Poking Around the Records

CNET Reports on government atttempts to force Amazon to give up records.
Q&A: Amazon lawyer on feds' subpoena for 24,000 customer records
Posted by Declan McCullagh
Amazon.com won an important legal fight to preserve its customers' privacy by persuading a court to reject requests for 24,000 customer records made by federal prosecutors in Madison, Wis.

Documents in that case, in which the FBI and IRS are accusing an independent Amazon seller of skirting tax laws, came to light in the last week. But it's not the first time that police on a fishing expedition have demanded customer records from the Web's largest bookstore.

Book Cover Skin

Hmm, I wonder why this would have been done. And more than once. Yuck!

A 400-year-old book covered in a sheet of wrinkled human skin is going under the hammer in a bizarre auction.

It is thought the skin was cut from the corpse of one of Guy Fawkes' fellow conspirators in the Gunpowder Plot of 1605, an attempt to blow up the British Parliament in a bid to kill King James I.

And if you hold the novel in the right light, you might even see a ghostly face on the cover, it is claimed.

Called "A True and Perfect Relation of the Whole Proceedings Against the Late Most Barbarous Traitors, Garnet A Jesuit and His Confederates," it tells of the grisly end met by the Gunpowder Plotters. Fawkes prepared the explosives for the event and is remembered annually in the U.K. on Nov. 5 with fireworks.

It was published in 1606, just months after the Jesuit priest Henry Garnet was captured and executed for his part in the plan to blow up the Houses of Parliament.

The book's owner, who does not want to be identified, told Sky News he hopes it will go to a museum so that people can see it.

He believes that marks on the leather are evidence of torture, and says a Latin inscription on the cover which reads "severe penitence punished the flesh" was written to make sure people knew what had happened to the victim.

Sid Wilkinson, of Wilkinson's Auctioneers in Doncaster, said the ancient human skin feels smooth "and a little bit strange to the touch."

Several other books covered in dead people's skin are held in museums around the world.

'Kindle' Wins Praise

A must-read for book lovers?
By David Colker
Los Angeles Times Staff Writer
November 28, 2007
For more than a decade, inventors have tried to come up with a high-tech version of that most sacred of analog content delivery systems: the book.

The results have been gizmos only an uber-geek could love.

But finally, someone has come up with a version for humans. At least some humans.

Amazon.com last week unveiled the Kindle, a hand-held, rechargeable device that can store hundreds of books, newspapers and magazines to be accessed and read page by page on the go. You can even use it in the living room, curled up in your favorite reading chair.

The experience of looking at a page on the Kindle screen is more like seeing one in an actual book than gazing into the glare of a computer or cellphone display.

The device is slim, only slightly larger than a mass-market paperback, and can do things no book can do, including look up the definition of a word with a click of a couple of buttons.

Turkey Reviews

Turkey, a lovely country, continues to struggle with how Western it wants to be. Free speech regularly runs into problems. Several years ago, I spent a couple of weeks in Turkey and never have I had such a good time. The Turkish people were wonderful, friendly, kind, proud of their country yet not obnoxious. Except for when it came to discussing the Kurds and then every Turk I met had the nastiest things to say about them. As their government has changed hands, it will be worth seeing which way the people will go: more conservative, more Islamic, or continue on its Western path.

Turkish Prosecutor Probes Atheist Book

ANKARA, Turkey (AP) — A Turkish prosecutor has launched a probe into whether a book by best-selling atheist writer Richard Dawkins is an attack on religious values — a move that could lead to the prosecution of the book's Turkish publisher.

Publisher Erol Karaaslan said Wednesday he would be questioned by an Istanbul prosecutor on Thursday as part of the official investigation into Dawkins' book, "The God Delusion."

Karaaslan could face trial and up to one year in prison if the prosecutor concludes that the book "incites religious hatred" and insults religious values, Milliyet newspaper reported. Karaaslan is both the publisher and translator of the book.

The investigation of the British scientist's book comes at a time when Turkey has been criticized for targeting writers and intellectuals for expressing opinions. The European Union, which Turkey hopes to join, is pressing Ankara to change laws that curb free expression, calling them inconsistent with the bloc's free speech standards.

Turkey said this month it would soften a much-criticized law that makes denigrating Turkish identity, or insulting the country's institutions, a crime.

