. Each topic is accompanied by funny and engaging anecdotes; the Bigfoot chapter, where Bourdain reflects on a West Village character who is famous among restaurant workers and suppliers alike, is full of them. Bourdain praises Dominicans, Puerto Ricans, Mexicans, and Ecuadorians at length for their efficiency in the kitchen, dedication to work and stellar work ethics; all qualities that are of great help in busy kitchens. Bourdain openly states that he'll take a Latino over a pompous white line cook any day and explains the reasons in detail. You'll think twice about immigration politics after reading Kitchen Confidential.Towards the end of Kitchen Confidential the reader learns about Bourdain's trip to Tokyo, where he had the hard task of improving Les Halles Tokyo's kitchen. In the Mission to Tokyo chapter Bourdain's enthusiasm for all kinds of food and his reasons for choosing the rough life of a chef become apparent: love of food and all the adventures and misadventures it presents.

I was upset when I finished reading Kitchen Confidential, and now I'm hungry for more Bourdain stories. I briefly satisfied my appetite by reading his reflections on the latest Israel-Lebanon war, "Watching Beirut Die," which he wrote for Salon.com. I enjoyed the piece and was glad to see that Bourdain's writing skills apply to areas outside his kitchen as well. I am still, however, longing for the main dish, which I hope to have soon in the form of his new book The Nasty Bits.

- C. Max Magee @ 5:47 PM ~ comments: 4 ~ Links to this post

 

Visiting Scriptland by Patrick Brown

"Scriptland," as it turns out, is not the area formed by the borders of the 10, 101, and 405 freeways, it is the LA Times' new weekly feature on the world's highest-paying thankless job, screenwriting. While the first installment of the series was a fawning valentine to the King of Scribes, Charlie Kaufman, this week's edition offers something a little more intriguing.

Jim Uhls (IMDb), who earned is bona fides adapting Fight Club (IMDb) (and doing a fabulous commentary track discussion with Chuck Palahniuk, I might add), has signed on to turn the graphic novel Rex Mundi into a movie starring Johnny Depp. This continues a trend of Hollywood snatching up graphic novels as if they were tacky TV shows from the 70s. I shudder to think of the day I wake up and find that they're making Jimmy Corrigan, starring Jack Black and Carl Reiner.

- C. Max Magee @ 8:30 PM ~ comments: 0 ~ Links to this post

 

Welcome Garth

Though Garth made his first appearance yesterday with his post about the Illustrated Pynchon, I'd like to formally welcome him aboard. I've known Garth for a long time - at least a dozen years, I think - and we've always talked about books, so I'm glad he decided to join us. He'll have other reviews and dispatches up soon. Let the hazing commence.

- C. Max Magee @ 8:26 PM ~ comments: 0 ~ Links to this post

 

Zak Smith's Gravity's Rainbow Illustrated to be Published by Tin House Books - by Garth Risk Hallberg

I am pleased to report that Tin House Books will soon be publishing a long-awaited volume of Zak Smith's Gravity's Rainbow Illustrated. The book features one illustration for every page of the Penguin edition of the Thomas Pynchon novel - a total of 760 allusive, elusive images. Release is scheduled for November 28. Gravity's Rainbow Illustrated will not, of course, feature the text of the novel on facing pages, but should fit neatly on bookshelves beside the dog-eared paperbacks of junior Slothrops everywhere. A limited-edition, signed hardcover will likely appear as part of a larger print run, to be distributed well and widely. Steve Erickson pens the introduction.

Serendipitously for Pynchoniacs (Pynchofiles? Pynchaholics?), Pynchon himself is also supposed to release a book that month: the sprawling, 960-page (?) Against the Day - as Ed reported back in June.

I know little about the Pynchon book... having followed Pynchon rumors for a while back in the 90s, I've decided to not allow myself to get excited about the novel until it's in my hands. But a book of Zak Smith's illustrations is something I've been longing for ever since the 2004 Whitney Biennial, where I first saw them mounted. All 760 of them, on one wall. Even before I knew what they were, the meticulous draftsmanship and vivid colors and narrative urge of the illustrations pulled me across the gallery like a tractor beam. Or like Disney World beckoning to a child initiate... a kind of how-long-will-it-take-to-experience-all-of-this effect. I think I only had time to look at like 30 of the images. Then I read the little plaque - Gravity's rainbow - and thought... I want to take this home with me. I want to read these pictures, over and over. I looked in vain for a print version in the gift-shop, and then on line. I even resorted to clipping the handful of illustrations that ran in Bookforum's Pynchon tribute last year and wedging them into the pages of my Gravity's Rainbow. So I was pretty excited to learn at a reading last night by the poet Alex Lemon (whose book Mosquito is also published by Tin House) that the complete project would be published right in time for my birthday.

Which presents a conundrum: do I then plunge back into Gravity's Rainbow again, or do I save my attention for Against the Day? Is it sane, or even possible, to read 1,720 pages of Pynchon consecutively? Wait... did I say I wasn't allowed to get excited?

[Note from Max: Garth, whose musings have appeared at The Millions from time to time, has joined us as a contributor - his bio will appear with the others shortly. This is his first post in that capacity.]

- C. Max Magee @ 9:40 PM ~ comments: 3 ~ Links to this post

 

After Moneyball

If you've been reading this blog for a really long time, you'll recall that I was a big fan of Moneyball, Michael Lewis' look at the inefficiencies of baseball as a business. What could have come off as dry, numbers-heavy, and "inside baseball," if you'll pardon the phrase, turned out to be a fascinating treatise that delved into psychology and economics and contained profiles a number of interesting people. With that in mind, I was excited to learn of a new book by Lewis coming out later this fall, The Blind Side: Evolution of a Game, which, if Malcolm Gladwell is to be believed, will be just as good. Says Gladwell,

It's about a teenager from the poorest neighborhood in Memphis who gets adopted by a wealthy white family, and who also happens to be an extraordinarily gifted offensive lineman. Simultaneously Lewis tells the story of the emergence of the left tackle as one of the most important positions in modern day football. I thought Moneyball was fantastic. But this is even better, and it made me wonder if we aren't enjoying a golden age of sportswriting right now.

