The book Year Million explores several possible scenarios for the universe a million years from now. Some of these possibilities aren't happy! Rats running the world, gray goo wiping out life on Earth. I just want to read the kick-ass ones! Because predicting the future at such a distance is almost like picking superpowers; your usual analytic skills are stretched to the point of absurdity. For example, some of the essays predict humanity evolving into shapeshifting superbeings; another predicts we will build baby universes. But the most immediately relatable describes a brain-embedded "Internet on crank," albeit one that might be clogged with spam. Actually, wouldn't that be possible in a couple of centuries?

Hillary Clinton wasn't the only woman to suffer an unexpected setback in the Democratic primary. Her biographer, magazine publishing doyenne Tina Brown, is left without the inauguration that would have been such a compelling finale-and recompense for the discomforts of the campaign trail. But the former Vanity Fair editor claimed to the biddies on The View this morning that Hillary's defeat gave her story a more interesting "arc"-and there may be some truth to that. The fallen Queen of Buzz identifies with the former First Lady even more than one would imagine; and a bitter-sweet ending has a certain resonance, as you'll see.

We told you earlier about British journalist and travel writer Jan Morris, who recently re-married her partner of almost sixty years. Before her sex change, Jan used to be James Morris—the first person to report the conquest of Mount Everest is 1953. James Morris was a very well-known reporter, and Bookslut brought to our attention this recent anecdote: years later, when Morris met the Queen of England as a woman, the Queen got very confused:

Running With Scissors author Augusten Burroughs gives an on-camera interview in which he reveals his secret writing process to the world. He works in bed! Gets up, showers, gets dressed, walks the dog, makes the bed, then gets back in bed. Weird. More importantly, he shares his simple and foolproof solution to overcoming writer's block. Hint: "It's like dropping a couple of Alka-Seltzer tablets into water. Fizz!...If you want to find out how powerful the storm is, fly the plane into the eye of the storm!" Okay! The revelatory video is below:

A renovation of a grand Fifth Avenue apartment by a very creative architectual designer, Eric Clough, resulted in a scavenger-hunt puzzle being built into the place. The apartment—for a young family—was secretly outfitted by the designer with coded messages, scrolls, and and an original mystery book that gave clues. It was a magical game for the kids to solve—and the parents didn't even know it was being built into their house! Who was asked to be involved? And who turned it down? Why, Brooklyn novelist Jonathan Safran Foer.

Simon & Schuster is printing 350,000 copies of a book by Madonna's brother Christopher Ciccone, to be rushed onto store shelves next month before the singer's lawyers can sue to block publication. The book is said by the Post's sources to be "brutal" and "extremely graphic and devastating," which normally would sound like publisher hype, except in this case the tabloid seems to be in a catfight with Simon & Schuster over a spoiled exclusive so that seems doubtful. Once Madonna's rock of stability, Ciccone was estranged from the pop star around the time Madonna met husband Guy Richie, who doesn't like gays. Or maybe Ciccone just hates his sister so much that he wants people to think Richie hates gays, so Madonna's gay fans will jump ship (Richie has denied being homophobic). Whatever. The important thing is that the public will finally learn some intimate details about Madonna, poster child for discretion and underexposure. [Post]

Bookslut points out the latest trend for the covers of chick-lit books: girls with no heads. On one hand, we can understand obscuring the faces—it's less specific and makes the female protagonist easier to project oneself onto. (It's probably been focus-grouped to death.) On the other hand—they look weird when put all together in a gallery, don't they?

A book advance is no free lunch! Authors who actually sell lots of their books find that the promotion song-and-dance is eating up more of their time—and possibly, their dignity! When will they find time to write—instead of, say, appearing in a Bloomingdale's advert or making a cameo on a soap opera?

If you ever find yourself needing an official corporate quote from CBS, the man who'll give it to you is Gil Schwartz, the Tiffany Network's top flack. And no matter how you feel about their news anchor, you have to give CBS credit: they're the only major media company to have a top PR person who writes books under a pseudonym about how much corporate America sucks. Schwartz's pen name is "Stanley Bing," and he's been writing for decades (currently, for Fortune) about all the business world's bullshit. Bing's real identity was outed more than 20 years ago, but—more bonus points—the network didn't fire him. They gave him a promotion! So how is CBS' Executive Vice President of Communications spending his time these days? By advising the world on how to slack off at their jobs:

Time's Mark Halperin, the most singularly irritating and negatively influential "reporter" in politics today, got a "mid- to high- six-fugre sum" to write a book about the ongoing presidential campaign with New York's John Heilemann. Hey, Mark already wrote a book about the 2008 campaign! It was called The Way To Win and it was about how "The Way To Win" was to emulate Karl Rove and suck Matt Drudge's cock. That book was sooo prescient and successful—remember how well that strategy worked for Hillary Clinton? Hell, remember how well that strategy worked for Mark's book sales? [NYP]

