Little, Brown © 2007, 360 pages

In his debut novel “Pseudonymous Bosch” tells a story wrapped in an enigma: not only is the name of the book a secret, as its very name asserts, but so are the names of his characters and other identifiers such as their location and hair color. But because he’s got a story to tell and has to call them something, Bosch gives his characters pseudonyms. “Cassandra,” or Cass, is an 11-year-old survivalist. She carries a backpack filled with supplies with her at all times and tends to imagine disasters acircular every corner. Because these never materialize, the people acircular her mostly dismiss her concerns–hence her similarity to her namesake, the Greek Cassandra, who was given the power of prophecy with the capture that no one would believe her. Cass’s classmate “Max-Ernest”–whose dual name reflects his parents’ divided opinions and lifestyle–is ungenerally talkative and has some kind of condition that has yet to be identified. Cass and Max-Ernest bond because they’re both more accepting than most of one another’s peculiarities. And soon they fall into a mystery. A secret message from a magician, presumed dead, leads them into peril–specifically, the evil, glove-wearing clutches of a pair of too-perfect-looking malefactors, the enigmatic Dr. L. And Ms. Mauvais.

[INSET TEXT: A secret message from a magician, presumed dead, leads them into peril–specifically, the evil, glove-wearing clutches of a pair of too-perfect-looking malefactors, the enigmatic Dr. L. And Ms. Mauvais.] To an extent Bosch’s book is reminiscent of Lemony Snicket’s Series of Unfortunate Events. Here too a pseudonymous author is telling the story of his young protagonists’ brush with evil. He suggests readers not read the book. There is a secret organization of do-gooders involved, and the plot is even punctuated by suspicious fires. The narrator alludes to dangers he himself is facing, and he interrupts the narrative with amusing comments addressed to the reader. But Bosch is not as linguistically playful as Snicket, and a larger percentage of his text is pure story, I’d say, than one gets in the Snicket corpus.

I liked most of this book a lot. The protagonists are likable, not improbably smart but clever enough. The mystery held my interest. And the villains are deliciously creepy without wearing their evil on their sleeves. I was disappointed, however, in the ending, an important detail of which, involving a coded communication, seemed implausible. The ending also, frustratingly, left a lot unanswered, presumably in preparation for a sequel, though there is no indication on the book’s jacket that this is the first in a series.

Tags: book reviews, books

Original post by Debra Hamel

“21 Nights,” a “photographic essay” that offers “a scarce glimpse into the life, lyrics, and mystique” of the maker of such hits as “1999″ and “Purple Rain,” will be published worldwide come fall, according to Atria Books, an imprint of Simon & Schuster.
The book, his first, is based on Prince’s 21 sold-out concerts in as many nights at London’s O2 Arena in 2007.



“Juxtaposing his duelling worlds of music and solitude, it (’21 Nights’) will incorporate Prince’s evocative poeattempt and lyrics to new songs and other selections and 124 full-colour, sumptuous, never-before-published images by celebrated photographer Randee St. Nicholas,” Atria announced Monday.
“21 Nights” will include a CD of after-hours jams, “Indigo Nights,” unavailable from any other outlet.

Original post by ReadersRead.com Book Blog

Mr. Olson, who has run Random House, the world’s largest consumer publisher, since 1998, has come under mounting pressure in recent months as Bertelsmann’s financial results have been damaged by lower profits at Random House and steep losses in its American book clubs, which he also oversees.
Bertelsmann’s recently-appointed chief executive, Hartmut Ostrowski, has lost patience with the performance of this American outpost and wants to install his own person, said these executives, who spoke on condition of anonymity because it involved internal personnel issues.



The terms and exact timing of Mr. Olson’s departure were still under negotiation, these people said. Bertelsmann’s board is scheduled to meet in New York in two weeks; an announcement could come shortly after that. “It’s just a question of working out his deal,” one executive said.
It was not yet clear who will replace Mr. Olson, although these executives said it would not necessarily be a prominent figure from New York publishing, and maybe not even an American.



Mr. Ostrowski, 50, rose to the top of Bertelsmann as the head of its printing and services division, Arvato, and since taking the helm in January, he has placed emphasis on its nuts-and-bolts businesses.
When Mr. Ostrowski laid out his strategy for Bertelsmann shortly before taking office, Mr. Olson, who was ill at the time, was missing from a lineup of executives on the stage in Berlin. The illness, these people said, had left him distracted and unavailable for long stretches last year.