Big Advance for Book

Huge Advance for Book Being Co-Authored by Zaslow
By Dave Astor

NEW YORK Wall Street Journal writer and former syndicated columnist Jeff Zaslow will be co-authoring a book that Hyperion bought the rights to for the reported huge sum of $6.7 million.

The other co-author is Carnegie Mellon University professor Randy Pausch, who's terminally ill with pancreatic cancer. Pausch gave a humorous and poignant "Last Lecture" a couple months ago that Zaslow covered for the WSJ. The resulting column (accompanied by a video) was seen throughout the world via the Internet and helped turn Pausch into a celebrity.

'Ghost Map'

Author Steven Johnson takes us on a 10-minute tour of his 2006 book The Ghost Map, telling the story of a cholera outbreak in 1854 London, and the famous map that physician John Snow made of the disease's path -- a map that not only convinced the world that cholera was a waterborne illness, but ultimately brought about profound changes in science, cities and modern society.

Book Auction

National Book Auctions has scheduled its next auction for Sunday, December 2nd beginning at noon with preview starting at 10:00am. This auction will feature an important 1830s acorn press and other early printing equipment as well as early books and print history reference titles. This auction will include a range of antique books dating back to the 1600s, decorative antique gilt and leather bindings, fancy deluxe bindings, and decorator sets. The print history reference books cover topics including printing technique and development, print styles, printing equipment history. At our website, you will see some of the highlights of our upcoming events; the complete catalogs will be available at the auctions. See you sale day!

The auction will be open for a special highlight preview on Tuesday, November 27th from 4:00pm until 6:00pm. This preview will be followed by a panel discussion entitled, "You Should Write a Magazine Article", presented in partnership by National Book Auctions and the Tompkins County Chamber of Commerce. For more information and to register for the seminar, go to the following link:

https://secure.data3m2.com/tompkins/?t=112&ID=217&m=11&y=2007

Block That Book!

I don't know if this is a case of content censorship or favoritism to a local industry.

Store pulls children's book off shelves due to anti-seal hunt stance

ST. JOHN'S, N.L. - A Newfoundland author claims she is being censored after the province's largest local book distributor refused to stock her children's book because of its critical portrayal of the seal hunt.

Littleseal, written by Morgan Pumphrey, tells the tale of a harp seal pup born on the ice floes off northern Newfoundland.

During the first three weeks of his life, Littleseal survives encounters with an ecotourist and a hungry polar bear, as well as separation from its mother. But he's killed after a "blinding, crunching, thud" at the hands of a seal hunter wielding a hakapik.

Pumphrey, a longtime opponent of the hunt, said she was disappointed but not surprised when the Downhome Shoppe and Gallery, a well-known store in downtown St. John's that sells locally made crafts and products, refused to carry her self-published book.

"The way I see it, going against the seal hunt is like going against the cod fishery in Newfoundland," Pumphrey said Wednesday in an interview.

"It's a motherhood issue and I've got to expect 99.9 per cent of the population to be against me, and it looks like they are."

Seal hunters and the federal government vigorously defend the hunt as sustainable, humane and a vital source of income for fishermen in Atlantic Canada and Quebec. But animal rights groups have just as vigorously called for the hunt to be banned, arguing it is cruel and provides little economic benefit.

Grant Young, president of parent company Downhome Inc., said Pumphrey's book was rejected because it wouldn't suit its customer base.

"The seal industry needs a few people on its side," said Young, who comes from a family of seal hunters.

"We don't call it censoring so much as making a decision. Do we want a product that fits our retail mandate and our company mandate?"

Young said the book was refused also due to an anticipated lack of demand.

"It's not going to be a powerful piece of literature that we're going to hold back from society," he said.

Department Store Publishing

This is creepy--a department store creates a book and tries to draw kids in as lifelong shoppers.

Stores use lure of children’s literature

By Lauren Beckham Falcone

Since 1947, the holiday movie “Miracle on 34th Street” has helped build brand awareness for Macy’s. What can other department stores do to appeal to kids - who in a few short years will have charge cards of their own?

Pen a children’s book.

Both Nordstrom and Saks Fifth Avenue have introduced new holiday picture books that may make loyal consumers out of the kiddies. Neither department store appears within its own tales, but the cross promotion is dizzying.

