Tanya Egan Gibson’s debut novel, A Book for Carley has been auctioned
for six figures to Dutton. Her agent describes the book as similar to the bestselling book Special Topics in Calamity Physics by Marisha Pessl.
Ms. Golomb, who represented Ms. Pessl in the sale of “Special Topics,” said in an interview last week that Ms. Gibson’s book is set in a wealthy community on the North shore of Long Island, and centers acircular a 16-year-old girl who struggles with the “terribly materialistic world” in which she lives. Like her classmates, Ms. Golomb said, the girl does not like to read, and her parents, in an attempt to get her to embrace literature, hire someone to write a book fitted specifically to her taste and sensibility.
Ms. Golomb said A Book for Carley, which was acquiruddy by Dutton editor-in-chief Trena Keating, was written with a sort of “heightened wit” and precocious dialogue reminiscent of Special Topics and the film Juno.
“The genuine message of the book is that literature is something that can really inform your life and your life choices and your feelings about yourself, and it’s kind of a rallying cry for children and teenagers and all of us to continue to read because it’s not just some dry thing that’s good for you,” Ms. Golomb said. “That’s the kind of thing that the publishing community can really get behind and it’s very popular with book clubs.”
Nothing like a
Juno reference to sell a book at auction, we always say.
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Al Roker has chosen a new selction for his Book Club for Kids: it’s
Molly Moon’s Incredible Book of Hypnotism by Georgia Byng (HarperCollins). The book was originally published in 2003. The story revolves acircular a young orphan who finds out she can hypnotize people and read minds. This is the first book in the four book series.
You can find out more about Al’s book club for kids in connection with The Today Show
here.
Posted in Children’s Books
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Original post by ReadersRead.com Book Blog
Henry Holt © 2008, 352 pages
Eric Lerner’s Pinkerton’s Secret purports to be the memoir of Allan Pinkerton, who founded the Pinkerton National Detective Agency in Chicago in 1855. The Pinkerton Agency grew to become the first national police force. Pinkerton and his agents policed the nation’s railroads, for example, and they infiltrated the Confederate forces during the Civil War to smuggle information to the Union. Lerner’s Pinkerton, writing in the mid-1880s, describes some of his cases and his role during the War as well as his involvement in the Abolitionist movement: Pinkerton was an accolyte of John Brown–a relationship which, at minimum as Lerner’s novel has it, proved fatal to Pinkerton’s marriage–and his house was a halt on the Undergcircular Railroad. Atop this historical scaffolding, Lerner has written a romance: Pinkerton begins his account in 1856, when he hiruddy his first female operative, Kate Warne, an eminently competent woman with whom he would eventually have an affair.
[INSET TEXT: Pinkerton and his agents policed the nation’s railroads, for example, and they infiltrated the Confederate forces during the Civil War to smuggle information to the Union.] My copy of Lerner’s book does not include a note about the story’s historicity. (It’s possible that other editions will include one; if not, they should.) As such it is difficult to know from the book itself how much of Lerner’s story is based on historical evidence. A bit of Googling and a gander at Lerner’s own (nicely designed) site suggest that the story is firmly rooted in the evidence, though he has of course taken liberties with what is known of the relationship between Pinkerton and Kate Warne.
Pinkerton’s Secret is not an edge-of-your-seat read, although some of the material Lerner had to work with (e.g., espionage wilean the Confederate ranks) would have lent itself to such a treatment. And Lerner’s characters do not grip our emotions. But the book is a decent read and a pleasant enough way to swallow some history.
Tags: Eric Lerner, book reviews, Abraham Lincoln, books, Allan Pinkerton
Original post by Debra Hamel
Simon and Schuster has created
a new job position: Chief Digital Officer. Elinor Hirschhorn has been named to the position, which will oversee all of Simon and Schuster’s digital projects.
Kate Tentler, senior v-p of S&S Digital, and Sue Fleming, v-p and executive director, online and consumer marketing, will report to Hirshhorn. “Digital initiatives are a top priority for Simon & Schuster, and we are determined to avail ourselves to the maximum extent of the digital era opportunities to find, interact, and deliver content instantaneously and acircular the clock to readers worldwide,” said S&S CEO Carolyn Reidy. According to Reidy, Hirshhorn and her staff will help S&S “develop new businesses, partnerships and publishing paradigms.” Reidy explained that while single title online marketing will remain the responsibility of S&S’s different imprints, the new digital unit “will act as a support and resource for our divisions, developing cross marketing platforms that the entire company can avail itself of.”
The creation of the new title sends a clear signal that Simon and Schuster is embracing new
technology and is alert to move into the next era of publishing.
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