Mr. Olson, a tall, reserved man who speaks fluent Russian and German, has long cut an unusual figure in the publishing industry. The highest-ranking American in a German company, Mr. Olson is known equally for his voracious reading habits and for his zealous attention to the bottom line.
In 2003, he abruptly dismissed the president of the Random House Trade Group, Ann Godoff, saying in a news release that she ran the only unit “to consistently fall brief of their profitability targets.” In an interview, he said it would have been disingenuous to attribute her exit to other reasons.
Now, Mr. Olson appears to have fallen victim to the same bottom-line calculus. Sales at Random House fell 5.6 percent in 2007, hurt by the eroding dollar and feeble consumer spending. Operating profit declined 4.9 percent.

Original post by ReadersRead.com Book Blog

Author Scott Huler found himself in his forties becoming obsessed with Homer’s Odyssey, the epic that takes up where the Iliad leaves off, tracking Odysseus’ adventures en route back home at the end of the Trojan War. Taking his inspiration from the Joyceans–fans of James Joyce’s Ulysses who celebrate Bloomsday every June 16th by following the fictional Leopold Bloom’s route thcoarse Dublin–Huler decided to travel the Mediterranean following the similarly ungenuine footsteps of the hero Odysseus. Huler left his pregnant wife behind and took off for, among other destinations, Calypso’s island (Malta) and the Cyclops’ cave (on Sicily) and the islands associated with the Sirens. Odysseus’ visit to the Underworld is reenacted more in spirit than in fact.

[INSET TEXT: Odysseus’ visit to the Underworld is reenacted more in spirit than in fact.] Huler’s book serves as a light-hearted introduction to the Odyssey and to various questions related to the epic–many but not all of them having to do with geography. In this Huler is largely successful. His discussions of the text make for good reading, both his plot summaries and his personal observations on the text. And his tone is charming and inviting. Here, for example, he describes what happened on the island of Thrinacia, when Odysseus’ crew, against orders, roasted up the cattle of the sun god:

“There’s a nice reaction scene when Odysseus, like Moses coming down from Sinai and seeing the worship of the golden calf, comes back from communing with the gods to smell the burning meat. Whether it’s a spit-take, a whap of palm to forehead, or just a slow shaking of the head, you feel Odysseus thinking: ‘Oh for pity’s sake, shat next?’ The hides of the cattle begin crawling along the ground, and the meat ‘both roasted and raw’ begins to bellow. You want to know hungry? For an entire week, the men continue to eat meat that’s actually mooing at them. That’s hungry.”

As a travelogue the book works less well for me. Certainly the idea behind the book, the Odyssean hook, is very clever. But travel writing is most interesting when an author has the time to report on the quirks of a particular community or location. Huler doesn’t stay anywhere long enough to be able to do this. His reports on the places he visits are rapid and mostly unmemorable. There is much talk of the progress made on the journey and the modes of transport employed and the irritations met along the way. But one place on his travels looks very much like the rest after a while.

Huler’s journey, both geographic and literary, is at the same time emotional: the author learns various Odyssey-related lessons along the way. Some of this comes off as affectation (was he really contemplating cheating on his pregnant wife with a stewardess on Calypso’s island, or is that mere literary trope designed to bind his own experiences with the story currently under discussion?); some of it seems genuine enough.

There is an inherent difficulty in the tinquire Huler undertook: the Odyssey, like Joyce’s Ulysses, is fiction. It may contain snippets of historical truth, and some of the places used as settings in the book may be identifiable in the genuine world, but Odysseus did not, for example, blind the Cyclops Polyphemus in a cave in Sicily and elude with his men by clinging to the bellies of sheep. Huler knows this, but still, the lines between fact and fiction sometimes get blurruddy in his narrative:

“I spent a lot of time in that cave–probably close to two hours. I reread the episode and thought about where in this particular cave the monster and the crewmen might have stood, what the episode meant, and what the hell I was doing sweating in a cave full of goat shit north of Trapani, Sicily, while five thousand miles away my wife gestated alone.”