At the time she was fired, HarperCollins CEO Jane Friedman was expected to post "strong fourth-quarter results... at the end of the month," according to the Observer. That only deepens the mystery as to why Friedman was fired — if not over bad numbers, then why? It does look like the book executive was pushed. She reportedly did not look distressed at an 11 am Wednesday meeting, just before News Corp. chief Rupert Murdoch told her she would be replaced by her deputy Brian Murray. She supposedly had no clue as to the purpose of her meeting with Murdoch, the sort of blindsiding one would expect in a firing. And Friedman's replacement, Murray, started acting tense when he got the news of his promotion two days prior, according to the Observer's sources — hardly the behavior expected of someone replacing a voluntarily-departing executive. The weekend prior, Friedman had been in high spirits at a HarperCollins party. So many things don't add up:

Remember the book that plays a major role between Carrie and Big in the Sex and the City movie, Love Letters of Great Men? It's not a real book! They just invented it for the movie. (Much to the dismay of booksellers—they're been swamped with requests.) [AP]

Book tours? So old media — or rather, not profitable enough for book publishers to conduct except for celebrity writers. Sarah Lacy, the author of Web 2.0 nonfiction chronicle Once You're Lucky, Twice You're Good, plans to defy that wisdom and go on a 10-city tour herself. She's already included her hometown of Memphis and the provincial burgs of Des Moines and Portland, and is asking for suggestions on the other cities — anywhere but New York, Los Angeles, and San Francisco. Our ideas:

This portrait of an ex-boyfriend of Jane Austen's is thought to be the man who inspired Pride and Prejudice's Mr. Darcy—the original Mr. Big. His name was Thomas Langlois Lefroy. (Is that a powdered wig in your pocket or are you just happy to see me?) Click to enlarge—the original portrait is only three inches. [Daily Mail]

It comes as no great surprise that not every single bit of unhinged essayist David Sedaris's essays are true. But they are mostly true, Sedaris says—enough to be filed under nonfiction at the bookstore, anyway. WRONG, says Barnes & Noble. "Apparently Barnes & Noble doesn't care what Mr. Sedaris thinks: an official chart distributed to publishers that shows sales figures for the week ending 06/23 defiantly has Mr. Sedaris's new book, When You Are Engulfed in Flames, listed under "Adult Fiction Hardcover." [NY Observer] If that wasn't bad enough, our lovely commenter tribalpottery chimes in to tell us the details of Sedaris's alleged cruise-y freakiness at a book reading:

The Wall Street Journal ran down the list of authors who have created YouTube videos to promote their books, and it turns out there's way more than enough writer videos to call it a trend! Video makers include Meg Cabot of Princess Diaries; Chuck Palahniuk of Fight Club; Naomi Klein of Shock Doctrine; Sherre Hirsch and Jen Lancaster. There are even companies that specialize in making these "book trailers." Is this a sad case of desperate scribblers whoring themselves out to an increasingly apathetic public? Probably! But it can be fun to watch!

"Red Rape is that rare sleazy pulp novel that actually lives up to its lurid cover illustration and alarmist subtitle (IT CAN HAPPEN HERE!) within the first two pages. It was a canny choice on the part of the publisher to use the popular - and in this case suggestive - civil defense rallying cry for the book's jacket slogan because it no doubt appealed to the patriotic and prurient interests of the anti-Communist pervs who purchased the book back in 1960. Indeed, the prolific author Connie Sellers* (who is a man) seems to have taken the subtitle as something of an editorial mandate and produced an 'anything goes' Soviet invasion fantasy that eclipses anything in John Milius's wildest RED DAWN wet dreams."

This week's award for most amusing disclosure goes to former Village Voice music critic and section editor (and DEAN OF AMERICAN ROCK CRITICS) Robert Christgau, reviewing a novel by former Ed Park. "I VOLUNTEERED TO REVIEW THIS novel by my former Village Voice co-worker Ed Park because I assumed the conflicts of interest would be so blatant they'd implode—a roman à clef, in which I myself might play a minor role, about the alt-weekly where I got fired the same day young Ed did." Sadly, everything is very fictionalized. Doesn't Ed get the point of these books? Score-settling, not literature! [NYO]

The creepy sexual compulsive has slept with 146 women (probably 147 by the time this post goes up)—and his layguide has been circulating the internet for a while. Now there's an e-book, for the low price of $39.95! (Looks like his proposal finally succeeded, sort of.) He describes himself on the promotional website for The Attraction Formula as a "legendary New York Playboy"—don't push your luck, Paul—and says he used to spend "many nights going to bed ALONE and waking up in an EMPTY bed. I felt DISCONNECTED from women and I didn't know what to do about it... So if you're not already VERY successful with women, it's NOT YOUR FAULT..." No, but the unintentionally hilarious table of contents definitely are his fault. (Example: "Case Study: I'm Not Ready to be Physical, Right Now.")

Wetlands, by Charlotte Roche, has sold over 680,000 copies and is "the only German book to top Amazon.com's global best-seller list. With her jaunty dissection of the sex life and the private grooming habits of the novel's 18-year-old narrator, Ms. Roche has turned the previously unspeakable into the national conversation in Germany." How dirty is it? "It is difficult to overstate the raunchiness of the novel, and hard to describe in a family newspaper," says the NYT, rather prissily. Well, then! We'll just have to guess. Is it about dirtsex?