Here is a quick update on where we’ve moved:

Bob Miller is currently Group Publisher at Workman Publishing.

Debbie Stier is the Director of Digital Marketing of HarperCollins and continues to edit the books she acquired at HarperStudio. She is currently working with Gary Vaynerchuk, Melanie Notkin, Baratunde Thurston, and Jill Kargman, among others.

Julia Cheiffetz is currently a Senior Editor at the Harper imprint under Jonathan Burnham where she continues to acquire and edit narrative nonfiction and the occasional novel. Some of the authors she is currently working with include Stanley Fish, Gayle Tzemach Lemmon, Harold Bloom, Greg Graffin, Jessica Valenti, Erica Jong, Divya Gugnani, Christopher Stewart, Rolling Stone magazine, Nina Sankovitch and Choire Sicha. She recently published the New York Times bestseller 5th Avenue, 5 AM by Sam Wasson.

Jessica Wiener is currently Director of Marketing at Workman Publishing.

Katie Salisbury is an Assistant Editor at Harper and continues to work closely with Julia. She is currently looking to acquire nonfiction titles.

Kathryn Ratcliffe-Lee continues to work closely with Debbie.

Below is the HarperCollins memo about the close.
HarperStudio to Close: HarperCollins’ Memo

Congratulations to Brad Meltzer, whose new book Heroes for My Son will hit the New York Times Best Seller list next Sunday at #2!

Bad Religion rocks out in Hollywood last night

To read more about Greg Graffin’s book Anarchy Evolution click here

A photo of a young Isabella Rossellini with her mother, Ingrid Bergman, discovered by fellow HarperStudio author Sam Wasson.

Baratunde Thurston dancing at SXSW, photo by Anthony De Rosa

Ok, first of all, can I just say, I think that was my all time favorite conference. Ever.

Yes, I know it was overwhelmingly huge, and people are saying this and that cranky thing about it (I’m ignoring) – but to me, it was thousands of super interesting, innovative people in every nook and cranny and there was absolutely no way to go wrong if you’re open to meeting new people.

I inadvertently wandered around on day 1 “alone” – which turned out to be a blessing I tried to repeat every day thereafter. Think Chatroulette in real life and you get the picture of what my days were like.

I’d spent the plane ride carefully orchestrating a “schedule” on my iPhone – but somehow, it all fell apart when I arrived at the check-in. I short-circuited in the face of all the options and resorted to paper printouts of emails, much to the embarrassment of my friends. A few hours in, I ran into Baratunde and he told me to put the schedule away and just wander around. That turned out to be the best advice.

Below are my agenda-less impressions:

• Douglas Rushkoff is AWESOME despite the fact that he said that books are over because the publishing process takes so long. He gave a talk called The 10 Commandments for a Digital Age and there were so many profound moments I’m not even going to try to sum it up. Just be sure to watch the video.

• Everyone’s a “Content Strategist” at SXSW 2010. It’s like being named “Michael.”

• Jeff Pulver’s 140 party was amazing – and not only because I got to meet (and be live streamed) by my internet crush, Leo Laporte. The place was beautiful and the vibe was great.

• I saw Danah Boyd speak and am happy to report that she fully recovered from the Web 2.0 fiasco. Thank God. I think it was the dress.

• Gowalla seemed to gain major traction. I heard a lot of people saying they like it better than Foursquare. Honestly, I never fully bonded with the whole “check in” concept, but I have to say, it was useful to know where people were, especially at night when you were done with dinner and wanted to know what was going on. I still can’t imagine “checking in” during my daily life (unless there’s a worthwhile prize – and a “badge” saying I’m the mayor does not motivate me) — but I get it.

• Leah Jones is amazing. She put together her second annual dinner. It was a private room full of people who didn’t know each other and it still brings a smile to my face when I think about it. Highlight of the evening was realizing that the Stacey who was sitting two people away from me was “Stacey Monk” of #TwitterKids fame.

• People I didn’t get enough of? Dario Meli and Yancey Strickler.

• I just have to say it one more time, I ♥ SXSW.

“I’ve always had a problem with authority. When I was in the third grade at Lake Bluff Elementary School just outside Milwaukee, my teacher, Wanda Rood, knew that I hated to be called by my full name, Gregory. I have always been Greg to my family and friends, and whenever Miss Rood called me Gregory to humiliate or intimidate me, I shook with fury.

Finally, one day when I was talking too much to my friends, Miss Rood said, ‘Gregory, do you have something to say to us all?’ I replied, ‘Don’t call me Gregory, Wanda.’”

Here Greg and I talk about his book and tour. I can’t tell you how excited I am about this project. MUCH more to come:

1. When you started Bad Religion at the age of 15, did you ever imagine the band would be around for 30 years?

As a 15 year old, I didn’t even imagine where I would be in three years, so thirty years was inconceivable. The band started out as a channel for rebelliousness. We were creative non-conformists who relished provocation. We didn’t think there would be much of a future in that.

2. Why do you think your band has had such staying power?

Scientific knowledge has staying power and punk shares certain qualities with science, in particular, challenging dogma. Without the overturning of prior theories, science can’t progress. This was immediately appealing to me as a teenager, as it still is.

3. You write in the book that as a teenager, science kind of saved you. What do you mean by that?

Through my early reading in evolutionary biology and geology, the world began to make sense. I could answer the “big picture” questions that were lacking from my a-religious upbringing. I was never taught about the stories in The Bible. Science offered a fantastical narrative from which I forged my songwriting career, which also began in my teens.

4. What’s the best part about touring?

Visiting antiquarian bookshops all over the world. I spend more money on foreign postage sending books home from tour than I do on meals.

5. Will you promote the book during your tour? (Fans: pre-order here!)

I would like to meet as many people as possible who are interested in evolution and the worldview they take from it. For that reason, I hope to appear in many bookstores, coffee shops, and speaking venues on the same days that we play concerts in cities all over the world. What a privilege, talk about the issues during the day, sing about them at night. It’s a dream come true!

Q: What did you think of Steve Martin and Alec Baldwin as hosts? Dynamic duo or awkward pairing?

A: What’s not to love? Though they did seem under rehearsed and under used, more like mascots than actual hosts. I mean where were they when we needed them most, during the Ben Stiller incident and that horrific horror montage? The host or hosts have the responsibility of making the show feel like an actual event as opposed to a series of loosely connected episodes. This year, the Oscars didn’t have that.

Q: What were your Oscar award predictions and how did they play out? Do you think the usual Oscar award “politics” were at play this year?

A: My Oscar predictions played out pretty much as I thought with the exception of Best Adapted Screenplay, Best Actress, and Best Foreign Film. I know it’s become fashionable to put down on Jason Reitman, but I thought he (and his collaborators) wrote a terrific script, and were very clever about when and how much they delivered on genre. The Academy loves an 80% old-fashioned movie, and that’s just what Up in the Air is. I can’t say I was that surprised to see Sandra Bullock win the Oscar for Best Actress, considering the Academy’s penchant for honorably discharging Meryl Streep. I never thought I’d say this about the greatest living actress, but I’m actually beginning to feel sorry for her. Julia Child was far from her best, but it was leagues ahead of the others. And finally, I was shocked out of my cummerbund when The White Ribbon lost Best Foreign Film. It was the strongest in the category, and it had all the momentum a winning film could have. Were politics at play? Absolutely. No matter what Mo’Nique says.

Q: Hurt Locker vs. Avatar. The underdog basically stole the show this year. Was the Best Picture win a triumph of story and direction over special effects and beautiful cinematography?

A: The Best Picture win was a triumph of many, many things, aesthetic and otherwise, the most significant of which, as everyone knows, is Kathryn Bigelow, the first woman ever to win a Best Director Oscar. But I wouldn’t call either of them an underdog. Both films showcased mind-blowing feats of direction, and both were beautifully shot (though I’m still uncertain about how cinematography fits into Avatar’s largely CGI universe), and well received. The underdog – and to my mind the best picture of the year – was The Coen Brothers’ film, A Serious Man.

Q: The Oscars featured a moving tribute to the films of John Hughes. What do you think it is about his movies that people love so much?

A: John Hughes respected his characters. More than that, he got to the strangeness of being young, and – here’s the feat – he made it relatable. No matter what, Hughes took all of his people seriously, and that, when dealing with teenagers – who are so often marginalized in cinema as well as life – is a wonderful, wonderful thing. He also understood the many kinds of teenagers from the jock to the nerd to the hot girl and onward, types everyone could relate to. It gave his films immediacy. But rather than paint them with broad strokes, Hughes always gave his characters a touch of contradiction or darkness or unforeseen humor that helped them to defy the limitations of their type. That right there is so much of what his films (and growing up) are (is) about: breaking type. People love his films because no matter who they are, Hughes loved them. And when you’re fifteen or sixteen, falling in love, out of love, scared, or alone, that’s no small thing.

Q: Who were the best dressed? Worst dressed? Did you get a swag bag? Who did you get to schmooze with after the show?

A: Sandra Bullock knocked my socks off. If only we had met later, she might have knocked off even more. And Vera Farmiga! VERA! FARMIGA! Holy Mackerel! She looked like a present I wanted to give myself over and over again. After the show, I got to schmooze with the liveliest bunch of rascals in the room, the editors and the documentarians. (Word of advice: at awards shows, always hang out with the editors and the documentarians. Actors are distracted by other people, directors are distracted by themselves, and writers are distracted by the buffet, but editors and the doc-makers are always present. Along with cinematographers, they see the bigger picture.) I quite literally bypassed Charlize on my way to Lynne Littman, Rob Epstein, Richard Pearce, Lynzee Kingman, and Mark Goldblatt. I got no swag. Only the happiest hangover of my life.

Read more about the Oscar’s on Sam Wasson’s blog. His book Fifth Avenue, 5 AM: Audrey Hepburn, Breakfast at Tiffany’s, and the Dawn of the Modern Woman will publish in July 2010.

Here are 10 signs you might be……….The Peanut Butter:

1) You can’t think of anything to show for your work in the last six months.

2) You think your job is to prevent mistakes from being made.

3) You believe that the more people invited to a meeting, the more successful the meeting will be.

4) Meetings take months to schedule.

5) You would rather be “politically correct” and “cc everyone” than make something great happen.

6) You’re paralyzed by the concept of “scalable.”

7) You think you have the upper hand in nearly all business dealings , but deep down inside, in those quiet moments late at night, you know you’re losing “control.”

8 ) You resort to bullying tactics to get your way without ever considering what might benefit everyone.

9) You spend your days trying to figure out how to gain control.

10) You’re an information hoarder.

At home, where he writes, he no longer has internet access. A four-month stint with wi-fi proved “deadly” for his productivity and having no access at all ensures that he is not tempted to “look at Kajagoogoo videos and old ads for Wrigley’s Spearmint Gum” on YouTube. “Writing is a deep-sea dive. You need hours just to get into it: down, down, down. If you’re called back to the surface every couple of minutes by an email, you can’t ever get back down. I have a great friend who became a Twitterer and he says he hasn’t written anything for a year.

Cut to this week when I have been asked for more FREE things than I ever remember. In one week, I received the following requests:

• Dozens of people (media, bloggers, and everyday ordinary folk) have asked for FREE tickets to a conference we’re hosting (And by the way, this conference business is supposed to be a revenue source because everyone wants their books for FREE these days. Turns out they want conferences for free too.).

• A TV Show wants 140 FREE books for the audience members. This seems to be a standard request these days. I’ve never quite understood how the author and publisher benefit from this, but it is practically expected.

• A blogger asked me for 100 copies of an author’s book for FREE to give away to his readers. He was writing a review. After much deliberation and hesitation, I agreed to 50 copies, which still seemed extreme to me.

At first I was appalled, and then I realized that maybe this is The Economics of Integrity…and maybe I should be going back to these requesters and making my own counter-requests…and maybe this is how the new economy works.

Okay, so. Amazing, right? I was absolutely stunned when I watched that video the first time, and I didn’t even comprehend that it was a site takeover until I watched the entire page swirl back into the salsa jar at the end. I had to watch it again (and again, and again) to catch the genius animation that snuck onto the screen, from the vines that creep up from the bottom to the slicing up of the Vimeo logo when the girl steps out of the frame to dance around the background. It’s interesting how much I have to force my brain to see the subtle shifting of the video frame and background zoom-in, since it didn’t even register the first few times I watched. This was more than an advertisement…viewing this was an experience. And even though I don’t like tomatoes or site takeovers, dang it if I don’t want to crack open a jar of salsa right now.

But aside from making me really hungry, the video also made me think of how certain media is presented to allow for an experience, to make the technology behind it disappear. That oh-so-smooth transition from “video on a video hosting website” to “Salsa Show!” was clutch to making me view this as more than a 40-second clip about a vegetable I really couldn’t care less about and something I wanted to click away from. Movie theaters are certainly designed to be invisible, and I think physical books are as well, providing only the turn of a page as the sole interruption between the written word and the reader’s imagination. Even then, that interruption is the mark of a good book: a “page-turner.” With the boom of electronic reading devices, it’s important to keep this feature in mind; which device will allow you to have an experience with a book, to make you want that salsa and nothing else, and then give it to you?

In the ramp-up to the iPad announcement, the internet ate up every little rumor and spit out post upon post of speculation about the features, capabilities, and technical specifications of the mythical creature. Then both during and after the event, many found themselves underwhelmed by the lack of glitter (No flash! No camera! That name!). Adam Frucci over at Gizmodo listed 8+ things that suck about the iPad, considering the lack of multitasking to be “a backbreaker.” But Joanne McNeil argues for the lack of multitasking in both the iPad and other devices because it solidifies the reading experience. The New York Times’s David Carr, as well as Jon Gruber at Daring Fireball, also noted the iPhone and iPad’s ability to, as gadgets, disappear, leaving as little as a finger swipe (page turn) between the user and the content. Similarly, while the Kindle can’t do much else, it certainly lets you read. What others may consider faults in these devices, readers should appreciate as features for creating a reading experience.

Now, as for what content is necessary for an experience, I’m not sure. That’s a whole ‘nother ballpark, but I think Kassia Kroszer hits one over the fence with her “What Are Enhanced Ebooks?” post. Now that we have the technology that allows us to create such enhancements and focus on them when reading, we need to actually deliver good salsa.

I’ve been hearing a lot of chatter that there wasn’t much new to learn at this year’s Tools of Change conference. In fact I heard the same things said about Digital Book World. I don’t know…..that’s not at all what I take away from these things. I attend a lot of conferences, even ones that have nothing to do with publishing. In fact, one of my all time favorites was Brad Inman’s Real Estate conference.

But here’s the thing, I don’t go expecting to take away some big revelation, and what I’ve learned over the years is that the lessons often take time to marinate and reveal themselves, and I don’t even know what I learned until weeks or months later. Also, for me, it’s every bit as much about the networking and connecting in the real world as it is about the lectures and panels. I firmly believe that magic can happen when you bring interesting people together face to face; the potency of that real world connection can’t be replicated virtually.

The other lesson (which I learned before, but was confirmed for me here) is that the least likely talks that I stumble into by accident are often the most interesting. This year, I fell into Brian O’Leary and Ashley Gordon’s talk about Print On Demand and it got me thinking in directions I had never considered……and the only reason I found myself there was because the Twitter room was too crowded. It was the most thought provoking hour of the week for me and I’m sure will lead me in directions I never imagined.

A lot of people are headed to SXSW this year and are asking me which panels to attend — and I’m going to give a big plug here for serendipity. I’ll be trying to steer myself clear of the obvious and will be looking to discover the magic in the least likely places. I’ll be the one looking to swim in a different pond. My favorite panel from last year had nothing to do with publishing, per se. It was called something to the effect of “How the Brain Works” by a lawyer named Craig Ball, and subsequently changed the way I give presentations (and as an aside, not to dis anyone specifically…..but I think others in our industry could benefit from what Craig Ball has to say). Another panel by YouTube star Felicia Day was hugely informative for me too — and I stumbled into it by accident.