Saks is the exclusive seller of “Snowpeople” (HarperCollins, $16.95), a 21-page picture book starring a bunch of snow folk who want to express their individuality through - wait for it - trendy clothes. The chain is also featuring the characters in its window displays, hand-painted ornament collection, greeting cards and more.

The Great Snowpeople Hunt - think of it as Where’s Waldo meets the Wicked Wealthy - challenges customers to count the hidden snowpeople in the Saks holiday catalog. Players who submit their guesses online or in-store are eligible to win a 21-day cruise to Antarctica.

Nordstrom’s “Once Upon a Holiday” (Chronicle Books, $16.95), which was written by Nordstrom copy editor Randy Schliep, features a little girl named Sophie, who teams up with a cow, an owl and the moon to save Christmas. The book is available at Nordstrom stores nationwide, and the art inspired the chain’s 2007 holiday decor.

Hmong and Publishing

After years of deep social problems, the Hmong are developing some serious culture in Minnesota

Renowned writer, lecture learns about Hmong arts in Minnesota
By Tom LaVenture

ST. PAUL (November 1, 2007) – The Hmong American Institute Learning (HAIL) has long been known for its support for emerging Hmong writers and poets through the Paj Ntaub Voice Quarterly Journal, and for Bamboo Among the Oaks, the first Anthology of Hmong American writers. The organization is about to undergo a major transformation to accommodate the growth and direction of a new vision and focus on visual and performing arts along with the writers and traditional cultural arts and crafts.

Dyane Garvey, Interim-Executive Director, HAIL, said the organization received a grant from LINC (Leveraging Investments in Creativity), a ten-year national initiative to improve conditions for artists in all disciplines to allow for more creative work. It was instrumental in helping HAIL do a turnaround last year with an art exhibition and strategic planning.

Dr. Rustom Homi Bharucha, a Regent’s Lecturer in the Department of World Arts and Cultures, University of University of California at Los Angeles; and the Department of South and Southeast Asia, University of California, Berkeley, was in the Twin Cities in part to learn more about HAIL as one of 12 LINC grant recipients, to see how the funding has impacted small ethnically diverse organizations in the areas of social transformation and change.

Cornwell Is Unhappy

Patricia Cornwell Asks if You Are a Real Fan

Happy Thanksgiving Dear Author Readers. I came across a special tribute by one Patricia Cornwell to all her fans and had to share it.

I saw on David J. Montgomery’s website a message from Patricia Cornwell making a call to her fans to contact everyone they know and strong arm them into leaving her positive feedback on etailers like Amazon and Barnes and Noble because apparently she cannot believe that the people who have left negative reviews actually dislike her work.

Montgomery is a crime fiction reviewer/critiquer/commentator who has written for Chicago Sun-Times, Washington Post, Philadelphia Inquirer and Boston Globe. He says that Cornwell’s latest effort, Book of the Dead, is “just dull, silly and pointless, with unappealing characters and run-of-the-mill lousy prose. Giving it a one-star review is generous.”

Apparently he is one of the cabal that is coordinated by “someone or a group of someones” to attack her through reviews.

We have reason to suspect that someone (or a group of someones) might be mobilizing people to attack me through Amazon and Barnes and Noble, etc., to hurt my sales and reputation.

Patricia Cornwell graciously provides instructions to the reading world at large on how to best counteract a nefarious conspiracy to discredit an author’s writing ability.

Taking Up Writing

Actor Kiel, who played Jaws, take new role

By Belinda Goldsmith

NEW YORK, Nov 22 (Reuters) - Actor Richard Kiel, best known for playing the steel-toothed villain Jaws in two James Bond movies, has taken on a new role - author.

Kiel, 68, has spent 25 years researching the life of Cassius Marcellus Clay, a white plantation owner and politician who fought for the abolition of slavery and after whom the boxer Muhammad Ali and his father were named.

It has culminated in the release of a book, "The True Story of Cassius Clay: Kentucky Lion," out this month, which Kiel co-authored with Pamela Wallace, the Oscar-winning co-writer of the movie "Witness."

Kiel said he became fascinated with Clay when he visited Kentucky 25 years ago and realized this forgotten American hero, who freed the slaves on his plantation, challenged stereotypes about the south and racism there.

