It's a sad state of affairs when the entire book industry, plus major retailers like Barnes & Noble, can see only one ray of hope for the future: the next novel from Da Vinci Code author Dan Brown. Apparently, they don't have anything else going on (no one else writes books, obviously), because they are slavering like dogs in heat for the next sure-to-(possibly)-be bestseller. Just one big title can jolt the entire industry, the WSJ reports, "as customers pour into the stores and walk out with a bagful of titles." Since the fate of the world is clearly resting on Mr. Brown, he's receded into New Hampshire and refused to comment. His agent isn't speaking, either. Good for them!

Back in the 1990s, crime author Patricia Cornwell (of the Kay Scarpetta series) seduced Margo Bennett, an FBI agent. It sort of didn't work out: Bennett's husband, also an agent, planned a kidnapping and attempted murder in revenge. (Perhaps proving that most men are only into the film versions of lesbian affairs). Love's a bitch! Page Six details the hot action, as detailed by upcoming book Twisted Triangle.

Everybody knows that reading books is for loners and nerds. But has anybody actually scientifically documented this information? The findings of a very important study by data-miner/WikiScanner creator Virgil Griffith, Books That Make You Dumb, tell us exactly which books will impair your intelligence.

Author and Nobel laureate Doris Lessing thinks the current marketing climate for young authors is damaging—in fact, she feels "desperately sorry" for them. "Now what happens is that if you are a girl who's good-looking and has written even a passable book you can be earning enormous sums of money very quickly and are then sent on a promotional tour... there are people who can't write a second book because they are always on the telephone or having to do some TV thing." (It must be said: back in the day, Doris was a total babe!) To paraphrase Diane Keaton: if a young lady is good-looking, she won't have to spend as much time working on her "fucking personality!" Or her book. [Times of London]

Yesterday, we wondered about the surely awesome proposal that resulted in the two-day auction of the forthcoming book for I Can Has Cheezburger?, tentatively titled "Professor Happycat's Guide to Lolcats." Half an hour later, said proposal landed in our inbox. Thanks, publishing elves! "The world is going crazy for lolcats," it begins. "Lolcats are pictures of cats with funny captions. No, srsly." It gets better!

British novelist Joan Brady says that toxic fumes from the shoe factory next door made her crazy-so crazy that she wrote a crime thriller! She's won a settlement of £115,000, the Times of London reports. (God, that's such a good idea-especially for those of us living in Greenpoint). The solvent fumes numbed her hands and legs, and she couldn't concentrate on writing literary fiction. (In her defense, the health department registered an off-the-charts reading for toxins). Click for the oddly prescient excerpt.

The book version of I Can Haz Cheezburger was sold after a two-day auction, Galleycat reports. Boy, we'd love to know what that proposal looked like. Literary agent Kate McKean explains that they won't be simply "slapping some lolcats on the page for the book." No, it will clearly be much more sophisticated than that. [Galleycat]

Which version of Times rich lady beat reporter Alex Kuczynski's book, Beauty Junkies, would you rather buy? The original hardcover is subtitled, "Inside Our $15 Billion Obsession With Cosmetic Surgery." The newer, younger paperback version is called: "Beauty Junkies: In Search of the Thinnest Thighs, Perkiest Breasts, Smoothest Faces, Whitest Teeth, and Skinniest, Most Perfect Toes in America." Whoa. Maybe they're trying to shore up sales? After the jump, we play a little game of "Which cover is better?

Tinker, tailor, soldier, fabulist alert! The credibility of A Long Way Gone, the bestselling Farrar, Strauss and Giroux memoir from child soldier Ishmael Beah has been called into question by an Australian couple. It seems Beah may have spent a mere three months-not two years-kidnapped, drugged, running for his life, and watching his friends and entire family be raped and hacked to death. The outrage! Listen here, Ishmael, there will be no getting mixed up, we don't care how much brown-brown they made you take or how heavy your AK-47 was. Our rules about memoirs are very serious.

Brand-new author with a book coming out? Turns out your literary star may burn brighter than you think! Publishing houses have long been known to pay bookstore giants for prime sales floor positions for the titles they're putting their weight behind-that's nothing new. But it turns out chains like Barnes and Noble also employ some sort of secret algorithm based on an author's previous B&N sales to determine where a book gets stashed in the store. First-time authors aren't penalized for their blank track records-good news for all you eager beaver up-and-comers! But if your last book blew (we're looking at you, James Lipton) or if it happened to catch Times reviewer Michiko Kakutani on one of her many many cranky days, head back to the Self-Help section where you might find your Great American Novel wedged spine-in under Astrology. If you have knowledge of the secret code, let us know.