As has been previously discussed here, the world could use more good books about football, so I'm pleased to hear about this one.

Update: Here's an excerpt. Thanks Patrick.

- C. Max Magee @ 9:12 PM ~ comments: 1 ~ Links to this post

 

Weekend Extras

• Corey Vilhauer, host of his Book of the Month Club here at The Millions, has put together a great collection of lists of greatest writers, straying outside of the purely literary realm into music, film, and other areas. He has his own top 25, as well as top tens from a number of guests.
• The Guardian interviews Richard Ford in anticipation of his upcoming third Frank Bascome novel, Lay of the Land. "It is quite some novelty to find myself waking up in Richard Ford's bed," it starts.
• The Boston Globe profiles John Hodgman, who, with his book The Areas of My Expertise, regular "Daily Show" appearances, and ubiquitous Mac ads is suddenly everywhere. Update: Hodgman gets interviewed by Radar.
• Did you know there are two books about "Jeopardy!" out right now? Brainiac is by Ken Jennings, the guy who was the game show's champion for about six months in 2004. A somewhat wackier look at the show is Prisoner of Trebekistan by another former champion, Bob Harris. The Village Voice recently reviewed both books.

- C. Max Magee @ 11:30 AM ~ comments: 0 ~ Links to this post

 

Amazon Ramps Up More "Community" Features

Amazon has further tangled and interconnected its product pages by adding comments to its customer reviews. Amazon also now allows you to search across Customer Reviews and "Listmania" lists.

• The comments on reviews up the interactivity quotient on Amazon pages by several notches, turning the comments into the equivalent of a topical blog with dozens of authors all writing about a particular book. It also alleviates the previously frustrating inability to correct or add to information posted in earlier reviews. I had to dig around to find some examples of the new comments in action. Just as political books are among the most frequently reviewed, they are also now getting the most comments (if troll-like.) For example, have a look at the dedicated page for a review of Noam Chomsky's Hegemony or Survival, currently in the news because Venezuelan president Hugo Chavez brandished it during his fiery Anti-Bush speech at the UN on Wednesday. Amazon has unleashed a free-for-all, but I applaud them for it. Why not let people communicate about individual books? Perhaps something good will come of it.
• The Customer Reviews search, meanwhile, probably has some value if you are either trying to drill deeper into what a particular book is all about - for example, a search for the word "Oprah" in the reviews of Jonathan Franzen's The Corrections - or trying to dig up information across Amazon's whole catalog that may not be evident using the standard search - like this search for "desert island book."
• The Listmania search allows for similar fun, if less serendipity.

- C. Max Magee @ 10:31 PM ~ comments: 0 ~ Links to this post

 

Thursday Links

• Google has added a Worldcat search to Google Books, allowing readers to look for books in their local libraries as well as on online bookstore sites. (via)
• From the Department of Clever Book Promotions: Random House is using a text-based (or interactive fiction) game to promote the release of The Glass Books of the Dream Eaters by Gordon Dahlquist.
• Steven Johnson's forthcoming book The Ghost Map, "a thrilling historical account of the worst cholera outbreak in Victorian London," sounds pretty terrific. To whet the appetite, he provides a brief list of the "best" plague books to the Wall Street Journal. (via).
• Just in time for Banned Books Week, check out some very cool banned books jewelry.

- C. Max Magee @ 9:43 PM ~ comments: 0 ~ Links to this post

 

Books on the Silver Screen by Patrick Brown

As Oscar season nears (and, no, it hasn't started yet... If you think Hollywoodland (IMDb), The Last Kiss (IMDb), or The Black Dahlia (IMDb) are winning anything more than a best art direction award, you're wrong), it's time to start thinking about serious literary adaptations. This year is full of them, including Stephen Zaillian's updated adaptation of Robert Penn Warren's All the King's Men (IMDb). This should be a fine film, as Zaillian is a first rate screenwriter. Also of note, James Carville is listed as a producer on the film. In this interview from KCRW's "The Business" Carville talks about how he got involved in the project. Naturally, it all started on the set of Old School (IMDb).

Another adaptation of note in the coming months is Zoe Heller's Notes on a Scandal (IMDb), starring Cate Blanchett and Dame Judi Dench. It should be no surprise that Scott Rudin is executive producing the film, as he owns nearly every literary novel of the note from the last ten years. Check out his rather staggering IMDb page. Not only does he have the "eagerly anticipated" Kavalier and Clay (IMDb) and The Corrections (IMDb), he's also grabbed the slightly more obscure "The Smoker" (IMDb) based on a short story from David Schickler's Kissing in Manhattan. While most of these projects are listed as in development (meaning two people once discussed the idea over lunch), obviously Rudin has the clout to bring them to fruition. The list of films does lend credence to the idea that Rudin isn't merely a "foul mouthed, phone hurling" scourge of assistants, he's also a reader.

