From the mailbag: "HarperCollins is estimating that Jessica Seinfeld's book [about tricking kids into eating healthy by pureeing their veggies] Deceptively Delicious has sold ~125,000 in its first week on sale. This week's sign of the apocalypse: that a woman with no discernible talent other than dumping her fiance when a richer guy comes along has just had what's arguably the nonfiction debut of the year. There's something like another 250K on order."
A buzzword is no black swan, but when one breaks out of the long tail into the short head and hits the tipping point it still makes me question the wisdom of the crowds. But because the world is flat, I've listed a freakonomical list of the lifespan of a buzzword. Purple cow.
Ooh, the National Book Awards finalist list is out. Congratulations to Farrar, Straus & Giroux, who scored with three of the five nominees for fiction (the heavenly Lydia Davis, Mischa Berlinski, and the great Denis Johnson). Who says FSG is washed up and out of touch? We are shocked to report that Christopher Hitchens is in the running for nonfiction for his stunt book "God Is Not Great: How Religion Poisons Everything." [National Book Foundation]
One of the things about being a stay-at-home writer is that you have perhaps a little bit too much time to peruse and write blogs! We were reminded of this by chick lit author Jennifer Weiner's rant in the comments of the Times' 'Paper Cuts' blog, which she continued on over at her own blog 'Snark Spot' (really). She has a bone to pick with an author who'd yearningly mentioned her books' consistent presence on bookstore shelves. "Be careful what you wish for, oh shelfmate o' mine! If you wrote chick lit—provided it was any good—you would indeed find your books on the shelf of most every store. But your books would not be reviewed twice by the Times."
"Who you know is everything in the media biz. Second in importance is letting others know you know. Name-dropping is an art form that can take years to perfect... if the person is truly famous, never overtly say that you know them, you've spoken to them, or they're a friend. Instead, gracefully weave in a mention of something they said." That's from the Gawker Guide To Conquering All Media, out now from Atria Books! And you know, coincidentally, that is just what Maer always says! He was there! Nikola Tamindzic recorded the moments for whatever sick posterity might want it.
"The trick is drawing the kind of readers, and enough of them, to one's newspaper that advertisers (especially high-rollers) desperately want to reach," Philadelphia Inquirer book critic Carlin Romano patiently explains. "[USA Today, the Wall Street Journal, the New York Times, the Los Angeles Times, and the Washington Post] understand that book coverage, like all coverage of what smart, successful sorts do, draws society's most highly educated, likely-to-buy readers, a group that also skews wealthy. Having corralled those readers, the Times and Journal preeminently, and the others to a lesser degree, get Lexus and BMW and all sorts of nonpublishers to take ads." Right, that's what attracts those advertisers! Good thinking, Carlin. Maybe you should stick to writing book reviews... while you still can. [PI]
Penguin is actually suing to get its advance back from biographer David Brinkley, which publishers almost never do. Ballsy! Brinkley was meant to deliver his manuscript about the life of crappy-writer idol Jack Kerouac way back in 2001, and he says he missed his deadline because he was being painstaking: "I'd rather take my time because the material is so great." Uh huh. Dog, homework. [NYS]
Legendary ladybook publishing company Harlequin is doing its darnedest not to be upstaged by online erotica, Zane ("Gettin' Buck Wild: The Sex Chronicles 2"!), and about eleven million other publishing trends that seem destined to put the Canadian company into a fatal swoon eventually. Their latest sally: A website, HarlequinRomanceReport.com, where readers are encouraged to anonymously post their dirtiest fantasies! It's like PostSecret without all the ones about molestation.
Ancient literary curmudgeon Norman Mailer is biting less-ancient literary curmudgeon Christopher Hitchens' styles and writing a book about God. Called On God. In it, "he finds fault with the Ten
Commandments—because adultery, he avers, may be a lesser evil than others suffered in a bad marriage." Okay, Norm, you can still get it up, we get it. [Publishers Lunch sub only]
Today's piece in the Observer is essentially about how agent Eric Simonoff tried to make it seem like publishers were clamoring to buy the James Frey novel—while really they were just vaguely curious to see whether it was any good. It closes with a quote from the man who got an exclusive on the project and bought it for a still-undisclosed but apparently large amount of money: Harper publisher Jonathan Burnham. "The point is he's written a great novel, and by summer of 2008 people will be able to approach James Frey with a clearer mind. Time will have passed." Well, of course he'd like to think so. Does anyone else?
The New York Times Book Review is expanding its bestseller lists as of next week; now there'll be 110 bestsellers all told. Paperback listings will be broken out into mass market and trade paperback categories. The expansion comes at the cost of an editorial page. Why the change? "'It's completely ad driven,' says a top executive at one of the major houses. 'People want to buy a position next to the lists.' Publishers are also more likely to buy ads—whether in the weekday books pages of the Times or in the Book Review—when their titles are New York Times best sellers." [New York Business]
"We're really into co-parenting," New York magazine "Breeding" columnist and author Amy Sohn said. "I mean, we only have a part-time nanny." The assembled crowd nodded sympathetically and shifted in their folding chairs, especially the children, who were beginning to get restless. They'd liked it better when Neal Pollack had been reading from his parenting memoir Alternadad a bit earlier. He'd used the word "shit" a lot, prompting a four-year-old girl in the second row to shoot me a way too knowing glance. Clearly, we were at the Brooklyn Book Festival.
So author and daddyblogger Steve Almond's new collection of mostly previously published essays, Not That You Asked: Rants, Exploits and Obsessions, doesn't just contain a deranged yet oddly bet-hedgey open letter to Oprah. It also contains secret wisdom that will change America, reopening our eyes to the pleasures of literature and eliminating our dependence on lowbrow culture! And maybe curing AIDS and solving poverty! At least, that's what Steve seemed to be implying in the thank-you note he sent to the Random House staff who worked to publicize his book.
Shameless promotion for people we like alert! U.S.C. professor (and our Celebrity Theory 101 author) Elizabeth Currid's first book, The Warhol Economy: How Fashion, Art and Music Drive New York City, is available now from Princeton University Press. We read it and really enjoyed it (except for some of the charts and data in the back, because numbers scare us), but don't take our word for it: The Economist, the Village Voice, Bloomberg, and a host of others are all buzzing about it. You can learn more about the book here.
