Sorry to remind those who are avoiding the inevitable, but the school year is upon us.

While I don't particularly miss the term papers, the presentations or gym class, I have to admit I always enjoyed choosing, and doodling all over, my book covers. It was especially fun when I started with a plain brown paper bag and turned my math book into what looked like a fire-breathing monster.

 What? That's normal.

 Anyway, a company in New York has made such doodling an art form. And Book City Jackets does one better: They'll provide covers to fit just about any book you've got.

So what if you hate the book jacket of some of your favorite books? Just cover them up with a few of these pretty designs -- including one labeling them simply as "favorite" -- and your problem is solved. Even better, you can add your own designs, enhancing (or in my case ruining) the beauty.

Of course, you can always just steal this idea and make your own at the kitchen table, as I did years ago. But mine never turned out this nice...

Posted by Nancy Knight at 8:14 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)
        

See where a love of reading can get you? Jenna Hager, a rookie reading instructor with the city schools, has been hired by the Today show as a reporter. The Federal Hill resident will contribute stories about once a month on topics such as education.

Isn't it great that a prominent TV show would reach out to an altruistic young woman working to help kids read?

Oh, wait, someone just told me that Ms. Hager also is known as Jenna Bush, a former First Daughter.

So NBC was more interested in ratings than getting kids to read -- and turn off their TV sets? I'm aghast.

AP photo

Posted by Dave Rosenthal at 11:36 AM | Permalink | Comments (7)
        

Talk about strange bedfellows. The Walt Disney Co. announced today that it will spend $4 billion to buy Marvel Entertainment -- and the more than 5,000 Marvel characters, including Spider-Man, Hulk, X-Men, Captain America and Fantastic Four.

Disney boss Bob Iger told CNBC that the acquisition was a way to attract more boys. Iger said Disney would not rebrand the Marvel characters as Disney ones, but would find opportunities to mine Marvel characters that are not well known.

Great news. Finally, a chance to see Post-It Note Man, a Spidey wanna-be who is held back from stardom because of inferior adhering powers. Or Octo-Mom, a single parent raising eight kids, working two jobs and stopping alien invaders in her spare time. Or RealFake, who exists in the shadowy netherworld between reality TV shows and real life.

Maybe we'll also see some new X-Men: Scrooge X-McDuck, who can make the historic figures on money come alive. Or X-Sneezy, a dwarf who can make villains dissolve into fits of sneezing (a good commercial tie in with tissue-makers).

Posted by Dave Rosenthal at 10:40 AM | Permalink | Comments (8)
        

The "Ask Amy" column in The Baltimore Sun occasionally dips into bookish topics, and today she fielded a question from Mary about book club relationships and etiquette. "In my book group, we try to keep our discussions focused by following the reading group guides or questions provided by the publisher. Nevertheless, one of our members never fails to monopolize the discussion, and her comments are mostly off the mark or anecdotal." She wants to get the club back on track, warning that one club member plans a public confrontation at the next meeting.

Amy, as you might expect, is less strident. Her advice: "The person who leads the next group meeting should start by asking members to state their objectives, and the group should decide on very basic ground rules. Each meeting should be moderated by one person, who can direct the conversation away from anecdotes and toward the book. If this one member can't adjust to the style of the group, then she should be encouraged (privately) to find another group."

My book club has never had to confront this challenge -- mainly because it's more of a social gathering where the ratio of eating and drinking to book discussion is about 10:1. But more studious clubs face problems like Mary's, compounded by the web of personal relationships. I know several people who have dropped out of book clubs because of a mismatch between their own outlook and the club's goals. Any other advice for Mary?

Posted by Dave Rosenthal at 10:05 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)
        

Edward Kennedy was buried Saturday, but his impact will surely linger in the words contained in his memoir, "True Compass." The book, which will be released Sept. 14, already has become Amazon's best-selling biography. "Last Lion: The Fall and Rise of Ted Kennedy" by Peter S. Canellos was also in the Top 10 in that category.

Jonathan Karp, editor-in-chief of Twelve, which is publishing the book, said in an open letter that "Kennedy has been keeping a personal journal through nearly 50 years of his public life, beginning with John F. Kennedy’s campaign for president in 1960. Five years ago, he began an oral history project at the Miller Center at the University of Virginia, where he began to address all aspects of his life – his family, his career in the Senate, and his view of the historic events of our time."

The hardback will list for $35, but Twelve plans to issue 1,000 copies of a leather-bound, electronically signed edition that will cost $1,000, according to the New York Times. Kennedy reportedly received an $8 million advance for the book, written with Ron Powers, an author of “Flags of Our Fathers” and other biographies.

Posted by Dave Rosenthal at 3:10 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)
        

David Letterman managed to take a swipe at one of his favorite targets (no spoiler here) amid the it's-late-summer-is-this-really-all-we-have-to-talk-about reaction to President Obama's Martha's Vineyard reading list. Or more simply, Hot-Flat-and-Crowded-gate.

Here's a clip, via Huffington Post.

(Warning, if you're a conservative and your blood pressure is already high from watching days of tributes to the late, liberal senator from Massachusetts, avoid this clip.)

AP photo

Posted by Dave Rosenthal at 12:30 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)
        

Happy Friday, everyone!

I'm preparing for my long-wished for vacation, and plan to read as much as possible for the 10 days I'll be work-free. So far, I've gotten a slew of Carl Hiassen novels, China Mieville's "The City & The City," and "How to Say Goodbye in Robot," by Marylander Natalie Standiford.

Standiford's latest novel isn't due out until October, but the YA author, who's also penned the Dating Game series, has tackled that treacherous topic -- friendship between the sexes, and in high school, to boot.

 As to this week's winner: Congratulations, Brian! You've won "You Were Always Mom's Favorite," by Deborah Tannen.

For next week, we've got "Graffiti World" Street Art from Five Continents," by Nicholas Ganz. The updated edition includes more than 2,000 color illustrations of amazing graffiti found all over the world. It's simply gorgeous.

And this is it, kids. I'm going to be gone for more than a week, and poor Dave has to hold down the fort. Not to worry, he has strict instructions to post next week's Freebie Friday on penalty of my incessant whining. I hope you have a great end-of-August!

Posted by Nancy Knight at 12:00 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)
        

I was just blindsided by an instant message from a well-meaning (and generally wonderful) co-worker.

Pleasant co-worker: did you hear about reading rainbow?
me: no, what?
PC: it got canceled
me: NOOOOO

And despite my unfailing professionalism in the work place (quiet, peanut gallery!), there may have been a whimper in there.

After 26 years, LeVar Burton's no longer going to dress up like a Medieval knight, introduce elementary schoolers to sushi or give kids their first 15 seconds of fame proclaiming their love of books. (I can't be the only one who used to practice talking about her new favorite book in a mirror, just in case Geordi called, right?)

Before Amazon's oh-so-handy list of suggestions (or the Internet, for that matter), Reading Rainbow was my best bet for finding that perfect book at the library. It inspired reading, it inspired curiousity about the world around me, and I really wanted a pet stardog. Oh, the memories.

Maybe I didn't have to take your word for it, Burton, but I did enjoy it, for many years. At least we still have Twitter -- but it won't quite be enough.

Posted by Nancy Knight at 10:30 AM | Permalink | Comments (6)
        

This week, Crayola honored children's book author Eric Carle by creating a new color: The Very Hungry Caterpillar Green. A nice gesture, though part of the beauty of Carle's work is that his caterpillar and other featured elements are collage-like, defying simple description.

Crayola has occasionally created other promotional colors. For example, a custom box of 64 was once given to Oprah with a new color: "the color purple.” (I would have given it to Crockett Johnson, author of Harold and the Purple Crayon, one of my favorite books for kids.)

Meanwhile, I'm still waiting for raw umber to make a comeback. It was scrapped by Crayola in 1990, along with maize, lemon yellow, violet blue, orange red, orange yellow, green blue, and blue gray (which should be the official color of the state of Maryland, given its North/South blend).

Posted by Dave Rosenthal at 6:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)
        

Greetings from the West County Area Library in Odenton! Dave and I will be here all day preparing for One Maryland One Book, a statewide reading program by the Maryland Humanities Council, which features James McBride's "Song Yet Sung" this year.

 This coming week, I will be cruising in the Bahamas, Tropical Storm Danny permitting. But fret not, there's plenty to do right here in Maryland.