"I hope to bring a fresh breeze of truth and positive feeling so people feel differently about the south and its people, not just because my wife comes from there but we need the truth to be free of this prejudice," he told Reuters.

"Here is a guy who put his life on the line and could not be stopped. It's a positive side of history that should told."

Notable Books at the Times

The New York Times posts its top 100 books of 2007.

Book Banned

It's a good idea to stay on top of book bannings, no?

Ontario School Board Bans Fantasy Book

BURLINGTON, Ontario (AP) — A Roman Catholic school board in Ontario ordered the popular fantasy book "The Golden Compass" taken off library shelves at dozens of schools Thursday after receiving a complaint about the author referring to himself as an atheist.

Similar concerns prompted a Catholic organization in the U.S. to urge parents to boycott a movie version of the book starring Nicole Kidman.

The board for Catholic schools in Ontario's Halton region said a complaint was lodged after British author Philip Pullman stated in an interview that he is an atheist.

"We have a policy and procedure whereby individual parents, staff, students or community members can apply to have material reviewed. That's what happened in this case," said Rick MacDonald, the board's superintendent of curriculum services.

The board, which oversees 43 Catholic elementary and secondary schools, has not released the identity of the complainant. It also removed two other books in Pullman's "Dark Materials" trilogy as a precaution.

While "The Golden Compass" was first published in 1995, attention was drawn to the book by the film, which opens next month, MacDonald said.

Pullman has made provocative statements in the past, telling the Washington Post in 2001 that he was "trying to undermine the basis of Christian belief."

Some Thoughts on Kindle

Amazon hopes Kindle will spark interest in e-books
By Tom Abate
San Francisco Chronicle
Taking its cue from Apple, Amazon.com has introduced a $399 device, called the Kindle, in the hopes of creating a market for electronic books, much as the iPod popularized paid music downloads.

Kindle premiered to Applesque hype, complete with adulatory broadcast interviews and fawning magazine articles quoting Amazon chief executive Jeff Bezos calling the gizmo, "the most important thing we've ever done."

But the long, sad history of e-books demands skepticism, even from favorable reviewers.

"This is probably the first e-book reader that's worthy of criticism," quipped Michael Gartenberg, a consumer technology expert for Jupiter Research. He thinks the Kindle, although not perfect, has better visuals and wireless access, which make it "potentially a game changer."

Erik Wilde, a computer scientist and electronic publishing expert at UC Berkeley, said the Kindle has some advantages over competing gadgets - the $299 Sony Reader lacks wireless downloads, for instance. But Wilde said the Kindle does not allow readers to clip a passage and e-mail it to a friend - a feature that would give it a capability that no paper book ever had.

Kindle has arrived. Long live the book!
Beverly Sullivan
I’ve been a bookworm for as long as I can remember. My shelves at home are groaning under the weight of books that go back to my early reading days. They’re starting to stack up on the floor too. I have a ‘to read’ stack, a ‘must re-read stack’, a ‘recently read’ stack and several random stacks.

So ‘Kindle’ should be the answer to my prayers, and save me from having to move house within the next year or so too.

Amazon’s new ‘ipod of reading’ is an amazing idea.

Amazon electronic book offers new opportunities
Sam Ingleby
Amazon’s founder Jeffrey Bezos was on stage in New York this week announcing the imminent release in the US of what he hopes will be the new ‘killer’ handheld device: an electronic book-reading console called Kindle.

Whilst not as aesthetically pleasing as the iphone, Kindle is still an intriguing proposition: long and slim, with electronic ink that mimics the appearance of paper - if not the feel - and with a back lighting facility that allows you to read in any light, Bezos believes its introduction could herald a step change in our consumption of books and newspapers. Retailing at about £200, users will be able to download books over a wireless connection accessing the extensive Amazon back catalogue of over 90,000 titles for about £2.50 a throw.

Thoughts on Kindle
Don Park
I think the e-book technology as well as the market are still not mature enough to address the needs of the general consumer market. Five years is my best guess on when everything will come together.