Here are a few quick & dirty observations from TOC:

• There were many more laptops than I saw at DWB
• In France, all books are priced exactly the same, wherever they are sold. It’s the law. (Wow. That blew me away. Can you imagine? That changes everything for everyone). Check out Julia’s post from last Fall.
• Peter Meyers is a visionary. I don’t know if all of his ideas will “work” — but he has really done some deep thinking about what a “book” can be.
• Everyone needs to hear Kirk Biglione’s presentation about the history of DRM. I’m not sure I agree 100% with everything he says about how it should be in the future, but it is very informative to hear a detailed history of what happened to the music industry.
• Tim O’Reilly says get back to work. Stop trying to be so “visionary” and work on the meat and potatoes of great book publishing.
• Brad Inman said that trying to make stuff happen with big publishers is like trying to swim through a jar of peanut butter. I love that. I’ve been saying the same thing for years — but I call it the “sludge.” You have a great idea, and then you’ve got to swim through the sludge to try to make it happen. Not a lot of fun. I’ve learned to dodge and weave and bob my way around it. From now on, every time I think to myself “how do I make this happen” — it’s going to be symbolized by a big jar of Skippy.

All in all, I loved TOC 2010. I signed up for next year before I left the conference center.

Yes, you heard that right. We’re hosting a breakfast with Vanity Fair called Re-Set Business.

Vanity Fair is our media partner, and Seth Godin is the host/moderator.  The four panelists are Anna Bernasek, Michael Eisner, Tom Peters and Gary Vaynerchuk, so we are guaranteed a provocative conversation about what it will take to succeed in the “re-set” business world ahead.

It’s taking place at the Harvard Club, 35 West 44^th Street (bet. 5^th and 6^th Avenues), on April 20, 2010, from 8:00 a.m. to 10:45 am (there will be a V.I.P. reception from 11:00 am to noon, which requires a separate ticket).

TICKET PRICES INCLUDE BOOK BY EACH AUTHOR.

Pre-registration (closing 3/05): $275

Early Bird Registration (closing 3/19): $320

Standard Registration: $375

V.I.P. Reception (limited capacity): $225 additional

For more information, pls go to www.resetbusiness.com, or call 917-338-0491.

Hope to see you there!!!

Oh…..and one more thing……you can keep in touch with us about the conference on Twitter and Facebook.

It was in that spirit that I wrote to Tom on his site, saying that I thought his success tips should be published as a book. To my amazement, Tom actually wrote back, inviting me to visit him at his farm in Vermont. A few days later, after driving through the snow and spending the day with Tom (and his colleague, Erik Hansen, and his wife, Susan Sargent, who provided us with the world’s most delicious sandwiches), my head was spinning with provocative thoughts about business, and books…and we had agreed to give it a try.

I suppose I should have realized that a guy who writes about excellence (“If not excellence, what?”) would push me and the staff of HarperStudio to question all of our book-making assumptions. Why not make the book bright orange instead? Why not do two-color endpapers so “The 19 E’s of Excellence” would have 19 red “E”s? Why not re-write the existing success tips and add new ones, and then re-arrange the whole thing thematically? Why not, indeed?

Tom pushed us to go the extra mile, and now we’re grateful. Because now we’re holding his new, bright orange, chock-full-of-inspiration book, THE LITTLE BIG THINGS, in our hands, and damn if he wasn’t right: a book that tells businesspeople that they should over-deliver should be a book that overdelivers. And this one certainly does so.

Thanks, Tom!!!

It’s a gorgeous book — delicate, elegant, subtle and lyrical — and yet it took me an embarrassing amount of time to read, and I think the point I want to make is somewhere in that; It’s to be savored like a gourmet meal — and that’s not a bad thing — but this type of reading doesn’t seem to have a place in my everyday life in the way that Swedish massage doesn’t either, and yet I love that too. The world I’m immersed in (for better or worse) is whiplash fast; it’s a world made for skimming idea books in big gulps on an iPhone and then summing it up in 140 characters.

Am I alone with this dilemma? It’s not that I don’t value a luxurious read – in fact I aspire to have a life where it fits in on a daily basis and isn’t just relegated to a stack of “vacation” reading. Am I the only one who can’t find 8 hours to carve out for a delicate novel?

I actually believe that there are still people out there who make the time to luxuriate in a literary novel. In fact I follow Gotham Gal’s blog in awe at how much she reads.  Big fat literary novels seem to be devoured like candy. The question becomes how does this reader find a book like Dear Money?

The review sections that built these literary authors are an endangered species; over 200 newspapers closed in 2009 alone.

So Martha’s got to blog, right? And work the tools out there today to tell her own story…and she is. Martha joined Twitter and Facebook; she started a beautiful blog that I love to visit because there’s always a little treasure to discover: a story, a recipe, or sometimes a great photograph. But if the truth be told, it may not be as much “fun” for everyone as I can make it out to be. I always tell authors “it’s like a big cocktail party”…but maybe there are authors who don’t like cocktail parties…

I want to live in a world where an artist is nurtured and allowed to flourish; a world that wouldn’t force an artist like a square peg into a round hole in order to survive. It’s the same world where Northshire Bookstore would flourish because it’s a magical haven of inspiration and ideas and should be exempt from playing in a field where Walmart and Amazon fight over loss leaders.

I don’t have answers here, just more questions.

UPDATE: Bob just told me to take a day off and go get a massage and read a book

1) Try to expand my food repertoire by cooking a recipe from a cookbook once a week. I’ve already broken this resolution after my first few recipes were flops.

2) Get out in the real world more. Everyone’s talking about online marketing and social networking these days…but I want to give a plug for getting together in real life too.

Yesterday I saw two authors in the “real world” and it was worth more than a million emails.

Turns out Ellen Galinsky isn’t just the President and Co-Founder of Families and Work Institute as well as the author of the forthcoming book Mind in the Making — she also happens to be an amazing photographer. I had the pleasure of seeing her latest exhibit yesterday in Dobbs Ferry.

After being inspired by Ellen, it was off to meet upcoming HarperStudio author Sascha Zuger for dinner with her son and parents. We’ve been Twitter buddies for a while, and I’ve been psyched to read her memoir about her journey from a 9 to 5 office job to working on a commercial shrimp boat on the Great Barrier Reef and sailing across the South Pacific — but nothing compares to hearing her awesome adventure stories over a bowl of pasta. Having a kid hasn’t seemed to slow her down an iota (if I heard her correctly, I believe she said she’s traveled to 20 countries with her 7 year old son?). Crazy. Inspiring. Can’t wait to read her book even more now.

And speaking of the real world, everyone’s always asking me if the book tour is dead — and honestly, I’m not sure. I do believe there’s a bigger opportunity to make it successful using the tools available today on the internet as well as by being extra creative. Here are two book tours that I want to point out as food for thought:

Stephen Elliott wrote about The D.I.Y Book Tour in the New York Times about a month ago. It doesn’t seem perfect, but certainly interesting and seemed worthwhile if you ask me.

Gretchen Rubin has done (and continues to do) a big tour. I’ve been following along on her blog and it seems that there are a lot of “Happiness is a Great Book Event in…” posts — so she did something right. I know she asked the readers of her blog early on where they’d be interested in having her visit, and I believe part of the tour may have been sponsored by a magazine (I don’t know more details than that), but I’m dying for the full wrap up from Gretchen on what worked and why, and what to skip in the future.

And then of course there was Gary’s tour which was a huge success. Check out the Facebook pages he created which really helped spread the word and gauge numbers in advance.

Would love to hear from anyone out there about what you find working in the real world…

Acclaimed journalist Anna Bernasek answers these questions as she takes us on a colorful journey that reveals the deep layers of trust involved in even the simplest of transactions. With examples that range from milk to mortgages, Bernasek shows how integrity is in fact our greatest economic asset; it forms the invisible bedrock of our economy.

As the world emerges from the financial wreckage of 2008, the question facing nations, companies, and individuals is how to create widespread prosperity again. Understanding the role trust and integrity play in our daily lives and the macro economy will force us to rethink the way we do business. In this “New Era of Responsibility,” Bernasek’s message is both essential and urgent. The Economics of Integrity is a book for our times.

The Economics of Integrity goes on sale February 23, 2010. Pre-order your copy today!

I reblogged it on Tumblr.

I reblogged it mostly because I was impressed that a young woman in the publishing industry would be bold enough to fearlessly and intelligently state her opinion about the controversial subject of piracy in such a public forum. Whether one agrees or not with Marian, there is no denying that her candor is rare among young women, and for me, a cause for celebration.

Reading this quote from Marian’s blog, I can’t imagine she’s not representing many readers in her generation:

I’m poor, I understand technology, and I guarantee I can find any book online, for free, in 10 minutes or less. You can delete and sue all you want, but at the end of the day the internet is a wide and limitless place, meaning it’s a waste of time, money and energy to fight it. Embrace the change and find another way to make money without a) annoying your audience, b) suing your audience, and c) losing you audience by wasting cash on completely ineffective “precautions”.

My Tumblr automatically feeds to Facebook, and before I knew it, men from the publishing establishment were leaving comments that felt scolding about the post on my wall. Yes it’s controversial and it’s not the opinion of many (most?) people employed in mainstream publishing — but it’s an honest opinion by a young woman who’s brave enough to share it with us — and that’s RARE! A few women chimed in on my wall that a dose of honest opinion is good for us, her piece is smart, etc.

Here’s the bottom line for me — whether you agree or not with Marian Schembari’s views on piracy, she has given us a glimpse into the psyche of a Gen Y reader. I appreciate her honesty. I believe this is a gift. I think we should listen.

Click through to read the pre-race Q&A he did with Julia Cheiffetz, where he talks about the competition, his gear, and how he handles the course.

Whatever your point of view on this, the use of “monopoly” to describe a publisher’s control of its content is a bit overheated, no?  Maybe we can go back to calling it what we used to in the old days: “copyright.”

1) For those people who might live under a rock, what are the X Games?

The X Games is an event that collects some of the world’s best extreme athletes in one place to compete in a series of events ranging from big air trick contests to mono skier crosses. The best athletes on snow come here every year to push their individual snowsport further, and as a result you get to see a lot of very different and very talented athletes all crammed together on one mountain. I’m in the athlete lounge right now, sitting across from the French Olympic team (competing in skier cross and wearing tight pink uniforms) and next to two girls getting ready to go out for halfpipe practice (wearing super baggy white ponchos).

2) I bet they don’t get many writers…

Hahaha – I don’t think so. I had to leave my corduroy blazer at home just so that I could fit in.

3) Which event are you participating in?

It’s called the Mono X, which is basically a skier cross for monoskis. You have a gated course that you and three other competitors must navigate at the same time in a race to the bottom of the hill. In between those gates, you have a series of features ranging from big air jumps (80 ft+ for the final), road gaps, step ups, step downs, and woopity woos. It’s pretty funny the names they give some of these features. It’s like they’re trying to take the edge of the insanity of the whole thing.

4) How much time goes into designing and building your monoski?

I started working on my gear back in August after a year’s hiatus. The design process, which I worked on in conjunction with a local R&D company, took about three months in which we stress-tested every other monoski on the market to find out their individual weak points for high-impact scenarios (something you get a lot of in the Mono X). After that, we went in fabrication mode, which was finished by December. By the second week of December I was working on custom valving the suspension (which is just a Fox Float shock taken from the front end of a snowmobile) with another Montana local. We put on the finishing touches about two weeks ago. All told – countless hours and thousands of dollars. And totally worth it. It’s called “Ullr”.

5) What kind of role does advertising play in the X Games?

In a lot of ways, X Games is the most widely publicized winter event in world (with exclusion of the Olympics every four years), and as a result, advertising plays a huge role in almost every aspect of the games. Almost every athlete here has a sponsor ranging from local support to having Yahoo! rent you a mansion on the mountain (well played, Shaun White). Everybody is beholden to somebody, so you end up seeing a lot of logos and free stuff floating around. It’s fun, but definitely nice to get back to the real world after a week of this.

6) You must be scared shitless before you race. How do you calm your nerves?

I just keep moving. When I’m at the hill, I’m trying to get in as many laps as I can just to keep my body warm and my head focused on skiing. I start playing head games with myself if I stay still for too long, so I just try always stay in motion.

7. What’s the craziest thing you’ve had happen during an X Games competition?

I think I’ll be able to give you a good answer by the end of the week. The course has been dramatically stepped up this year in terms of difficulties. Just inspecting it yesterday, the nerves amongst the other competitors was palpable. Also – there are no “optional” jumps, so I get the impression that the real crazy stuff is heading this way…

Kevin Connolly is the author of Double Take. You can watch him compete in the X Games this Sunday on ESPN.

After months of questions and angst about the future of the publishing industry and whether it was part of my future, my answer came in the form of Baratunde Thurston. I’d heard him speak at the Web 2.0 conference and I wanted desperately to work with him. After tracking him down, he came to my office for a brainstorm, and it was during that meeting that I had an epiphany: There is nothing in the world I’d rather be doing.How cool is it that I get to go to conferences, hear really interesting speakers, then have them over to my office to figure out their book with them? And then I get to work on that book.

My fate became clear during that meeting with Baratunde Thurston. He’s writing a book for HarperStudio called How to be Black.

The next author to sign with HarperStudio was Kevin Rose, the founder of Digg.com. I’m a huge fan — have been following his blog, twitter, videos, etc. for some time, and think he’s one of the smartest tech entrepreneurs out there with lots of wisdom and experience to share .  He’ll be writing a book about the secrets behind his success called One to One Million.

Jill Kargman is a novelist. I saw her on Samantha Ettus’s show Obsessed TV six months ago and knew I wanted to work with her. We met a few times and completely clicked. The question was , what’s the “HarperStudio” book. In early December she came to my office to have another brainstorm and told me some terrible personal news. The thing was, she told the story with such humor and grace that instead tears and sadness, we were hysterically laughing…and it was in that moment that we realized that’s her gift: she sprinkles the funny everywhere, even on the tough times. Jill’s going to write two books for HarperStudio. The first is called Sometimes I Feel Like A Nut and will be essays about using humor as a tool to get through life –making the fun times funnier and the tough times bearable, in reference to Woody Allen’s magical math equation: COMEDY = TRAGEDY + TIME. The second will be a novel.

The fourth author to sign with HarperStudio during that lucky month of December 2009, was Ryan Tate from Gawker.  I’d been thinking a lot about merits and challenges of being a small company within a large corporation, and Bob suggested that there’s a book in that. Nick Bilton from the New York Times lead me to Ryan Tate at Gawker, and he is now writing a book for us called Skunkworks, which I can’t wait to read.

One more author who I want to mention who signed with HarperStudio, though it was slightly before that December epiphany, but still very much part of my process of realizing how much I love my job, is Melanie Notkin, the Savvy Auntie. She’s writing her Savvy Auntie’s Guide to Life.

So there you have it: now a total of five authors who make me so excited about my work and this industry that I feel like the luckiest girl in the world.

Ms. Grandin is currently reading a copy of Elaine Hall’s book Now I See The Moon (Elaine starred in the incredible HBO doc Autism: The Musical). I can’t wait to hear what she thinks!

(update! this just in from Temple Grandin: “Now I See the Moon provides insightful ways to teach and work with individuals with autism and severe disabilities.  It will give parents great hope.” Whoop! Whoop! JC)

“So I get email from a good former student, applying for a job and asking for a recommendation. “Sure”, I say, “Tell me what you think I should say.” I then get a draft letter back in which the student has described their work and fitness for the job in terms so superlative it would make an Assistant Brand Manager blush.

So I write my letter, looking over the student’s self-assessment and toning it down so that it sounds like it’s coming from a person and not a PR department, and send it off. And then, as I get over my annoyance, I realize that, by overstating their abilities, the student has probably gotten the best letter out of me they could have gotten.

Now, can you guess the gender of the student involved?

Of course you can. My home, the Interactive Telecommunications Program at NYU, is fairly gender-balanced, and I’ve taught about as many women as men over the last decade. In theory, the gender of my former student should be a coin-toss. In practice, I might as well have given him the pseudonym Moustache McMasculine for all the mystery there was. And I’ve grown increasingly worried that most of the women in the department, past or present, simply couldn’t write a letter like that.