 Terry Pratchett fans should head to Constellation Books tonight to discuss "Comic Money." As well as having plenty of snark, it could give some well-needed perspective on the worth of all that paper we carry around in our wallets.

 Saturday morning, you can discuss the latest hit in both theaters and bookstores, "Julie and Julia," at the Pratt Central Library. 

 And later that day, local author Jennifer Carle will be at Greetings & Readings to discuss and sign her two books. The first is her personal memoir, following her struggles with eating disorders and anxiety; the second book centers around a rescue dog that needs a second chance.

 Looking for more bookish fun? Check out the Read Street calendar for more ideas!

Posted by Nancy Knight at 12:30 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)
        

Dominick Dunne, who crafted a great second act as novelists and crime reporter, died today at age 83, according to his frequent publisher, Vanity Fair. Dunne's novels included "An Inconvenient Woman" and "The Two Mrs. Grenvilles," which were popular choices with book clubs. More recently, he became a fixture at high-profile, celebrity trials, including those of O.J. Simpson, Claus von Bulow and the Menendez brothers.
But writing was not his first profession. As The Los Angeles Times said in its obituary: "Covering the last Simpson trial capped an extraordinary career that had bloomed from tragedy. Dunne was a television and film producer for two decades until drugs and alcohol ruined him. He had started life over as a writer when his daughter, Dominique, was murdered in 1982.

Dunne wrote an article for Vanity Fair magazine that raged at the injustice of the crime and the leniency of the killer's punishment. The story propelled its author into a new career reporting from the intersection of celebrity, society and scandal."

Posted by Dave Rosenthal at 6:59 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)
        

Have you heard about what's happened to poor Emily Bronte? Her masterpiece, "Wuthering Heights," has been disguised as a Twilight book to trick tween readers into picking it up.

 Whatever happened to the good ole summer reading list? That's how I met Cathy and Heathcliff. But I guess marketers have decided they can't let a golden opportunity -- the FICTIONAL CHARACTER Bella Swan's endorsement of the book as her favorite -- go by without a tie in.

Now, I'm all for repackaging the classics so that they'll appeal to readers. But how about you do it like this?

Compare Ruben Toledo's gorgeous illustrations -- which include Cathy and Heathcliff looking morose on the moors -- with that flower thing, that has some sort of ribbon tied around it. What's that supposed to mean, anyway? It's worse than that iconic "Great Gatsby" cover with the drippy neon lights and creepy eyes staring out at you. And then the literal "Twilight" stamp of approval.

In short, ew.

Posted by Nancy Knight at 12:00 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)
        

A British publisher known for art-heavy (and just plain heavy) books has announced plans for an edition on wine -- with a price tag of more than $1 million.

"The Wine Opus," a hefty 850 pages and more than 55 inches square, will feature a list of the 100 best wineries in the world. And besides being a limited edition of 100, it will come with a nice sweetener: Purchasers will receive six bottles of wine from every winery listed.

"Whoever buys the books will instantly have an incredible wine collection. Some wineries we expect to be included have waiting lists of 16,000 people for some wines," Karl Fowler of Opus Media told the London Evening Standard. Publisher Kraken Opus is known for luxurious works whose weight approaches 100 pounds, and subjects include the Super Bowl, the Machester United soccer team and fashion designer Vivienne Westwood. It has also launched a book on Michael Jackson.

This is one book that won't be available for $9.99 on the Kindle. I think I'll wait until "The Wine Opus" hits the clearance bins -- I can probably steal it for $300,000.

Posted by Dave Rosenthal at 11:30 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)
        

Sad to hear about Edward Kennedy's death. For Baby Boomers, the Kennedy family held a special place, reflecting both the hope -- and tragedy -- of our youth. Recalling the 1960's, when two of his brothers were felled by assassins' bullets, the then-America seems an almost unbelievable place. Of course, young Teddy had his own demon: the Chappaquiddick incident that left a young woman dead. But he put together a remarkable political career as the only surviving brother.
There is a wealth of material on the Kennedys, and Edward's memoir, "True Compass," is scheduled for a September 14 release. Until then, you can read more about him in these books:
-- "Ted Kennedy: The Dream That Never Died" by Edward Klein
-- "Last Lion: The Fall and Rise of Ted Kennedy" by Peter S. Canellos
-- "The Kennedy Legacy: Jack, Bobby and Ted and a Family Dream Fulfilled" by Vincent Bzdek

Some other books written by Kennedy:
-- My Senator And Me: A Dog's Eye View of Washington, D.C. (2006)
-- America Back on Track (2007)
-- In Critical Condition: The Crisis in America's Health Care (1973)
-- Our Day Generation (1979)

Posted by Dave Rosenthal at 8:39 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)
        

The Daily Beast sees a dark side to President Obama's vacation reading list, noting that it may be inflated with books he has already read. Referring to a September 2008 news report in which Obama discussed Thomas L. Friedman's Hot, Flat, and Crowded, Samuel P. Jacobs wonders why the president brought the book to Martha's Vineyard. No word from the president, but Friedman told the Daily Beast in an email: “Given the pressure of a campaign, I doubt that the President got to read anything cover to cover. And for most of his presidency, the Great Recession has really swamped debate and discussion about climate and energy. So, I was very pleased to hear that he is diving into it again. ..."

Jacobs doesn't see anything sinister about the discrepancy; he just wonders how seriously we should take these presidential reading lists. But it shouldn't take long for Obama critics to jump on Hot-Flat-and-Crowded-gate. (Rolls off the tongue, doesn't it?)

Heavy readers, meanwhile, will probably feel for Obama. I know that the TBR pile on my nightstand includes books that have patiently waited months for my full attention. Other books I've read more than once, though they're probably not the ones I would bring on a vacation.

Posted by Dave Rosenthal at 11:28 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)
        

Author: James R. Ross

Synopsis: Ross explores the question of Jewishness, through groups of people in remote areas of Peru, Uganda and other countries. These groups, including some who claim a connection to the lost tribes of Israel, worship in non-traditional ways but seek acceptance among Jewish and Israeli authorities.

Review: With simple prose, Ross explores the question: What is a Jew? Visiting communities around the world, he chronicles the groups' struggles to get recognition from Israeli authorities, or to immigrate there. His writing is strongest when he questions the political and cultural underpinnings of that struggle. For example, are those who immigrate to Israel left to be "human shields" in dangerous settlements in the heavily near Palestinian West Bank? But he seems to pull his punches when asking whether a racial bias exists among Jewish leaders. And he hews too closely to the Orthodox viewpoint, ignoring the conflicting theories about Jewishness that might be supplied by Conservative or Reform movements.

Read it if you like: Jewish history and books such as "My Father's Paradise."

Avoid this if: You're looking for a deep, scholarly discussion of Jewishness.

Posted by Dave Rosenthal at 10:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)
Categories: Reviews
        

If you haven't had a chance to take the quiz yet, do it now. Because next up, we're going to find out which famous author you most drink like.

 If you hadn't figured it out yet (and Joie de Livre, you're a clever one) each letter represented a different writer who knew their way around an alcoholic beverage or two.

 If a majority of your responses were A, you're an Ernest Hemingway kind of drinker. While Hemingway knew his way around plenty of drinks -- and bars -- the world over, the celebrated author of "The Old Man and the Sea" most famously has his own Hemingway Daiquiri. While this rum concoction is not the actual recipe for Hemingway's daiquiri, an inexact one is provided. All I know is, I couldn't drink like Papa Hemingway. Good luck to you Hemingways, although with your hard-living ways, you probably don't need luck from a mortal like me.

Did you answer with a lot of Bs? Then you're the elegant Jane Austen. While there's no evidence Austen spent her days at the bottom of the bottle, it's clear through her writing that she was no innocent. And in "Sense and Sensibility," she makes it clear that the cure for a broken heart is a nice glass of wine -- Constantia wine, to be exact. You can get your own bottle of vin de Constance, a South African dessert wine, at your local wine shop. Add a bit of music and dancing, and Austen would most definitely approve.

Mostly Cs, and you're in luck! Oscar Wilde's favorite liquor, absinthe, was recently legalized in the U.S. "A glass of absinthe is as poetical as anything in the world," he once declared. I myself can't stand the licorice flavor, but if you can get past that, sit back, take in the world, and bring on the razor-sharp wit.