However, there are market segments which are not only ready but in severe need of e-book. One good example is the K12 market. Kids today have to carry insanely heavy textbooks to school everyday. And those textbooks are too expensive and often too scarce for parents to buy second set of every semester. That's the market ready to pay hundreds of dollars for an e-textbook device and services. That's also a great market to foster user-created content community: notes, tests, translations, tips, and lessons created, shared, and sold to teachers, tutors, and parents. Feynmen Lectures? Think Super-Mom's Easy Geometry slideshows or Don Park's How to Speak Konglish video.

Worst Book Titles

World’s Worst Book Title winner
By Phil Kloer
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Well, folks, we had a squeaker in the vote for World’s Worst Book Title ever. But the Supreme Court was called in for an emergency ruling, and by a 5-4 vote they declared George Bush to be the winner.

No, wait. Wrong vote. The winner was “Cooking With Pooh,” which is a real book from Disney. It barely beat out “Letting It Go: a History of American Incontinence,” “The Stray Shopping Carts of Eastern North America: A Guide to Field Identification” (which I think maybe some people did not realize is also a real book) and “Everything You’ll Need to Remember About Alzheimer’s.”

Writers Guild

From the striking WGA, 'A World Without Writers'

Author Trudeau in Trouble

Court finds 'Natural Cures' author Trudeau in contempt

WASHINGTON – Best-selling author Kevin Trudeau violated a 2004 court order by making “patently false” claims in one of his books about a weight-loss regimen, a federal court said in a ruling released Monday.
The ruling found Trudeau in contempt of a 2004 court order that barred him from using infomercials to sell any product or service other than books and required that he not misrepresent the content of those books.

Book Notes

In India: Help for the visually impaired:


Guwahati: For visually disabled persons in the northeastern States, listening to books in English or in the regional languages by a writer of their choice that would be read aloud in a Talking Book Library may be a dream that will come true soon, courtesy the National Federation of the Blind (NFB).

A Talking Book Library equipped with a compact disk recording studio is one of the three projects identified by the NFB aimed to make the learning process easier for visually disabled persons of the region and to provide them skill development training to ensure gainful employment.


And a librarian tells his story

Fixing Your Books

There's an interesting article on Wikihow, explaining how to repair a book's binding. I confess, it never occurred to me to try.

Amazon's Newest Idea

Newsweek looks at Amazon's latest ideas about delivering books.

Nothing will replace the joy of holding a book in your hands but that doesn't mean there aren't other ways of delivering stories.

The Future of Reading

Amazon's Jeff Bezos already built a better bookstore. Now he believes he can improve upon one of humankind's most divine creations: the book itself.

Where Reading Is Regular

Imagine! A place where people like to read!

In the Valley of the Literate

...The Pioneer Valley is arguably the most author-saturated, book-cherishing, literature-celebrating place in the nation. Popular leisure outings here include browsing a dusty used bookstore, taking in an art book show, attending a workshop in bookbinding or letterpress printing, or chatting with an author (while buying a signed first edition of his work) at a public reading.

“That’s what we do for fun,” said Bonnie Isman, director of the Jones Library. “It’s part of life here.” While the library has several author readings each month, the independent bookstores of the area are adding still more, she said.

Smart Words About Dictionaries

TED.com--Technology, Entertainment, Design--is one of my favorite sites because of the intelligence of its conference speakers.
And look who turned up--Erin McKean!

The Power of Poetry

This is pretty funny: poetry as presidential politics statement.
There are, of course, both pro and anti-Bush; I've chosen the latter.
"Make the Pie Higher"

I think we all agree, the past is over.

This is still a dangerous world.

It's a world of madmen

And uncertainty

And potential mental losses.

Rarely is the question asked

Is our children learning?

Will the highways of the internet

Become more few?

How many hands have I shaked?

They misunderestimate me.

I am a pitbull on the pantleg of opportunity.

I know that the human being and the fish

Can coexist.

Families is where our nation finds hope

Where our wings take dream.

Put food on your family!

Knock down the tollbooth!

Vulcanize society!

Make the pie higher!

Make the pie higher!


Snopes.com has successfully traced all of the lines back to Bush except the "pitbull on the pantleg of opportunity," which remains, thankfully, elusive

Standing Up

So, a "handler" for Sean Hannity didn't like what a guy in the crowd said, so he tried to have him arrested?? From Daily Kos. Here's one suggestion on how the Book Revue store--an excellent establishment, by the way--could respond in the future.

Follett's $50 Million

Holy cow, that's a lot of money--$50 million for author Ken Follett's works.