- C. Max Magee @ 6:25 PM ~ comments: 1 ~ Links to this post

 

Geniuses 2006

The annual MacArthur "Genius" Fellows were named today. This award gives people from diverse fields $500,000 with "no strings attached," for "exceptional creativity, as demonstrated through a track record of significant achievement, and manifest promise for important future advances." There are typically a handful of literary types among the scientists, artists, and musicians who become Fellows, with this year being no exception. George Saunders is probably the best known among them, but I've listed all of the literary winners below along with some relevant links:

• David Carroll - Naturalist Author/Illustrator - From the bio on his site: "David is an active lecturer and turtles/wetlands preservation advocate. His art and writing, as well as his extensive fieldwork with turtles and wetlands has been widely recognized, and been the subject of many feature articles." He is the author of a recently published memoir, Self-Portrait with Turtles and "the wet sneaker trilogy" of The Year of the Turtle, Trout Reflections, and Swampwalker's Journal.
• Atul Gawande is a prominent surgeon, but he is better known for his book Complications: A Surgeon's Notes on an Imperfect Science and his articles in the New Yorker, including "The Bell Curve: What happens when patients find out how good their doctors really are?", "Piecework: Medicine's money problem," and many others. In my opinion, Gawande's best quality is his ability to bring his perspective as a surgeon to his stories. Nearly all of his articles start with an observation he has made on the job that he then investigates further. (In this respect, he's not unlike another great medical writer Oliver Sacks.) Other links: A Slate diary Gawande did in 1997; Gawande's 2005 commencement address at Harvard Medical School
• Adrian Nicole LeBlanc's Random Family was an incredible work of journalism. To write the book, she spent ten years following the lives of an extended family in the Bronx to paint a detailed portrait of the lives of people that don't get typically get such attention in the press. In an interview with Salon from 2003 (you have to watch an ad to read it), LeBlanc explains what she discovered while writing the book. See also: a recent article by LeBlanc on child actors in the New York Times Magazine, reprinted here.
• David Macaulay is the illustrator and author behind those incredible "The Way Things Work" books. In them, he deconstructs everyday objects as well as big buildings and other structures in engaging, lighthearted, yet incredibly detailed illustrations. You can see a few of those illustrations here. Macaulay is probably best known for The Way Things Work, but his architectural books, like Mosque are fascinating as well.
• I can't pretend to know much about Sarah Ruhl - theater is a blind spot for me - so I'll point instead to this long and glowing profile from the Washington Post: "She has been writing and rising steadily ever since, creating plays that aren't easy to categorize. (An anthology of her plays will be published this fall.) The Clean House is tight and funny, skirting the polemics you might expect from a scenario that begins with a demanding WASP doctor and her recalcitrant immigrant maid. Yet it deepens by sly degrees, sweeping the audience on a surprising cloud of feeling as the characters deal with terminal illness in unorthodox ways."
• George Saunders likely needs little introduction here as he's been a favorite at The Millions and on many other book blogs. He is known for his unique, dystopian yet bleakly funny style that somehow manages to capture everything that is weird about our world without being obvious about it. For more George Saunders fun, check out an interview at Identity Theory, his story "Adams" from the New Yorker (there's more where that came from), or his books, CivilWarLand in Bad Decline, Pastoralia, The Brief and Frightening Reign of Phil, and In Persuasion Nation.

- C. Max Magee @ 8:23 PM ~ comments: 0 ~ Links to this post

 

Tuesday Links

• Clusty has unveiled a very cool Shakespeare search engine, allowing one to sift through all the bard's works with the push of a button.
• The Washington Post is hosting live lunchtime chats with various authors over the next two weeks to coincide with the 2006 National Book Festival. The highlight: Geraldine Brooks, author of Pulitzer Prize-winning The March on Thursday.
• Just announced: Another Hannibal book from Thomas Harris called Hannibal Rising, prompting Ed to call Harris "The Laziest Titler in the Publishing Industry."

- C. Max Magee @ 7:29 AM ~ comments: 0 ~ Links to this post

 

News from Middle Earth

Though posthumously published work is often disappointing, it's hard not to be curious about the just announced publication of The Children of Hurin by JRR Tolkien, which has been compiled from excerpts and notes by Tolkien's son, Christopher. According to the Guardian, Tolkien enthusiasts will be familiar with the work since fragments of it have been previously published elsewhere:

Extracts from the original tale, said to be a detailed but staccato account of the family of Hurin, the man who dared defy Melkor in the first age, have already been published - illuminating, Tolkien enthusiasts say, some of the oldest tales of the legendary land of Middle Earth.

The new book is slated to arrive in Spring 2007.

- C. Max Magee @ 7:14 AM ~ comments: 1 ~ Links to this post

 

Ed Champion: Nemesis

Ed Champion has a nemesis, Time magazine book reviewer Lev Grossman, as we discover in Grossman's latest column. Though somewhat tongue in cheek, Grossman is basically asking bloggers to use their power for good. All in all, it's far more civilized than Steve Almond's pathetic attempted takedown of Mark Sarvas in Salon from a year ago, which read like a laundry list of Almond's insecurities. Grossman's essay and Ed's response make it clear that Grossman is an altogether more pleasant person than Almond and that the relationship between book bloggers and the literati has matured. As Ed notes in his brief response to Grossman, he (and other book bloggers) are regularly paid to pen book reviews in major newspapers. The lines are blurring. Oh, and I've met Ed. He's not that scary.

- C. Max Magee @ 6:57 AM ~ comments: 1 ~ Links to this post

 

Brooklyn Book Festival Dispatch

An old friend sent in this report from the inaugural Brooklyn Book Festival

Leaving to the New York Times, for the moment, the question of whether Brooklyn circa 2006 can fairly be compared to Paris circa 1930, it would have been apparent to anyone attending Saturday's 1st Annual Brooklyn Book Festival that the borough has become at the very least a vital center in the republic of letters - a worthy rival to its sister across the river.

After a week of rain, the weather was perfect. For our delectation, Borough President Marty Markowitz - almost single-handedly, if the font size on the flyer was any indication - had filled Borough Hall plaza in downtown Brooklyn with five reading stages and over sixty vendor tents from bookstores, literary nonprofits, and small presses. We're all accustomed, of course, to our beloved BP's inimitable brand of self-promotion... and this was not the only echt-Brooklyn aspect of the festival. Both the crowd and the participants were almost as laudably diverse as the borough, and that wonderful Brooklyn admixture of charm, originality, and public-mindedness tempered by self-satisfaction were palpable all around.

