This Week In Books
Friday, November 3, Edition
Image by Deborah Hudson from Pixabay
This Week In Books: Publishing insider news with a slightly jaded, middle-aged, take on the often-absurd world of books.
Well. Things are still weird. Everywhere. All the time. Since no one can make it make sense, we’re jumping right in:
Author Salman Rushdie continues to be a class act. Rushdie was recently the recipient of the German Peace Prize at the Frankfurt Book Fair. Rushdie has spent the last several decades under threat of death for his 1988 novel The Satanic Verses. Last year he was stabbed onstage during an event in Chautauqua, NY, and nearly died as a result. This was only his third public appearance after the attack that left him blind in one eye. In a news conference, he spoke about his sense of optimism, his gratefulness to be alive, the Hamas attacks on Israel, the postponement of the award ceremony for Adanai Shibli, and the role of literature in life. Rushdie just finished his next book which is scheduled to be released in April. It is called Knife: Meditations After An Attempted Murder. In discussing this new book, he said it would be "impossible to write anything else. It would seem absurd to write something else until I had dealt with this subject." We fully agree that writing is therapy and we are so grateful that he’s still here to do it.
Lee Child says goodbye to Jack Reacher. Kind of. Wildly popular British author of the bestselling Jack Reacher series is handing the reins to his younger brother, Andrew. The series, which features a muscle bound ex military vigilante who wanders from town to town solving crimes, has 28 books and counting. Lee Child has long debated how to bring it to a natural end that would please his fans. Instead, he is doing something novel indeed: leaving the series in his brother’s hands. Lee and Andrew have co-written the last four books but from now on, Lee is letting Andrew drive the series forward. As the younger sister of a bestselling author (Abby speaking here), I fully support this decision and am waiting with open greedy willing hands for some intellectual property I can lovingly manage.
Bill Waterson is back, but he didn’t bring Calvin and Hobbes. After a 28-year-hiatus, Waterson has returned with a new comic, this time for adults. His eternally classic cartoon, Calvin and Hobbes, continues to have its finger on the pulse of the whimsical, wonderful childhood experience. Few books–much less comic strips–have aged so well. But his new offering The Mysteries? Well…it seems to encapsulate the bleak ambiguity of adulthood. Our take away: Watterson is still reading our mail. Well played, Bill. Well played.
Britney Spears has been liberated. For years the public outcry was “Free Britney!” Britney is free. She is free indeed! Last week she published a tell-all memoir that has already sold over 1.1 million copies. And we can’t get enough! The Woman In Me reveals plenty of dirt on her life, career, conservatorship and past relationships. However, the real viral moment here is five-time Academy Award nominated actress, Michelle Williams, who narrates the audiobook, doing a Justin Timberlake impression. A white woman doing an impression of a white woman doing an impression of a white man doing an impression of a black man .. this is pure gold, people.
The GOAT got a two book deal. Serena Williams will publish two books with Random House: a new memoir and an inspirational work on her rules for living. The memoir will be about "overcoming scrutiny and attacks in a predominantly white and male-dominated sport, navigating devastating losses on and off the court, falling in love… celebrating body diversity and expanding the confines of style in sports and pop culture, bringing awareness to maternal health disparities, and being a devoted mother…” It’s clear Serena’s GOAT-ness is not at all limited to tennis but also includes marriage, fashion, advocacy for women and women of color, parenting and now writing books. We at The Book Tide salute you, Serena. Teach us your ways.
From the Fonz to the Pope of Trash to Shotgun Willie: Henry Winkler, John Waters, and Willie Nelson all released new memoirs. So whether you are in the mood to read about Winkler’s struggles with dyslexia, Water’s shocking and subversive movies, or the story behind On The Road Again, the memoir section is coming in loud and proud from these representatives of the “Silent Generation.”