If you found yourself with a lot of Ds, you take after Baltimore's own H.L. Mencken. Mencken was a martini man, who once declared the cocktail "the only American invention as perfect as a sonnet." He wasn't the only writer with a penchant for the gin-soaked drink: E.B. White, Dorothy Parker and F. Scott Fitzgerald were all big fans. Parker's poem to the martini is one of my favorites.

Finally, if you're wondering about Mr. E, it is indeed Edgar Allan Poe. In celebration of Poe's 200th birthday, the University of Virginia has displayed Poe's written apology to his publishers, blaming the mint juleps for his shameful behavior at a New York meeting. Juleps, and the bourbon in them, are no laughing matter, and after just one of them, all is usually right with my world.

 Seems to me we have the makings for quite the literary bash, now. As always, drink responsibly, and don't forget a toast to your own favorite writer, whatever their drink might be.

Me? I like mojitos. (There's that Hemingway, again...)

(Photo by mluedtke at stockxchng)

Posted by Nancy Knight at 6:30 AM | Permalink | Comments (5)
        

Even President Obama needs a good beach read once in a while. Here's what he took for his vacation on Martha's Vineyard, where he played golf today:

-- "The Way Home" by George Pelecanos, who writes crime fiction about Washington (and wrote for The Wire).

-- "Lush Life" by Richard Price, a fictional account of a Manhattan shooting.

-- "Plainsong" by Kent Haruf, a novel about small town life on Colorado's plains.

-- "Hot, Flat and Crowded" by Thomas Friedman

-- "John Adams" by David McCullough. (Nod to New England)

White House deputy spokesman Bill Burton said it would total about 2,300 pages. From one father to another, good luck with that, Mr. President. I'd spend more time seeing the colorful clay cliffs at Gay Head, playing with the kids on the beach, or maybe picking up "Jaws" at a used bookstore (much of the movie was filmed on the island).

Posted by Dave Rosenthal at 4:39 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)
        

Nothing like a hot movie to goose book sales. Thanks to the response to the film adaptation of "Julie & Julia," Julia Child's "Mastering the Art of French Cooking, Volume I" is selling like never before and is headed to a top spot on The New York Times best seller list. In J&J, Julie Powell tries to turn her life around with an unlikely goal: cooking all 524 recipes in Child's famous cookbook within a year.

The movie version, which stars Meryl Streep and Amy Adams, has grossed about $60 million in three weeks and refocused attention on Child. According to the Times, her cookbook sold 22,000 copies in the most recent week tracked -- more copies than were sold in any full year since the book’s appearance. The book will make its debut at No. 1 on the Times best-seller list of Aug. 30 in the advice and how-to category.

(Child-mania has even seeped into the Baltimore dining group that my wife and I belong to. On Saturday, we'll be joining some friends to make an MAFC-inspired dinner of Crab Quenelles, roasted duckling with cherry and peach sauces, Tomates a la Provencale and Spinach Timbales. If I'm still alive next week after gorging on all that food, I'll give you a more complete report.)

Posted by Dave Rosenthal at 11:21 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)
        

It's no secret that many of the world's most famous authors were drinkers with a writing problem. Authors such as F. Scott Fitzgerald, Dorothy Parker, James Joyce and O. Henry were all celebrated scribes who were helped, and more often hindered, by the bottle. And while alcoholism is no joke, I find no fault occasionally indulging in a tipple or two.

So that got me wondering: Which author would I most like to go drinking with? Ernest Hemingway would have amazing stories to tell; Oscar Wilde would make a great people-watching companion; and H.L. Mencken could introduce me to the who's who of American society, even if he didn't like them that much.

And so, a little quiz: Which famous author do you most drink like? Answers will be revealed tomorrow, but feel free to make your predictions now Answers are up now!

1. What's your idea of the perfect afternoon?

A) Exploring exciting new places, preferably with a gun.

B) Catching up with friends and family, in person or via e-mail.

C) Checking out the latest scene, dazzling everyone with your wit.

D) Blogging about celebrities, politicians and people who annoy you.

E) Hanging out with your little cousin.

2. When it comes to school

A) Academics and athletics -- you did it all!

B) You learned life's most important lessons at home.

C) The other kids were never really nice to you.

D) You'd rather be working.

E) There's more to life than studies! Like gambling!

3. Your relationship with your family is best describe as:

A) You look forward to your seasonal hunting, fishing or boating trips.

B) You can always count on each other for anything.

C) Your wild ways have alienated most of your relations.

D) You tend to rebel, but not too much.

E) You're a little too close to your extended family.

4. How would you describe yourself?

A) Rugged, tough and larger-than-life.

B) You appreciate a good laugh, but are quick to point out the world's serious flaws.

C) Your joie de vivre is misunderstood and underappreciated.

D) Unflinchingly honest, courageous and often insensitive.

E) Mysterious, with a touch of the macabre about you.

5. In matters of the heart, you:

A) Love many, and often. 

B) Tend to keep quiet about your love life.

C) Are the subject of gossip and/or scandal with your escapades.

D) Fell in love once, seemingly against your will.

E) Love deeply, and perhaps a bit too fanatically.

6. Whom do you admire most?

A) Yourself, clearly.

B) Your family.

C) People are too flawed to be looked up to.

D) Mark Twain.

E) Your lost love.

7. Soon after your arrival at the party, you:

A) Head straight to the wet bar and dare your buddies to keep up with you.

B) Dance the night away.

C) Make sure everyone noticed your entrance.

D) Get your more musically inclined friends to strike up the band.

E) Don't really party much. (Not since college, anyway.)

8. Which of the following statements describes your legacy to the world?

 A) You'll give new meaning to the word "macho."

 B) Women everywhere will admire you, while most men will simply be perplexed.

 C) Your unmistakeable talent will far outlast any unsavory reputation.

 D) It'll be a mixed bag: You'll be remembered as much for the good as the bad.

 E) Your work is so admired, strangers will be pouring one out for you years after your death.

(Photo by melodi2 at stock.xchng)

Posted by Nancy Knight at 6:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (4)
Categories: Whatever
        

Today in The Baltimore Sun, you'll find a review of "Born Round" by Frank Bruni, who has been the New York Times' restaurant critic. The book doesn't focus on inside chatter about the city's eateries, though Bruni does describe his disguises. Instead, the book takes a hard look at his personal demon: an eating disorder. An excerpt from Diane Garrett's review:

It’s a good thing Frank Bruni is such a talented writer, or “Born Round: The Secret History of a Full-Time Eater” would be a lot tougher to digest. The outgoing restaurant reviewer for The New York Times writes frankly about gargantuan binges and drastic weight-loss strategies in this alternately rollicking and sobering memoir. A book of comic excesses and culinary appreciation, it ends on a cautiously optimistic note: Bruni mostly has his eating under control but doesn’t take it for granted.

His passion for food, however, remains undiminished.

Bruni has always loved to eat. The author even suggests he was a baby bulimic, describing in vivid detail the time he threw up all over his highchair after being denied a third burger. ... “My parents would later tell me, my friends and anyone else willing to listen that they’d never seen a kid eat the way I ate or react the way I reacted whenever I was denied food,” Bruni writes. “I have no independent memory of this. But according to my mother, it began when I was about 18 months old.” ...

Gourmands will no doubt relish his descriptions of meals at top restaurants. His stories about disguising his identity are also amusing. Alas, this portion of the book is Bruni’s most self-indulgent: He quotes liberally from his reviews, clearly

 

tickled by his prose, and details a spat with restaurateur Jeffrey Chodorow in unbecoming fashion. It’s a false note in an otherwise deftly written book.

At the outset, he invokes his grandmother’s saying — “Born round, you don’t die square” — to describe his physique, but doesn’t hit readers over the head with the metaphor. Toward the end he ponders whether people can change their nature. His younger brother had. Bruni thought he had too. Except he hadn’t. One night’s overindulgence reminded him he’d always have to be careful about his eating. He’s not like everyone else when it comes to gustatory indulgence.

Posted by Dave Rosenthal at 6:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)
Categories: Reviews
        

Now that I'm back from vacation, I'm catching up on my reading. The Washington Post featured Baltimorean Laura Lippman last week in The Writing Life column, and it's an interesting read for her fans -- and anyone fascinated by the process of writing. She describes her on-again, off-again relationship with protagonist Tess Monaghan and the realities of the publishing business.