The indoor readings and panels, featuring the likes of Jhumpa Lahiri and Jonathan Lethem, were so packed that I couldn't get in - —which is good, I think. The Book Festival, if it is to take off as a viable successor to New York is Book Country, needs to generate this kind of excitement. For me, though (slathering, slobbering, fetishizing book-hound that I am), the vendor's booths were where the action was. Literary magazines were well-represented. Out-of-towners like Jubilat and Gulf Coast mingled with New York's own one-story and Open City. A Public Space proved particularly popular - the scintillating first issue of this Paris Review offshoot is now sold-out, and issue two was flying off the tables. I like that A Public Space is trying to bridge the divide between the traditional literary magazine - which these days appeals to a small, self-selecting audience - and that endangered species, the general interest magazine.

Small presses, meanwhile, were showcasing their fall catalogues. Seven Stories, Soft Skull, and Akashic are bringing out a number of titles with mainstream appeal, and it's hard to compete with Joe Wenderoth's Letters To Wendy's (Verse Press). But for my money the most interesting house in Brooklyn is Archipelago. These guys, like Dalkey and NYRB are putting out translations of serious works of fiction from around the world, in beautiful editions. Elias Khoury's magisterial Gates of the Sun, a surprise success, has introduced readers across the country to Palestinian literature; this fall's offerings include works in Russian and Korean.

And what would a Brooklyn Book Festival be without the McSweeney's table? Many of the authors represented in the festival - Jonathan Ames, Jonathan Lethem, Rick Moody, Colson Whitehead, Jennifer Egan - are less than a degree of separation away from Dave Eggers' merry band, aesthetically and/or professionally. Members of said band had flown in from San Francisco for the event, and were chatting with visitors about upcoming projects. Writers and readers have sometimes seemed divided on the question of a McSweeney's style - that kind of playful, knowing, "in-joke" humor and deep interest in childhood and adolescence. And we on the web love a backlash, don't we. But it is indisputable that McSweeney's has contributed greatly to the literary renaissance underway here. The 826 NYC learning center is a noble effort to extend the bounty of the literary boom to kids often ill-served by rapid gentrification. And the publishing operation is growing. Eggers' novel about Sudanese war refugees - due out in October, I think - sounds like a work of great reach and ambition. But if you're into that sort of thing, there's no need to wait - McSweeney's has also just put out Chris Adrian's monumental (600+ pages) novel, The Children's Hospital. This book strikes me as a bid to compete seriously with the big literary houses, albeit under a different financial model. At the book fair, the editors seemed to be waiting to see whether a book with a modest promotional budget and independent distribution can succeed in the way White Teeth and Motherless Brooklyn and Middlesex have. But if it is a just world, they don't need to worry. I started reading the book last week, and am pleased to report that it's everything I look for in a novel - richly imagined, wonderfully written, ample in scope, formally daring. In a word, serious. On the log-line alone - The Stand meets Cuckoo's Nest meets the Book of Revelations - it should take off.

Or anyway, I'm hoping. Because if there's a flaw in the Brooklyn literary model, as opposed to the Parisian one, it may be that we're too damn comfortable here. Walking around on a gorgeous fall day, eating a burrito, reading about Wendy's, seeing kids listen to Dr. Seuss, it was hard to want anything more. And this, too, is so very Brooklyn (nouveau Brooklyn, that is), this feeling of, we've got it so good here, this is so great. Look at us, us smart and engaged and right-minded people! Look at how many wonderful writers live and work among us! It can be hard to stay hungry. But hunger, yearning, desire, insane and ravenous need, are the fuel for great and life-changing books. And with luck, the thing that's happening here, in Brooklyn, will produce (or continue to produce) those books. God knows we need them.

- C. Max Magee @ 8:34 AM ~ comments: 0 ~ Links to this post

 

NYT Book Review News

I'm not really one to analyze the New York Times Book Review, but I noticed that the section got a couple of mentions in the journalism industry magazine Editor & Publisher. The first points out that the section's online version has introduced a new bestseller list, one devoted to politics. The usefulness of such lists aside, the introduction of a politics list highlights how important these books - often little more than lengthy screeds coming from the Left or Right - have become to the bottom line for the publishing industry. From the New York Times' point of view, it's "'The more best-seller lists, the better,' Sam Tanenhaus, editor of the Book Review, told E&P."

Separately, E&P published a piece about the glowing review that the Times gave to The Greatest Story Ever Sold: The Decline and Fall of Truth from 9/11 to Katrina by its own columnist Frank Rich. As E&P puts it:

Ian Buruma, the well-known author, in a front-page review, offers enthusiastic praise both for the book and most of Rich's commentary, which is extremely critical of the media for shirking its watchdog role in the runup to the Iraq war. The Times itself gets hit by its own columnist.

So, to recap, the Times praises a book which is critical of the Times but is written by a Times columnist. It's a small world, no?

- C. Max Magee @ 4:54 PM ~ comments: 0 ~ Links to this post

 

On Recommending Books

In the Contra Costa Times, librarian Julie Winkelstein pens a thoughtful little column about the challenges of recommending books and receiving recommendations from others.

I also realized that although I have come to accept that my recommendations aren't always taken, I still find it difficult when I don't like a suggested book. It makes me feel guilty, somehow, as if I didn't try hard enough. And it is not easy for me to simply say it wasn't right for me.

As one who is thought of as a book expert - thanks to this blog and my former job as a bookseller - I'm often asked to provide recommendations, and it's pretty rare that they hit the mark. After all, it can be hard to pin down someone's taste in books.

- C. Max Magee @ 4:40 PM ~ comments: 1 ~ Links to this post

 

Cyborg Shoppers

Bookseller Chick describes what is currently the bane of booksellers everywhere: those Bluetooth cell phone headsets.

