File it under smart people who do dumb things. Instead of ignoring, or laughing off, the book ON HER MAJESTY’S SERVICE by Ron Evans, who guarded Rushdie when he was in hiding, the knighted author is threatening to sue–which doesn’t really invalidate the book’s assertions. Rushdie tells the Guardian, “He is portraying me as mean, nasty, tight-fisted, arrogant and extremely unpleasant. In my humble opinion I am none of those things.” He gives them paragraphs of quotes and denials, culminating in this: “This is not a free speech issue, this is libel – there is a difference between those two […]
Archives for August 2008
Pease's Eye for Talent
The Boston Globe focuses on editor Roland Pease’s consistently sharp judgment in discovering great fiction writers. He edited the US version of Rawi Hage’s DENIRO’S GAME, before Hage won this year’s IMPAC Dublin Literary Award. For 15 years at his own company Zoland Books, and now as an editor for Steerforth Press (which bought Zoland), Pease was the first publisher of Ha Jin; Peter Behrens’ Governor General’s Award-winner THE LAW OF DREAMS; AND MORE. “Four of his past five titles, including Castle Freeman’s Go With Me, were named to Barnes & Noble’s Discover Great New Writers series, said Chip Fleischer, […]
LA's Acres of Books to Go Fallow
The LAT reports on Long Beach-based store Acres of Books: “After 74 years in business, the independent bookstore giant with an inventory that topped 1 million volumes is closing down to make way for a redevelopment project.” Owners Jackie and Phil Smith sold their building to the city three months ago for $2.8 million.LAT
Italian Publisher Overspends to Bring Bestseller to US
The IHT reports on Italian publisher Baldini Castoldi Dalai’s efforts to put out an English translation of Giorgio Faletti’s 2002 book I KILL, “an Italian thriller about a serial killer on a murder spree in Monaco [that] has been translated into two dozen languages and sold five million copies worldwide.” The IHT adds, “For Italian novels, even best sellers at home, the situation is particularly difficult. A few, like Umberto Eco’s Name of the Rose, have managed to break through. But Susanna Tamaro’s Follow Your Heart, the biggest selling Italian postwar novel, with more than 14 million copies sold, according to its […]
Alloy's Books Fuel Movies and TV
Out of hiding again with their undetermined role in the Kavya Viswanthan incident ancient history, Alloy Entertainment is the focus of an LAT profile for the growing profile of screen adaptations of their teen books. “This fall, television network the CW will air a second season of Gossip Girl and launch Privileged, while ABC Family will air the three-day miniseries Samurai Girl early next month. All three shows are based on Alloy books.” Plus there’s the second Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants movie and another film, Sex Drive, set for October, long with The Clique, a made-for-DVD movie. “When it […]
Bear Stearns Book Due Next Month
Brick Tower Press has generated finance world media for their just-announced BEAR TRAP, written by an anonymous senior director at Bear Stearns and marketer Andrew Spencer at Creative Management Group. The book is due September 22 and they say the author will reveal his identity at the time. It’s promoted as “describ[ing] what happened within Bear’s walls and on the trading floor that resulted in the most sensational financial crisis of our times. He recounts in detail the chain of events that led to the downward spiral-from both Bear’s point-of-view and from the overall world financial marketplace’s.” But Fox News’s […]