Hedes & Dekes: Author J.D Salinger Dies

The Washington Post has reported that one of the great American writers, J.D Salinger, has passed away. He was 91. [Washington Post]

--Uptown Literati

Hedes & Dekes: Battle For Camus' Grave, iPad Inks Deal with Publishers

One of France's most beloved writers, Albert Camus, died in a car crash 50 years ago this month. However, the issue of where his final resting place should be has sparked debate between French president Nicolas Sarkozy and a tiny village in Lourmain, where Camus lived until the time of his death. NPR breaks down the controversy as France commemorates one of it's literary and philosophical heroes. [NPR]


In other literary news: Apple's new iPad offers book publishers a deal to compete with Amazon's monopoly on the e-reading industry. Random House appears to be the only holdout. [NYT]

Hedes + Dekes: E. Lynn Harris Left 7 Unpublished Manuscripts

The latest in the death of prolific novelist E. Lynn Harris' sudden death comes from Essence.com:

Seven unpublished manuscripts written by the late groundbreaking author E. Lynn Harris have been recovered from his computer's hard drive, according attorney Dermot Givens, who's the lawyer for Mrs. Etta Williams Harris, the late author's mother and sole heir. Computer forensic experts were able to locate and open password-protected files that were found on Mr. Harris's personal laptop. Mama Dearest, the novel Harris was working to release at the time of his death, hit bookshelves in late September 2009.

Thanks to Erica Kennedy for forwarding the link via Twitter.

--Whitney Teal

Hedes + Dekes: 'Sex & the City' Scribe Launches 'Broadroom'

Candace Bushnell, that sassy chick lit author who is responsible for the ladies of "Sex & the City" and "Lipstick Jungle," is back at it with her Web show, "Broadroom."

[The cheeky broad herself, Candace Bushnell]

We can tell from the cheeky title that it will probably discuss women in the corporate America. But we're just guessing. MediaBistro's FishbowlNY blog covered the launch of the show on Maybelline.com, which was star-studded.

We were at the premiere at Fred's, the eatery inside Barney's flasgship where Bushnell and the stars of the show, Jennie Garth ("Beverly Hills, 90210"), Jennifer Esposito ("Samantha Who?"), Talia Balsam ("Mad Men"), among others, were all expertly working the red carpet.

After about 45 minutes of meeting and greeting, MORE editor Lesley Jane Seymour took to the podium to welcome everyone and introduce Bushnell. The lady of the hour thanked the various corporate marketing departments that brought "Broadroom" into being: MORE magazine, its parent company the Meredith Corp. and Maybelline. A quick thanks to Ellen Gittelsohn, the shows director, her agent and the cast, and then viewing commenced.

Watch the show on Maybelline.com.

--Whitney Teal

Check back for more smart chick lit coverage when "The Chick Lit Chick" column debuts next week.

Hedes & Dekes: Early 20th Century Spy Records Up For Viewing

British spy and art historian Anthony Blunt wrote a 30,000-word memoir during his time as a spy for the Soviet Union between sometime in the 1930s to the early 1950s. Last week, after keeping the memoir sealed in a steel container for twenty-five years, the British Library has made the document public, reports The New York Times.

The memoir does not really reveal much new information about Blunt’s work or espionage, but it does offer some perspective on his opinions of what he was doing. Most notably, it is nearly completely unapologetic for any harm his spying may have caused.

Following Blunt’s death in 1983, the executor of Blunt’s will deposited the memoir with the library on the condition that the document, which Blunt had intended as a testament to family and friends, be kept secret for twenty-five years. Those twenty-five years are up, and the document is finally available to the public.

It’ll be interesting to see who is first to snatch up publishing rights.
--Rachel Frier

Photo: The New York Times

Hedes & Dekes: Literary Legacy of Frank McCourt

Frank McCourt, author of Angela’s Ashes, has passed away at the age of 78. In a New York hospice on Sunday, July 19, McCourt died of meningitis. He is survived by his third wife Ellen Frey, daughter Margaret McCourt, and brothers Malachy, Michael, and Alphie McCourt.

The schoolteacher-turned-memoirist was born in New York, but had spent most of his childhood in his parents’ native Limerick, Ireland. It is there that Angela’s Ashes, the story of his childhood, takes place.