In the past, once this formerly erratic behavior was observed the bookseller could then take extra caution or at least have an answer to give other customers if they came up and complained about the person talking to themselves, but now we are left wondering. Are they on the phone? Are the talking with aliens on the rock formerly known as the planet Pluto?

When I worked at the bookstore in Los Angeles a few years back, the Bluetooth thing was starting to take hold (they're early adopters out there with all things cell phone), and all too often, thinking I was being summoned by a book buyer in need of assistance, I would find a patron chatting into his ear piece, as if insane. Worse yet, we would be subjected to half conversations of an all-too-often personal nature - discussions about cheating spouses, play-by-plays of recent therapist sessions, and the like. Makes me glad I don't work retail any more.

- C. Max Magee @ 4:24 PM ~ comments: 0 ~ Links to this post

 

Booker Shortlist - With Excerpts!

Forget the longlist. The Booker Prize shortlist is here, and favorites Peter Carey and David Mitchell didn't make the cut, clearing the field for lesser known writers as the Guardian describes. Those that did make the list are:

• The Inheritance of Loss by Kiran Desai - Excerpt
• The Secret River by Kate Grenville - Excerpt
• Carry Me Down by M.J. Hyland - Excerpt
• In the Country of Men by Hisham Matar - Excerpt
• Mother's Milk by Edward St. Aubyn - Excerpt
• The Night Watch by Sarah Waters - Excerpt

Bonus Links: The new favorite? According to the oddsmakers, it's Sarah Waters by a wide margin. Maud collects reviews and interviews to accompany the shortlist.

- C. Max Magee @ 11:00 PM ~ comments: 0 ~ Links to this post

 

On Paranoid Writers

Ed hones in on a favorite excuse that wannabe writers use to explain why they don't have an agent or aren't getting published:

The point of all this is that if you're a writer clinging to the stubborn notion that someone is out there to "steal" your work, and if you are letting this get in the way of writing, submitting, or pitching, then I ask you for the good of humanity to step out of the way.

Like Ed, I have encountered a number of writers (and a couple of musicians) who insist that they would be published and even famous were it not for concerns that the moment they let anyone see or hear their work it would be snapped up by a greedy opportunist. As Ed rightfully illuminates, this is almost always a stock excuse to cover up a lack of motivation, confidence, or even the fact that their work doesn't yet exist.

- C. Max Magee @ 9:11 PM ~ comments: 0 ~ Links to this post

 

Books as Objects: Drug Mules

I happened upon this story about a scheme to smuggle drugs into a Michigan prison using library books. From the Muskegon Chronicle:

Inmates at the prison in eastern Montcalm County communicated with somebody on the outside, providing titles to check out from the Madison Square branch library on the southeast side of Grand Rapids. The outsider was to check out the books, cut open the bindings, tuck drugs inside, then reseal them. Then, the accomplice would return the books to the library and contact the inmates, telling them which drug-packed books to request.

Luckily the plot was foiled before any books could be mangled in its service.

- C. Max Magee @ 9:05 PM ~ comments: 1 ~ Links to this post

 

Edward P. Jones in the News

A pair of Edward P. Jones items that are getting mentioned everywhere but deserve a link from me too:

• A thorough look at Jones' ouvre to date in Harper's. (via YPTR)
• Part one of an interview with Jones at After the MFA. (via Pinky)

- C. Max Magee @ 7:50 AM ~ comments: 0 ~ Links to this post

 

Flying with the Boy Wizard

JK Rowling nearly had "to stow her top secret notes for book seven" of the Harry Potter series when flying from New York to England recently due to restrictions on carry on items. "They let me take it on thankfully, bound up in elastic bands," she told fans on her Web site and attested that she would have sailed back if she had not been able to take the pages with her in the plane. The Guardian has all the details. It would be easy to poke fun at Rowling's dilemma, but I'd rather push them to let books back on planes (flights between the U.S. and Britain still face baggage restrictions due to the recently foiled terror plots). I can't imagine flying without a book or two. That's when I get my best reading done.

- C. Max Magee @ 7:38 AM ~ comments: 0 ~ Links to this post

 

Google Highlights Banned Books

Google has put together a special page on its "Books" site devoted to frequently banned books in recognition of "Banned Books Week," the American Library Association initiative to protect intellectual freedom and raise awareness about attempts to ban books. This year, the event takes place from September 23 to 30.

The Google tie in to this, I think, illuminates the importance of the company's efforts to digitize books and make them accessible to anyone with an Internet connection. In this way, even if a frequently challenged book like Lolita or Beloved is made inaccessible to a curious reader, it will always be available online. (via)

- C. Max Magee @ 7:44 AM ~ comments: 0 ~ Links to this post

 

Let's Dzanc

The tireless Dan Wickett (creator of the Emerging Writers Network) has teamed with Steve Gillis (founder of 826 Michigan and author of Walter Falls) to creat Dzanc Books:

Dzanc Books is a 501(c)3 organization set up to operate exclusively for charitable, literary, and educational purposes. Our mission at Dzanc is 3-pronged: To assist literary journals in reaching the largest reader base possible; to develop educational programs within the schools in the areas of reading and writing; and, beginning in 2007, to publish two excellent works of literary fiction per year.

Sounds like an exciting and much needed venture.

- C. Max Magee @ 7:35 AM ~ comments: 0 ~ Links to this post

 

Stephen King in the Paris Review

Stephen King, once a favorite target of critics, has been embraced by at least some in the literary elite in recent years. He was awarded the National Book Award for Distinguished Contribution to American Letters, his fiction and non-fiction have appeared in the New Yorker, and now he is the subject of an "Art of Fiction" interview in the fall 2006 issue of the Paris Review, a distinction that might as well elevate him to canonical status.