Excerpts: [Tess] has literally kept a roof over my head and even thrown in the kitchen of my dreams. I spend more time with her than almost anyone in my life, with the possible exception of my spouse. She is the childish thing that too many adults are duped into putting away: a very satisfactory imaginary friend. ...

The conventional wisdom is that writers must choose between series or stand-alones. Only a handful of crime novelists get to do both, and, for some reason, I'm one of them, at least for now. When other writers ask me how I managed this feat, I fall back on a joke: The trick, I tell them, is to not be too successful at either.

The more accurate answer would be that a writer who wants to balance a life between series and non-series books needs them to be equally strong, like complementary muscles, lest one throw the other out of whack. ...

Posted by Dave Rosenthal at 6:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)
        

It's Friday, and if it had come any later, I'd be a puddle of goo at my desk right now. However, I hope your week was pleasant, and your weekend is even moreso!

So let's get down to business: I just read "Fables: 1001 Nights of Snowfall," by Bill Willingham, with art by  Charles Vess, Brian Bolland, (breath), John Bolton, Michael Wm. Kaluta, James Jean, Tara McPherson, (breath), Derek Kirk Kim, Esao Andrews, Mark Buckingham, Mark Wheatley and Jill Thompson. Whew!

It's actually a series of graphic novels, with reimagined fairy tales. This one focuses on 1001 Arabian Nights, with Snow White sent to Arabia as an ambassador from the Fables community, and kept as a doomed prisoner by the jilted sultan. It's gruesome but gorgeous, which is how the best ones are these days.

But back to important matters: the giveaway! Congratulations, Amy, you're this week's Freebie Friday winner. We hope you enjoy "In Praise of Doubt."

Next week, you could be the proud owner of Deborah Tannen's "You Were Always Mom's Favorite!: Sisters in Conversation Throughout their Lives." Tannen interviewed hundreds of women while researching the complex relationships between siblings, and if it's anything like her previous best-seller, "You're Wearing That?", it'll be plenty entertaining.

So give me your weekly book reviews! And by the way, I'm going to the Bahamas week after next, so I'll need plenty of ideas for what to download onto my Kindle!

Posted by Nancy Knight at 11:30 AM | Permalink | Comments (3)
Categories: Freebie Friday
        

For me, part of the fun of any vacation is visiting local bookstores, and last week in Denver, I got back to an old favorite: The Tattered Cover. From the store's name, you might think it's a tiny cove of used books, overseen by a fat calico cat. But it's really a group of three large stores steeped in modern merchandising. One store is in a renovated warehouse in the fashionable LoDo neighborhood, another is in a former historic theater (shown here), and a third is a typical suburban store (I guess Denver doesn't have as many historic buildings to rehab as the Baltimore area does.)

I can always depend on the store's employees to point me to books with local relevance. Last year, I picked up "Deadwood" by Pete Dexter and this year, "Tallgrass" by Denver author Sandra Dallas. The new read is a fictional account of a real-life tragedy: a camp built in Colorado during World War II to house Japanese-Americans. It has a "To Kill a Mockingbird" feel.

In Aspen, I was pleasantly surprised to find Explore Booksellers, which occupies most of two floors of a Victorian house. (The rest is an airy vegetarian restaurant.) It was a nice change of pace from the designer shops that stand shoulder-to-shoulder in the town center. And Aspen seems like the type of place (surrounded by big spenders, removed from big box stores) that an indie can survive -- as long as the rent doesn't get too high.

I'll have to update the Read Street bookstore map. Let me know avout your vacation finds, and I'll add them, too.

Posted by Dave Rosenthal at 9:02 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)
        

News today that Scottish officials had released the Lockerbie bomber from prison -- so the terminally ill man can return to his home -- will reverberate in Maryland. Among the 270 people who died in the bombing was 20-year-old Miriam Wolfe, a Severna Park resident who was returning to Syracuse University from a semester abroad. Her mother, Rosemary Mild, wrote a book, Miriam's Gift. based on her only child's diaries and journals.

As Baltimore Sun columnist Susan Reimer wrote in 1999 when the book was published: "Over time, horror was replaced by a bottomless sense of loss, the wearying knowledge that grief would be with her as far into her own future as she could see. Then came a sense of urgency. Rosemary Mild feared that the world would forget her daughter in a way that would be a second death. She feared that Miriam's memory would grow dim in the hearts of those she touched -- and there were many. And she feared that those who had not known her would now never know her. ...

"More than a family memento, more than an expression of a mother's grief, it is an expression of the unbounded optimism of a young girl ready to step onto the world's stage. It is Miriam's gift to the reader.

" 'The sky was bluer today, the sun was yellower today,' reads one of her journal entries just days before her death. 'And the whole of the earth seemed to be rejoicing in its own perfection.' "

Abdelbaset Ali Mohmed al-Megrahi, who had served eight years of a life sentence in the 1988 bombing over Lockerbie, returned to his family in Libya. His release is sure to deepen the wounds felt by relatives of Miriam Wolfe -- and the many others lost on Pan Am Flight 103. It was a wrong-headed decision by Scottish authorities. And though it may have eased al-Megrahi's pain, it will bring much more sadness to other families around the world.

Posted by Dave Rosenthal at 10:16 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)
        

Checked my mailbox today, but I still haven't received an invitation to the Archie/Veronica nuptials. We noted a few months ago that Red had gone all jugheaded on us, deciding to toss aside wholesome Betty for snooty Veronica.

Well, the issue that begins the six-issue story line went on sale today in comic book shops (on newsstands Sept. 1), with a cover that shows Archie popping the question on bended knee, and Veronica answering with a big, red YES! (The Washington Post has an entertaining story about the decades-old love triangle.)

Meanwhile, Betty, who's teary-eyed on the cover, opened her heart on her blog: Look what I got it the mail...What can I say? It is so sad. Xoxoxoxo Bets

I bet that as the series progresses, we discover that Veronica's family was wiped out in the Madoff scandal, and Archie rethinks his future with a newly impoverished, but still obnoxious, girl. He'll go crawling back to Betty, you betcha.

Wedding coutesy of Archie Comics

Posted by Dave Rosenthal at 6:36 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)
        

Author: Margaret Atwood, who's recently started her own blog to chronicle the book tour.

Synopsis: The novel follows two women as they struggle to survive in a pre- and post-apocolyptic "America." (What, it's Atwood, were you not expecting a plot along those lines?) One is a self-described hypocritical cult member; the other is a dancer at an upscale sex club, and they're both trying to figure out what's happened to their friends and family, and how they'll stay alive long enough to find out.

Review: At turns exploring religion, science, environmentalism, corporate greed and popular culture, Atwood leaves no aspect of our culture unscathed. While "Handmaid's Tale" was a quiet scream, "Flood" is a long, loud bellow, warning against the arrogance and greed of mankind. Gene-splicing creates monstrous creatures with human intelligence, as well as conveniences for everyday living; corporations take on the role of the government, with deadly results for those who aren't helping the bottom line; and chilling references to the wall barring TexMex immigrants from the country: "Flood" is fantastic.

Even better, Atwood writes women as people, not victims. Terrible things happen to and around her characters, and instead of making them pitiful, it makes them strong. Not once do you wonder how these women are going to get past the atrocities; you wonder how these characters are going to see themselves through safely to the end.

If you liked: Anything else by Atwood, Suzanne Collins' Hunger Games or Aldous Huxley's Brave New World, you should pick this book up.

Avoid this if: Dystopian worlds depress you for weeks, or you're looking for some light reading for before bed. This book is not for the faint of heart or the sleepy of mind.

Posted by Nancy Knight at 11:20 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)
        

The folks at LibraryThing took our ice cream flavor challenge seriously, and came up with some inspired suggestions. My mouth is watering -- especially since I went to Baskin-Robbins Monday night for a quart of chocolate chip, my favorite flavor, only to find about 10 percent of the normal allotment of chips. (If some guy at B-R corporate changed the recipe, I'm suing.) Without further whining about my cho' chip, here are the LT flavors:

From kswolff: Clockwork Orange Sherbet and Gravity's Rainbow Sorbet

justifiedsinner: Brave New Swirl, The Malted Falcon and In Cold Blood-Orange Sorbet

darsu: Finnegans Shake

inaudible: Travels With Chocolate

geneg: The Road, Rocky and I, Butter Pecan

tfrank0630: Of Mice and Mint and The Grape Gatsby

If only I had an ice cream-maker at home, I'd get crankin'. Maybe I can talk Nancy into using hers.

