Ricky Gervais’ children’s book series, Flanimals, will be adapted
into a 3-D animated feature film.

Gervais will voice the lead character in the film version, which is being adapted for the screen by The Simpsons writer and producer Matt Selman. Flanimals, a four-volume series written by Gervais and illustrated by Rob Steen, introduced readers to a world of weird creatures, ranging from Grundit, a dopey, muscular blue Flanimal with a bump on its head, to Honk, a small Flanimal that spends most of its time asleep, but occasionally wakes to emit a loud honk.



Gervais’s character, Puddy the Puddloflaj, is a pudgy, perspiring purple creature who spends most of its days avoiding the Grundit. “It will be awesome to play a short, fat, sweaty loser for a change,” Gervais said.
The film is being produced by Chris Meledandri under the auspices of new Universal offshoot Illumination. Flanimals does not as yet have a director or full voice cast.

If Gervais is voicing Puddy the Puddloflaj, we’ll be there. Ricky is hilarious.



Permalink | Recent Headlines | Our News Feeds

Original post by ReadersRead.com Book Blog

A new Book Espresso Machine launched
in London Friday. The machine will print any of 500,000 books for you in five minutes.

It’s not elegant and it’s not sexy - it looks like a large photocopier - but the Espresso Book Machine is being billed as the biggest change for the literary world since Gutenberg invented the printing press more than 500 years ago and made the mass production of books possible. Launching today at Blackwell’s Charing Cross Road branch in London, the machine prints and binds books on demand in five minutes, while customers wait.



Signalling the end, says Blackwell, to the frustration of being told by a bookseller that a title is out of print, or not in stock, the Espresso offers access to almost half a million books, from a facsimile of Lewis Carroll’s original manuscript for Alice in Wonderland to Mrs Beeton’s Book of Needlework. Blackwell hopes to increase this to over a million titles by the end of the summer - the equivalent of 23.6 miles of shelf space, or over 50 bookshops rolled into one. The majority of these books are currently out-of-copyright works, but Blackwell is working with publishers throughout the UK to increase access to in-copyright writings, and says the response has been overwhelmingly positive.

Alas, the machine does not serve you an espresso while you wait, which we think is most disappointing.



Permalink | Recent Headlines | Our News Feeds

Original post by ReadersRead.com Book Blog

The brief list for the Orange Prize for Fiction has been announced. The winner of the Orange Prize for Fiction will receive £30,000,and a limited edition bronze figurine called Bessie. Both prizes are anonymously endowed.



Here’s the 2009 brief list:

• Scottsboro by Ellen Feldman
  
• The Wilderness by Samantha Harvey
  
• The Invention of Everything Else by Samantha Hunt
  
• Molly Fox’s Birthday by Deirdre Madden
  
• Home by Marilynne Robinson
  
• Burnt Shadows by Kamila Shamsie
  

Permalink | Recent Headlines | Our News Feeds

Original post by ReadersRead.com Book Blog

Publisher John Wiley is thinking outside the box when it comes to book signings. The company used Skype to hold a virtual booksigning. Wiley used Skype to allow Mark White to appear and give a talk to a live audience in a Cincinnati bookstore from his home in New Jersey. White is promoting his new book, Watchmen and Philosophy: A Rorschach Test.

Wiley director of events P.J. Campbell said the event used computers, cameras and microphones set up in White’s home and at the bookstore. White’s image was projected on a screen and, thanks to the SKYPE hookup, the author was able to discuss Watchmen and Philosophy, which examines philosophical questions in Alan Moore’s acclaimed graphic novel, and respond to questions from the audience at the bookstore in Cincinnati just like a typical bookstore event. The event was cosponsoruddy with Clifton Comics and Games, a local comics shop.


*****


Michael Link, publisher relations and events manager at Joseph-Beth, said the store was pleased with the event (they sold about 25 copies of White’s book) and planned another SKYPE event in June.

Organizers said that curious customers stopped by and stayed to listen to White as he spoke to the crowd. We think using SKYPE for booksignings will become commonplace, because it cuts down on book tour costs. But fans still want to meet authors in person.



Permalink | Recent Headlines | Our News Feeds

Original post by ReadersRead.com Book Blog

« Past Entries