Mailer Roundup

Over at the BookCritics Circle is a nice roundup of Norman Mailer obits.

Swiftboaters' Low Profits

Conservative Authors Sue Publisher
By MOTOKO RICH
New York Times
Five authors have sued the parent company of Regnery Publishing, a Washington imprint of conservative books, charging that the company deprives its writers of royalties by selling their books at a steep discount to book clubs and other organizations owned by the same parent company.

In a suit filed in United States District Court in Washington yesterday, the authors Jerome R. Corsi, Bill Gertz, Lt. Col. Robert (Buzz) Patterson, Joel Mowbray and Richard Miniter state that Eagle Publishing, which owns Regnery, “orchestrates and participates in a fraudulent, deceptively concealed and self-dealing scheme to divert book sales away from retail outlets and to wholly owned subsidiary organizations within the Eagle conglomerate.”

Some of the authors’ books have appeared on the New York Times best-seller list, including “Unfit for Command: Swift Boat Veterans Speak Out Against John Kerry,” by Mr. Corsi and John E. O’Neill (who is not a plaintiff in the suit), Mr. Patterson’s “Dereliction of Duty: The Eyewitness Account of How Bill Clinton Compromised America’s National Security” and Mr. Miniter’s “Shadow War: The Untold Story of How Bush Is Winning the War on Terror.” In the lawsuit the authors say that Eagle sells or gives away copies of their books to book clubs, newsletters and other organizations owned by Eagle “to avoid or substantially reduce royalty payments to authors.”

The authors argue that in reducing royalty payments, the publisher is maximizing its profits and the profits of its parent company at their expense.

“They’ve structured their business essentially as a scam and are defrauding their writers,” Mr. Miniter said in an interview, “causing a tremendous rift inside the conservative community.”

Traditionally, authors receive a 15 percent royalty based on the cover price of a hardcover title after they have sold enough copies to cover the cost of the advance they receive upon signing a contract with a publisher. (Authors whose books are sold at steep discounts or to companies that handle remaindered copies receive lower royalties.)

In Regnery’s case, according to the lawsuit, the publisher sells books to sister companies, including the Conservative Book Club, which then sells the books to members at discounted prices, “at, below or only marginally above its own cost of publication.” In the lawsuit the authors say they receive “little or no royalty” on these sales because their contracts specify that the publisher pays only 10 percent of the amount received by the publisher, minus costs — as opposed to 15 percent of the cover price — for the book.

Mark York has more.

Prize Winner

Elizabeth Hay Wins $40, 000 Book Prize
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
TORONTO (AP) -- Elizabeth Hay, a former radio journalist who long hoped to write a novel about her ''golden summer'' working in northern Canada in the 1970s, won the lucrative Scotiabank Giller Prize for her novel ''Late Nights on Air.''

''I am very thrilled and very lucky -- so lucky in fact that I'll probably be hit by a truck tomorrow,'' Hay joked as she accepted the $40,000 prize. ''It's important that I say my thank-yous now.''

The Giller Prize is considered one of the most prestigious in Canadian literature. Past winners have included such stars as Margaret Atwood, Mordecai Richler, Michael Ondaatje and Alice Munro.

Young Author Tops the List

Young Author Strikes It Rich
BEIJING, Nov. 7 -- Young Chinese author Guo Jingming earns more than any other writers in China, according to the latest list of writer millionaires.

The annual list, which triggers controversy every year among both authors and readers, is based on interviews with major bookstores and publishers throughout the country. The 24-year-old Guo tops this year's list with 11 million yuan (US$1.48 million) in copyright royalties.

Guo's latest novel, "The River of Sorrow," hit shelves in April and sold a record high of one million copies in the first two weeks.

Book Swap

The folks at Paperbackswap.com are going to be expanding their offerings to include DVDs, possibly by the end of the year. This is a wonderful site for readers who don't want to spend a fortune. Check it out.
How it works: Book swaps aren't limited to paperbacks. Members order books from each other--members ship at their expense but then get a credit, which can then be used to purchase books from another member.

Toni Morrison

Lots and LOTS of Reviews

Over at Metafilter, readers are debating the talent and ethics of Harriet Klausner, Amazon's top-ranked reviewer.

Helen Steiner Rice