Speaking of old school, this weekend the Times featured an epic 2,000-word Alan Feuer profile of legendary Daily News reporter Jimmy Breslin who's got a book out and, who is, much to Feuer's surprise, still alive, kicking-and working! Gee whiz, good for him. Feuer may not be the most erm, precise reporter on the planet, but like any fabulist worth his salt, he's got a good grip on phrase-turning. "Mr. Breslin's growl is actually more of a squawk and not unlike how a pintail duck might sound if it smoked a pack a day through a kazoo," he writes. Of course, that line sounds like it's pulled straight from a Breslin column, but never let's mind that.

Like some weird flu, the cellphone-novel is tearing through China and Japan. "In this age, with a flood of information, I thought it was cruel to force readers to wrestle with a 200,000-word book," explains He Xingnian, author of Chinese cellphone novel Out of the Fortress. Well, it's not that hard to read a book, but whatever: each chapter is about 70 words long. Some elitists have called this phenomenon the "cheapening of literature." How dare they! After all, there's a chance that your cell contains most of a novel in text form already. ("He told me my hair looked pretty. What do you think that means?") [NYT]

"There's a great quote in the latest Philip Roth book (Exit Ghost)," Mayor Bloomberg announced during his State of the City Address. "'I came to New York,' the character says, 'and in only hours, New York did what it does to people — awakened the possibilities. Hope breaks out.'" But actually, as City Room points out, the book is pretty much not hopeful at all after that point, with the character leaving the city "more or less defeated." When asked if Mayor Bloomberg had actually read the book, his press secretary said he had not, but luckily, "he's read enough books to recognize a metaphor when he hears one... The Old Man and the Sea is not just about an old man and the sea." Looks like we've been schooled! [NYT City Room]

Jenny 8. Lee's forthcoming food-porny book, The Fortune Cookie Chronicles: now with excerpts!

Vladimir Nabokov, Russian author of Lolita, specifically asked for his remaining, uncompleted work to be burned after his death. Is that too much to ask? Apparently it is. Maybe we're old-fashioned, but the fact that neither his late wife nor his son followed through on his last wishes is nothing short of annoying. Son Dmitri has been playing a wishy-washy "maybe I will, maybe I won't" game with the press for years that is equally irritating and opportunistic.

Oh, if only Apple would release its own version of Amazon's Kindle, a lightweight book-reader with a high-definition screen, access to all the world's literature and the magic design sensibility of the company's founder, Steve Jobs. For anyone in publishing who hopes that technology, embodied by the Apple founder, can rescue the book, here's some bad news. "It doesn't matter how good or bad the product is, the fact is that people don't read anymore." [John Markoff via Galleycat]

Much like bloggers, Stalin "rewrote history, made anonymous accusations, hired and elevated hacks and phonies, ruined reputations at will, and airbrushed suddenly unwanted associates out of documents and photographs," explains New Republic editor Lee Siegel. And that's only one choice bit from the Times' review of his book, Against the Machine: Being Human in the Age of the Electronic Mob. For his part, Siegel refers to his praiseful anono-commenting on his very own essays as "my rollicking misadventures in the online world." Now that's re-writing history! (Click for the work of Siegel's former anonymous avatar, "Sprezzatura.")

The acknowledgments section of your book is not really the place to get all flowery and "express yourself." You thank your agent, the publisher you probably haven't met, your 'rents, and the friends who put up with your bitching over the last two years. If you're Times reporter Jennifer 8. Lee, however, and you've just written a book about the Chinese food diaspora called The Fortune Cookie Chronicles—well, the acknowledgments section might take on an overlong, strange life of its own. (Remember her totally adorable blog overshares?) In four pages of hugs and kisses, she probably thanks you! Excerpts, plus shots of the whole damn thing, follow.

It's kind of embarrassing when you're opening rejection letters one day and writing about twelve-year-olds successfully publishing self-help books the next. But that's life! Libby Rees, 12, is on her second book. (Her first, about coping with her parents' divorce, was published three years ago). It's called At Sixes and Sevens and is about "making the transition from primary to secondary school." In other words, it's about the sheer hell of starting high school, going from "being the biggest to the small fry." Note to young readers: this pattern will repeat itself throughout your lives. [Sydney Morning Herald]

The Church of Scientology has disseminated a detailed response to Andrew Morton's unauthorized biography of Tom Cruise, the Hollywood star and, according to Morton, the sect's number two in all but name. Let's look at the Scientologists' strongest contention. "For the last two years, the Church of Scientology requested to be interviewed or be presented with any allegations so we could respond. Morton refused despite our insistence in offering our cooperation. At no time did he request interviews nor did he attempt to get any information from us." True?