This worry isn’t about psychology; I’m not concerned that women don’t engage in enough building of self-confidence or self-esteem. I’m worried about something much simpler: not enough women have what it takes to behave like arrogant self-aggrandizing jerks.”

The reactions to Shirky’s comments were mixed among my friends. One person said “I know a SHITTON of self-aggrandizing blowhards who also happen to be women. Regardless of gender, I always think karma’s at work anyway and if you are ultimately just faking it, it will bite you in the ass in the end when people eventually realize you’re full of shit!”

I am curious to hear what people think. Is there some kind of ultimate karmic justice in the world? Do people agree with Clay Shirky’s take on women?

But what if it’s non-fiction and the world is changing at breakneck speed and there’s potentially updated information that happens in the six months between when the print book was finished being written and is finally published?

When Gary proposed the idea to us last Fall that he wait to record the audio until December, six months after the book was finished so that he could incorporate the latest info, we thought it was genius.

I love the idea that the hardcover is the mother ship, and then the other formats can be derivatives. Vook would fall in this category too.

So here it is for your listening pleasure: Crush It! the remix.

It was published the first week of January and has been selling incredibly well despite the fact that I can’t seem to find anywhere except for a few tweets from Gary that there’s new information here. About every few pages, Gary stops reading and adds off the cuff stories. Even if you’d read the book, it’s enough new info that you might want to listen too.

Check it out…It’s on sale for now $7.49 (from $13.22). Totally worth the $7.49.

We need to protect our author’s copyrights, and make sure that we don’t get Napstered by massive illegal online distribution. But small quantities of people reading our books for free may not be harmful, and may actually promote literacy, and the joy of reading…and the business we’re so worried about protecting.

I was first turned on to Ryan Murphy when he optioned Sin in the Second City a book I edited at Random House. Over the holiday, I finally sat down and watched Glee, the FOX show about a group of high school misfits. I know I’m late to the Glee party but I’ve just got to say: The dude is a genius.

What Glee lacks in subtlety it makes up for in imagination. A show choir performance of Amy Winehouse’s “Rehab,” really?? Murphy is able to take the most cliche ridden material and make it fresh. Check out this clip from “Don’t Stop Believin’.” It’s like tasting apple pie for the first time.

Over the holidays I caught up on some of my recreational reading and read Ender’s Game, the scifi classic written by Orson Scott Card and published by TOR in 1985. It only took me ten years to get to it–I first heard about the book in high school when my friend Dash gave a book report on it in Freshman English. Light years ago, right?

What surprised me most about the book, though, was how accurately Card predicted future technologies: all the recruits have desks (touchscreen laptops), when they’re not studying or practicing they have time for free play (video games), the school has a system the students can send messages through (email), and back on Earth people communicate across the globe on the nets (the internet).

If anyone still doubts the power of Twitter and the blogosphere, this passage from the book, where Ender’s siblings back on Earth, Patrick and Valentine, take up the personas of Demosthenes and Locke on the nets in order to amass political influence, reads almost as prophecy:

With false names, on the right nets, [Patrick and Valentine] could be anybody. Old men, middle-aged women, anybody, as long as they were careful about the way they wrote. All that anyone would see were their words, their ideas. Every citizen started equal, on the nets.

Of course they were not invited to take part in the great national and international political forums–they could only be audiences there until they were invited or elected to take part. But they signed on and watched, reading some of the essays published by the great names, witnessing the debates that played across their desks.

And in the lesser conferences, where common people commented about the great debates, they began to insert their comments. At first Peter insisted that they be deliberately inflammatory.

The responses that got posted were vinegar; the responses that were sent as mail, for Peter and Valentine to read privately, were poisonous. But they did learn what attributes of their writing were seized upon as childish and immature. And they got better.

Peter took careful note of their most memorable phrases and then did searches from time to time to find those phrases cropping up in other places. Not all of them did, but most of them were repeated here and there, and some of them even showed up in the major debates on the prestige nets. “We’re being read,” Peter said. “The ideas are seeping out.”

In an age when Ashton Kutcher has more followers on Twitter than CNN, this scenario couldn’t ring more true.

Gretchen turned out to be such a gift to have at the meeting because as I would speak to these authors and tell them what I thought they should be doing, she would chime in as a member of their tribe instead of the outsider (me) and give her own perspective about what was easy or challenging.

Over the course of that next year and half I followed carefully what she was doing and was always impressed. We got together in person a few times, and I would tell her what a great job she was doing, we’d compare notes about this and that, and she’d always say “but will it sell books when the time comes?”

Well, it turns out that it does work (I feel like a broken record ). Gretchen’s book, The Happiness Project, went on sale on December 29, 2009. On Wednesday we found out that it will land at #2 on the New York Times bestseller list for the January 17 list. I realize that Gretchen’s subject lends itself to blogging and twittering more easily than other books would, and it’s got a great jacket, title, and traditional publicity — but there is no denying, IMHO, that Gretchen Rubin worked hard, for a long time, establishing a relationship with the community, and it paid off.

Here are 5 things that Gretchen did right:

1) As I’ve said, it’s not a “campaign.” This is a long-term relationship with your readers. Gretchen understood that and started the relationship long before (as in years) it was time to “promote her book.”

2) She talked about her book…but she also talked about other people’s books, and in general, we got to see the world through Gretchen’s eyes and to know her. She posted frequently, linked them up in Facebook (often I found them on Facebook), and had GREAT content. I don’t think there was a post I didn’t love and I felt like I found a little present every time she put one up.

3) Once the book jacket was done she put it up on the site in a place where people could always see it so she didn’t have to always “promote herself.” I hear this a lot from authors: “I’m not comfortable promoting myself.” Gretchen didn’t promote herself; she was fabulously interesting, and when I would click through to read her posts I was always reminded by the book jacket that it was coming out.

4) She didn’t sit around waiting for a publicist to make her famous. Yes, there is traditional media as part of the mix; lots of it in her case. But it’s a healthy mix of traditional and social media and they riff off each other. It’s like having a well balanced stock portfolio…not to mention that she has a tribe with whom she can communicate about all of this media.

5) Here’s my favorite one: The Video. The video the video the video. Every author needs one (kidding); most are not good. The thing I LOVE about Gretchen’s is that it is simple beyond belief, and what it lacks in fancy production and editing it makes up for in spades with heart and soul.

I watched this video a few months ago and was so moved I’ve seen it about another 10 times. I think about it all of the time. Watch here.

UPDATE:  The Happiness Project was published by HarperCollins.

Q&A with Christopher S. Stewart:

Chris S. Stewart is The Deputy Editor of the New York Observer. His magazine work has appeared in GQ, Harper’s, The New York Times Magazine, and Wired, among others.

1) What is your book about?

The epic search for a lost city buried somewhere deep in the jungles of the Mosquito Coast in Honduras. The city is called Ciudad Blanca, or the White City, and explorers as far back as the Spanish conquistador Hernan Cortes tried to find it – with no luck. Some of the men never came out of the jungle; they died or disappeared. Others got lost. It’s one of the biggest and wildest and most impenetrable jungles in the world – known as the little Amazon. But in 1939, one man claimed he located the El Dorado-like city and this is where the book begins.

Theodore Morde was an American explorer and World War II spy. His story is as layered and enigmatic as the White City. But here’s the twist: he died under strange circumstances before disclosing the city’s location. There are people who actually believe that the spirits of the lost city killed him.

But to this day, the mystery remains: What’s out there? What was it that drew in these explorers, and at such terrific risk? This is ultimately a detective story. And some of the answers began to come when I tracked down Morde’s secret journals in North Carolina and then set out with them on my own journey to find this lost place.

2) Broadly speaking, what is considered to be a “lost city”?

Well, a lost city begins with a rumor – that there’s some spectacular and ancient world that vanished at some point in time and is waiting to be found. The city persists in legend and myth, stories passed along over the decades. Its size doesn’t matter much. But it’s likely encased in some impressive and mysterious history. There are lots of incredible lost city

tales: Atlantis, El Dorado, Z. And with these stories, there’s the ubiquitous riddle – if these in fact cities existed, what happened to them and where did their inhabitants go? I heard many end-of-the-world scenarios for the White City. Among them was the story that a volcano covered it up, another was that it was destroyed by an evil army.

But in many ways, a lost city refuses to be discovered. As I stumbled through the jungle and talked to people, the place I was looking for was always around the next corner, up the next river, over the next mountain.

For some of the indigenous people I met, the city wasn’t even meant to be found. They said it would continue to elude because the White City was a spiritual place, and that, like a specter, it constantly migrated from one unreachable location to another.

Oh yeah. Once I hit the jungle, there was no cell coverage anywhere. Even the satellite phone was unpredictable – to use it, I had to wait for a break in the near-constant rain and then find a hole in the sprawling sea of forest overhead. That kind of isolation, that being unable to reach the outside world was more than a little unsettling at times. I kept thinking, what if something goes wrong? I’m not a backpacker or a trekker. The last time I slept in a tent was in my parents backyard when I was 10. I live in New York City, so being in the the rain forest, for me, is a lot like being on Jupiter. I fretted about the deadly snakes, the airborne viruses, the bandits and river pirates. Even though I traveled with three others — two natives and an American archeologist — there were moments where all of my fears and the remoteness of the jungle overwhelmed me and I felt completely and utterly alone, like the rest of the world ceased to exist.

4) Did you have any Heart of Darkness moments down in the jungle?

Many. I walked for hours every day, up mountains, across rivers, with a fifty-plus-pound bag on my back and uncomfortable combat boots on my feet.

Sometimes in driving rain, sometimes using a machete to slash through thick jungle. I was never completely dry, not even at night. Almost every day, I heard warnings about wily forest spirits or gun-toting settlers or the smugglers coming up from Columbia. The military coup that dethroned the Honduran president while I was out there only made things more worrisome.

Twice, I saw dead men. It was one constant green nightmare. But the most frightening moment for me was the day I got into a dugout canoe with three armed men and headed down a river that felt like it was flowing towards the end of the world.

I remember Marlow describing his terrifying river experience as a “peculiar blackness.” These guys I met were rough, dressed in rags, chewed cigarettes dangling from their jaws. They said they’d been moving wood up the river, which was another way of saying that they were involved in trafficking of some sort. I was sick and tired and having malaria dreams at night. A couple hours down the river, the men said that the price we’d negotiated was no longer enough. And then they decided that they were going to stop for the night before they took us the rest of the way. There was nothing around us, but black jungle that shut out the sky and their little pirate hut on a cliff. Monkeys and invisible creatures provided a constant, eerie soundtrack. That night, I didn’t sleep. I worried that these men would kill me. And who would know where to look?

5) What drives people to explore?

Generally, I think it’s the sense that there’s still stuff out there that we don’t know about. It’s a romantic notion that there could be a richer world somewhere, perhaps hidden in a distant wilderness, or buried in the shadow of a remote mountain peak, or submerged in the deepest ocean. And that’s what I think propels the explorer — the possibility of discovering something lost or unknown. Is it really out there? They want to believe it is — because maybe it would actually overturn some important notions about our world. So they search.

“It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair, we had everything before us, we had nothing before us, we were all going direct to heaven, we were all going direct the other way – in short, the period was so far like the present period, that some of its noisiest authorities insisted on its being received, for good or for evil, in the superlative degree of comparison only.”

- A Tale of Two Cities, Charles Dickens

Decades from now, when we look back at the book business in 2009, it seems likely that we’ll see it as a threshold year, one in which all of the signs were there for what followed. It was a year in which sales held steady (Nielsen Bookscan, which covers 75% of the market, reported that overall unit sales through December 20 were 724 million copies, only a 3% drop from last year—and adult hardcover fiction was up an amazing 3%), and a few authors were so successful (Stephanie Meyer, Jeff Kinney) that the fates of entire publishing houses were altered by them; however, it was also a year that saw publishing’s profit margins squeezed in perplexing new ways. It was a year in which some of the most highly-respected bestsellers (Audrey Niffenegger’s Her Fearful Symmetry; Andre Agassi’s Open; Edward M. Kennedy’s True Compass) were also apparently the year’s biggest money-losers for their publishers, due to their multi-million-dollar advances; at the same time, some of the books with the highest rumored advances (Dan Brown’s The Lost Symbol; Sarah Palin’s Going Rogue) were likely the most profitable. It was a year in which e-book sales increased exponentially, with the cherry on the sundae being Amazon’s announcement that they had sold more e-books on Christmas Day than p-books (though of course this was helped by all the people who got Kindles as presents and spent the day filling them); but it was also a year in which the prices charged for those e-books made them a threat to the health of the p-book retailers on whom publishers continued to rely, and possibly a future threat to publishers’ ability to make money on the e-book format itself, in spite of that format’s wonderful ability to eliminate the costs of production, distribution, and returns. It was a year in which the largest publishing houses slowed title acquisitions and reduced the number of titles they published, while one company—Author Solutions—increased its annual output to a remarkable 24,000 authors (even more remarkably, these authors were all paying for the privilege). It was a year in which review coverage of new fiction disappeared almost entirely, and yet one first novel (Kathryn Stockett’s The Help) sold more than a million hardcover copies thanks to word of mouth alone. It was a year in which publishers continued to spend exorbitant amounts of money on print advertising, in spite of data showing how ineffective such advertising tends to be, but also a year in which some publishers discovered the power of online media to reach niche markets at significantly lower costs.

What does this mean for the future? That for every trend there will be a counter trend. And since this is the time of year for Top Ten lists, here’s mine:

1. Trend: The large publishing houses will continue to reduce overhead as profits shrink in the years ahead. Counter trend: Publishers will be looking for mergers and acquisitions to compensate for those shrinking profits. The Big Six could be the Big Three within five years.

2. Trend: These companies will continue to focus more resources on fewer titles, using their strengths as large-scale marketers and distributors to publish brand-names. Title count at the largest houses could drop by as much as fifty percent over the next five years. Counter trend: At the same time, self-publishing (including partnerships like the one announced recently between Author Solutions and Harlequin) will grow exponentially.

3. Trend: Title reduction will be most significant for new talent, with the largest houses entrusting support of new authors to a handful of editorial imprints. The editors at those imprints–editors with proven ability to choose new material successfully–will increase in value. Counter trend: Editors whose job is to handle existing talent will find their roles diminished.

4. Trend: In terms of advances, the amounts paid for brand-names will continue to increase, with seven-figure or eight-figure acquisitions commonplace among authors with established track records. Counter trend: There will be an increase in five-figure acquisitions (perhaps with profit-share arrangements) for less predictable material. The six-figure advance—that dangerous neighborhood inhabited by books with lots of potential but few guarantees—will become a rare species within the decade.

5. Trend: E-book sales will grow exponentially, with the proliferation of new devices and applications for reading on smartphones, etc… Within five years, half of all reading will be done electronically. Counter trend: There will be a resurgence of appreciation for well-designed physical books, as keepsakes, gifts, etc… While e-books will create a downward pressure on pricing, there will be notable exceptions (as seen this year with Carl Jung’s The Red Book, in great demand at $195.00, or Thomas Keller’s gorgeous Ad Hoc at Home, a bestseller at $50.00).

6. Trend: As more consumers become e-book readers, demand will increase for the availability of e-books simultaneously with p-books. Counter trend: Publishers will try a variety of strategies to meet this demand while not undercutting their p-book sales, such as offering more expensive “enhanced” e-books at publication and plain vanilla, less expensive e-books several months later (the strategy recently announced by Macmillan) or by offering a variety of “bundled” discounts to purchasers of multiple formats (prediction: within five years, it will be common practice to give every p-book purchaser a “free” e-book version of that book at time of purchase, as is already the case in the music business, in which someone who buys a cd can also listen to that cd on other devices in digital form, without paying a separate fee).