McCourt had become a devoted reader at the age of ten, when he was hospitalized for three months with typhoid. In the comfort of the well-heated hospital with its well-stocked library—a far cry from the impoverished conditions he was used to at home—the young McCourt read his first lines of Shakespeare, and was hooked.

As an adult, McCourt turned his passion for reading into a profession, and spent thirty years as a teacher of English. Though he dabbled in writing, he didn’t have much success until later in life, when Angela’s Ashes was published when he was 66. All he had wanted was to have a library of Congress catalogue number, but the book became a runaway bestseller and then won the Pulitzer, bringing McCourt fame he had never dreamed of. He went on to publish two more volumes of memoir, but neither received the acclaim of Angela’s Ashes. [Via Time]

--Rachel Frier

Photo: Time

Hedes & Dekes: Piece of Literary Landscape For Sale

The location rumored to have been the inspiration for Virginia Woolf’s novel To the Lighthouse is about to go up for sale. As a child, Woolf spent many summers in a guest house at Upton Towans beach in Gwithian, from which the lighthouse on nearby Godrevy Island is clearly visible.

The novel, long considered an exemplum of modernist fiction, is set in Hebrides rather than Cornwall, but features many of the same geographical landmarks as the Upton Towans beach, including the seashore, gardens leading to the sea, and of course the lighthouse.

Bids for the beach are expected to begin at about £50,000, and proceeds from the sale will go to Truro’s Hall for Cornwall theatre. It has been reported that buyers in both the U.S. and China are interested in the Cornish beach. [Via BBC News]

The nearby lighthouse had been slated for closure, but was saved by public outcry in 2005. [Via BBC News]

--Rachel Frier

Photo: BBC News

Lifestyle Gumbo: MJ's Expansive Book Collection + MJ Books Sells Quickly

Say what you will about Michael Jackson—the man was well read. Apparently he was not only an avid reader, but had amassed a collection of 10,000 volumes in his library at Neverland Ranch. [Via Seattle PI]

Perhaps it’s only appropriate, then, that a book commemorating the King of Pop’s more recent life and career is published more quickly than any other. Simon & Schuster Publishers has released today a 500,000-copy run of Ian Halperin’s Unmasked: The Final Years of Michael Jackson. The unauthorized biography was due to be released in honor of the 50th-anniversary comeback tour, but its publication date was rushed forward. [Via Canada.com]

Montreal publisher Pierre Turgeon says that in his many years in the book business he's never seen anything like the turnaround time of this biography. The publishers attribute the quick turnaround to their strong production team, efficient use of technology, and cooperation from suppliers. [Via Publisher's Weekly]

--Rachel Frier

Photo: Fan Pop

Hedes & Dekes: Kindle Action

A recent article from Slate makes note of the Kindle’s role in changing the state of the publishing industry. Marion Maneker explains: with the introduction of the Kindle 2, Amazon’s founder and CEO Jeff Bezos announced that electronic books sales have nearly tripled. [Via The Big Money]

But the Kindle isn’t the only component in the changing landscape of publishing. More and more texts are being offered for free, and many authors are taking the initiative to publish their own texts online for free. A year ago, Tor reported an increase in sales for readers offering free copies of their books. [Via Bloggasm]

Of course, this is not a new concept. “Information radicals,” Cory Doctorow and Charles Stross among them, have long been promoting Creative Commons licenses, allowing readers to download, reprint, and otherwise share their published materials. [Via Forbes] The Ja(y)ne bloggers at Dear Author have been making the same claim for years as well. However, most major publishing companies have been hesitant to make such a move before now.

But slowly, the tide is turning, and more and more free e-books are becoming available across the Web. So where are all these free books? And are they even worth reading? The answer to the latter question is a resounding Of course! The answer to the former is: just look around the ’Net.

Publishers
· Harlequin is offering some books for free. Check out Rachel Vincent’s My Soul to Lose.
· Jelly Ink Press follows Creative Commons licensing. Check out Kelly Link’s Magic for Beginners.
· Samhain Publishing offers a number of free short stories for download.

Self-Published e-Texts
· Cory Doctorow’s Little Brother
· T.A. Pratt’s Bone Shop
· Catherynne M. Valente’s The Girl Who Circumnavigated Fairyland in a Ship of Her Own Making
· Tim Bete’s Guide to Pirate Parenting
· Michele Albert’s Absolute Trouble (previously out of print)

Still at a loss? Check out the Finding Free e-Books blog [Via Finding Free e-Books or Booklorn’s Free Reading series [Via Booklorn].



