Nicholas Sparks’s new novel, for publication in fall 2009, is being written simultaneously with the author’s own adaptation of that story as a starring vehicle for Hannah Montana star Miley Cyrus (Offspring Entertainment is producing, for Walt Disney Pictures). Sparks had pitched “a premise for a novel that intrigued Cyrus, her family and the producers,” Variety says, though no details are being shared. Sparks says, “This is similar to the way it’s gone with movies based on my novels; it’s just out of order. Certain opportunities garner your interest, and this was one of those.”Variety
New Releases/Forthcoming
Some Actual News from the Gelman Book
An LA Times blog takes an amusing approach to Barton Gellman’s book on Vice President Cheney, noting that the Washington Post has been “shamelessly flakking excerpts from the book on page one of its newspaper. But some portions are still embargoed.” They go on to reproduce an anecdote in the book in which Cheney has turned down President Bush on a request to go spearhead relief efforts in New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina: “I asked Dick if he’d be interested in spearheading this,” Bush announced. “Let’s just say I didn’t get the most positive response.” Bush nodded ironically toward the […]
Cheney Book Looks at Conflict Over Spying
The Washington Post is running excerpts from Barton Gellman’s THE ANGLER: The Cheney Vice Presidency, which publishes on Tuesday. The book’s take on domestic surveillance conducted post 9/11: “Cheney and his counsel would struggle for months to quash the legal insurgency. By the time President Bush became aware of it, his No. 2 had stoked dissent into flat-out rebellion. The president would face a dilemma, and the presidency itself a historic test. Cheney would come close to leading them off a cliff, man and office both.” Washington PostSecond excerpt
Ambitious New Alexander McCall Smith Serial
The Telegraph will serialize a new Alexander McCall Smith novel, Corduroy Mansions, beginning on Monday and running in installments (a new one every weekday) over the next 20 weeks. The idea came from the Telegraph’s comment and community editor Iain Martin, who serialized a novel by the author when he worked at the Scotsman. Martin says, “He wanted to see if he could take it one step further –I think we have gone several steps.” The Telegraph has built a large website around the serial, which will elicit reader comments, questions and suggestions that McCall Smith will address online, and […]
Spears Book Is the Embargo to Break
You didn’t see it on most of the fall preview round-ups, but the press has ample space for anything Spears and the AP has gotten a copy of Lynne Spears’ book THROUGH THE STORM well in advance of the September 16 laydown: Spears presents herself as a loving, selfless (she gave up her job as a school teacher for her daughter’s sake) but increasingly powerless parent. After the jolting, but pleasant surprise of Britney Spears’ debut smash, … Baby One More Time, Lynne Spears says she felt she was losing control when a 1999 Rolling Stone magazine story featured a […]
First Lady Bios, First on Kindle
Globe Pequot is releasing biographies of the two potential First Ladies Cindy McCain and Michelle Obama as Amazon Kindle exclusives in advance of the print releases. Elizabeth Lightfoot‘s Michelle Obama: Grace and Intelligence in a Time of Change is available electronically today, with an announced print release date of November 26. Alicia Colon’s Cindy McCain: Elegance, Good Will and Hope for a New America will be available on Kindle on September 15, but “will only go to print if John McCain wins the election.” Amazon release