7. Trend: Fewer and fewer books will be sold to publishers at “auction,” and that practice will disappear completely within five years, as more and more publishers realize that the “winner” in such auctions—the publisher willing to pay more to acquire a book than any of their competitors–is often actually the loser in the end. Sales will be made either by brand-name authors to their previous publishing company or by new authors to carefully chosen editors with strong reputations. Counter trend: Instead of auctions for the highest advance, there will be auctions in which a basic advance is established by the agent, with the auction winner being the publisher who bids the most in marketing committed to the book.

8. Trend: As the initial sale becomes less of the focus for authors, the agent of the future will become more of a business manager who handles every aspect of an author’s career, overseeing the author’s online presence, developing sources of revenue outside of book sales such as workshops and lecture tours, and acting as the author’s publicist in between publications. Counter trend: Publishers will create free-standing departments whose services can be purchased a la carte by authors, whether that author is self-published or published by a competitor who doesn’t offer such services.

9. Trend: As the Boomers lose their eyesight and their children become teenagers, demographics will favor books for young adults over books for adults. This is also the generation most likely to embrace a variety of online and offline formats, without feeling the need to choose one over another. Counter trend: While auctions and advances diminish for adult titles, they could heat up for young adult material as publishers bet big in search of the next Stephenie Meyer. (Prediction: publishing houses will soon have entire departments devoted to developing books about the undead.)

10. Trend: Every year for the foreseeable future, books will be purchased between Thanksgiving and Christmas about how to prepare high-calorie foods (a favorite from this year: Fat: An Appreciation of a Misunderstood Ingredient, by Jennifer McLagan). Counter trend: Every January for the foreseeable future, the bestseller lists will be dominated by books about how to lose the weight gained by eating those high-calorie foods. (Not much of a prediction, sorry…but I needed a tenth trend to complete the list!)

Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

Nina Sankovitch, the author of Tolstoy and the Purple Chair, has compiled a fabulous gift list for all the readers in your life: The runner: What I Talk About When I Talk about Running by Haruki Murakami; The Optimist: On Kindness by Adam Phillips and Barbara Taylor; The Teenager: The Love of the Last Tycoon by F. Scott Fitzgerald. For the full list click here.

Not sure whether to laugh, cry, or applaud at Andy Spade’s new installation.

(via Suite 2046)

But Robert Andrews over at paidContent.org makes an excellent argument against e-readers, as enhanced as they will become:

“Personally, I’m not convinced any of these single-function gadgets – whether for books or magazines – will be particularly successful. iPhone has succeeded because it’s not a walled garden; ereaders need more than both books and magazines.

Apple and Microsoft are rumoured to be working on multi-functional devices – it’s here, if anywhere, that tablets may really come in to their own, as near-computers, not slabs that mimic individual olde worlde media.”

The problem with the dedicated e-reader is that it’s dedicated, and I personally can’t justify spending money on something that limited when an iPhone can do more for less. Engadget already reported that the Nook has been hacked to include a web browser and Pandora (as well as other apps) proving the desire for a device to be more than multiple books. The Apple tablet (or the Unicorn, as Kassia Krozser calls it) won’t save publishing, but it will convert many more people to e-books than e-readers can.

On the customer end, I went in and clicked to buy the book, uploaded a photo, wrote a message, and the book is now being sent to me. Free Shipping. Really seamless and lovely shopping experience.

How can this not be the biggest thing in book publishing since sliced bread? Wouldn’t everyone who’s giving a book as a gift want the opportunity to to personalize it for the recipient? I plan on trying many more of these!

As an aside, SharedBook can also seamlessly bring a blog to a book format. Check it out here.

If they are, then I understand why you would delay e-book releases to remove the competition for hardcover sales. But it seems that a majority of e-book readers, who have spent the couple of hundred dollars on an electronic reading device, are rather dedicated to the format and wouldn’t let a timing delay convince them to spend extra money on a hardcover. In those four months, they would spend their $9.99 on other books (and you know there are plenty out there to choose from) and possibly forget about the delayed titles by the time they’re available. As an Amazon spokesman said in the Wall Street Journal article, “Authors get the most publicity at launch and need to strike while the iron is hot. If readers can’t get their preferred format at that moment, they may buy a different book or just not buy a book at all.”

James McQuivey over at the Forrester blog posted a great response to the announcement, proposing alternatives to the delayed e-book plan, including bundling the formats and offering premium digital editions that can be released at the same time as hardcovers. We’ve discovered some challenges with bundling formats and putting the physical and digital into the same shopping cart, but we’re still working on finding solutions that won’t keep any readers out in the cold.

(via Guy Gonzales)

“I did too” says Timberlake. And then, a pause: “No I didn’t” Timberlake says, chuckling. Huh? I don’t get it. The message is.. a Sony Reader is a cool looking device…for people who pretend to read? I’ll take Hodgman any day over that.

Cara Eisenpress and Phoebe Lapine are the creators of Big Girls, Small Kitchen, the food blog that had our mouths watering for months before the pair came in to pitch their book. We were inspired by their sophisticated take on childhood classics like Pesto Mac ‘n Cheese and Pancakes with Pomegranates. Cara and Phoebe’s book will tell the story of their friendship (they’ve been cooking together since a middle school bake-off) complete with recipes and a foreword by Ina Garten. 

We’re super excited about this book — and so are our stomachs. What else can I say? It was love at first bite. 

p.s. Check out the recipes for Cara and Phoebe’s scrumptious book deal cookies. We chomped through those babies in less than two days and I don’t think the janitor was too happy about all the crumbs we left behind…

See GET COOKING author Mollie Katzen’s simple and delicious ideas here.

And she’s answering questions on Cookstr here.

Emeril Lagasse was taking questions live on Sirius Radio, and his hints can be found here.

And the chefs at Food52, whose cookbook we’re partnering to publish next year, have a Thanksgiving 911 as well as great recipes that are currently in competition to be in the book.Good luck in the kitchen, and Happy Thanksgiving!

Last week I attended the web 2.0 Expo in New York at the Javits Center. It was my second year attending, and it’s definitely high on my list of favorites. Almost all of the speakers I saw were inspiring, enlightening, and entertaining (one was hilarious). The vibe was great; no shortage of interesting people to mingle with. According to the program, the theme of the conference was “The Power of Less.” Think Google; think Twitter; think simple, clean, stripped down and lean.

I’m going to attempt to list the highlights below, for me, day by day:

Day 1 – Alistair Croll and Sean Power set the bar very high on day one for the rest of the conference with their full day workshop on “Communilytics.” I didn’t start out in their session, but after watching the twitter stream all morning, I jumped in there after lunch and they did not disappoint. Their slide show is chock full of useful info.

Day 2 – I saw a lot of great speakers day two, including Tara Hunt, Kevin Rose, Jay Adelson, and Chris Brogan. Best discovery that day was Caterina Fake’s new site, Hunch. Most profound hour spent was at the end of the day with Jeff Jarvis. He spoke about the world going BETA, why that’s a good thing, and what that means, industry by industry. The subject of his talk might develop into his next book, which I can’t wait to read. His weekly podcast, This Week In Google, is a bevy of good info and insight where he talks about a lot of the same themes and issues.

Day 3 – There were many highlights Day 3. Loved the Launch Pad (startups pitched their ideas to the crowd); Gina Trapani explaining Google Wave was a must if you are as confused by Wave as I am. Session on Security, Identity & Liability in Social Media blew my mind with issues I had never even considered (and still don’t want to) But the highlight of all highlights was most definitely Baratunde Thurston. I’m not even going to attempt describe it. His talk, “There’s a #Hashtag for That,” is a must watch:

Day 4 – Most thought provoking speakers to me were Ching-Yung Lin talking about “What’s a Friend Worth?” and Genevieve Bell discussing what to do about people who aren’t on the internet (can you imagine?).

The younger Nabokov’s introduction claims that “despite its incompleteness,” “The Original of Laura” is “unprecedented in structure and style.” Brian Boyd recently made a similar claim to The Wall Street Journal: “The opening few words just blew me away. There’s a kind of narrative device that he’s never used before and that I don’t think anybody else has ever used before.” I just can’t see the evidence. The absence of a plot — what we have here is all setup for unknown events to come — indicates that we don’t know what structure Nabokov had in mind. So, in fact, does his son’s implicit invitation to reshuffle the cards. And what’s the unique narrative device in those opening words? “Her husband, she answered, was a writer, too — at least, after a fashion.” Does Boyd mean the device of beginning a novel in medias res, with a character answering a question we don’t get to hear? Virginia Woolf did the same thing in the first sentence of “To the Lighthouse.”

Even Nabokov, it seems, needs a sales pitch. But hey, can you blame them for trying? (That’s a serious question.)

Check the WSJ’s gallery of redesigned Nabokov backlist titles including covers by Chip Kidd and Carin Goldberg. Amazing:

Stacy you make magic happen and inspire me every day.

This little slice of heaven actually exists in the real world. I’ve sent authors there many times over the years and always heard reports back that it’s a very special place. They’ve won awards for their fabulousness, including the bookseller of the year.

But nothing I’d ever heard could describe the magic I felt when I walked through the front door of Northshire Bookstore in Manchester, VT last Saturday. I was there to speak on a panel with Bob Miller and David Black and moderated by Joann Davis about the future of book publishing.

As soon as I walked into the store, the pressing issues about the future of book publishing — pricing and ebooks, DRM, the kindle, the nook, returns and advances — faded to the background. This was a place of community and ideas. Northshire Bookstore felt like a quality of life issue, and I couldn’t help but feel like that’s been muffled in the conversation about the future of our industry.

I took a mental picture before I left. If you love books, you’ve got to put Northsire Bookstore on the list of places you must visit. Seriously, it’s a destination bookstore.

Here’s a passage from their business plan that captures the essence:

We see the Northshire Bookstore as a resource promoting the

stimulation, development, improvement, or refinement

of the

mind, emotions, interests, manners, skills, taste, and knowledge

of the people who make us part of their community.

We operate from a belief that truth comes in many forms,

and exposure to diversity is healthy.

We seek to serve in a way that offers people the tools to

nurture a more complete and comprehensive view of life,

inclusive of art, morals, science, and religion/faith/spirituality,

as an integrated whole.

In our workplace we seek to integrate considerations that the

traditional workplace focuses on, behavior and systems,

with consideration of

our colleague’s emotions and values and general welfare.

See more photos from Saturday here.

I think so! It was an elegant capstone that encompassed the themes (particularly, Footnotes favorite: stubborn individualism!) of the season. It also packed the wallop we’ve been all waiting for — who knew that a dreary old business deal would have more verisimilitude than the Kennedy’s assassination this season!

2) Were there really no non-compete clauses in the early 60s?

With McCann-Erickson, essentially, no. In the early 1960’s they gobbled up a mid-sized shops and retained them under one umbrella, but still forced them the compete for clients. This had an upside: two agencies could be under the McCann-Erickson parent with one shop servicing American Airlines and the other shop servicing TWA. And a downside: the fear, at the time, was there would be leaks and betrayals between agencies.

3) Is the last shot of Don Draper meant to signal a kind of re-birth?

Goodness no! That’s Don at work. Don with his team. It’s just Don doing what he does with all that charisma: lead. Don’s far too restless and caught up in his own melodrama (divine though it is) to reform himself into being any kind of consistent, deferential personality. He’s a powder keg of emotion in a very tidy hat!

4) Was Don full of horseshit when he told Pete that Pete has always been one step ahead?

I think Pete is one step ahead purely by virtue of being young. And Don was right, Pete is the one pushing Sterling Cooper (RIP) into aerospace space and black magazines. While Peggy has been great in the clutch for copy, it’s been Pete and Harry who have tried to pioneer into new markets. I think that’s why Kinsey and Kenny were left behind because they seem endlessly complacent.

Visit msnbc.com for Breaking News, World News, and News about the Economy

Martin: When he first took over, A.G. Lafley at P&G was brilliant enough to realize they were missing a lot about the holistic consumer experience by sticking to things that were rigorously quantified. For example, when the company moved into beauty products, they were looking at face cream. And the scientists decided it must be about pore coverage. So they analyzed the hell out of pores and said ‘We can cover pores better than anybody.’ So when women in their research started talking about wanting to feel beautiful and desirable, they’d say, ‘Don’t talk about that. We don’t know how to quantify that!’ And they couldn’t understand why stupid women would go off to department stores and pay ten times more when they could cover pores just as well. Ten years ago, P&G couldn’t prove they could sell women billions of dollars of Oil of Olay face cream at $30-$60. They could imagine it, but not prove it. Lafley took it as a management challenge to see across the divide.

Fast Company: If you don’t have A.G. Lafley or Steve Jobs at the helm, how can you sell your organization on the idea of an intuitive leap instead of a scientific leap?

Martin: You don’t have to convert the whole organization to design thinking. Propose a little experiment–say, three months in length–where you test out a bite-sized chunk of a problem using this method. If you have a little success, be sure to then attach metrics to it. In that way, you turn the future into the past in a way they understand.

Click here to read the full interview.

We’re excited that they picked three of our books to appear on the coveted INDIE NEXT LIST this December.

Crush It! Why NOW Is the Time to Cash In on Your Passion by Gary Vaynerchuk

(HarperStudio, $19.99, 9780061914171)

“Refreshingly free of BS jargon (that would stand for Business School, of course!) Crush It! explains exactly why your business should engage in the world of social media, and it tells you how to do it. Vaynerchuk (better known as @GaryVee — if you don’t know what this means you need to read this book) built a $60 million wine business largely using free Internet tools, and his book will convince you that you can too.” –Rich Rennicks, Malaprop’s Bookstore/Cafe, Asheville, NC

Double Take: A Memoir by Kevin Michael Connolly

(HarperStudio, $19.99, 9780061791536)

“Kevin Connolly was born without legs, but raised to believe he is no different from anyone else. He graduated with a degree in photography and now travels all over the world on a skateboard taking pictures of peoples’ reactions to him. Connolly is a great writer, and Double Take is entertaining, funny, and enthusiastic. I can’t stress enough how entertaining it is.” –Mary Jane DiSanti, Country Bookshelf, Bozeman, MT

Get Cooking: 150 Simple Recipes to Get You Started in the Kitchen by Mollie Katzen (HarperStudio, $24.99 paper, 9780061732430)

Indie Next Notable Pick

Stop into one of their stores and we’re sure they’ll lead you to a book you won’t soon forget.

The event will take place at Northshire Books on Saturday at 4 pm, so please spread the word and come say hi. In fact, they asked if I would tweet what is going on during the event, but I’m not so great at tweeting and talking at the same time…so if someone wants to take that on, that would be great!

After Esquire announced the new feature last week, posts quickly popped up reviewing the magazine’s execution and asking questions. December will surely see a boost in sales due to people like me buying the magazine for the novelty of the experience, but is this something that will go on to save the print industry? Will people be able to appreciate the need for a webcam to read something in print? Will the cost of AR technology ever be completely offset by ad sales and thus a sustainable feature? Are we creating a future for AR?

It’s important to remember that, while you may be adding a medium, you might not necessarily be adding value. In an OpEd for AgencySpy, Jack Benoff criticized Esquire for using AR as a self-proclaimed gimmick instead of adding any value beyond what could be accomplished online. As far as we can tell, the interactive feature is mostly entertainment based, but Benoff offers one way to take AR to the next, necessary level:

Of course it’s easy to sit here and rip on someone else’s work without providing any real value, so here’s an idea: what if Esquire’s “fashion spread” allowed people to overlay images of an article of clothing on themselves ( for example ties) so that they could match (or in my case, learn how to match) them with their existing wardrobe. Editorial content could provide tips, tricks and insights. Now, that might provide some real value to consumers looking to make a purchase (not to mention the brands that sell those articles of clothing) and would be an execution that could be updated and utilized all year long (that is, Esquire could sell the space to various retailers each and every season).

So while I’ll be picking up the issue to marvel at the AR magic, I would love to see magazines (or even books!) take on augmented reality to engage with the reader and provide valuable interaction.

From a 1895 article called Tesla’s Osillator and Other Inventions, a photo of Mark Twain with one of Tesla’s marvelous contraptions.

————-

So just to be clear, Mark Twain is still awesome, yes?