I'm a big fan of Stephen King's books because they're unflaggingly entertaining, but I also enjoy King's work because of his close connection with his readers and his unwillingness to put himself on a pedestal. King's exuberance can be found in his book On Writing. Part of the book is a common sense writing guide, but On Writing is worth a read for the funny little autobiography that the guide is paired with. He casts aside the notion of the writer as tortured soul and replaces it with the idea of the writer as a showman, serving his audience.

What interests me, though, is how King has graduated from the bestseller list and moved into literary limbo. In the Paris Review interview, King talks about writers like John Grisham, Tom Clancy, Danielle Steel, and James Patterson. While King has some kind words for Grisham, he recognizes that he's not really in competition with these perennial bestselling scribes any more, nor does his ego need the lavish advances that they receive. At the same time, he is reluctant to embrace the literary elite, because, I think, he believes that doing so would break his contract with his readers. Now, though, he seems less orthodox on this point. It's not that he is embracing the literary world, far from it. It's more like, coming back from an accident that nearly killed him - he was struck by a van near his home in 1999 - he has turned inward, and is writing mostly for himself, having previously done it for fame, money, and his love of entertaining. Of his forthcoming book, Lisey's Story, which PW calls "a disturbing and sorrowful love story," King tells the Paris Review:

To me it feels like a very special book. To the point where I don't want to let it out into the world. This is the only book I've ever written where I don't want to read the reviews, because there will be some people who are going to be ugly to this book. I couldn't stand that, the way you would hate people to be ugly to someone you love. And I love this book.

The interview ends with King wondering aloud if he can "do something that's even better."

Links on King: Only a small snippet of the King interview is available online, but, if you're interested in King, it's worth picking up this issue of the Paris Review to read the whole thing; King's National Book Award speech; King's account of his accident from the New Yorker.

- C. Max Magee @ 8:30 AM ~ comments: 0 ~ Links to this post

 

Monday Links

• On this sad aniversary, the Pioneer Press provides a small selection of 9/11 books and movies.
• Ed does a great job reviewing Haruki Murakami's new collection Blind Willow, Sleeping Woman in the Philadelphia Inquirer. Kudos to him for penning a thoughtful and thorough review.
• The AP writes up a new video game based on the Christian apocolyptic Left Behind series of books. The novels have sold more than 63 million copies according to the story.
• This made me a little queasy: A teacher in Hurst, Texas has ignited an interest in reading among her students by having them all read a book together... James Patterson's young adult thriller Maximum Ride: The Angel Experiment. Whatever it takes, I suppose.

- C. Max Magee @ 8:00 AM ~ comments: 3 ~ Links to this post

 

Laurie visits the Decatur Book Festival

Longtime Millions reader Laurie sends in an account of her visit to the first annual Decatur Book Festival (with photos!) Sounds like a great event.

The first annual Decatur Book Festival, held over Labor Day weekend, exceeded its organizers expectations. I know, because by Saturday afternoon they and the volunteers were grinning a lot and commenting to anyone who would listen how surprised they were. Bill Starr, director of the Georgia Center for the Book which hosted a bunch of speakers, never seemed to lose his smile. I was excited, because this was the first really large, general-interest book festival Atlanta has ever had. Crowds increased throughout each day and people continuously entered ongoing author talks (unless they were too packed), adding to the feeling that you were at an event of public interest as important as a town meeting or a political rally (except everyone was in a better mood). You had to squeeze through clumps of strollers winding past the dealer tents. Ron Rash (The World Made Straight) started with about 45 listeners at about 10:30 a.m. in the 200-something seat auditorium in the Decatur Library, and ended with over 60. At about 4 p.m., the Atlanta Journal Constitution panel filled the same auditorium. At the local Holiday Inn, there were long lines for signings by both pop-lit writers like Diana Gabaldon (Outlander) and Pulitzer-winners like Robert Olen Butler (pictured above) (A Good Scent From A Strange Mountain).

The city of Decatur (pronounced De-KAY-tur) is basically part of Atlanta. As of the year 2000 the city-within-a-city's population density was 4,343 people per square mile, 65% white, 31% black, with a median household income of $47k. It has a great little downtown area with a public library and courthouse and a Holiday Inn conference center a few blocks from each other. That and the restaurants and funky shops make for nice strolling, but going back and forth to get from one author event to another at these places turned into a real workout. From about 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. each day I ran, literally, to get to author appearances.

The kickoff event, advertised as a "parade" led by the Cat in the Hat, consisted of a few costumed volunteers followed by a horde of kids down a city street to a small park. There, the mayor of Decatur and another volunteer read/enacted Green Eggs and Ham in an open-air tent too small to hold the overflow crowd. (pictured at right) No one complained, though -- either because it was free or because the reading was pretty lively.

The biggest problem (besides distance between venues) seemed to be too small spaces for the most popular authors. Michael Connelly (The Lincoln Lawyer) gave a talk in a courtroom that held less than 150 people, I think, nowhere near the number who were turned away (though they gave patient fans who couldn't get in the first chance to get books signed when he finished talking). Pulitzer winner Edward P. Jones (The Known World) was put in an auditorium in the Holiday Inn conference center that held at most 110 seats (I counted). Fans filled the aisles and every open space for his talk. They sat quietly enthralled as he read a couple of stories from his latest collection All Aunt Hagar's Children. Unlike some authors, he adopts the voices of his characters with an actor's ability, and he had the audience laughing at words which on the page seemed more serious. He and other writers deserved a larger audience; maybe next year the organizers will get nearby Agnes Scott College to provide some larger auditoriums.

The Georgia Antiquarian Booksellers held their annual fair in conjunction with the festival. One dealer had a first edition of To Kill A Mockingbird by Harper Lee on sale for $12,000, another had a first edition of Live & Let Die by Ian Fleming for $750. There were a lot of cheaper works, but even if you weren't into first editions, it was fun to walk through and marvel at the beautiful bindings and old children's books (I saw a bunch I wish I still had).