Posted by Dave Rosenthal at 5:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)
        

Have you ever wondered what would happen if you were a character in your favorite book? Kinda like Choose Your Own Adventure, but without the almost-certain death?

Well, even if you haven't, someone else out there clearly has: Namely, video game designers.

For instance, next year will see the release of Dante's Inferno, a very intense reimagining of the classic poem. In this version, Dante is a warrior who returns home from battle to see his girlfriend pulled into hell. And as Dante, you get to slash your way through ghouls, demons and even Cleopatra. I'm sure she had it coming, right?

If that's a little too intense for you -- and let's face it, the gluttony level is going to be unbelievably difficult to stomach (pun entirely intended) -- IGN has suggested a list of classics they'd like to play at home. 

Games include the "Pride and Prejudice" dating simulation, "All Quiet on the Western Front" first-person shooter and "A Separate Peace" game, in which you attempt to balance on a tree branch while another player tries to bounce you off. You know what happens if you fall.

In fact, just about every book you could think of has at least one corresponding video game. Sherlock Holmes. Dracula. Even fairy tales get the pixelated treatment.

How about you? Any lit-based video games you'd like to see?

(1861 illustration of Limbo by Gustave Dore)

Posted by Nancy Knight at 10:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (3)
        

You can have model Kathy Ireland, politician Tom DeLay, football player Michael Irvin, singer Macy Gray and the rests of the 2009 lineup for Dancing with the Stars. I have my own list of pairings I'd like to see next season, and it has a more literary bent:

-- Stephen King (The Shining) and Stephenie Meyer (Twilight)-- it would give them a chance to end the name-calling feud.

-- Michelle Malkin (The Culture of Corruption) and Barack Obama (Dreams from My Father) -- ditto

-- Elizabeth Gilbert (Eat, Pray, Love) and Michael Pollan (The Omnivore's Dliemma)

-- Charlaine Harris (Club Dead, Living Dead in Dallas, Dead to the World, etc.) and Rick Warren (The Purpose-Driven Life) -- a true life and death battle.

-- Karrine Steffans (The Vixen Manual) and Steve Harvey (Act Like a Lady, Think Like a Man) -- Who leads?

Now that's entertaining television!

Posted by Dave Rosenthal at 6:38 PM | Permalink | Comments (11)
        

The publisher of Reader's Digest, the country's most popular general interest magazine, said today that it will file for a federal bankruptcy reorganization, the AP reported. Reader's Digest Association Inc., owned by a New York private equity firm since 2007, said major lenders agreed to erase some of the $1.6 billion in debt they hold in return for an ownership stake.

Reader's Digest was founded in 1922 as a collection of condensed articles from other publications -- in a sense, it was a print precursor of Google News.  But it has struggled recently as the recession and the Internet sapped advertising strength. I bet the magazine was also losing its audience. In my mind, it was a staple of doctors' offices and seniors' homes, but I can't picture it in the hands of younger readers. (The magazine is certainly not the only publication to have problems; Tribune Co., which owns The Baltimore Sun among other newspapers, also is in a bankruptcy reorganization.)

In June, Reader's Digest announced it would cut the circulation guarantee it makes to advertisers from 8 million to 5.5 million, lower its frequency from 12 to 10 issues a year, the AP said. In the second half of 2008, the U.S. edition of Reader's Digest had circulation of 8.2 million -- 12 percent below circulation a year earlier.

Posted by Dave Rosenthal at 4:35 PM | Permalink | Comments (11)
        

I was a bit of slacker in posting last week while I was on vacation. Here's one of the spots we visited, the amazing Maroon Bells formation outside Aspen, Colo. My son led us on a hike to a nearby mountain pass about 12,500 feet in altitude, and believe me, the lungs of this flatlander were bursting. All I could think about was the description that Jon Krakauer provides in Into Thin Air about your brain expanding at high altitude, and brain cells dying off by the zillions. But it was worth the incredible view.

I also broke out of my reading slump -- nothing like a couple of cross-country flights to provide some solid reading time. I finished A Prayer for the Dying by Stewart O'Nan (a review to come later this week) and took a serious bite out of Homer & Langley, an E.L. Doctorow book that comes out next month. Also started the novel Tallgrass by Colorado author Sandra Dallas. It was, literally, a cool trip -- BWI last night at midnight was the hottest I had been in a week.

But now that I'm back in muggy, sea-level Baltimore (and my expanding brain has stabilized), I'll be posting more regularly again.

Posted by Dave Rosenthal at 1:15 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)
        

Happy Friday, everyone! Is it just me, or did the week fly right by?

I just picked up a book that looks to be fascinating to this media nerd: "Moral Panics and the Copyright Wars," by William Patry. Patry is former copyright counsel to the U.S. House of Representatives Committee on the Judiciary, and currently copyright counsel at Google.

In other words, he should have intimate knowledge of the Google Books project, and I'm dying to see what he thinks of copyright protections.

But on to the important part of the post: Who's winning, and what could you win next?

The winner of "That Old Cape Magic" is ... Brian Shields! Congratulations, Brian, and I hope you enjoy it! Preferably near a sunny beach.

And next up: is "In Praise of Doubt: How to Have Convictions Without Becoming a Fanatic," by Peter Berger and Anton Zijderveld. Just released this month, the book details how a healthy amount of skepticism can keep faith alive, without resorting to fundamentalism in either religious or secular issues. The book was recently featured on the Diane Rehm Show, as well as the Wall Street Journal and our sister paper, the Los Angeles Times, and is kicking up a lot of debate.

So come on, let us know what you're reading -- and you could be the next Freebie Friday winner!

Posted by Nancy Knight at 12:30 PM | Permalink | Comments (7)
Categories: Freebie Friday
        

We're officially in the dog days of summer, and I've got the events calendar to prove it! But not to fear, there's always something bookish to enjoy.

Saturday afternoon, you can join Baltimore author Monchel Rice for tea, coffee and cookies at Constellation Books. Rice will discuss "Charge it 2 Da Game," which is described as a story about envy and greed. Luckily, gluttony is not mentioned, so I assume you can eat as many cookies as you can find.

Later that night, join Frederick native Jason Tinney, Michael Pollack, Paula Bomer and Tania James at the 510 Readings held at Minas Gallery. The presenters represent a variety of disciplines, including fiction, poetry and musical performances. In other words, there's a little something for everyone, and it's free!

Monday evening, Ukazoo hosts its biweekly creative writing group. Participants can write to the prompt or bring in their own projects: Either way, be prepared for critiques and community with your fellow writers. The event is open, but registration is requested, so call 410-832-BOOK beforehand.

And Baltimore Restaurant Week was recently extended into Baltimore Restaurant Weeks, so take your best friend (or book) out somewhere nice for a change, won't you?

Posted by Nancy Knight at 12:00 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)
Categories: Book It
        

Lately the U.S. Postal Service has been discussing plans to close post offices, and folks have been lamenting the loss of letter-writing skills -- do they even have Pen Pal clubs anymore?

Here's another lost art: the bookplate. You know the basic one: Ex Libris, with various designs. The decorative plates gave you a sense of ownership, they were a mark that you were building you own personal library. (They also helped remind folks who borrowed books that they should be returned.)

They were also small works of art. Collectors such as Louis Jaffe, a Philadelphian who has been collecting bookplates for 30 years, can point to many exotic examples. His blog, Confessions of a Bookplate Junkie, even has a grouping from Baltimore, including the one shown here.

Try putting one of those on your Kindle!

Posted by Dave Rosenthal at 6:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (6)
        

NPR had children's author Lesley Blume on the air this morning with a must-read list for kids this summer. It includes books I've loved and forgotten, including "The Phantom Tollbooth," "The Boxcar Children" and "The Witches."

It also reminded me how scary children's books can be! I'm not talking R.L. Stine Goosebumps scary. I'm talking creepy, your-parents-are-going-to-die-and-leave-you-out-in-a-world-inhabited-by-the-supernatural scary. I'm starting to wonder how in the world Harry Potter caused such a stir while Natalie Babbitt's "The Devil's Storybook" is considered a classic. (If Babbitt's name looks familiar, it may be that you remember her mystical and "Tuck Everlasting.")