From the left: Eli Horowitz/ McSweeny’s, Todd Zuniga/ Opium, Maja Thomas/ Hachette, Chad Post/ Open Letter, Molly Barton/ Penguin, Julia Cheiffetz/ HarperStudio, Paul Morris/ Bomb

In France literature is practically a form of religion, and the “droit auteur” or copyright is sacrosanct. We have our Founding Fathers. They have Victor Hugo, Flaubert, Zola, and Balzac. The extent to which the French are ready to defend the rights of authors and publishers came into sharp focus for me this past week on the Courants Study Tour hosted by the Ministry of Foreign Cultures in Paris and the French American Foundation. Seven American publishers of varying sizes – including Penguin and Hachette- were invited to participate in a week-long exchange about the future of e-books and digital publishing. We met with publishers large and small (as well as the mega chain Fnac). We engaged in passionate debate about Amazon and Google- often disagreeing amongst ourselves, but also with our French counterparts. We ate.

If you are vaguely familiar with the French book market you probably already know that writers in France are not typically represented by literary agents. Book advances are usually small or nonexistent. One thing I didn’t realize before last week was that the French government passed legislation to fix the price of books in 1981. This is why French independent booksellers have been able to thrive in the wake of superstores; one figure cited 800 independently owned bookstores in France – 800! Of course, to put things in perspective, the French have unions for writers, publishers, literary reviews, and the notion of publishing a book solely to turn a profit is, well, foreign. (On the other hand Oliver Cohen was quick to remind me that French publishers want to make money, too. And that their publishing ethos is not based on lofty socialist ideals, but rather on a strong sense of individual taste; they simply publish what they like.)

Despite the radically different playing fields it was heartening to hear that publishers across the pond are having the same conversations about the state of the book business – and to see that we are all experimenting in similar ways (see Léo Scheer, also Francois Bon) But really, unless the US government steps in to regulate the price of books and support the arts in a more European fashion, the business challenges will eclipse the philosophical ones.

Oh, and the word for pie chart in French? Camembert.

My view from the Academy Awards stage at the Kodak Theatre

How many people can say that they spoke on the the stage where the Oscars are held?

I have a personal rule, which is that whenever someone asks me to do something, I always say yes without thinking about it. Jeff Pulver one time told me that he calls that putting yourself in luck’s way. Usually, it turns out to be a good idea. I’ve agreed to do many things that I probably wouldn’t have had the courage to do had I taken a moment to think about it. One such instance was the #140 Conference in LA, hosted by Jeff Pulver. It was in the Kodak Theatre in Los Angeles (yes, where the Academy Awards are held). I’m sure had I stopped to think when Jeff asked me, I would have been way too terrified to get up on that stage. Thank goodness I’m more impulsive than fearful because it turned out to be such a great experience.

Reasons I’m grateful that I just said yes to the #140conf in LA:

• Got to have lunch with some of my favorite book peeps on Twitter: @vromans @booksquare @kirkbiglione @thinkmaya @permanentpaper. I find it truly profound that I have these friends around the country who I can learn from and connect with every day — and then even in person every once in a while. It reminds me what a gift Twitter is. Just think, even 3 years ago I probably wouldn’t have had the opportunity to know these wonderful people — and now I can connect with them nearly every day, know what they read, think about book publishing issues, etc. What a gift.

• Got to meet @JessicaGottlieb. I’ve been following her on Twitter for a while now and always thought she seemed like a lot of fun. She’s really funny in person. When her talk is posted, be sure to watch it on blip.tv. It’s good for a smile.

• Got to hang out with my friend @MarkTauber who’s the publisher of @HarperOne. Good friend who I don’t get to see often enough. Really smart; awesome panel moderator (I’ll post video when it’s up online). Helped turn around a day that started out not so great. (thank you Mark!)

ETA:

• Left with an awesome Kodak video camera in my goodie bag. Thank you Kodak! You’re the best! What an amazing conference you sponsored. You are an inspiration. Be sure check out the Kodak speech in the opening remarks. I’m now a fan!

He agrees to do a “Hudson Hustle Tour.” That would be 6 Airport Hudson News Stores in 24 Hours. Check it out on Facebook. Tell all of your friends who might be traveling on November 2nd and 3rd to come say hi…and follow along on Facebook and Twitter if you can’t make it.

Here are the airports: LGA, ORD, DFW, DEN, LAX, and EWR.

Pass it on!

]]> http://theharperstudio.com/2009/10/chicken-soup-and-humble-pie/feed/ 1 http://www.facebook.com/pages/This-Is-Why-Youre-Fat/115690713670?v=app_4949752878 http://www.facebook.com/pages/This-Is-Why-Youre-Fat/115690713670?v=app_4949752878#comments Wed, 28 Oct 2009 14:53:51 +0000 Steffen http://theharperstudio.com/?p=4914 Join THIS IS WHY YOU’RE FAT, Suite 2046, and VendrTV on October 29 and take part in the Eat N Tweet Challenge! Follow the tweets, find the food trucks, and eat ‘n’ tweet to win!

Well I’ve discovered a company that let’s you build your site as a mobile site, and then redirect traffic to the mobile site when it sees it’s coming from a phone. It’s crazy easy (think Tumblr easy), and so reasonable it’s practically free. Check them out at www.mofuse.com. You even get analytics as part of the deal. Fascinating!

Ok, now go to your phone and try it…Type in www.theharperstudio.com and see how fast it loads and readable it is and pretty it looks…and then come back and tell me what you think

As soon as I heard about the Vook, I knew I wanted to experiment, and the perfect author to start with was Gary.

Cut to six months later, and a baby Vook was born last night at 11:50 pm in the iTunes store.

In the video clip you see here, Gary discusses the future of media with US News reporter Rick Newman. There are a few pages in Crush It! about the future of media. During the writing process, we had a lot of discussion about how much to add in the book on this topic. We knew Gary’s vision would most likely be controversial, so the question became, do we add more to this section so he could flesh out his vision, or do we not spend more than a few pages, because after all, this isn’t a book about the future of media. We decided to leave it at just a few pages, but then went back to it for the Vook and have Rick interview Gary so it could be explained further.

It was so liberating to be able to expand out from the print book in areas where a video could enhance the written word, while at the same time, it was a challenge to come up with video content that was fresh and unique from Gary, who’s all over the Internet in video. I think we achieved what we set out to do with the Vook. This is whole new medium with so much potential.

2) Special Offers — Gary is the master great partnerships.

3) The Street Team — It’s like a political campaign

4) Tour Dates — This isn’t just the killer tour…note the RSVP buttons that lead to Facebook Fan pages where people RSVP for the events…and then the Recap feature at the bottom. Love.

5) About The Book — Not just boring catalog copy. It’s fun and energetic…but scroll down…don’t miss the “Myths” and “Learn” at the end.

The book cover Twitter avatars are pretty cool too.

Our pals Kiwa Iyobe and Susan Choi at Suite 2046 have been doing a FABULOUS job of putting together next week’s Tweet N Eat contest for the release of This Is Why You’re Fat. So far we have six trucks on board, including The Treats Truck, Wafels & Dinges, the Cravings Truck, Cupcake Stop, the Bistro Truck, and Van Leeuwen Artisan Ice Cream. The locations of each truck will be tweeted out by @tiwyf on Twitter starting at 11 am on October 29, so make sure to follow them to get in on the action. The first five people to order the TIWYF special at each truck will receive a free book, and the first one to hit up all six trucks and tweet pics will win a private food truck party for 25 friends! (Grub Street, NBC New York, Midtown Lunch, and Crain’s New York, among others.) Make sure you spread the word and wear loose clothing on October 29th. SEE YOU ON THE STREET!

Image: Latest book prices at Walmart.com

The argument over book pricing started to heat up with Amazon and then BN.com offering e-books at $9.99; now that Wal-Mart and Amazon have started offering the top ten industry hardcovers for $10.00 each, that argument is reaching a boil. Beyond the news stories about this “price war,” there is a lot of traffic on blogs, Twitter, etc…about what this means for authors and publishers. For instance, on today’s “ShelfAwareness” Robert D. Utter of the Other Tiger bookstore in Westerly, R.I. says,

What ARE the economics? How much money are these two behemoths losing on each sale when costs are taken into account? What would the P&L and balance sheets look like for this model? At what point is their behavior illegal and anticompetitive?

To answer him briefly, retailers pay publishers roughly 50% of the suggested retail price for books. For instance, when Wal-Mart buys a $35.00 book from Scribner, they pay Scribner about $17.50. If Wal-Mart then chooses to sell that book for $10.00, they are losing about $7.50 per copy sold. So, the “P&L” doesn’t look so good in this case for Wal-Mart, but clearly there are larger agendas involved for these companies, who are willing to use these books as “loss leaders” to establish their predominance on the retailing landscape. Their behavior is not illegal or anticompetitive; in fact, it would be illegal for publishers to tell any American retailer what to charge for a book; that’s why it’s called a “suggested” retail price.

The short-term results of this price war are some losses for Wal-Mart and Amazon, and some brisk sales for the publishers whose books have been chosen. But the “road kill” here are the accounts who can’t afford to participate in the race—traditional booksellers. And in the long term, these large retailers may succeed in convincing consumers that $10.00 is the right price for a book, whether digital or physical. That would put an enormous squeeze on an already-squeezed business, since of the $12.50 we get now for a $25.00 book, we spend about $2.00 to produce each copy, about $1.00 to market each copy, and another $1.00 or so on freight and warehousing, etc., leaving us roughly $8.50 out of which we must pay the author (who would get $4.25 if this were a profit-share, or $3.75 if this were a 15% royalty) and cover our significant overheads, before we end up with a slim profit.

If you can tear your eyes away from the photo for just a second, I would like to point out that Kevin Michael Connolly is taking his memoir, DOUBLE TAKE, on the road. Kevin has posted his national book tour schedule over on his blog, and he also provided a handy public Google calendar to give you a better look at where he’ll be for the next month or so. Check it out and see if Kevin will be stopping by a town near you!

Now back to the photo. Kevin isn’t doing handstands just for the heck of it (okay, maybe he is)…there is a bigger picture here. Kevin is challenging Stephen Colbert to a handstand contest, and he needs a little help:

there is one thing I desperately, desperately need your help with. I’m not trying sell anything here – buy my book or not, it’s entirely up to you – but what I do need from you is a small amount of your time to help lobby Colbert (of Comedy Central’s, The Colbert Report). People have begun lobbying Colbert to put me on his show under the challenge of a handstand contest (during which, I’m hoping we’ll talk about the book, of course). First one to fall has to eat a hardcover copy of Double Take.

So here’s what I need you to do:

Copy and paste the message below into the “Comment” field at Comedy Central’s site to see a Colbert’s first inverted interview! Oh, and don’t forget to select “The Colbert Report” from the drop down list. Here’s the link: http://www.comedycentral.com/help/questionsCC.jhtml

“THE HANDSTAND CHALLENGE: COLBERT VS. CONNOLLY

THE CHALLENGE: Holding a handstand for as long as possible. First one to fall has to eat a hardcover copy of the book Double Take. Winner gets eternal glory.

THE CONTENDERS:

Kevin Michael Connolly, 24-year-old legless guy and author of the new memoir, Double Take.

Stephen Colbert, anemic political satirist and host of The Colbert Report.

THE BOOK: Double Take http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w5MD7KHwLw4

Quit hiding behind that desk, Colbert!“

Please take a couple of minutes to submit a comment and challenge Colbert to a handstand contest with Kevin. I’m not taking sides or anything, but you know you want to see Colbert eat a book.

The other day my father called to tell me how great the Crush It! billboard is. He said it stopped him in his tracks while driving out of the city one day.

Crush It! billboard? Huh?

When I emailed Gary to get the scoop, this is what I got back:

So exciting to see what everyday brings!

We’re also excited to learn that Theresa’s writing has been included in two anthologies: The Best American Science Writing, 2009, and The Best American Medical Writing, 2009. Additionally, she was recently featured in the American Nurses Association‘s daily newsletter as their top story. For those that would like to read Theresa’s essays in another context, here are a few more options!

Yesterday’s article made me wonder if there is  a shoestring equivalent for bookstores? Indeed bookstores have always been community spaces, and one doesn’t have to look very far to find examples of young booksellers who are trying to push them (back) in that direction. I’ll be interested, for example, to see what kind of events/ open mics/ classes Jessica Stockton holds at Greenlight Bookstore which opens its doors next week in Fort Greene (we’re rooting for you Jessica!). 13-foot-tall Lucite trees sound pretty cool, but at the end of the day creating a unique space where people want to hang out doesn’t necessarily require battery operated equipment. Or does it? I am curious what people think adds to the bookstore experience -

Great job Martha! Can’t wait to see how it develops!

Read All Day Long

One word: Wow.

In his op-ed, Sicha rightfully questions the value of placing Coke in a movie like The Road: “Who will prevent these man-eaters of commerce from persuading me that my personal escape from Thunderdome must not be Pepsi-fueled?” It’s true, this seemingly arbitrary product placement probably has little impact. But, on the other hand, the see-click-buy variety that companies like Delivery Agent are enabling appears to be the way of the future (and don’t forget the scary Tivo/ Amazon partnership). Yes, we may be immune to cola in the apocalypse, and cigarettes in space, but we all want to know where Joan Holloway bought her dress.

More about Kevin Michael Connolly’s upcoming memoir, Double Take, can be found here.

And if you love Kashi, the natural foods company (and what fan of their Cinnamon Harvest cereal doesn’t?), you’ll be excited to hear that Kashi will be promoting GET COOKING on the backs of 8 of their most popular cereal boxes this Fall!!! Kashi has also partnered with Mollie to create a fantastic new video-based website called Get-Cooking.com, which launches today. Check it out for terrific instructional videos that will have you making everything from polenta to pilaf in no-time.

Illustration by Zach Kanin

I do not like them, Sam I am.

Would you like them in a blog?

I would not like them in a blog.

Would you like them in a vlog?

I would not like them in a vlog.

Would you like them in a vook?

I would not like them in a vook. What are you, some kind of kook?

No, I am not some kind of kook. A vook is a new kind of book.

Could I buy this vook on Woot?

Yes, of course this vook’s on Woot.

Then that is something I will tweet.

Oh, how sweet that you will tweet;

Please tweet it out and all about.

And I will download this for free:

Green eggs and ham for you and me.

Even Chris had to admit that the experiment of giving away his most recent book for free in e-book form had been a mixed success. “Free” was given away to 500,000 people via various e-book platforms, but sold less than what Chris’s previous book had (“The Long Tail“). But as I told Chris after the panel, the problem wasn’t the experiment. The experiment was a great learning experience, and even if they sold only ten percent of the sales on “The Long Tail,” that would have been a success if the book had been done on a low advance/profit-sharing basis. The problem is when authors want to have their cakes and eat them, too…getting a large advance but wanting to experiment with free content models, or getting a large advance and then deciding that what they really want is more marketing. I love to experiment, too…but we should all benefit equally from the results.

The fact of the matter is, I need to break out my copy of Organizing the Disorganized Child and just start over, and read it again…and again and again.

It was a year ago in the hospital, sometime during the week between Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur, when another nurse and I heard one of the more disturbing sounds we’d ever heard in the hospital coming from a patient’s room. It was like a strangled, low-pitched moaning, and we both went on instant and frightened alert.

On my floor all the rooms have glass windows set into the doors and we began cautiously peering into them as the haunted sound continued. The patient we saw through the first window was sitting comfortably in bed watching television. The second patient was clearly asleep and breathing normally. We moved to the third window in the row, expecting to see something unimaginably horrific and terrible—for what, short of a huge blood clot stuck in someone’s larynx, could cause such an inhuman sound?

We looked into the room together, and saw not a blue-faced patient struggling to breathe, but three men with big beards wearing white shirts, black hats and black suits. One of them was blowing on what looked like a ram’s horn. Quickly we realized that the ram’s horn was the source of the surprising sound.