Maybe the festival owes its success to the lack of big book festivals around here, or the higher level of education of the Decatur population (over 60% have college degrees); maybe the summer's high gas prices made folks more frugal and disinclined to travel (the festival was free); maybe no one wanted to deal with traffic and so stayed close to home. The audiences skewed mostly to families and retired folks -- I saw very few late teens/20-somethings, despite the nearby liberal arts college. Does the lack of MTV/GenX/Y readers bode ill for the future of books? Should publishers only aim at the very young or the very anchored?

Whatever, I'm just glad that Atlanta finally has a big general interest book festival in a friendly location. It's near a MARTA station, the city's bus/rail transit system. There's a lot of parking if you drive yourself. You can picnic under trees by the courthouse and listen to musicians perform at a gazebo (rocking blues, even!), and Sunday night they had fireworks. There's restaurants and cafes nearby, and Eddie's Attic, a longtime acoustic music club where Wesley Stace (Misfortune) and others performed. One of the cafes, the Red Brick Pub, has over 200 kinds of beer including local brews like Athens' own Terrapin Rye Pale Ale (which we here in Athens are fond and proud of). Plus Jake's Ice Cream was serving their seasonal honey-fig ice cream. I'll go again next year.

- C. Max Magee @ 11:10 AM ~ comments: 0 ~ Links to this post

 

DFW on Federer by Emre Peker

Yesterday my friend Yakut emailed me the article "Federer as Religious Experience" by David Foster Wallace, which appeared in the New York Times' Play Magazine on August 20, 2006 (available here). Wallace penned an immaculate piece on Roger Federer, who also happens to be my favorite tennis player these days. As per his custom, Wallace resorts to 17 footnotes, provides detailed accounts of what he terms "Federer Moments" from the Nadal v. Federer Wimbledon Final of 2006, comments - in a tongue-in-cheek fashion, of course - on the Wimbledon Lawn Tennis Museum and the tournament's rules. It is a great ode to Federer, and contains a healthy rebuke of Nadal - who happens to be my least favorite pro these days. If you're a tennis - and DFW - fan, enjoyed his essays in Consider the Lobster, and do not have the guts to restart Infinite Jest just yet, but would like to continue reading some brilliant prose, you should definitely check it out.

- C. Max Magee @ 11:03 AM ~ comments: 2 ~ Links to this post

 

9/11 Book Controversy Up North

Canadian writer David Bernans is embroiled in controversy after being barred from reading his novel, North of 9/11, a fictional account of the reaction to 9/11 in Canada. He had planned to do a reading on the campus of Concordia University in Montreal, but "after filling out an online application to hold a public reading on campus, Bernans received an e-mail on July 25 stating his request had been declined by Concordia's 'risk management team,'" according to news reports.

A description of the book:

North of 9/11 is the story of Concordia student, Sarah Murphy, a political activist determined to stem the tide of war mania emanating from the United States, and racist hysteria affecting her friends Hassan and Hakim. Sarah overhears a conversation between her father, and the executive of a Montreal-based aerospace manufacturer involved in production for the Pentagon.

Sarah and her friends plan a non-violent direct action to draw attention to Canada's participation in US war efforts. Activists are questioned by the RCMP, phones are tapped, movements are shadowed. The RCMP closes in on the presumed sleeper cell while bombs fall on Afghanistan.

Update: The Guardian picks up the story, says the University is calling this a mix up due to human error. Bernans isn't buying it.

- C. Max Magee @ 8:10 AM ~ comments: 1 ~ Links to this post

 

Karen Russell Debuts

Remember Karen Russell whose story "Haunting Olivia" appeared in the 2005 Debut Fiction issue of the New Yorker when she was 23? Her first collection of stories, St. Lucy's Home for Girls Raised by Wolves is now out. NPR has another of her stories on its Web site, "Ava Wrestles the Alligator."

- C. Max Magee @ 7:57 AM ~ comments: 0 ~ Links to this post

 

New Mutis

It's been a while since I've mentioned Alvaro Mutis here. His book, The Adventures and Misadventures of Maqroll, is one of my all-time favorites. Unfortunately, though Mutis deserves to be counted among the greats of Latin American literature, aside from Maqroll, not much of his work is available in English, which is why I was excited to see that he's written the forward to a new book that sounds interesting in its own right. The Adventures of a Cello follows the path of a cello known as the Piatti that was made by Antonio Stradivari in 1720. According to the book description:

Over the next three centuries of its life, the Piatti cello left its birthplace of Cremona, Italy, and resided in Spain, Ireland, England, Italy, Germany, and the United States. The Piatti filled sacred spaces, such as the Santa Cueva de Cadiz, with its incomparable voice. It also spent time in more profane places, including New York City bars, where it served as a guarantee for unpaid liquor tabs. The Piatti narrowly escaped Nazi Germany in 1935 and was once even left lying in the street all night.

Since 1978, the Piatti has been owned by Carlos Prieto, the author of this book and friend of Alvaro Mutis.

- C. Max Magee @ 7:43 AM ~ comments: 0 ~ Links to this post

 

Amazon Blogging

Amazon has blog, and they've been at it since May. Why did it take me so long to find it? The Amazon bloggers don't seem to link to any of the many book blogs out there very often, and that, typically, is how bloggers discover one another.

- C. Max Magee @ 7:33 AM ~ comments: 0 ~ Links to this post

 

New Data on Google Books

Various book blogs have been pointing to the vnunet.com story, which says that Google Book Search is causing people to buy books. The story points to data from Hitwise, a research firm, which shows that 15.93% of Google Book Search UK users click through to book store sites from Google's site, with Amazon UK being the most popular destination. The article, and a Hitwise blog post, imply that this data means that Google Books is, despite the fears of publishers to the contrary, helping to sell books. Of course we can't really know if that's true. What seems more likely is that people researching particular books will do so at Google Books and they will click through to the book store sites as they try to seek out more information - user reviews, for example - on the books that interest them. Occasionally, of course they may buy some books this way.