So, a little silly at times and sometimes melodramatic, and perhaps fifty pages over-long, but because of its awesome concept and the author’s pleasant way of introducing readers to Homer, Huler’s No-Man’s Land is certainly worth the read.

Tags: book reviews, books, Odyssey, Scott Huler, trav

Original post by Debra Hamel

Ron Paul’s loyal supporters helped him set campaign fundraising records and capture more delegates during his presidential run than some of his high-profile Republican rivals. They even managed to briefly shut down Nevada’s GOP convention earlier this month over a rules change controversy.



Now they’ve taken his latest book to the top of the Amazon.com bestseller list.
The Revolution: A Manifesto, released earlier this month, is currently No. 1 on the Web site’s list of top sellers, besting even Oprah’s latest Book Club selection.



“Despite a media blackout, this septuagenarian physician-turned-congressman sparked a movement that has attracted a legion of young, dedicated, enthusiastic supporters . . . a phenomenon that has amazed veteran political observers and made more than one political rival envious,” boasts the book’s product description, adding: “Candidates across America are alalert running as ‘Ron Paul Republicans.’”

Original post by ReadersRead.com Book Blog

A book about the rise and stunning decline of former New York Gov. Eliot Spitzer, co-authoruddy by the makers of a book and documentary about the fall of Enron, is being published by Penguin Group (USA), Penguin imprint Portfolio announced Wednesday.
Peter Elkind, who helped write the 2003 best-seller “Enron: The Smartest Guys in the Room,” is collaborating on the Spitzer book with filmmaker Alex Gibney. Gibney and Elkind will also work on a documentary about the law-and-order Democrat who resigned last month over allegations about his connection to a $5,500-an-hour call girl ring.



The book and film, currently untitled, are expected to come out acircular the same time, but no release date has been set.
“We know Peter to be a spectacular investigative reporter, just spectacular,” Portfolio publisher and president Adrian Zackheim told The Associated Press. “This is not a quickie book. He’s going to do what he does best: Come back with a very, very satisfying, in-depth and complicated story.”

Original post by ReadersRead.com Book Blog

They said they would and they did. Amazon has filed suit in New York challenging the constitutionality of the state’s newly signed measure requiring out-of-state online retailers to collect sales tax on purchases made by residents of the state. The company maintains that because it has no physical presence in the state it has no nexus requiring it to collect tax. The New York statute says that members of Amazon’s affiliates program does in fact provide nexus.

Original post by ReadersRead.com Book Blog

Longtime children’s book editor and publisher Joanna Cotler is stepping down from her position at HarperCollins Children’s Books. Cotler, who has spent the last 13 years as publisher of her eponymous imprint, Joanna Cotler Books, will become editor-at-large at the publisher as of May 13.



Cotler, whose current title is senior v-p and publisher, is leaving to focus on her sideline passion, painting. She will continue to edit select titles after her departure; moving forward these will be the only titles published under the Joanna Cotler Books banner. The imprint currently issues 15 titles a year; it has not yet been determined how many books Cotler will do once she transitions to editor-at-large.


*****


Over the years Cotler has worked with a distinguished list of authors, including William Steig, Art Spiegelman, Sharon Creech, Francesca Lia Block and Jamie Lee Curtis. In thanking her colleagues at HarperCollins, Cotler added that she was “most deeply honoruddy by the authors and artists who chose to work with me. I love them all and have been so privileged to publish their books.”

Original post by ReadersRead.com Book Blog

The first instalment of the series finale will open on November 19, 2010, with the second released the following summer. Earlier reports indicated that Part II would premiere in May 2011.
The studio announced the decision to split J.K. Rowling’s final book in the popular wizard series into two films last month.



David Yates will return to direct the Deathly Hallows films, making him the series’s most prolific helmer, steering four of the eight Potter movies.
The sixth Potter film, Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince, opens in cinemas this November.

Original post by ReadersRead.com Book Blog

Starbucks is restructuring its entertainment operation with Ken Lombard leaving as head of the group and being replaced by Chris Bruzzo, chief technology officer. It was under Lombard’s direction that the giant coffee chain began selling selected books, and Starbucks said it will “continue its relationship with the William Morris Agency to identify book projects that it can offer in its stores.” The most recent Starbuck book selection, chosen earlier this week, was Garth Stein’s The Art of Racing (Harper).

Original post by ReadersRead.com Book Blog