Wednesday’s lunchtime talk between Patti Smith and Neil Young on the occasion of his upcoming book WAGING HEAVY PEACE — which he characterized as “not quite a memoir. It’s more like a diary and a projection” — was understandably a major event at BEA. As part of the wide-ranging conversation about Young’s career, how technology affected music, and the nature of memory, Smith told Young “I have read much of your book,” she said, “and one of the things I liked most about it is that there’s no barrier between the reader and you. It’s intimate. You’re talking. And it’s […]
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People, Etc.
Natasha Trethewey has been named the newest Poet Laureate by the US Library of Congress. NYT Philip Roth has won Spain’s Asturias Prize, given to an author “whose literary work represents a significant contribution to universal literature.” The Overlook Press will publish The Russian Library, an “ambitious one hundred and twenty five volume series of translated Russian fiction, drama, and poetry”, over the next ten years, the publisher announced Wednesday at BEA. Overlook is working with (and is sponsored by) Read Russia on the project, which will feature classic and contemporary Russian works and launch in Fall 2013 with five […]
People: Ray Bradbury, 91, Dies
Science fiction giant Ray Bradbury, 91, died Tuesday night in Los Angeles after a long illness, his grandson Danny Karapetian and biographer Sam Weller confirmed to i09. Bradbury, author of more than 600 short stories, and 30 novels including classic works such as THE MARTIAN CHRONICLES and FAHRENHEIT 451, had only this year made those two books and other novels available in digital editions, published by Simon & Schuster. “If I had to make any statement, it would be how much I love and miss him, and I look forward to hearing everyone’s memories about him,” Karapetian said. “He influenced […]
BEA Kicks Off with Colbert, Diaz, Kingsolver and Nesbo
Book Expo America kicked off Tuesday morning’s author breakfast with attendees lined up early to enter and offered the classic mix of humor, appreciation and creative inspiration. In a new twist, BEA is live streaming the marquee convention events, and the stream actually worked. (We have the player on the PublishersMarketplace.com home page, and you can find it on many other trade sites, as well as BEA’s own site.) Emcee Stephen Colbert was in classic form, setting the stage for “three of the world’s best authors of books other than mine.” Of his own forthcoming book AMERICA AGAIN: Re-Becoming the […]
Oprah Revives Book Club “2.0” With Cheryl Strayed Memoir WILD
Late Friday afternoon Oprah announced via a video message obtained by the NYT that after a two-year hiatus — corresponding to when she left broadcast television and started her own network, OWN — she would bring back her book club, now called Oprah’s Book Club 2.0. The first selection in the revived club, which will feature “several selections” through the end of 2012, is Cheryl Strayed’s memoir WILD. “I love this book,” Winfrey wrote in the July issue of O, The Oprah Magazine. “I want to shout it from the mountaintop. I want to shout it from the Web. In […]
People, Etc.
Bertelsmann has appointed Marcel Reichart to the newly-created position of evp, digital business development and partnerships, reporting to Thomas Hesse, effective October 1. Reichart is currently managing director of DLD & Ventures at Hubert Burda Media. Danielle Lynn has joined Rodale Books as publicity manager. She was most recently a senior publicist at Simon & Schuster. Kirsten Hall has been promoted to managing agent at Bright Group International, the company’s first full-time agent based in the US. Effective immediately, PGW will handle print and digital distribution for Entangled Publishing, Cameron + Company (as well as its Roundtree Books imprint) and Yosemite […]