John Freeman–the No. 1 “top reviewer” tracked at the Publishers Marketplace Book Review Index (with 576 reviews noted since October 2002 (yes that’s about 125 books a year, with 65 percent positive reviews, and just 7 percent pans)–is taking a staff job. As of January he will join Granta Magazine as their American editor, reporting to Alex Clark. “Working closely with Granta’s headquarters in London, he will develop an ambitious program of author events and provide a vital connection between the magazine, US-based writers and Granta’s North American and Canadian readership.”
The Best of The Best Of
In our second not-necessarily-annual compilation, we’ve put together best books of 2008 lists from the Amazon.com (their top 25), the Boston Globe, the Christian Science Monitor, Los Angeles Times, New York Magazine, the New York Times, the National Book Awards finalists, PW, Salon, Time magazine, the Washington Post, plus lists from critics Michiko Kakutani and Janet Maslin to determine the consensus picks from among all the lists. Of course we could have told you the winner this summer, when critics across the land made it clear they were prepared to love Robert Bolano’s 2666–whether or not the public was eager […]
More Top Tens, from Time
Time magazine’s top fiction, nonfiction, and children’s books: 1. 2666, by Roberto Bolano2. Lush Life, by Richard Price3. American Wife, by Curtis Sittenfeld4. Anathem, by Neal Stephenson5. Unaccustomed Earth, by Jhumpa Lahiri6. Personal Days, by Ed Park7. The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society, by Mary Ann Shaffer and Annie Barrows8. When Will There Be Good News?, by Kate Atkinson9. The Graveyard Book, by Neil Gaiman and Dave McKean10. The Widows of Eastwick, by John Updike Fiction 1. The Forever War, by Dexter Filkins2. The Thief at the End of the World, by Joe Jackson3. The Snowball, by Alice Schroeder4. […]
Lunch Weekly for Monday, December 8
Deal Reports Just e-mail to deals@PublishersMarketplace if you aren’t using the online form linked below. Report a deal using the online form The Key As usual, the handy key to our Lunch deal categories. While all reports are always welcome, those that include a category will generally receive a higher listing when it comes time to put them all together. “nice deal” $1 – $49,000 “very nice deal” $50,000 – $99,000 “good deal” $100,000 – $250,000 “significant deal” $251,000 – $499,000 “major deal” $500,000 and up FICTION Debut Paul Elwork’s THE TEA HOUSE, inspired by the true story of […]
Random House: Free iPhone Book Promotion
Random House and Ballantine are offering free books to read on the iPhone via Lexcycle’s fast-growing Stanza reader. (The app has been downloaded approximately 500,000 times.) The works come from the backlist of popular authors such as Alan Furst, Julie Garwood, Charlie Huston, David Liss, Laurie Notaro, Arthur Phillips and Simon Rich, and include promotional excerpts for new hardcovers scheduled for 2009. The company says it is also “providing links to retailers like Amazon, Barnes and Noble.com, Borders.com, Powells.com and IndieBound.org to encourage readers to purchase more books by these authors.”
Penguin 2.0: Groundbreakingly Revolutionary, If They Say So Themselves
Penguin has pulled together a few electronic initiatives under the umbrella of a Penguin 2.0 mini-site, which does sport a fun logo (the zero is depicted by a Penguin, naturally). It gathers up the eSpecials program begun earlier this year, a promotional iPhone app launched recently, and a new program with SharedBook to offer Penguin classics with customized dedication pages (for now, the first and only offering is a paperback of The Christmas Carol–personalized for $17, versus $9 for the regular edition). Most intriguing is a forthcoming feature for next year, Penguin Custom, in which “you will have the ability […]