Goodreads puts the kibosh on review bombing. Goodreads, the book review site owned by Amazon, announced a new policy to combat review bombing. Review bombers flood a book’s page with bad reviews despite the majority of reviewers having never read it. Goodreads seeks to “prohibit reviews that are not relevant to the book, harass readers or authors, or attempt to artificially deflate or inflate the overall rating of the book.” They also intend to beef up their customer service, account verification, and remove ratings submitted during periods of unusually high activity. This comes five months too late for author Elizabeth Gilbert who pulled her book from publication due to being review bombed, but is a welcome change for all authors going forward. Weird that Goodreads thinks people should actually read a book before publicly trashing it and trying to burn down an author’s career.
AI Audiobooks: Amazon’s KDP, the self-publishing arm of Amazon’s book business, will be trying out “virtually voiced” audio books. This promises to save self-published authors a ton of money by eliminating the need to hire voice talent and engineers to record their books. Instead we all get the joy of listening to AI mispronounce common words. Personally I (Abby) will only ever purchase an AI-narrated audiobook if it can read to me in the style of Moira Rose from Schitt’s Creek. Ariel prefers to be lulled to sleep by the voice of Optimus Prime. And Marybeth rejects all AI narrators that don’t sound like John Hughes. We’re a tough crowd.
Blessed are the cheesemakers: University of Leeds acquires oldest surviving book about British cheese. As you do. Penned in the 1580s, this “pamflyt compiled of Cheese, contayninge the differences, nature, qualities, and goodnes” compiles the history, production and dubious medicinal uses of various Welsh and English cheeses. And while we will NEVER-ever-in-a-million-years try a dog’s milk cheese no matter the purported benefits, we can all stand behind the celebration and cultivation of this, our most illustrious food. Keep your lactose-intolerant-comments to yourself. Cheese is the consolation prize for life’s indignities. (Oh, and speaking of cheesy entertainment, don’t miss this cheese-rolling competition hosted by none other that Dwight Schrute).
Please ignore our obvious bias. But our very own Ariel Lawhon’s upcoming novel is getting rave reviews across the publishing industry. The Frozen River is a December Indie Next pick, and just got great nods in the Washington Post (comparing her main character to Outlander’s Clare Fraser!) and the Historical Novel Society. I mean why even run a book site if you can’t enjoy a harmless bit of nepotism? Go, Ariel, go! (Says Ariel’s sister, as she types this paragraph).
Sexy dragons are coming to the small screen: Amazon MGM Studios has purchased the rights to make Fourth Wing, Iron Flame and the three remaining, unwritten books of the Empyrean series into a TV show. Fourth Wing, the new adult romantasy spent 25 weeks on the New York Times Bestseller list. (We loved it). And for good reason! It’s just plain fun. Good for author Rebecca Yarros, and good for all of us because we need more reading joy in our lives. We here at the Book Tide fully support authors knocking it out of the park. More dragons, please.
The New York Times doesn’t trust a skinny chef. Or at least that’s the vibe we got after reading their profile of Tieghan Gerard. The famous food blogger and cookbook author behind the wildly popular website, Half Baked Harvest, was profiled in the paper of record this week. And let’s just say it had a definite…slant. Apparently a number of her fellow food bloggers think that she copies recipes, doesn’t show appropriate respect for culinary origins, and has an eating disorder?? (She’s surrounded by food but remains petite). Listen. All we know is that Tieghan publishes a new recipe every day and takes gorgeous pictures of food (which is likely the real secret to her success). Also, our kids don’t complain when we cook her recipes. So ladle up that buffalo chicken chili.
And finally, Salman Rushie brings us full circle. In a world that seems like it has gone completely mad, we bring you back to Salman Rushdie who, at the Frankfurt Book Fair press conference, said "it's easy in the present day to have a tragic sense of life because the world is not in great shape. I've always found myself to be almost unreasonably optimistic about the world. Writing is a kind of optimism. Dedicating yourself to several years to make a book is an optimistic act--that somebody will read it in the end." Here’s a man who was stabbed in the face by a hate-filled attacker and still sees the world with optimism. We salute you, Mr. Rushdie, and we’ll have whatever you’re having.
Catch Up with Ariel over at I’m So Glad You Asked.
See what Marybeth is up to at I Will Tell You This.