October 2009 Archives

The Associated Press reports:

Ten emerging writers, their home countries ranging from Vietnam to the United States, each have received a $50,000 prize.
The Whiting Writers' Awards, given annually for "exceptional talent and promise in early career," were announced Oct. 28. The recipients included fiction writer Vu Tran, born in Vietnam and now living in Las Vegas, and poet Jay Hopler, a native of Puerto Rico who lives in Tampa, Fla.
The other winners were poets Jericho Brown and Joan Kane, playwright Rajiv Joseph, nonfiction authors Michael Meyer and Hugh Raffles, and fiction writers Adam Johnson, Nami Mun and Salvatore Scibona, whose novel "The End" was a National Book Award finalist in 2008.
The awards, presented by the Mrs. Giles Whiting Foundation, were founded in 1985. Previous winners include such Pulitzer Prize winners as Jeffrey Eugenides, Michael Cunningham and Jorie Graham.

Writers planning to participate in the National Novel Writing Month are invited to meet to discuss ideas at 10 a.m. Oct. 31 at The York Emporium, 343 W. Market St., York.

National Novel Writing Month begins Nov. 1. The goal is to write a 175-page
(50,000-word) novel by midnight Nov. 30.

For details, visit www.nanowrimo.org or the local group's Facebook page. Look for Central-PA-Wrimos.

Best-sellers at Borders Books & Music in Springettsbury Township for the week that ended Oct. 18.
1. "The Lost Symbol" by Dan Brown.
2. "In a Perfect World" by Laura Kasischke.
3. "Have a Little Faith" by Mitch Albom.
4. "Touch of Dead" by Charlaine Harris.
5. "The Big Burn" by Timothy Egan.

Johnny Depp, son of an engineer father and a homemaker mother, was born in Owensboro, Ky. As a young boy, he spent most of his time with his beloved grandfather, who died shortly after Johnny's seventh birthday. That same year, his family moved to Florida, living in at least a dozen different houses, leaving him feeling displaced. When he was 15, his parents divorced. Johnny became surly and disinterested in school. He turned to drugs and a wild, rebellious lifestyle that carried over into adulthood and followed him through his career.

When he was 12 years old, his mother bought him an electric guitar and he taught himself how to play. He eventually formed a rock band, The Kids, that played in clubs around Florida opening for big name bands. At 20, he met and married (and eventually divorced) Lori Ann Allison, who introduced him to a friend of hers, Nicholas Cage, nephew of Francis Ford Coppola. Cage in turn, suggested Johnny try acting and introduced him to his agent, who landed him an audition for the movie, "A Nightmare on Elm Street." And the rest is history.

From the Associated Press:

NEW YORK -- The latest weapon in the publishing price wars: Stephen King.

Scribner announced Wednesday that the digital edition of King's "Under the Dome," a 1,000-plus page novel, would have a list price of $35, several dollars higher than for what e-books usually are listed. Amazon.com and other online retailers have been offering best-selling e-editions for $9.99, which publishers fear is unrealistically low.

From the Associated Press

NEW YORK - Target is throwing itself into a heated price war on books expected to be top sellers.
The retailer says it will offer some of this season's most anticipated book titles at $8.99, in line with recent moves by Walmart.com and Amazon.com.
Target says the $8.99 price applies to pre-orders on Target.com of such books as "Breathless" by Dean Koontz, "Ford Country" by James Patterson, and "Under the Dome" by Stephen King.
Target's move is expected to heat up the price wars that began Thursday between Walmart.com and Amazon.com. Both sites lowered online prices on certain forthcoming titles to $9. Walmart.com showed the books priced at $8.99 Monday afternoon.

Best-sellers at Borders Books & Music in Springettsbury Township for the week that ended Oct. 11.

1. "The Last Symbol" by Dan Brown.
2. "Have a Little Faith" by Mitch Albom.
3. "Arguing with Idiots" by Glenn Beck.
4. "Say You're One of Them" by Uwem Akpan.
5. "In a Perfect World" by Laura Kasischke.

DEBORAH SULLIVAN
On the Shelves

In times of war, when an army wanted to dominate another town, it would destroy the town's library, erasing its history. The conquerors would then write a new town history explains author Stuart A.P. Murray, in his recent book "The Library: An Illustrated History."

From the Associated Press:

NEW YORK -- An online book special offered by Wal-Mart Stores Inc. is turning into a full-fledged price war with Amazon.com.

Wal-Mart got things started Thursday, offering $10 prices on such upcoming hardcover releases as Sarah Palin's "Going Rogue" and John Grisham's "Ford County," a cut of 60 percent or more from the regular cost. Wal-Mart will also offer free shipping.

Amazon.com, the largest online bookseller, matched the $10 price, prompting Wal-Mart to take its offer to $9. By Friday morning, Amazon.com also had priced the books at $9.

From the Associated Press:

MADRID -- Spanish writer and journalist Angeles Caso has won the country's most lucrative literary award for a novel about the ordeals of women from poor countries who emigrate in search of a better life.

From the Associated Press:

FRANKFURT -- Nelson Mandela will release a new memoir focusing on the best of his personal archives and letters from his time as anti-apartheid activist and former South African president, the publisher Macmillan said Wednesday.

Just in from the Associated Press:

NEW YORK -- Tycoons, evolution and the environment are among the subjects of this year's National Book Award nominees.

Marcel Theroux's global warming novel "Far North" and T.J. Stiles' "The First Tycoon," a biography of Cornelius Vanderbilt, were some the finalists announced Wednesday. Two books about evolution, including a story for young people about Charles Darwin, were also nominated.