And speaking of children's books that are more than meets the eye (I will never forgive you for ruining my Transformers, Michael Bay!) here's a New Yorker piece about the evolution of the Little House books.

If you haven't read it yet, it's a fascinating look into the complex relationship between Laura Ingalls Wilder and her daughter, Rose Wilder Lane. And I find the passages about their hatred of the New Deal is especially interesting today, considering our current seemingly never-ending economic crisis.

Posted by Nancy Knight at 11:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (4)
        

H.L. Mencken loved beer, wordplay and music -- not necessarily in that order. He and a small group of friends met regularly in Baltimore to play together -- H.L. on the piano -- and the group eventually became known as The Saturday Night Club.

"Some of the performers were dpownright poor and some were highly skilled professionals," Louis Cheslock wrote in H.L. Mencken on Music (Knopf, 1961). "To be a member one had to be, first of all, a genuine lover of music. If he could play -- fine! If not, he had to listen. His conversation had to be worth while, and he had to be able to hold his own at the beer table."

The camaraderie continued for decades, and now the Enoch Pratt Free Library is offering a taste of the club. In an exhibition that began Monday and runs until Sept. 12, the Pratt will display 650 compositions by four club members: Gustav Strube, Theodor Hemberger, Emma Hemberger, and Adolph Torovsky. Letters written by Mencken to club members about music will also be on display.

And don't forget that Sept. 12 is the annual Mencken Day celebration at the Pratt, which has the largest Mencken collection in the world, owning three-fourths of his estate.

Posted by Dave Rosenthal at 6:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)
Categories: Marylandia
        

Some high-powered organizations -- including major media companies -- have joined in the battle over an unauthorized sequel to J.D. Salinger's The Catcher in the Rye. When we last left the fray, a federal judge in New York sided with Salinger, and blocked U.S. distribution of 60 Years Later: Coming Through the Rye. Judge Deborah Batts rejected claims by the Swedish author that the book was a critical examination or parody of character Holden Caulfield. The ruling is a temporary order meant to remain in place until the case can be aired at trial.

But media companies including The New York Times and Tribune, owner of The Baltimore Sun, are worried about the larger issue -- the government stepping in to stop publication, Publishers Weekly reports. As we noted on Read Street in June, judges are extremely reluctant to halt publication of books and newspapers, due to First Amendment guarantees of freedom of expression. In a major case on that issue, the U.S. Supreme Court rejected govenment efforts to halt newspaper publication of the "Pentagon Papers," a critical review of U.S. policy in Viet Nam.

As the Second Circuit Court of Appeals prepares for oral arguments on the Salinger case on Sept. 3, media companies have filed a supporting brief that says in part: "An injunction that effects a content-based, government-imposed speech restriction is especially inappropriate where it is entered without the benefit of a full trial. There is no reason why, if a copyright infringement is ultimately found, that monetary damages, rather than a book banning, would not be an adequate remedy.”

Posted by Dave Rosenthal at 6:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (6)
        

You may remember last month's post detailing the hullabaloo over the U.S. cover of Justine Larbalestier's "Liar." The Young Adult novel with a black protagonist featured a very white model.

Last week, Bloomsbury told Publishers Weekly that the cover will be changed ahead of the book's October publishing date.

"We regret that our original creative direction for 'Liar' -- which was intended to symbolically reflect the narrator's complex psychologial makeup -- has been interpreted by some as a calculated decision to mask the character's ethnicity," officials said in a statement. "As the publisher of 'Liar,' we also hope that nothing further distracts from the quality of the author's nuanced and accomplished story, and that a new cover will allow this novel's many advocates to celebrate its U.S. publication without reservation."

I'm not quite sure what a picture of a white woman is supposed to reflect about a black woman's mind, but I'm just glad the publisher decided to change the hardcover jacket, instead of waiting to fix the problem until the paperback's release.

Bloomsbury mentions in the same statement that they hope discussions about race and the importance of diversity in YA literature continue in the publishing world, and I hope they've now decided to lead that discussion. But in case they don't, my guess is that their latest star writer will be happy to point them in the right direction.

Larbalestier recommends a few books with minority characters for readers to explore, and I'd like to add "Maniac Magee" by Jerry Spinelli and "Libyrinth" by Pearl North.

Posted by Nancy Knight at 9:30 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)
        

Read Street guest poster and author Gail Farrelly always poses interesting questions about reading. Last month, she wrote about the fear of being bookless and the joys of re-reading. Today, the topic is Young Adult books. Here's Gail:

When I heard a deejay on the radio talking about a crossover artist who was on the music charts in both the pop and country categories [like Dolly Parton for 9 to 5], it made me think of literary crossovers -- books that aren't limited to pleasing just the category that happens to be their target audience. Cynthia Crossen raised this issue recently in her Dear Book Lover advice column in the Wall Street Journal. She was asked to recommend books for a woman in her 80s, a voracious reader and a lover of historical fiction who now finds it hard to follow a huge cast of characters in a book.

Crossen's answer? "What I’m about to suggest may seem condescending, but hear me out." She then went on to recommend YA novels for older readers, pointing out that, "Good YA is not dumbed-down adult fare; it’s literature that doesn’t waste a breath. It doesn’t linger over grandiloquent descriptions of clouds or fields, and it doesn’t introduce irrelevant minor characters...."

Among the YA books she recommends are: The Astonishing Life of Octavian Nothing, Traitor to the Nation by M.T. Anderson, The Book Thief by Marcus Zusak, The Midwife’s Apprentice by Karen Cushman and A Northern Light by Jennifer Donnelly. According to Crossen, "Good books marketed to young adults are crisp, an adjective that seems to have fallen out of favor these days." The Knife of Never Letting Go by Patrick Ness is next up on Crossen's reading list.

Shakespeare had it right. "What's in a name?" After all, I'm sure there are many novels labeled YA, in addition to the ones mentioned above, that make great reading for older adults. Maybe even for adults who aren't older?

Posted by Dave Rosenthal at 6:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (9)
        

Dewey the library cat may have passed away, but he will live on in books. Iowa librarian Vicki Myron, who made the stray famous in Dewey, The Small-Town Library Cat Who Touched the World, has a seven-figure deal for a new book. according to Publishers Weekly.

Myron hit bestseller lists with her 2008 book about caring for a cat found in a book deposit bin in the winter of 1988. Dewey, named for the Decimal System, died in 2006. Myron was cat-less until earlier this year, when she adopted a stray that she named Page (shown here).

Two picture books about Dewey are coming — the first, Dewey: There's a Cat in the Library, is due September 1, PW said. There's also talk of a movie. The big advance -- $2 million, according to PW's industry sources -- was for Dewey's Nine Lives. Myron's agent said it would detail the "amazing relationships between cats and their people" and feature new stories about Dewey. Bret Witter, who co-wrote the original Dewey, will work with Myron on Nine Lives, scheduled for fall 2010.

Posted by Dave Rosenthal at 12:30 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)
        

This weekend in The Baltimore Sun, movie critic Michael Sragow takes a closer look at John Waters' push to get a Manson Family killer paroled. Waters, in an excerpt from his upcoming book, Role Models (scheduled for release next May), describes years of his interviews with Leslie Van Houten, and addresses criticism he received this week for suggesting that she go free. A sampler from the article:

Waters connects the ecstasies and the atrocities of the counterculture in a clear-headed, non-moralistic manner. It’s passionately reasoned and it’s sober. Most of the gallows comedy comes from his mother, who wonders whether the Manson Family really needs to have the Waters Family address; she also wishes that Waters wouldn’t confess that LSD helped him become a filmmaker. But the essay maintains its urgent focus. It never ceases to be a plea for Van Houten’s parole on the grounds of her remarkable psychological and moral recovery. ...

In interviews, he is especially intent on emphasizing his respect for the LaBianca family. “Whatever they say, they’re not wrong, it can’t be wrong, because it’s personal, it’s their family. I am talking from the view of society, the law, and what is fair. And that’s a very

“She’s very intelligent,” he says. “She takes the most severe criticism and owns up to her guilt and tries to deal with it in the best way she possibly can. ‘I’m not trying to get away with anything,’ she says, and she’s not.”

