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Hmm…. “Did Writing Anti-Coulter Book Cost a Reuters Editor His Job?” (Editor & Publisher) I, for one, would be curious to learn more details. And I like that the two anti-Coulter books coming out this week are called Brainless: The Lies and Lunacy of Ann Coulter (by Joe Maguire, published by Morrow) and Soulless: Ann Coulter [...]

Magazine Editor Undergoes Sleek New Redesign (The Onion): “I made a conscious decision to look more open and less dense without losing that smart edge that people have come to expect,” said Williams, who claimed the new design’s smaller size, bolder colors, and smoother lines will give her a broader appeal across upper demographics. von [...]

So Orhan Pamuk, “who in the quest for the melancholic soul of his native city has discovered new symbols for the clash and interlacing of cultures,” has won the Nobel Prize in Literature. Pamuk is pretty popular around here, but I definitely think more people were rooting for Philip Roth (or, “Big Phil,” as we affectionately [...]

Maybe the National Book Awards are our equivalent of the Man Booker Prize. As the Booker is given to a Brit (technically, a “a citizen of the Commonwealth or the Republic of Ireland”), the NBA is given to a Yank (technically, “a citizen of the United States”). Both are judged by writers, although the Booker throws in critics and [...]

In England, you have a handful of tweedy types who meet in secrecy to choose the winner of the Man Booker Prize. In America, you have average Joes and Jolines who vote on the internet. Ladies and gentlemen, the Quills Book of the Year is…drum roll, please…Don’t Make a Black Woman Take Off Her Earrings, by [...]

Kiran Desai, daughter of Anita Desai, has won the Booker Prize for her novel, The Inheritance of Loss. Talk about fodder for an interesting dinner conversation: Anita Desai was shortlisted three times without winning, while Kiran Desai won on her first try. Not only that, at 35, she’s the youngest woman ever to win it. (Also surprised [...]

Okay, I know I’m nearly a week late on this item–an eternity in blogworld–but you wouldn’t really want to read a blog written by a person who had no life, who simply sat at the computer 24 hours a day in order to be the first person to weigh in on a subject, would you? [...]

I finished reading Ian Sansom’s The Case of the Missing Books yesterday. It’s (ahem) bloody hilarious. And–sorry, Nancy Pearl–librarians have a new superhero. Well, not exactly a superhero. But a hero. After a fashion. Not so much a hero as a figurehead. But not that he’s representative of librarians. More of a mascot, really. But not a [...]

I wasn’t able to attend Bouchercon this year, unfortunately, even though it was held in nearby Madison, Wisconsin. It’s a really unique convention, not very commercial, that gives crime writers and fans of crime writing a chance to get together for informal, sometimes rowdy, panels and parties. I attended last year’s Bouchercon, which was in Chicago, and [...]

The synchronicities continue. Last Thursday, I discussed the difference between writing and acting. Last Friday, I called the JT Leroy hoax “theater.” And in Robert Stone’s Prime Green: Remembering the Sixties, which I finished reading last night, he writes about a moment in 1958 when an acquaintance suggested he study acting. Stone was already considering a writing life, but wasn’t [...]