Winners in the four competitive categories of the National Book Awards will be announced at a Nov. 18 ceremony in New York.

Author Maurice Sendak has always had a rough relationship with his book "Where the Wild Things Are" which has sold more than 10 million copies since its release in 1963.

The author and illustrator felt the story of a mischevious boy named Max overshadowed the work he did afterward.

Read the Associated Press interview with Sendak about the film adaptation, which will be released on Friday.

From the Associated Press:

STOCKHOLM -- Romanian-born German writer Herta Mueller won the 2009 Nobel Prize in literature Thursday, honored for work that "with the concentration of poetry and the frankness of prose, depicts the landscape of the dispossessed."

The 56-year-old author, who emigrated to Germany from then-communist Romania in 1987, made her debut in 1982 with a collection of short stories titled "Niederungen," which was promptly censored by the Romanian government. In 1984 an uncensored version was published in Germany and her work depicting life in a small, German-speaking village in Romania was devoured by readers.

That work was followed by "Oppresive Tango" in Romania.

Because of her vocal criticism of Romania's government, and its feared secret police, she and her husband left the country.

The prize includes a 10 million kronor ($1.4 million) prize and will be handed out Dec. 10 in the Swedish capital.

From the Associated Press:

NEW YORK -- Ian Frazier is a funny man. Officially.

The author and frequent New Yorker contributor won the Thurber Prize for American Humor for his lighthearted book on parental guidance, "Lamentations of the Father." Frazier, who in 1997 received the inaugural Thurber award, will receive $5,000, prize organizers said Monday.

Other previous Thurber winners include David Sedaris, Christopher Buckley and Jon Stewart and the co-authors of "America (The Book)."

From the Associated Press:

NEW YORK -- A critical work on black intellectuals and an anthology of the late Chicano poet Jose Antonio Burciaga are among this year's winners of American Book Awards.

The awards, now in their 30th year, are given for outstanding work of multicultural literature and are sponsored by the nonprofit educational organization, the Before Columbus Foundation.

Recipients announced Tuesday included Houston A. Baker's "Betrayal: How Black Intellectuals Have Abandoned the Ideals of the Civil Right Era," "The Last Supper of Chicano Heroes: Selected Works of Jose Antonio Burciaga" and Claire Hope Cummings' "Uncertain Peril: Genetic Engineering and the Future of Seeds."

Just in from the Associated Press:

LONDON -- A tale of political intrigue set during the reign of King Henry VIII won the prestigious Man Booker prize for fiction Tuesday.

Hilary Mantel's "Wolf Hall" scooped the 50,000-pound ($80,000) prize. Mantel's novel charts the upheaval caused by the king's desire to marry Anne Boleyn, as seen through the eyes of royal adviser Thomas Cromwell.

Mantel's novel beat stiff competition from a shortlist that included previous Booker winners A.S. Byatt and J.M. Coetzee.

From the Associated Press:

CAMBRIDGE, Mass. -- Harvard University has acquired the manuscripts, correspondences, and other papers of two-time Pulitzer Prize winning author John Updike, a member of the university's class of 1954.

The Boston Globe reports that Harvard's Houghton Library, the university's primary repository for rare books and manuscripts, will house the John Updike archive. Officials did not disclose how much Harvard paid for the papers.

Leslie Morris, curator of modern books and manuscripts at Houghton Library, says the collection includes 1,500 books, including Updike's collection of his own work, as well as books Updike reviewed, photographs and correspondence from Kurt Vonnegut, Joyce Carol Oates and others.

Updike died in January at age 76.

From the Associated Press

STOCKHOLM -- The new frontman of the Nobel literature prize jury believes the secretive panel has been too "Eurocentric" in picking winners and says there are plenty of American writers who would qualify for the award.

Peter Englund's comments Oct. 6 come two days before the prize announcement. They contrast with his predecessor's view that U.S. literature is too insular.

Englund told The Associated Press that because award judges in the Swedish Academy are European they tend to a "European outlook" on literature. Europeans have dominated the literature awards in recent decades and won nine of the last 10.

Englund, who replaced Horace Engdahl as the Swedish Academy's permanent secretary in June, said "I think that is a problem."

York resident Noel Sloboda has a poem featured in the new book "Poems
on the Hungry and the Homeless." Published by Popcorn Press, this anthology
features 151 poems about hunger and homelessness from 80 poets. All profits
from this book go to programs helping the hungry and homeless. It is available
from Amazon and directly from the publisher.

More information about the volume
can be found here:
http://www.popcornpress.com/index.php?act=viewProd&productId=14".

Winnie the Pooh will reappear in "Return to the Hundred Acre Wood" in the first authorized sequel to A.A. Milne's classic children's stories on Oct. 5.
Written by David Benedictus and illustrated by Mark Burgess, the book continues the adventures of Christopher Robin, Winnie the Pooh, Tigger, Piglet, Eeyore and friends. And there's a new friend, Lottie the Otter. To see more, visit www.penguin.com/pooh.
And to hear an interview with the author and a reading by Jim Dale, visit NPR.org at http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=113406207

Why would a young American woman want to live in Tehran? Azadeh Moaveni has many reasons.

In "Honeymoon in Tehran" she explains them -- she works as a Middle East correspondent for Time Magazine; she has roots in Iran, her parents having emigrated from there to the United States before she was born. Her extended family of aunts and cousins in Iran help with housing and lend moral support. And, most important, she meets an Iranian man she wants to marry.

But it is 2005, President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has just been elected and as the government cracks down, life gets uncomfortable for many Iranians and for Moaveni.