To us, expecting to see an oxygen-starved patient possibly spitting blood (because that’s what my imagination conjured) and to see instead these three men, embracing the dress and customs of their century-old ancestors, was too much of a contrast. We both burst out laughing, and then hustled away as quickly as we could, hoping the Orthodox Jews who had come to share part of Rosh Hashanah with a hospitalized patient would not hear us.

There’s a large community of Orthodox Jews near where I live, and if you have cancer, we’re the hospital a lot of people come to. We’re close enough that Orthodox friends and family can walk to and from the hospital. It’s a long walk, but it means that Sabbath visits are possible for observant Jews who won’t drive on the day of rest.

Still, the ram’s horn that had caused the other nurse and I so much worry: what was that, I wondered. My husband is Jewish, but a self-described “Hebrew-school dropout;” he wouldn’t know from ram’s horns. So I asked another friend, one who’d served in the Israeli army.

“Oh, that’s a shofar,” he said, his tone implying “Everybody knows that.”

And it turns out the shofar isn’t that exotic, but in the context of the hospital, where anomalous sounds are always worrisome, the tones of this simple instrument, meant to herald the new year, were ominous.

The other nurse and I argued afterwards about what we thought the shofar had sounded like. She heard the moans of a sick cow, whereas I thought it sounded more like a cat stuck in the heating duct. It’s the nature of our work that odd sounds typically signal distress. When I told her later, “That ram’s horn is called a shofar,” she insisted that visitors should warn someone at the nurse’s station before playing such an unusual instrument.

This led to several jokes about hospitals needing to be shofar-free zones. However, knowing a little bit about Rosh Hashanah, what could be more appropriate than blowing a shofar on a cancer floor?

My understanding is that hearing the shofar wakes people up to the idea of judgment and to God’s sovereignty and power. According to tradition, Rosh Hashanah is the time when God decides which names will be written in the book of life for another year—who will live and who will die. Our patients are acutely aware that their fate is out of their hands, that they need all the help they can get to make it into that book. We offer them the most cutting-edge treatment available. But some patients will also find comfort in rams’ horns and their own time-worn traditions of religious community.

I think back on my surprise when I saw those three bearded black-hatted men trying to bring a little piece of their faith to our sterile hospital environment. I was so happy to see them, rather than a patient going through a physical ordeal horrible enough to make him produce such a sound.

Probably for the patient in the room, the shofar, an ancient instrument with years of accumulated cultural and spiritual meaning, sounded like hope. But there’s little space in the modern hospital for displays of faith. When one occurs so dramatically, and so audibly, the effect can be unnerving.

So when the other nurse and I laughed, we were expressing relief. We thought we’d look in the room and see a patient retching blood, but “Gottze dank, just three Mensches playing the Shofar,” transmitting a message we can all find meaningful. Here’s wishing all our patients another year in the Book of Life.

(And by the way, the Food52 cookbook will be published by HarperStudio…)

The Book of the Shepherd: 10/27

Emeril 20-40-60: 11/1

Why are people so obsessed with the show?

Well, it’s high art but totally accessible. Top notch writing, complex characters, high stakes historical moment. It’s like a visual novel or a really sexy play. But it’s on TV so it’s relaxing to consume! Also, I think the narrative is engrossing because, you know, we’re so anxious right now! There are these slow rolling cultural shifts that are happening right beneath our feet. Similarly to rumbling Don and the feet of his cohorts.

Tell me about the book.

There all these historical elements floating around in each episode, adding to the overall mood and motif of the show. I want to grab them all and put them in one place, not just because I love the show but because I’m also fascinated by midcentury society, its social mores, politics, design, etc. So the book will use Mad Men as vehicle to explore and catalogue that time in our history. It will be handsome both in look and verse with tons of new stuff.

Most of the actors in Mad Men came from left field. Do you think the show would be the same if Don was played by a marquee name?

Ooo going with lesser known actors was a great move. I feel strangely uprooted when I see them out of their suits. They are also such fine actors that I never feel like they are acting!

What would Betty Friedan say about Betty Draper?

I’m sure she would shake Betts by the shoulders and scream, “is this all?!?” But I think Betty really just needs a friend more than a pamphlet. Oh, Betty! She’s the most complex character of the show, I veer between thinking of her as villain and victim.

Who does the best post show analysis? Slate?

Slate has wonderful dish, it’s a must. The AV Club is my favorite for commentary. Also Basket of Kisses is a kicky site that puts a great emphasis on the ladies of Mad Men. Also, artist Dyna Mo! She created the Mad Men Yourself site for AMC and does beautiful illustrations of a scene from Mad Men once a week on her flickr site.

Why is the date of Roger Sterling’s daughter’s upcoming wedding significant?

Oh dear. Events at a parade in Dallas are going to overshadow her special day and put a general damper on you know, THE COUNTRY.

Why Meditations in an Emergency?

Ah, what a glorious choice! Totally risky, right? But what a great payoff. So many reasons. Ok, let’s start with the title. It just taps right into the sense of slow moving dread and forced introspection of Don Draper and the whole mood of the show. Also, O’Hara’s verses are so wry and punchy, so easily digestible that it reads like the best ad copy and vice versa.

We’re getting hungry already…

Now, amid all the chatter and the noise on radio and TV, with all the falsehoods that are promoted by not just talk show hosts but sometimes prominent politicians, sometimes it can be easy to lose sight of what the debate over reform is all about. It’s about stories like the one told by an oncology nurse named Theresa Brown. A few weeks ago, Theresa wrote a blog post about a patient of hers. He was in his 60s, a recent grandfather, a Steelers fan — (applause) — spent the last three months of his life worrying about mounting medical bills.

And she wrote: “My patient thought he had planned well for his health care needs. He just never thought he would wake up one day with a diagnosis of leukemia. But which of us does?” she asked. And then she wrote: “That’s why we need health care reform.”

Nurses, that’s why we need health care reform. I am absolutely confident that if you continue to do your part — nurses, you guys have a lot of credibility; you touch a lot of people’s lives; people trust you — if you’re out there saying it’s time for us to act, we need to go ahead and make a change — if all of us do our parts, not just here in Washington but all across the country, then we will bid farewell to the days when our health care system was a source of worry to families and a drag on our economy, and America will finally join the ranks of every other advanced nation by providing quality, affordable health insurance to all of its citizens. That’s our goal. We are going to meet it this year with your help. Thank you very much, everybody. God bless you. (Applause.)

We’re publishing Theresa’s extraordinary book, Critical Care: A Nurse’s First Year, next June. (We’ll make sure to send President Obama an early copy!)

Click through to view the video and advance to the 12 minute mark to catch the exciting clip!

I wonder which book was just too good to put down…

]]> http://theharperstudio.com/2009/09/maybe-we-should-ask-the-nurses/feed/ 0 http://theharperstudio.com/2009/09/beatlemania-2-0/ http://theharperstudio.com/2009/09/beatlemania-2-0/#comments Wed, 09 Sep 2009 17:28:53 +0000 Steffen http://theharperstudio.com/?p=4467 For the last few weeks I’ve been eating, breathing, and sleeping with The Beatles on the brain–but with good reason. We’re publishing You Never Give Me Your Money: The Battle for the Soul of the Beatles by Peter Doggett, a British journalist and rock historian, which is slated to come out Summer 2010. As the title suggests, the book explores in meticulous detail the events that lead up to the break-up and the eventual collapse of their cooperative experiment, Apple Corps. 

Lucky for us, even though the group disbanded nearly four decades ago, The Beatles are back! Today marks the release of the highly anticipated The Beatles: Rock Band, along with remastered versions of The Beatles’ entire discography. There is something magical about listening to this montage of Beatles classics and watching the Fab Four come back to life. And of course, I can’t wait to rock out (virtually) at The Cavern or in a field of psychadellic, LSD inspired flowers. Rock bands may come and go, but The Beatles never die.

p.s. John Lennon would be happy to know that Beatlemania 2.0 would make its resurgence on 09/09/09 – his lucky number was 9!

How many galleys do you have piled up on your desk? (Or under your desk.) How many PR blasts do you get a day from faceless publicists claiming such and such debut novel is a “masterly tour de force!!” or x work of nonfiction is “truly ground breaking”?

Actually, don’t answer that.

If I were writing a press release for the book I want to tell you about I would lead with: STARRED KIRKUS REVIEW! STARRED PUBLISHERS WEEKLY REVIEW! SARA GRUEN CALLS DOUBLE TAKE “DEEPLY AFFECTING” AND COMPARES AUTHOR TO JEANETTE WALLS!!

These reviews might mean something to you but I’m not writing a press release. In fact I wish I could strip away the meaningless adjectives and layers of fabricated publicity hype that infest your inbox day in and day out, and speak you directly, as a book editor, about a memoir I think is incredibly special. The book is called Double Take and the author, Kevin Connolly, is a 24 year-old born without legs who travelled the world on his skateboard and photographed over 30,000 people starting at him. Kevin is also a champion skier. I’ve never met anyone like him. If you watch a tape of Kevin Connolly or speak to him for about 2 minutes you will want to book him on your show. I guarantee it. This is a book that will change how you look at other people. (Click here to read the full glossed up description.)

Most books fall into oblivion unless they get a lucky break. Our first lucky break came when Edward Ash-Milby at Barnes & Noble read Double Take and loved it (and loved Kevin when he met him). This blog post is a heartfelt plea to try and get you to pull the galley of Double Take out from under your stack.

Watch the rest of Tamy’s crusade here and here.

via @somerset

While not exactly a pay-as-you-wish scheme, what he did was release the book in one-chapter installments as free downloads on his website over the course of a year. Now that all the installments are in, the book will be released as a paperback by Grand Central on September 8 with a first printing of 150,000. The jury may still be out until real sales numbers come in, but so far, with over 90,000 registered readers on his website, it sounds like Kiyosaki may end up as the next Radiohead success story.

photo credit: Adrian Kinloch

I’ve just read M.J. Rose’s editorial from last Friday, “Publishers Must Change the Way Authors Get Paid,” and I couldn’t agree more that it’s time to re-think the publisher/author relationship.  M.J. deserves credit for moving this conversation forward; indeed, for years M.J. has shown by her own example how authors can and should be full partners in the marketing of their books. If anyone has earned the right to question author compensation, it’s M.J. Rose.

However, I don’t think that the solution is to have authors paid a higher royalty in exchange for their marketing efforts.

First of all, how would this be judged? What amount of marketing effort should be expected of the author before their royalty changes?  Shouldn’t author and publisher alike be doing everything possible to make a book succeed, without needing to count up who has gone beyond the call of duty and who hasn’t and trying to calculate how that should translate into how they share the proceeds of their success? What if the author and the publisher have both made herculean marketing efforts, but the book has lost money? Should the author get a higher royalty, even as the publisher is taking a loss? (Similarly, I don’t see how publishers and authors would know how to apply the author’s marketing expenses to their advances, as M.J. suggests here.)

That song! That butterfly! The show will be sorely missed.

Robin is doing something off the beaten track to get his book published: all of its funding is being raised from pledges – designated amounts of money that will support the production of the book and guarantee you a copy (or four) of the book once it’s done. He makes sure you know what you’re getting into by offering up some of his previous work for you to read for free as well as outlining the project without spoiling it. You can pay $3 for a PDF of the finished book, or $39 for four bound copies with your name in the acknowledgments that you can distribute as you wish. Various levels exist in between, but they all give you a front row seat to Robin’s work. And after watching the video, who wouldn’t want that?

Robin is making sure that the reader is fully involved in the book, from the tailored purchase/pledge to the behind-the-scenes updates that will be coming on a weekly basis. It feels like you’re more of a collaborator than a reader, and the end result will be that much more interesting because you know that you had a hand in its creation. Robin has reached his initial goal, the one that will guarantee that the project will actually be funded, but that doesn’t mean he’s going to stop. The more money he raises the better the book will be (better materials, more colors, and possibly a hardcover format), making sure that readers get a nice return on their investment.

I sat in on a Twitter discussion called #FollowReader yesterday. It’s a weekly discussion on Twitter with some topical guidelines for the bookish community, lightly moderated by @KatMeyer and @CharAbbott, who provide a new topic each week. Yesterday’s topic was “What you (as readers) want publishers to know,” but past topics ranged from libraries to book genres to discussions with Random House sales reps. You can catch up on past discussions with Kat’s recaps over at Follow the Reader.

This being my first #FollowReader, all I could manage to do was sit back and watch as the tweets popped up at lightning speed. Kat advised using TweetChat to participate because it let you retweet or reply directly and automatically included the chat’s hashtag in every post. It also updated in real time and would pause the updates if you needed to scroll down and view older tweets. TweetChat is an excellent tool, and I hope to be able to use more of it during next week’s discussion. This week though, tweets came in too fast for me to respond to someone without missing someone else.

It was a great discussion, lively with a broad range of posts. Issues with e-readers were voiced, from pricing to formats, as well as misleading blurbs and book covers. It wasn’t an hour set aside for simply complaining about publishers though; Kat made sure to ask what publishers were doing right. I would say it was a very encouraging chat, because the feedback from readers and publishers let us know what we should continue to do and what we need to work on. The best part for me though, was that I was immersed in a passionate group of people that could not stop talking about books (in a good way!). Kat is moderating from 4 – 5 pm on Thursdays, but the hashtag is used all week long to bring excellent ideas and discussions to the table.

If you manage to make it through without having a heart attack (congratulations!) then please Digg it. This Is Why You’re Fat goes on sale October 27, 2009, but you can pre-order it now.

ETA: Want to know what New York Magazine thought of the cover?  They break it down for you here.

harpercollins.com to win a 15 minute phone consultation with Marcella Moran!

You made my day Sarah

Farrar, Straus and Giroux's No Impact Man by Colin Beavan

I read this article in The New York Observer yesterday about book jackets, and how some publishers are forgoing dust jackets in favor of stamping a design directly onto the cover boards. It got me thinking about how I read my books, and if I would actually prefer hardcovers without jackets. Sometimes I do remove the jackets before reading because they slip around when the book is opened, and they’re less likely to be torn or folded when set to the side. Other times though, I use the jacket as a bookmark, taking one of the flaps and inserting it between the pages. I tend to dog-ear paperbacks, but if I have a flap handy, I’ll use that. So, I personally value book jackets for the designs that I don’t want to ruin and the less obvious uses. The tell-tale designs also clue me in to what others are reading with a quick glance – if you’re on a Kindle or have removed the jacket, you’ve probably had people have to ask you what you’re reading before launching into a conversation.

The way most books are printed today, the actual boards are minimally designed with simpler fonts and two-toned material, with the understanding that there will be a jacket in place to please the eye. The jacket, which is easier and cheaper to produce, allows for range in the color, typeface, images, and even texture of the design. Printing or stamping directly onto the boards is limited, even if one were to design without a jacket in mind. Covers can still look attractive and appealing without jackets, but it’s more difficult to differentiate between books if manufacturers can only produce certain color boards and stamp certain typefaces. Since we all know that people do actually judge a book by its cover, jackets are still needed to make most books stand out.

This isn’t to throw out the idea of designing uncovered boards – in fact I really appreciate books that can offer an aesthetically pleasing and unique cover when the jacket is removed. (We added a little bit of flair to Who Is Mark Twain? by stamping Twain’s signature onto the board.) Maybe what we need is a happy medium, where books won’t be considered completely naked if stripped of their jackets.

(Yes, we realize this has nothing to do with books, but wanted to make you smile on Monday morning.)

In cased you missed it, here it is (please vote: http://bit.ly/2d9Pqr)

http://inboxzero.com/

photo credit: Adrian Kinloch

I don’t know how many of you know this, but HarperStudio Marketing Goddess Sarah Burningham is an author in her own right. In fact, she just published her second book with Chronicle called Boyology. I have to say, as someone who’s been in publishing for quite a long time, Sarah’s got the magic: the books are great (and as I always say, it goes back to the book); she’s got a great hook (self-help books for teenage girls by a young woman who’s old enough for the Mom’s to feel comfortable with and young enough for the girls to identify with and look up to); and she lights up like a lantern when the camera turns on.