--Rachel Frier

Hedes & Dekes: T.S Eliot's Birthday Bash!

To celebrate the 86th birthday of T.S. Eliot’s poem “The Waste Land,” one of the 20th century’s most revolutionizing poems, a contingent of England’s foremost literary voices gathered to read segments of the poem aloud.

Making a rare public appearance was Valerie Eliot, T.S. Eliot’s second wife and widow, who was 37 years his junior and who accompanied him on many of his literary ventures. Said Mrs. Eliot, “It was marvelous to hear Tom’s poems and to have them read so well.”

The event was organized by Josephine Hart, known for pioneering public poetry readings at the British Library. Part of the T.S. Eliot International Summer School, readers included Nobel Laureate Seamus Heaney, actor Jeremy Irons, "The Wire’s" Dominic West, and actress Anna Cartaret.

Check out the photo, which shows the impressive line-up at this historical event! [Via This is London]

--Rachel Frier

Photo: This is London

Hedes & Dekes: New Zealand School Offers Bribes for Books

A New Zealand boys’ school is taking drastic steps to get boys to read more: bribery. Rongotai College in Wellington offers boys a can of soda if they can prove they’ve read two books, a voucher from Subway for five books, and a movie voucher for ten books. The dedicated few who are able to read twenty books get a mobile phone voucher.

No mention of the quality of the reading students must do in order to receive their prizes. Is Captain Underpants and the Perilous Plot of Professor Poopy Pants rated as highly in this program as The Odyssey? Also, the math seems a bit odd: two books for a can of soda, and twenty books for cell phone minutes? Perhaps the program will yield a side study of what incentives are really important to kids these days.

The school claims that the program is effective, and says that the number of books borrowed from the library has doubled since its inception. Yet to be seen, though, is whether these students are forming life-long habits, or are learning that reading is only worth doing if there’s a prize attached. [Via The Guardian]

--Rachel Frier

Photo: Panoramio

Hedes & Dekes: Literary Awards Around the World

Neil Gaiman's young adult novel The Graveyard Book has been shortlisted for the 2009 British Fantasy Award. (One has to feel some sympathy for the other nominees—being up against Neil Gaiman, whose most recent novel has already received the coveted Newbery award and others, must be pretty daunting.) [Via McNally Robinson]

As we wait for the winner to be announced at the British Fantasy Convention, to be held September 18-20 in Nottingham, U.K., it seems only right to celebrate some other recent wins.

· On June 16, East German authors Erich Loest, Monika Maron, and Uwe Tellkamp received the prestigious German National Prize award. The German National Foundation said the writers "represented three generations symbolizing, personally and with their literary works, the multiple fractures in German history." [Via DW World]

· On June 17, at a ceremony at St. Anne’s College in Oxford, Kathy Rooney, the managing director of Bloomsbury Publishing, was awarded the £3,000 Kim Scott Walwyn Prize in recognition of her professional achievements in publishing. [Via Guardian UK]

· Last week, Toronto writer Pasha Malla won the $20,000 Trillium Book Award for his book of short stories The Withdrawal Method, and Jeramy Dodds of Orono, Ont., won the $10,000 poetry prize for his collection Crabwise to the Hounds. Dodds was also a nominee for the Griffin Poetry Prize, awarded earlier this month. [Via The Chronicle Herald]

· Also last week, Glasgow author James Kelman, a former Booker Prize winner, won the £30,000 Scottish Book Award for his novel Kieron Smith, Boy, a story chronicling the life of a young boy in post-war Glasgow.[Via BBC]

--Rachel Frier

Photo Graveyard Book: The Graveyard Book; Photo Kim Scott Walwyn: Book Trust UK

Hedes & Dekes: University Presses vs. E-publishing. The Battle Wages On

Last week, an AP article seemed to suggest that university presses are about to go the way of the Titanic. The article’s grim assessment of the situation faced by Louisiana State University Press, among others, would make it seem that all such presses have become great dark financial voids, sucking in money without returning revenue. As publishers worldwide brace against impending doom, fearing replacement by e-publishers and other upstarts, LSU Press’s example seems a veritable Thánatos.

