The latest group of MacArthur Fellows include Nigerian-born novelist Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, author most recently of the splendid Half of a Yellow Sun, and music critic and author of The Rest is Noise Alex Ross. Adichie tells the Washington Post, “I really appreciate the recognition.” She adds, “I can write and get well paid for it for the next five years, which is the best possible position for a writer to be in.” Post
Awards
Another Fall Preview
The Seattle Times highlights “40 upcoming books looks from mid-September forward” though “like a bird-parent pushing the strongest fledglings out of the nest first, many of this fall’s books have already been released — and reviewed by The Seattle Times.” The editors write: “There’s a tradition in publishing that says the reading public gets distracted during an election season — best to stay away from ‘major’ book releases. Like so much else, this crumb of conventional wisdom has been swept under the rug.” Their Perfect Timing award goes to Michael Lewis for his December 1 release, PANIC: the Story of […]
Business Book Award Shortlist
The nominees for the FT/Goldman Sachs business book of the year award. The winner will be named October 14: A Splendid Exchange: How Trade Shaped the World William J. Bernstein (Atlantic Monthly Press) Cold Steel: The Multi-billion-dollar Battle for a Global IndustryTim Bouquet & Byron Ousey (Little Brown Book Group UK) When Markets Collide: Investment Strategies for the Age of Global Economic ChangeMohamed El-Erian (McGraw-Hill) McMafia: A Journey Through the Global Criminal UnderworldMisha Glenny (Knopf) Remix: Making Art and Commerce Thrive in the Hybrid EconomyLawrence Lessig (The Penguin Press) The Snowball: Warren Buffett and the Business of LifeAlice Schroeder (Bantam)
German Book Prize Nominees, and Australian Winners
The 25,000-euro prize for Germany’s best novel will be given October 13, right before the Frankfurt Book Fair. The contenders are: Dietmar Dath: Die Abschaffung der Arten (Suhrkamp, September 2008)Sherko Fatah: Das dunkle Schiff (Jung und Jung, February 2008)Iris Hanika: Treffen sich zwei (Droschl, January 2008)Rolf Lappert: Nach Hause schwimmen (Hanser, February 2008)Ingo Schulze: Adam und Evelyn (Berlin Verlag, August 2008)Uwe Tellkamp: Der Turm (Suhrkamp, September 2008) Schulze appears to be the only author who has been published previously in English (with works including Simple Stories and 33 Moments of Happiness: St. Petersburg Stories and New Lives, set for release […]
Oprah's Telle?; BN's Pick
There’s good circumstantial reason to believe the online speculation covered on Galleycat and elsewhere that David Wroblewski’s The Story of Edgar Sawtelle is a prime candidate as the selection for Oprah’s Book Club to be announced this Friday. Based on the scant metadata displayed by online booksellers, we know that it’s a recently published HarperCollins book available only in hardcover at $25.95 and in a Harper Luxe large-print edition. The best giveaway comes from Amazon’s Canadian site, where they also indicate the page count of 576, the same as Sawtelle. Amazon.ca lists the publisher as “unknown” to try and avoid […]
Oprah Book Club #62
Penguin’s had a long ride with Eckhart Tolle; now Oprah is finally ready to select another title for her Book Club, to be announced on September 19. The lucky publisher is HarperCollins, and for now, contrary to recent custom, both Amazon and BN.com are showing the new selection as a $25.95 hardcover. One other potentially meaningless clue: the collaborative filtering on Amazon tells me that customers who bought items like this also bought….almost all thrillers (Kathy Reichs; Jeffery Deaver; Tess Gerritsen; Nelson Demille; Robert Crais; James Patterson, etc…–plus an add assortment of Little Golden Books.)Amazon page