From the moment I saw Sarah do her first television interview, I knew the days of her working in house were numbered. It was only a matter of time before she came to me, as she did a few weeks ago, and said that she’d like to leave her day job and start writing books full time.

We are all thrilled at HarperStudio for Sarah and wish her the very best and will be cheering her on every step of the way. As I told Sarah when she came to me, there is not one iota of a doubt in my mind that she is going to be a hugely successful author.

Which now leads me to the next announcement. We’ve hired a new Marketing Director. Her name is Jessica Wiener and she comes to us from Hyperion Books. She’ll be starting right after Labor Day, and we’re thrilled to have her. She’s been the the wizard behind the curtain of the campaigns for Mitch Albom, Randy Pausch, Candace Bushnell, Nigella Lawson, Jamie Oliver, Kelly Corrigan, etc. etc. etc.

Need I say more? We feel extremely fortunate to have someone with such great experience stepping into Sarah’s big shoes.

To be continued…

Turns out that feel-good vibe is intentional. Tumblr founder David Karp designed it that way. Not only can you only ♥ something (no “thumbs down” option), but you can’t leave a comment UNLESS you reblog it and leave the comment on your own blog, thus making the commenter take ownership of their words.

Genius.

By the way, I now find myself cruising the internet looking for the ♥ button when I like something.

Typical blog post found on Tumblr:

The idea : “A talented, creative writer invents a story about an object. Invested with new significance by this fiction, the object should — according to our hypothesis — acquire not merely subjective but objective value. How to test our theory? Via eBay!”

http://significantobjects.com/

Madeline by Ludwig BemelmansHarold and the Purple Crayon by Crockett Johnson

For all of you out there who are just like me, spend a little time figuring out how to search books by playing the Google Books Game. The actual game ended last week (each day the top three submissions were rewarded with Sony Readers), but you can still play for fun and test your book knowledge. The questions are a bit challenging, but luckily, even if you don’t know the answer you can still take advantage of Google’s gold mine of literary references.

2) Keep up with your competition. I didn’t know Hank Paulson’s memoir is being published this January by Grand Central, but now I do (thanks @katelaurielee).

3) Early buzz machine. Why leave it up to your publicist to promote the book the month before it goes on sale when you can start publicizing it the day it is acquired? You’d be surprised how eager people are to have a window into the creative process: And when the book does go on sale, you have one more channel for publicity.

4) Be there first. By getting up to the moment information, you can immediately respond to breaking news or approach a writer you stumble across.

5) Watch and learn from innovative people outside of book publishing. @tedtalks @hotdogsladies @doctorow @jkottke inspire me.

*Bonus! Community. A lot of editors still associate Twitter (and blogs in general) with snark culture. Twitter can actually provide a great sense of community and positive energy. People are passionate about books. Just look at @booknerdnyc @randomeditor @debbiestier @spiegelandgrau

PS: This video of old school journalists talking about twitter was the impetus for this blog post.

book animation from Ian Hammond on Vimeo.

“If there is one fact of life that Audrey Hepburn is dead certain of, adamant about, irrevocably committed to, it’s the fact that her married life, her husband and her baby, come first and far ahead of her career.

She said so the other day on the set of Breakfast at Tiffany’s, the Jurow-Shepherd comedy for Paramount, in which she plays a New York play girl, café society type, whose constancy is highly suspect.

This unusual role for Miss Hepburn brought up the subject of career women vs. wives – and Audrey made it tersely clear that she is by no means living her part.”

- From Paramount Pictures publicity, released November 28th, 1960

Check out AMC’s website for details on the “New York’s Gone Mad” event calendar which includes a screening of ads form the 60s at the Museum and Arts Building, and various Mad Men inspired libations at hotel bars around town.

And don’t forget to Mad Men yourself!

Among the many discoveries last week was a site called Animoto. I heard about it from speaker Brian Boero.

Simply load your photos, choose some music (I used their music because I knew it was kosher)……and voila. Animoto makes magic. The whole process took about 3 minutes.

You’ve got to check out life on Animoto. Watch out……it’s addictive.

Jennifer Gilmore made this awesome trailer for her book using Animoto:

Anyone want to guess what the point of the video was?

I’ll leave the answer in the comments tomorrow. In the meantime, enjoy the video. I loved it.

We were also excited to learn Double Take was selected as a B&N Discover pick for this fall!

So after finishing George Dawes Green‘s terrific new novel, Ravens, I immediately ordered his first one, The Caveman’s Valentine, a brilliant book that fully deserved its Edgar Award.

If my experience is any indicator, the downward pressure on price from e-books might very well be counter-balanced by something we can all feel good about, and hopefully find a way to make money from: a newly voracious appetite for page-turners (or page-clickers, as I guess we’ll now need to say).

I discovered Marian Schembari yesterday when I noticed her ad on my Facebook page saying she wanted to work at HarperCollins. How clever. I clicked through on the ad and found the most awesome, “2009″ resume.

A few hours later, I saw a screenshot of this ad on another HarperCollins employee’s Facebook page with a note saying “Uh, this is kind of scary.”

Of course I had to chime in with my 2 cents

Not scary at all, I countered. I think it’s creative and innovative and blah blah blah. On and on I went……..to which she replied that it’s the Facebook tool of using her personal information to target ads to her that she finds scary. I must point out that we both have the fact that we work at HarperCollins as part of our Facebook profiles — so I’m not sure Facebook has used anything we declared as private for this woman to be able to target us with her campaign. I’m sure what’s fair game information is all in the fine print of Facebook.

The conversation went on a few more rounds with others chiming in about the brave new world and their thoughts on targeted ads, etc..

Here’s the bottom line for me: I would so much rather have an ad that is targeted to me than some spaghetti on the wall generic message that I could care less about. Please, give me an ad about a book or someone in publishing rather than make me endure a laundry soap commercial or car ad or any of the other products that I care nothing about and yet am held hostage to as the price to pay for consuming traditional media. Hyper-targeting is one of the many advantages that internet media has over traditional media platforms, and is a modern day gift to marketers. It’s Nielson ratings versus Google Analytics — and it’s why I think Facebook and Twitter and all of the other free platforms that we use are going to be just fine in the new economy.

Now if marketers could just be fabulously creative and interesting with their targeted ads, we could all be happy and prosperous.

This book is your new best friend.

Anyway, we’re publishing a book in a few weeks called ORGANIZING THE DISORGANIZED CHILD that will hopefully help alleviate some of the stress that comes with school. We just got finished copies in the office and it will be in stores on August 25, though you can pre-order it online now. We’ve got le crème de la crème of quotes for the book, and lots of magazine coverage lined up, including Parenting Magazine and a feature in Time Out New York Kids, which just hit the stands yesterday.

Marcella Moran, the co-author, has a great blog and twitter stream where she gives out helpful really helpful advice for parents of school children. If you’re a parent with kids in school, it’s a must read.

Also of note here is that “haste yee back” is often in our top 10 search terms. Haste Yee Back is one of our most consistent commenters — and I have to say, always with a smile on his face, he’s got something sweet to say (Love you Haste Yee ).

Hirschorn looks at The Economist‘s somewhat staggering ad revenue which saw a 25 % increase last year (as opposed to Newsweek and Time which, he says, dropped by 27 and 14 percent, respectively). The secret to The Economist‘s success? Well, it’s complicated (exemplary branding, a global recession) but the short answer, and one we might learn from is this: The magazine does not try to be all things to all people. It fills a need. Its promise is clear. In Hirschorn’s words, “niche is sometimes the smartest way to take over the world.” (Read the article here)

I stumbled upon these great ads that Penguin Books did, which gives me hope that great ads do exist, even in the summer.

Aubrey Lynch from Tor arranged a little get together last Wednesday night at Lily’s in the city. I had such a great time talking books and publishing with passionate book peeps. One of the many topics covered was why Aubrey loves Prairie Lights. I asked her to write a a post explaining what makes it such a wonderful place:

A few weeks ago I made a trip out to Iowa–the order of business, meeting my boyfriend’s parents for the first time–daunting, to say the least. But one of the things I was most excited about doing while I was in Iowa City was visiting the infamous Prairie Lights Bookstore. Infamous in that it has a reputation for putting on great author events and for being a conscientious and passionate bookseller. How could I resist? I am a booklover to the core and was, at one time, an aspiring writer. Of course I had heard of the Iowa Writers’ Workshop and the fact that Iowa City is the world’s third City of Literature (as designated by UNESCO). With so much to recommend the city as one of the world’s centers of literature, I was hoping to find the bookstore I’d always been looking for—and wow, did I find it. Here’s what I found.

• Prairie Lights Bookstore felt homey—almost like I was walking into a room in my own house (well, that is, if I had a nice big house and not a “cozy” apartment in Brooklyn)—I can’t explain it—something just felt familiar, comfortable and safe about it. Maybe it was the warm colors or the carpet. Maybe it was the lighting. It was quiet without being a library and the people who worked there seemed very happy to be right where they were.

• What was most impressive was that scattered throughout the store—in places where people would be most likely to see them, were lists of book awards and the titles of the books that had most recently won those awards. Talk about making things easy for a casual browser who might have thought about reading mysteries in the past but didn’t want to risk spending money on a book that wasn’t that great and that would forever be their first impression of the genre (I say this because I am often that cautious browser).

• When I went to find the science fiction and fantasy section, right there, right smack dab in the middle of everything, was an announcement for the release date of the Robert Jordan and Brandon Sanderson book in the Wheel of Time series that fans have been anxiously waiting for! Here was the exact date that the book would come out—in November! And no one is paying them to do this. No one asked them. It wasn’t a sponsored announcement—they did it because they love the books and they are fans. Honestly, these are the types of people I want to sell me books—people who are anticipating the next book in a series, just like I am—people who love the work of authors and who love to tell the world about it!

• Cubes of bookshelves that you could see over—it opened up the room a lot—I never felt like I had to wonder about what was around the next corner—everything felt very open—the perfect word for the way the books were laid out, to me, would be “organic”—like following the paths your mind would naturally take.

• A café in the bookstore—not a bookstore in a café which is how I sometimes feel when I walk into a store that’s trying to do both. The focus is on the books, not the drinks they are going to sell you. It was tucked away on the 2.5th floor. It was quiet, without obtrusive music blasting—leaving readers to quietly sip and read.

• The people—Wow—the people who work in that store really know their stuff—they are fans as well—they love to read the galleys so that they know what books they can recommend to people before they come out—they have very specific tastes and even if they don’t read the types of books that you do, someone very close by will be able to help you.

• The owner works on the floor. This is important. The owner talks to readers/customers every day—the owner knows what the customers want. The owner cares about you, the books, the authors. The employees and the store.

• A newsletter from the store and community postings. This bookstore is all about the community—but not in a “self-serving, we only want to sell you stuff” kind of way.

There is so much more about this store that’s incredible but I think you should check it out for yourself to see:

Prairie Lights Bookstore

15 South Dubuque Street

Iowa City, IA 52240

http://www.prairielights.com/

I’d love to hear from others about what makes a bookstore great for them — , and then I’ll compile a list of the top 50.

And Juliet Grames — I want a post on “Why I’m a Borders Girl.”

I mean, I think the big issue online and the pressure publishers are feeling is that publishers online are having a hard time replicating the economics that they saw offline. And many of them are looking at that through the lens of copyright…. I think where I would just draw a distinction is I am not so sure that copyright is really the culprit in a lot of this…that that’s an imperfect lens and an imperfect remedy.

Listen to the podcast here.

Here’s a clever short film from first time novelist Bill Folman. The book is called The Scandal Plan.

There are a ton of insta-books on Michael Jackson and other MJ books in the pipeline. How is Rolling Stone’s book different from the others?

This book will be the definitive look at Jackson’s life and music. We will tell the full story of his career, in a fascinating essay by Mikal Gilmore, who has been writing about Jackson since the early days, and we will delve deep into his music — examining in detail the early years at Motown, his move to become a solo artist in the 70s, and his key blockbuster solo albums: Off the Wall, Thriller and Bad. We will also draw on deep reporting into Jackson’s private life for a piece that looks at what went wrong in his later years, and we will provide sharp, authoritative critical guides to his songs, videos and other work. It will also contain intimate tributes from artists who knew and worked with Jackson. Unlike the insta-books flooding the market, this book is the ultimate guide to Michael Jackson, with beautiful photographs and elegant design, in classic Rolling Stone style.

The music industry has obviously changed dramatically since the eighties and the media in general is much more fragmented. Does the death of Michael Jackson represent the death of a certain kind of popular culture?

Not really — Michael Jackson was a one-of-a-kind icon, on par with Elvis and Sinatra. His music is alive in so many different styles of R&B, rap and hip-hop – from the Black Eyed Peas to Justin Timberlake to Ne-Yo and Usher.

 Someone who is not a Jackson fan said to me recently that Thriller has the sound of a TV commercial. What do you make of that? I instantly disagreed but have been thinking about how pivotal that Pepsi commercial was in his career.

 Jackson was such a huge artist that his music was everywhere – on the radio, MTV, in TV commercials - Thriller sold more albums than any other in history and for a time it became so big it was like the white noise of our pop culture, and globally too. My wife tells a story of going to Egypt on tour in the 90s, and people came up to her in small villages and asked if she knew Michael Jackson. He was that big. For some people, perhaps, the ubiquity diminished the value of the music. But go listen to Billie Jean or Beat It now and tell me it’s not amazing…

Where did Jackson learn to dance? (Did he get the pulled up pants from Fred Astaire?)

Complicated question: he learned from all over – breakdancing, old movies. I can go into this more later if you want.

Some people feel Jackson’s later albums are interesting musically. Do you agree?

Absolutely! Especially Bad and Dangerous, but Invincible and History have very interesting elements to them too that were often overlooked at the time. We will have a piece specifically addressing these later albums.

 We’ve been talking a lot about the cover of MICHAEL. Why aren’t there more quality portraits of Jackson?

Michael wasn’t photographed a lot in his later years – and he was rarely photographed casually. He was very concerned with how he looked and his image, so there aren’t a lot of photographers he was comfortable with. Also, Michael bought up many of the photos that do exist so they are not on the market.

What is your favorite Jackson song?

“Rock with you” and “Don’t stop ‘til you get enough” are probably my all-time favorites. There’s something about that album [Off The Wall] that’s just so exuberant, like he’s breaking loose for the first time, it’s impossible to resist.

Here’s quick and dirty re-cap of what I read:

A Long Way Gone by Ishmael Beah — I loved it. I realize I’m late to the party on this one, but I never got around to it when it first came out, and now my son has to read for school. I sobbed and sobbed numerous times. I had one moment of thinking “is this all true?” — and when I looked up online and saw controversy, I clicked off quickly. I don’t want to know. To me it was real. Takes a powerful book to move me like that.

The Odyssey — Again, Summer assignment for my son. I read quickly, had trouble enjoying. Will go back and re-read when he gets home and try to find the joy (suggestions welcome). I did read this in college and remember the gist — I’m looking to find the joy though.

Lies My Mother Never Told Me by Kaylie Jones — This is a memoir by the daughter of the prize-winning novelist, James Jones that comes out on August 25, 2009 from William Morrow. I toggled between this and The Odyssey. It’s about a young woman’s struggle with addiction (her own and her mother’s) as well as her coming of age as a writer. Set in Paris, New York, and Sag Harbor with characters such as Bill Styron and Norman Mailer throughout the book, this is a lot of fun to read. (Full disclosure: I haven’t quite finished, but I’m looking forward to getting back to it).

Double Take by Kevin Michael Connolly — comes out from HarperStudio on October 13. I’d read this before on the fly, but wanted to re-read in the comfort of a hammock overlooking the ocean. Loved it every bit as much the second time around. This is the story of young man born without legs who traveled the world with his camera- and found out what it truly means to be human along the way. I think this is going to be big. Great quotes just in from Sara Gruen and Lee Woodruff.

Bagby, who has been interpreting Twain since 1991, is giving us an added treat by reading the piece as the American master, so everyone will get the full experience of a Mark Twain reading. If you won’t be able to attend, the reading and interview will be taped and shared online.

The event is scheduled for 2:00 PM on Saturday, August 15, 2009.

