After all of last week’s media attention–and ethical questions–over Canongate’s publication of their Julian Assange book against the author’s wishes, driven by the publisher’s admitted “financial imperative,” the serial fees from the Independent may turn out to be among the title’s leading sources of income. After its first three days on-sale, BookScan UK reports the book has sold just 644 copies, making it the 50th bestselling hardcover and the 537th bestselling book overall for that week. At Amazon UK the printed book (ranked 681) and the Kindle edition (ranked 1,176) continue to slide. That reception may also influence international publishers […]
New Releases/Forthcoming
Assange Says Canongate Is “Profiteering” from “Unfinished Draft”
Julian Assange issued a lengthy statement via WikiLeaks last night, saying that Canongate’s publication Thursday of the early draft of his book over his objections is “old-fashioned opportunism and duplicity — screwing people over to make a buck.” He says the house is “profiteering from an unfinished and erroneous draft.” Assange says the manuscript that became the basis of publication–which Canongate has acknowledged was a first draft–is rather “a narrative and literary interpretation of a conversation between the writer [Andrew O’Hagan] and me.” Assange says it was never submitted to the house at all; instead, he says O’Hagan’s researcher provided […]
Canongate Will Publish Assange Memoir Against His Wishes, While Knopf Cancels
The man who made countless national secrets transparent without permission now faces a bit of turnabout, as Wikileaks founder Julian Assange’s memoir is set to be published tomorrow, over the author’s apparent objection. Canongate will release the book in the UK, but will present it as “an unauthorized biography” since by their own account the author wanted to cancel the contract. Canongate says Assange “had already signed his advance over to his lawyers to settle his legal bills” and did not pay them back, so the house “decided to honour that contract and to publish. Once the advance has been […]
The Posthumous Files: James Cain, Reynolds Price, and Gerald Schoenfeld
In the ample flow of deal news, this week’s reports include a trio of posthumous publications: Hard Case Crime will publish James M. Cain‘s THE COCKTAIL WAITRESS, a previously unpublished manuscript that he was still working on upon his death in 1977. Founder and editor Charles Ardai told the NYT he was tipped off to the manuscript’s existence by Max Allan Collins, but it took him five years to obtain a copy and several years more to convince Cain’s estate to let him publish the book, which will appear as a hardcover in fall 2012. NYT Scribner will publish a […]
Madoff Book Acknowledged, Palin Publicity Continues
Little, Brown’s poorly-veiled Madoff book, sold to the trade in July as Untitled by Anonymous, has had its pub date moved up two weeks, to October 31. The publisher now acknowledges what was reported in July–the book, TRUTH AND CONSEQUENCES: Life Inside the Madoff Family, is by Laurie Sandell, and promises “extensive, exclusive interviews” with Andrew Madoff, his fiancee Catherine Hooper, Ruth Madoff and others. A 60 Minutes segment will air October 30. In other forthcoming books, the NYT follows short, lurid leaks from Joe McGinniss’s THE ROGUE with a pre-publication review–which actually gives you a sense of why the […]
The Promotional Files: Doonesbury Features Short McGinnis Book Quotes
Doonesbury offers a new twist in books excerpts–and controversy–this week. The comic strip is featuring short quotes from Joe McGinniss’s forthcoming book on Sarah Palin, THE ROGUE (with a 9/20 publication date). A chief of staff says “Sarah just isn’t comfortable in the presence of dark-skinned people,” and the head of her security detail as governor says, “You know what she was? A housewife who happened to be governor.” Andrew Sullivan says at The Beast that “McGinniss sent advance copies of his devastating book on Sarah Palin to three people: me, Garry Trudeau and Rosanne Cash. Make of that what […]