Photo courtesy of John Waters

Posted by Dave Rosenthal at 12:30 AM | Permalink | Comments (20)
        

As a kid, one of my favorite books was a collection of Aesop's Fables. I recall reading it as I walked home from elementary school, barely pausing to look up when I had to cross a street (life was calmer then in New Britain, Conn.) So I was amazed to read about a new study by British researchers that verifies the scenario in The Crow and the Pitcher. As you may recall, a thirsty crow finds a pitcher, but can't reach the water at the bottom. So it drops stones into the pitcher, gradually rasing the water level. The moral: Necessity is the mother of invention. (Or, Little by little does the trick.)

Researchers Christopher David Bird (seriously) and Nathan John Emery found that "Rooks Use Stones to Raise the Water Level to Reach a Floating Worm," according to the journal Current Biology. A summary: "We presented four captive rooks with a problem analogous to Aesop's fable: raising the level of water so that a floating worm moved into reach. All four subjects solved the problem with an appreciation of precisely how many stones were needed. Three subjects also rapidly learned to use large stones over small ones, and that sawdust cannot be manipulated in the same manner as water. This behavior demonstrates a flexible ability to use tools, a finding with implications for the evolution of tool use and cognition in animals."

Now if Bird and Emery can just find a wolf that dresses in sheep's clothing.

Posted by Dave Rosenthal at 10:46 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)
        

Happy Friday, everyone! I trust the week has treated you well, and hope your weekend will be even better.

 I'm headed home to the Eastern Shore this weekend (the family has to meet my adorable puppy), so I probably won't get much time to read "Catching Fire," Suzanne Collins' so-far fantastic sequel to "The Hunger Games." I'm about a third of the way through, and it is wonderful. I don't care what you think of the YA genre, you need to read this series, which will eventually be a trilogy -- especially if you're at all interested in Greek mythology (specifically the labyrinth myth) or dystopian novels.

Speaking of dystopian novels, I think it's time to announce the winner of Tim Hamilton's reimagined "Fahrenheit 451": Sam! Looks like your plea for your classroom touched the heart of random.org.

Next up: Pulitzer Prize-winning author Richard Russo's "That Old Cape Magic." Set on the beaches of Cape Cod, I think it's the perfect addition to your beach read list. Let us know what you're reading, and it could be yours!

Posted by Nancy Knight at 10:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (10)
Categories: Freebie Friday
        

On vacation last week, our family made a two-day sprint through New York City, where my daughter hoped to spot some of the glitterati. No luck the first day and a half. But as we prepared to check out of our hotel Thursday evening, we saw a galaxy of flashbulbs across the street at the Ziegfeld Theatre for the premier of Julie and Julia. Through the traffic and crowd, we could make out (I think) Amy Adams, shown here with co-star Meryl Streep, as well as attendees Martha Stewart and Barbara Walters.

The movie is an adaptation of Julie Powell's popular book in which she tries to "revitalize her marriage, restore her ambition, and save her soul by cooking all 524 recipes in Julia Child's Mastering the Art of French Cooking, Volume I, in a period of 365 days" Sort of a kitchenette version of Eat, Pray, Love. Sounds like the movie is a success -- The Baltimore Sun's Michael Sragow gives it three stars and calls it "wacky, engaging entertainment." Maybe it will take its place with other worthy foodie adaptations, including personal favorites such as Chocolat and Like Water for Chocolate.

Posted by Dave Rosenthal at 2:50 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)
        

I do believe I will start calling people "chum" right now.

Posted by Nancy Knight at 10:30 AM | Permalink | Comments (3)
        

Feeling bookish and artistic? Baltimore's Enoch Pratt Free Library this week announced its first Altered Books Competition. Eligible is "any book, old or new that has been recycled by creative means into a work of art. They can be rebound, painted, cut, burned, folded, added to, collaged in, rubber stamped, drilled or otherwise adorned. [It] may be as simple as adding a drawing or text to a page, or as complex as creating an intricate book sculpture."

I've seen some mind-boggling creations made from books -- the art shown above is just a sampling from the FunForever blog.

If you need artistic guidance, the Pratt will have a workshop at the Baltimore Book Festival on Friday, Sept. 25, 6 to 8 p.m.; old books and supplies will be provided for free. Entries in the competition must be received by the Pratt no later than 1 p.m. Saturday, Sept. 26. Prizes will be awarded to the top three altered books; the top 15 altered books will be displayed at the Central Library during October.

I admit there's something sad about defacing any book. But I have lots of old textbooks and other books lying around the garage, just waiting to be turned into works of art. Watch out Principles of Accounting, here I come! 

Posted by Dave Rosenthal at 6:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (3)
        

Baltimore film-maker John Waters has been pleading this week for parole for a member of the Manson Family. Well, his plea was answered, but it wasn't the woman he was thinking of. According to the Federal Bureau of Prisons, Lynette "Squeaky" Fromme, who was imprisoned after pointing a gun at then-Presdent Gerald Ford, is set to be released on parole Aug. 16.

Fromme (shown here in 1975) is now 60 and for years, she was one of Manson's few remaining followers, CNN reported. She was convicted in 1975 of pointing a gun at Ford in Sacramento, Cal. Secret Service agents prevented her from firing, and the gun was later found to have no bullet in the chamber, although it contained a clip of ammunition.

Maybe Waters has a touch of ESP. This week, in excerpts from an upcoming book, he calls for parole for another "Manson girl." As he writes in the first of several dispatches for Huffington Post: "I have a really good friend who was convicted of killing two innocent people when she was nineteen years old on a horrible night of 1969 cult madness. Her name is Leslie Van Houten and I think you would like her as much as I do. She was one of those notorious "Manson girls" who shaved their heads, carved X's in their foreheads and laughed, joked, and sang their way through the courthouse straight to death row without the slightest trace of remorse forty years ago. Leslie is hardly a "Manson girl" today. Sixty years old, she looks back from prison on her involvement in the La Bianca murders (the night after the Tate massacre) in utter horror, shame, and guilt and takes full responsibility for her part in the crimes. I think it's time to parole her."

Waters has taken a lot of heat for those statements, with lots of people saying that Van Houten, a convicted killer, does not deserve freedom. With the Fromme release, maybe he is being vindicated in a weird sort of way.

Posted by Dave Rosenthal at 5:48 PM | Permalink | Comments (7)
        

The trailer has been released for The Lovely Bones, the adaptation of Alice Sebold's harrowing novel about the aftermath of a teenage girl's rape and murder. The book, published in 2002, was a huge hit and fans have been eagerly awaiting the movie.

It will be interesting to see how Peter Jackson, director of the Dreamworks film, handles the otherworldliness, with the dead girl watching from heaven as relatives cope with the loss. Judge for yourself from the trailer.

(Note: the YouTube version posted here this morning was taken down because of copyright issues; apparently Apple had dibs on it. So much for information wanting to be free, Steve Jobs.)

Posted by Dave Rosenthal at 11:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)
        

Can you believe that it was more than a year ago that Stephenie Meyer's last installment of the Twilight saga was released? The way everyone goes on and on about the author, her characters, the Twilight movies and even the actors in those movies, you'd think this series was still going strong.

And actually, it is. USA Today reported earlier this week that Meyer's books still top their best-seller list, at Nos. 4,5, 6 and 7. That's 52 weeks in the top 10, compared to Rowling's 24 weeks, total.

While Rowling has still sold about 100 million books (in the U.S. alone) more than Meyer, that's gotta sting.

And of course, the marketing machine that is "Twilight" isn't stopping anytime soon. The movie adaptation of "New Moon" will be in theaters in November, and there's a special edition of "Breaking Dawn" to look forward to, sold with a DVD of the Breaking Dawn Concert Series.

Yes, the concert series. I had no idea, either. (And if you click on that link, I suggest you turn the volume WAY down. The video clip contains lots of teen shrieking.)

But in the end, I still believe that the Harry Potter series will have more staying power. While Twilight could reach the cult status of V.C. Andrews, Harry Potter's coming-of-age is the type of story parents will share with their children for generations.

What? I can dream, can't I?

(AP photo)

Posted by Nancy Knight at 9:45 AM | Permalink | Comments (6)
        

In an era of budget tightening at the Enoch Pratt and elsewhere, thousands of people hope to promote libraries through an unusual campaign: petitioning Ben & Jerry's to create a library-themed flavor. Eat ultra-fattening ice cream to help a library? Sign me up!