But the point, as I see it, isn't that people are using Google Book Search to buy books, it's that they're using it like a library - after all, only 15.93% of users click through to book stores, and some small fraction of those go on to buy books. The additional data collected by Hitwise for the study seems to bear this out. Hitwise is capable of dividing users into dozens of thinly sliced demographic groups. Of all those groups, here are the three biggest users of Google Books UK, according to Hitwise:

• Low Income Elderly: Elderly people living in low rise council housing, often on low incomes.
• University Challenge: Undergraduate students living in halls of residence or close to universities.
• Sepia Memories. Very elderly people of independent means who have moved to modest apartments suitable for their needs.

Bearing in mind that the Hitwise data should be taken with a grain of salt, these groups are probably among the most heavy users of brick and mortar libraries. And while college students certainly fit the profile of pirated media swappers, the other two demographic groups do not. To me, this data confirms that in the minds of the casual user, Google Book Search is a research tool, an online variety of the library - not meant to replace libraries, mind you, but meant to fill in the gaps libraries' current online offering, namely full text search - a fact that explains Google's cozy relationship with a number of library systems, as opposed to its acrimonious relationship with a number of publishers.

- C. Max Magee @ 8:55 AM ~ comments: 0 ~ Links to this post

 

The Corey Vilhauer Book of the Month Club: September 2006

Sometimes I find that I need to slow things down. After reading four or five books a month, it becomes necessary to pick one book and settle down - to nestle in and enjoy every painstakingly created word. This month, I finally did it.

I found great pleasure in discovering John Steinbeck five years after going to college. I read Of Mice and Men while in high school, and breezed through The Pearl in college, but never gave him a second thought until reading East of Eden last year.

I was hooked.

Instead of doing the compulsive book-reader thing and devouring every Steinbeck book at once, I've decided to stretch them out. Steinbeck's not writing any more books, and I'd hate to not have one to look forward to, even if it's a shorter novella or play.

With that in mind, I felt it was time to dive into his Pulitzer Prize winning novel - The Grapes of Wrath - and experience the horrible, yet satisfyingly moralistic life of the Joad family.

Think about it: what happens when you lose everything? When your livelihood dries up and your home is taken away. When you're forced onto the road after selling nearly everything. What happens when you drive off in search of a better place and it proves not to be the Babylon you'd dreamed of but a living hell?

To most of us, the Great Depression and Dust Bowl eras are historic concepts, no longer conceivable in today's world, destined to live in the past and remembered only by those who lived through it. However, nearly 70 years after it was published, The Grapes of Wrath continues to outline the life and death struggle to survive without food, money, or prospect.

The Joads are a typical Dust Bowl group: a farm family whose land dried up, cashed out, and was taken away. They're forced to begin a journey to California, admittedly with the greatest of intents. Jobs are rumored to be plentiful, and even the eldest members are excited to bask in endless fields of grapes and peaches. With very little money and an unreliable truck, the family heads west on Route 66 in search of their new life.

What they find is anything but plentiful. An entire population of displaced farm families - "Okies," as they were slanderously called - had arrived in California to find very few jobs. Because of this, wages were lowered; child labor encouraged, and even those who had constant work were hard pressed to keep their families fed. Children starved, men and women collapsed, exhausted, and what little belongings that still existed were moved weekly, sometimes daily.

Steinbeck constructs an unassuming, yet vicious landscape throughout the book. The imagery is stark. Hope is fleeting as the Joad family slowly makes its way down Route 66. They felt the cold calculation of the banks that took away their home. Then they experienced the restless journey towards something they couldn't quite grasp. Eventually, they discovered that they could be powerful - if they organized, they could beat this rap. If a man's children are crying for food, starving and dying, you'd be surprised the amount of fight it can bring up.

The Grapes of Wrath isn't a dusty, boring tome. It's not a chore. It's amazingly gripping and startlingly vivid. At times it's hopeful. Other times, terrifyingly melancholy. If you see a little of yourself in the Joad family, you're liable to understand their plight, to feel their pain - to quietly champion their cause until, by the end, you're fighting for a rally and hoping things turn out.

Steinbeck champions the "down on his luck" traveler better than anyone. He brings the fight not just to the family, but to everyone around them. Brief chapter-long interludes paint a frame around the Joad family's odyssey, bringing perspective to their suffering. Steinbeck argues that bad luck shouldn't cause an entire region to end up poor, homeless, and without prospect. And it shouldn't cause hardship for the small farmers that have to try to survive in a world of declining costs and dwindling returns.

There are stark parallels between the westward migration of Midwesterners during the Depression and a more recent disaster - Hurricane Katrina and its aftermath. Look at what happened last summer - at the destruction that Mother Nature brought down upon the people of New Orleans - and consider what happened to residents who were too poor to pick themselves back up. Think about the people who were forced to move on from their homes in order to fight for the same job as their displaced neighbors.

Ultimately, we can all learn a lot from Steinbeck's prose. In The Grapes of Wrath, we learn not to take anything for granted. We learn that beauty can be found in the simple - in a loaf of bread, or in a porcelain bathtub.

Most of all, we learn that many times it's the people with nothing that are willing to give the most. We learn that everyone is a member of the same human race - that everyone has a hand in everyone else's life - and that if you can't help a fellow destitute, then what good are you to yourself?

Frankly, that's a lesson we all could learn a thing or two about.

Corey Vilhauer - Black Marks on Wood Pulp
CVBoMC Jan, Feb, Mar,