However, Jennifer Howard at the Chronicle of Higher Education suggests that it may not be quite so. Reporting from the annual meeting of the Association of American University Presses, Howard has a more optimistic outlook: “The meeting, which ended Sunday, was more a study in resilience and adaptiveness than it was a death watch.” Presses are looking for new ways to function, and making chances to help ensure their survival. The financial situation facing university presses is still far from ideal, but they’re not going down without a fight. Let’s hope they can set an example for the rest of the publishing world. [Via Chronicle of Higher Education]


--Rachel Frier

Photo: Google

Hedes & Dekes: Simon & Schuster Embrace the Digital Era of Books

Facing significant changes in the publishing industry, in conjunction with the recent economic downturn, Simon & Schuster publishers have been trying a number of new and different marketing techniques to try to get their books in the hands—or on the screens—of more readers. On Monday, the publishing company announced its new partnership with Scribd.com, through which it will sell more than 5,000 titles as e-books, making these texts available on computer screens, e-readers, and some mobile devices.

Says Trip Adler, Scribd CEO and co-founder: “We’re thrilled to offer our users a one-stop solution for discovering, sharing and buying written works of all kinds, including bestselling books by one of the world's top publishers.”

The new partnership will make available in e-text version such titles as Angels and Demons, by Dan Brown; The Other Boleyn Girl, by Philippa Gregory; Born Standing Up, by Steve Martin; and Pulitzer Prize-winning Angela’s Ashes, by Frank McCourt.[Via Scribd]

--Rachel Frier

Photo: screen shot from Scribd

Hedes & Dekes: Rare Manuscripts of Latin Text Re-discovered

On the recent death of his father, Joseph Sisto led the FBI to his father’s home to inspect his estate. Seem odd? Sisto knew that his father’s collection housed more than 1,600 rare manuscripts, and that most of these manuscripts had originally been stolen. (His father had paid for them, but they had once been pilfered from Italy and elsewhere in Europe.) The FBI will be working with the manuscripts’ country of origin to try to have these national treasures returned to their rightful owners.

But the discovery has significant implications for literary historians and museum curators around the world. Many of these manuscripts are the only exact copy of their text, and reside only within this collection. The items in Sisto’s collection will likely help to complete other collections in other museums. Also, Sisto’s translation work will prove invaluable to those interested in learning more about the content of these manuscripts – John Sisto (Joseph’s father) learned Latin in order to translate many of the text, and had worked through approximately 1,100 translations at the time of his death. [Via NPR]

-Rachel Frier

Photo by M. Spencer Green

Hedes & Dekes: Nancy Drew is the Common Denominator

What do Sandra Day O’Connor, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, and Sonia Sotomayor all have in common? Mary Jo Murphy at The New York Times explains that aside from being female Supreme Court justices (Sotomayor’s nomination still pending approval), they all have a deep love for Nancy Drew, the famous girl detective.

Certainly not all of us who were charmed by Nancy Drew when we were younger will grow up to one day serve in the justice system. But there’s got to be something about Nancy’s can-do attitude that makes her stories into motivational tales for young women, piquing their curiosity while at the same time teaching them that they can do anything they set their minds to.

Nancy never backed down from a challenge, and was able to reason her way through to the end of the puzzle. She was motivated, not by romantic prospects or duty to family, as so many literary heroines are, but by her intrinsic interest in tracking clues and righting wrongs. Something in that equation remains titillating to young female readers, decades after the series’ initial publication.

For all those Nancy Drew lovers out there, what was it that sparked your interest in the series? What was your favorite trait of our beloved girl detective?

--Rachel Frier

Photo courtesy of Chronicle Books

Hedees & Deks: Literary News

An exciting discovery in medieval literature: A manuscript may be a medieval women's magazine. While I’m not sure "magazine" is quite the right word for it (after all, these texts were not mass produced), this manuscript points to the literary variety prevalent in the Middle Ages as much as today. No less significant is its implications for female literacy in the medieval period, too! This discovery may well alter expectations of 15th-century literacy.

In other news, James Love at the Huffington Post reports that Obama joins group to block Treaty for Blind and other reading disabilities. The article offers a rather grim perspective on Obama’s stance (I’m not convinced that Obama has as much of a direct role as the article seems to suggest), but highlights the important issue of transmitting accessible literature across borders, and the literacy divide between industrialized and developing countries. The article raises an interesting question about whose rights are placed at the forefront of treaty negotiations: those of individuals, or those of corporations? [Via Dear Author]

--Rachel Frier