New Jersey librarian Andy Woodworth started his Facebook group in June and has more than 4,400 people supporters. Among the flavor suggestions: Gooey Decimal System (dark fudge alphabet letters with caramel swirls in hazelnut ice cream) and Sh-sh-sh-Sherbet! (key lime or a chocolate/vanilla combo. Woodworth's logic is flawless, as anyone who has taken a college philosophy course will recognize: (1) Libraries are awesome; (2) Ben & Jerry's Ice Cream is tasty; therefore: (3) A library-themed Ben & Jerry's Ice Cream would be tasty awesome.

Ben & Jerry's has honored musicians (Cherry Garcia is a favorite of mine), movies (Pulp Addiction) and comedy groups (Vermonty Python), so why not libraries? My choice for a library flavor: Overdue Chew (stale brownies in pistachio ice cream). But why not broaden the options to include character themes such as Dumbledore S'Mores (bits of graham cracker and marshmallows in chocolate fudge) or authors Peppermint Stieg Larsson (candy cane bits in vanilla)?

Edited 5/5: Andy Woodworth tells how it all started, in a comment below.

Posted by Dave Rosenthal at 5:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (8)
        

Amazon's apology for swiping 1984 from its customers' Kindles hasn't stopped the debate over that issue -- and over the broader subject of e-books. Yet the Kindle owners I know don't seem to be bothered by the controversy, and they're uniformly in love with the convenience of the devices. Last weekend, I offered to lend a book to a friend who was visiting from Connecticut, and he said, "Don't bother, I'll download it." What? For your reading pleasure, here are excerpts from recent reports on the e-book issue by NPR, The New Yorker and the Los Angeles Times:

-- Los Angeles Times: For Amazon, books are a business, and the more hegemony it exerts over the market, the better off it is. For the culture, though, books and information serve as a collective soul, a memory bank, something bigger than commerce that shouldn't be merely bought and sold. Because of that, it's not the incidents themselves but their ramifications that are disturbing: the idea that Amazon can effectively alter the collective memory at will.

-- NPR: Larry Bowen, an administrator at the University of Alabama in Tuscaloosa thought that he would miss books when he bought his Kindle, but that hasn't happened. He thinks his transition to digital reading has been eased by his experience with downloading music to his iPhone.

-- The New Yorker: The problem was not that the screen was in black-and-white; if it had really been black-and-white, that would have been fine. The problem was that the screen was gray. And it wasn’t just gray; it was a greenish, sickly gray. A postmortem gray. ... This was what they were calling e-paper? This four-by-five window onto an overcast afternoon?

Posted by Dave Rosenthal at 10:38 AM | Permalink | Comments (3)
        

As if the Detroit Lions' 0-16 record last year weren't embarrassing enough, their new coach, Baltimore boy Jim Schwartz, has to go and disparage women.

Authors, to be exact, whom he says he just doesn't read.

"If I find an author -- David Morrell, Mario Puzo, John Grisham or any guy I hear is good -- I'll read everything he did," Schwartz said, according to an Associated Press article. "I don't read books by women. I've tried to, but their perspective is different, so I stick with what I like."

Oh, Jim. For a man who studied economics at Georgetown, that is a pretty uneducated worldview to have. Avoiding the words of half the world's population because they have a different view? And what exactly is so monolithic about women authors that they're all "different" from you, Mr. Schwartz?

So, in an attempt to enlighten this man, (and after all, if he doesn't do better than his predecesor, he's going to have a lot of extra time on his hands for reading) I thought we Read Streeters could provide Schwartz with a little reading list.

1. Sports writer and Lance Armstrong biographer Sally Jenkins has written two memoirs with the Tour de France champion: It's Not About the Bike and Every Second Counts. I think she's proven she can hang with the big boys.
2. Willa Cather, My Antonia. Sure, it's a middle and high school classic, which may disqualify it in many people's minds. But Cather was the master of setting up a scene to bring the quiet horror out. The fate of Antonia's father sticks in my mind as one of the scariest psychological breakdowns I've ever read, because all the reader experiences are the effects, rather than the causes. Realistic and heartbreaking.
3. Laura Hillenbrand, Seabiscuit. This New York Times best-seller won the 2001 William Hill Sports Book of the Year in Great Britain. If that's not enough macho cred for you, it's about a horseracing champion and his tutelage under a failed prizefighter, a cowboy and a soldier. And no, watching the movie doesn't count.
4. Margaret Atwood, The Year of the Flood. I recently read this eerie tale of a dystopian America, and I think Schwartz could really relate to the survivor spirit of the women in this book. Their families, homes and jobs are all stripped from them, they're beaten down physically and mentally by the people around them, and yet they never stoop to victimhood. It's an underdog story with the frightening background of a hostile corporate takeover of the world. It's set to come out this fall, so there's something to look forward to.
5. [Your suggestions here]

(Associated Press photo)

Posted by Nancy Knight at 9:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (15)
        

Baltimore film-maker John Waters has always created comedies with a dark, or at least shady, side. Remember Multiple Maniacs and Female Trouble? How about Serial Mom, (filmed in the Stoneleigh neighborhood), about a surburban housewife who carved up both roasts and people? But I never realized that one of the sources of Waters' inspiration was the Manson family, a dangerously warped group responsible for the gruesome 1969 murder of pregnant actress Sharon Tate and others.

On Huffington Post, an excerpt from Water's upcoming book Role Models, details his contact with some "family" members. The book, scheduled for publication in 2010, is described as "a self-portrait told through intimate literary profiles of his favorite personalities; some famous, some unknown, some criminal, some alarmingly middle of the road."

An excerpt from the excerpt: I needed to know more. How had these kids, from backgrounds so similar to mine, committed in real life the awful crimes against peace and love that we were acting out for comedy in our films? ...

Sexy, scary, brain-dead, and dangerous, this gang of hippy lunatics gave new meaning to "folie à famille", group madness and insanity as long as the same people are together and united. It was an amazing thing to see in person. Heavily influenced, and actually jealous of their notoriety, I went back to Baltimore and made Pink Flamingos which I wrote, directed and dedicated to the "Manson girls", "Sadie, Katie and Les".

Posted by Dave Rosenthal at 2:10 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)
Categories: Marylandia
        

Call it Freebie Monday (with apologies to Nancy, who trademarked the Freebie tage). Today, Random House is giving away free downloads of the well-reviewed Let the Great World Spin, through Oprah's Book Club. Colum McCann”s novel brings together a disparate cast of New Yorkers, with a cultural touchstone of the tightrope artist who walks between the towers of the World Trader Center. This might even be the book to lift me out of a my summer slump.

Here's an excerpt from the New York Times review: Let the Great World Spin can feel like a precursor to another novel of colliding cultures: The Bonfire of the Vanities, Tom Wolfe’s classic portrait of New York in the 1980s. But McCann’s effort is less disciplined, more earnest, looser, rougher, more flawed but also more soulful — in other words, more like the city itself.

Posted by Dave Rosenthal at 9:59 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)
        

I've been a baaad reader lately. First, I made a detour for the Tour de France, postponing my reading to watch nightly reviews of the annual bike race (at least the views of the countryside provided some sort of cultural benefit). Then vacation hit, with lots of driving on I-95 and a few days in New York City. Reading took a backseat to spending time at museums, restaurants and other sites.
I lost all momentum in reading -- does that ever happen to you?
To get back on track, I need a killer book, one that moves fast and is relatively short. If you have a recommendation, please pass it on.

Posted by Dave Rosenthal at 9:17 AM | Permalink | Comments (7)
        

Catching up on book news after vacation, I couldn't help but laugh at this: Amazon's move to swipe 1984 from customers' Kindles has sparked a lawsuit from a teen who says he also lost the notes for a homework assignment. Ain't America great?
According to a news release from the law firm KamberEdelson, Justin D. Gawronski, 17, bought George Orwell’s classic for a homework assignment. Amazon deleted the book from his Kindle -- the company said later it did not have rights to the work -- making his electronic notes worthless.
Jay Edelson, the lead attorney in the suit, said, “Amazon.com had no more right to hack into people’s Kindles than its customers have the right to hack into Amazon’s bank account to recover a mistaken overpayment.”
The suit (click here for a copy) asks a judge to bar Amazon from improperly accessing people’s Kindles in the future. It also seeks money relief for those who lost notes and other materials in addition to the deleted books.
Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos has apologized for the move, calling it "stupid."

Posted by Dave Rosenthal at 8:42 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)