The local bookstore signing – something every author wants and yet few know how to handle. We talked to a bookseller, let’s just call her Bookseller X, to find out how to make a local event work…and keep your local booksellers happy.

It’s finally happened, your book has been published, and you’ve managed to set up a signing at your local bookstore. Congratulations! You think publishing was the tricky part? You’re only just getting started. Here are some things to think about as you get ready for your Big Day:

1) We are investing in you. Invest in us!

When a bookstore agrees to host a reading/signing for you, it’s more than just slotting you into a schedule: it’s an investment. We are agreeing to invest both time and money into you and your book by ordering in copies, giving them prime shelf-space, using staff time to plan and execute your event, etc. So invest right back! Use your own list of contacts to help bring people in. If you’re willing and able, help out with promotional materials like posters or flyers, or maybe even refreshments at the event. Local author events are at their best when the authors have invested in them just as much as the bookstore has.

2) Don’t spread yourself too thin.

More is better, right? In terms of events, this can be dead wrong! You may be tempted to pepper your area with signings and readings, trying to get the most exposure you can. But keep in mind that unless you’re in a huge metropolitan area, you may just be handicapping your own events. Most cities only have so much of an audience for author events, and if you have too many too close together, attendance and sales will suffer for it. Some bookstores will require that, if you are to be hosted at their store, theirs is either the only or the first event. It’s not because we’re greedy, I promise! Rather, we want to have the best event we can (see #1!), and if you’ve already signed at two other bookstores plus a couple of Costcos, it’s not likely to go well.

3) Please don’t second-guess the bookstore.

We know you want to sell a ton of books. And maybe you’re doing #s 1 and 2, investing in your event, making sure that it’s a big launch, calling each and every person in your high school yearbook, inviting your entire extended family including third cousins twice removed. Make sure your bookstore knows exactly what you’re doing to help out, and then, step back. Over the years we’ve come to know our stores and our events, how many people to expect, how many books to order, how many staff to have on hand, what kinds of formats work best for which kinds of books. It’s our job, after all, to make sure events go well! If you think your bookstore is underestimating your event, then the best thing to provide them with are facts: How many people did you invite? How many did you hear back from? What organizations are you connected with that might provide big crowds? Are your friends big spenders? Are your family coming to buy every book they can get their hands on? Let us know, by all means! But don’t expect us to necessarily change our orders or logistics, and don’t be offended if it doesn’t happen. It’s our job to get it right; trust us!

4) Stay calm; do not panic!

The big day is approaching, there are a million little things that could go wrong, and you’re up every night dreaming about them. Take a deep breath, and remember: it’s our job to get it right! Your event manager has probably not only thought of each and every one of those million little problems, but dealt with 99.99% of them. You’ll probably be tempted to call or email (possibly several times a week, if not several times a day–yes, this has happened) each time you think of a new disastrous possibility. Don’t! If you can’t resign yourself to trust your bookstore, then try this instead: start a running list of things you’re worried about. Put down as many things as you can think of. Give yourself time and permission to get a really good list going. Then, let it sit for a day or two. Take another look. Is it really likely that a plane will crash into your signing? Probably not, cross that one off the list. If you feel like you have legitimate concerns, concerns you’ve thought about and considered, then send your event manager an email detailing them. Just one. Yes, an email, not a phone call! Not only is it less intrusive, but it allows your event manager to consider it at their leisure, when they have time to focus on it. Don’t demand answers or immediate action, but rather put it out there for their consideration: “You’ve probably already dealt with/thought about this already, but I was a little concerned that…” Chances are you don’t need to worry about any of it. But if you absolutely can’t let it go, try to make it as easy for the event manager to understand and respond as possible. If you call five times in three days, or if our email boxes overflow, you can bet we’re going to be more frustrated than receptive!

5) Enjoy your big day!

Let go of any expectations, worries, hopes and fears. If you’ve done 1 through 4, then you’re bound to have the best event you can expect, be on good footing with your local bookstore, and give your book a nice bump!

Whether you’re a blogger, an editor, or a flea market fanatic, it’s important to have a discerning eye.

via the paris review

“Let’s make a viral video,” I keep hearing. To me, it feels like saying “Let’s publish a bestselling book” or “I’m going to be popular.”

I keep wanting to shout from the rooftops “just make it GREAT!”

Olympus has done just that with this great video.

As part of our ongoing Q&A series with people in publishing, we talked to one of our international colleagues, Scott Pack, publisher at The Friday Project, an imprint of HarperCollins UK in London.

Q: We have to ask – why The Friday Project?
A: There was a significant, if somewhat tongue-in-cheek, social movement a few years back which called for everybody to be given Friday off work. By making the weekend longer we’d all be happier. The founders of The Friday Project (TFP) subscribed to that notion and the name was chosen.

Q: You’re the publishing arm of HarperCollins in the UK but you function pretty independently. What’s the biggest difference between the US and UK publishing industries?
A: On a commercial level it is the discount. Retailers in the UK can, and usually do, discount books significantly from publication. So you can usually find the biggest book of any given week at half price in the shops. Some people think this is a bad thing but anyone who has ever been hooked by a 3 for 2 promotion (probably the biggest vehicle for selling books over here) can testify that it definitely works in terms of selling books. Elsewhere, I don’t think we have any one influencer that can make a huge book overnight. A wonderful New York Times review or a mention on Oprah can often create a bestseller in the US but there isn’t anything with that impact here now that Richard & Judy have left terrestrial television.

Q: What’s the hot trend right now in the UK? Cat books? Vampires? What should we be watching for?
A: There do seem to be a lot of vampire books around, and zombies. Right now every publisher and his uncle is rushing out a Michael Jackson book (we are not, I should add). I guess there are always mini-trends or waves of interest but ultimately the only consistent trend is the readers’ love of a great story.

Q: What do you wish every US-based author knew before getting his or her book published in the UK?
A: That there are a hell of a lot of ways you can promote a book without leaving your seat. If you make yourself available through Skype, blogs, instant messenger, Twitter and really put some time into online promotion you can reach many UK readers even if your publisher doesn’t have the cash to fly you over. Also that we really don’t care about the baseball or basketball scores over here. Not a bit. Your excitement is not ours to share.

Q: eReaders. We can’t do a Q&A without asking about them. Love or hate? Or both?
A: Love them, in all their forms. At present the Kindle isn’t available over here and Amazon doesn’t seem to be in any great rush to change that. To be fair, I think it is down to the fact that they will need to have an option for the whole of the EU, not just the UK, before they go live. That means that the Sony Reader has a genuine foothold here. But there are still issues over pricing, availability and content for eBooks that need to be resolved before they will really take off. They are part of the future and we need to adapt to that.

    Check out the history of the word Trousers (which also seems to be a case study on Victorian prudishness) here or click here  to learn more about the tumultuous history behind this gargantuan thesaurus

The other morning I was invited to do an interview over breakfast at the home of a shopkeeper whom I had already interviewed several times at his work, a trendy, four-story Kabul department store selling elaborately beaded dresses from India ranging in price from $200 to well over $1000. Brides often come with their families to choose one of several outfits which will be worn during what are usually two days of wedding celebrations.

After my generous host wheeled out a delicious continental buffet of chai, naan bread, yoghurt, and cherry jam from Iran, we spoke of his family; he has four children, three of whom were toddlers during the fighting which took place in the country’s north during the Taliban years. He then asked me whether I was married, to which my mischievous colleague, who also serves as my guide and chaperone here, answered, “Yes, she is. Ask her how many people were at her wedding!”

My mild-mannered host looked at me with an expression that formed a question mark, compelling me to elaborate. Yes, I answered, I was married about a year ago. And we had 18 people at the wedding.

“18?” Disbelief and laughter followed. He shook his head and marveled that the number was only double-digit — and low double-digits at that. “Do you know that Afghan weddings are usually at least 1000 people? A small wedding here would be 500 or so guests.”

Now I was in awe. I had heard for years about big and marvelously fun Afghan weddings with music and food and an overflow of family and friends. But 1000 seemed an extraordinarily large number.

“Oh, yes,” said my host. “1000 at least; sometimes much more. And you have to feed all those people!” This means ordering sacks and sacks of sugar and rice and vegetables and meat weeks ahead of time; no big-box super stores here to turn to for last-minute supplies. Over-sized party sites large enough to fit thousands and featuring glamorous monickers such as “Kabul-Paris Wedding Hall” are serious — and lucrative — business here in the capital.

“But that must cost a fortune,”I asked. “How does anyone afford it? In the States weddings are quite expensive; that is part of why people try to limit the guest list. Five hundred people is an enormous wedding in America!”

Weddings are very expensive here, too, said my host. Too expensive. My colleague agreed. People save up for years to afford them. And sometimes the price of a wedding stops the marriage from happening at all. In Kabul, weddings can run upwards of $10,000 to $15,000. An unmanageably large sum for most.

Still, he said, 18 people was too small! If I wanted to have a more affordable wedding with everyone I wished to invite, I should come to Kabul. For the same cost as my small, State-sized nuptials, I could have 1500 people and lots of good food and music here in Afghanistan. Never mind that I am in my mid-30s, well beyond the usual age for marriage here.

“Next time!” I joked, knowing that most Afghans do not share the American belief in multiple attempts when it comes to marriage. “You know we Americans often try two or three times to get it right.” My host broke out into a rolling round of morning laughter. And so did I.

- Gayle Tzemach

I have been interpreting Mark Twain since I was cast in the role of the great humorist and author in the Bakersfield Musical Theatre (community theatre) production of “Big River,” the musical adaptation of “The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn,” in 1991. Since then, I have studied biographies, critical essays, and read nearly everything he has written. This has helped immensely and helped refine my performances, and have since done the musical twice more, most recently in January of this year.

Also, I crafted/adapted/scripted two different two-hour shows of Mark Twain material, “Greatly Exaggerated,” and “Nobody’s Fool,” which I performed at another local community theatre, the Spotlight Theatre. These are one man shows, recreating the style and format of Mark Twain lectures, though indebted as are Twain interpreters, to the great work of Hal Holbrook, who is a great inspiration as well.

My performances have also included schools, professional groups, business gatherings and last November I did a one-hour show called “In Considerable Doubt,” at the Bakersfield Museum of Art. I am totally delighted as I think about including my local Border’s as a performance venue, especially under the circumstances!

I don’t know if I’m the next Mark Twain, as there will never be another. But I’m gratified to keep his work, life and words alive for audiences to enjoy, and I thank HarperStudio and Borders for helping to keep Mark Twain in the public consciousness, especially as we approach the centennial of his death. And I’m absolutely thrilled to have won….I’m trying to be humble, but I’ll let Mr. Twain have the final word: “I have had many compliments, but they always embarass me. I always feel they have not said enough.”

Mark Bagby Wins Writing Contest and Claims his Status as "The Next Mark Twain"

And he has a surprising career history…

HarperStudio and Borders are pleased to announce the winner of the I am the Next Mark Twain writing contest: Mark Bagby, of Bakersfield, Calif. His conclusion to the unfinished Twain essay “Conversations with Satan,” was chosen from among 100 entries as the most fitting ending to Twain’s satirical piece. Ten other writers have been selected as Honorable Mentions: Joshua Minuto, James Pendergast, William Colletti, Robert Frazier, Robin Chae, Janet Reeves, Howard Krulewitz, Kimberly Maloney, Chris Narbone, and Craig Cheney. Contestants’ biographies and locales were not revealed during the judging process. In a twist to this story, the Grand Prize Winner just happens to be a Mark Twain interpreter and has been performing one-man shows of Twain’s works.

The contest was created to coincide with the publication of Who Is Mark Twain? and to engage readers and fans alike in “finding” the next Mark Twain. The entries were read by a panel of three judges: Robert Hirst, editor of the Mark Twain Papers project, Dave Taffner, a member of the Borders Fiction buying team, and Julia Cheiffetz, senior editor at HarperStudio.

“One of the most exciting things about publishing the newly-discovered Twain pieces in Who Is Mark Twain? is to see how contemporary Twain still is,” Robert Miller, HarperStudio President reflects. “The terrific responses we received to the ‘I Am the Next Mark Twain’ contest are the ultimate proof of that. I’m sure that Twain would have enjoyed seeing how brilliantly his work was finished, almost a century after his death. We are grateful to Borders for teaming with us on this contest—it was fun.”

Mark Bagby, as the Grand Prize Winner, will receive a free copy of Who Is Mark Twain?, have his piece published on Borders.com, and will give a reading of his work at his local Borders store. Bagby will be able to invite friends and family to hear him read the winning piece and another selection from the book. The winner will also be video taped and interviewed for a segment to air on Borders.com and theharperstudio.com. The date and location of the reading will be announced.

“The fiction buying team here at Borders is thrilled to announce our winner of the ‘I Am The Next Mark Twain’ writing contest. There was an abundance of interest in this contest, and we were pleasantly surprised at how many wonderful submissions we received. We are looking forward to Mark Bagby’s appearance at his local Borders store to read his winning masterpiece and we wish him the best of luck in his writing endeavors,” said Anne Kubek, executive vice president of Merchandising and Marketing for Borders.

Congrats to Mark Bagby, the next Mark Twain!

 So the question is: can Book Publishers follow suit?  In a time where creative ideas are welcome, perhaps we need only look at Merge Records to realize that trust, cautious decision making and staying grounded may lead us in the right direction.

Click here  to read the article or here to listen to the intriguing piece.

I really enjoyed meeting Kristin McLean at BEA and invited her to post this essay on our blog:

A New Way Forward

Is it just me, or did anyone else notice the new glasnost at BEA? Gone is the Henny Penny panic we were all feeling in January, and in its place there is a palpable sense of problem solving and openness to change. What the change is, no one completely knows, but it seems that everyone is on board with the fact that it’s no longer business as usual. 

It’s quite refreshing, actually. Very few industries have the opportunity to revisit the business model in the way publishing is. There’s nothing like a hole in the boat to get the serious creative juices flowing.

John Foster Dulles, Secretary of State under Eisenhower, once said “The measure of success is not whether you have a tough problem to deal with, but whether it is the same problem you had last year.”

Ironically, this new era of creative problem solving might allow us to tackle one of the biggest problems we’ve had for many years—our distribution system. Quite literally, it is the most inefficient system in all of retail, and it’s costing us billions in labor, fuel, materials, and environmental karma. No wonder our margins are so low at every level of the industry. We’re subsidizing this system with duplicated effort, overprinting and un-saleable stock, wild swings in inventory, and lost opportunity because billing pressures force returns before books have had a chance to gain traction.

I came to the book business from the toy business about a decade ago after spending many years managing an indie toy chain. In each of our three stores, we had a full children’s book section—a store within the store. We carried a comparable amount of stock per square foot to a bookstore, and averaged a respectable 3-5 turns per year on each SKU. 

The section was twice as profitable as the average bookstore. 

Why? Because the buyer chose about half as many new titles, and went twice as deep on the ones she knew staff and customers would love. Key backlist was always in stock in two copies, and every effort was made to stock best-sellers and staff favorites. It was highly edited, full of personality, and well respected. Proof that you don’t need to have everything, just the right things.

And the stock was bought direct from the publishers, non-returnable. 

If it didn’t sell, it was just marked down and moved out. I must say, returnability seemed like a pretty screwy way to do things then, and I haven’t changed my mind much since.

I understand why our model developed as it did. I understand why, when general interest bookstores were the only outlet, returnability made sense. However, the general bookstore model is under heavy pressure, and I believe one of the most viable ways forward is to develop a retail model that emphasizes a strong curatorial eye, narrower choices, and a deeper commitment to our stores as unique places carrying a selection that isn’t duplicated anywhere else. You don’t need to have everything, just the right things. The Special Markets departments at many publishers already know this. Niche is the new black.

Moving to a non-returnable model will demand changes throughout the chain: Publishers will need to start publishing less frontlist and do more to nurture backlist; Authors will need to give up large advances in lieu of a higher cut of sales; and Stores will need to trim some space, wean themselves off the psychological comfort of returns, and commit to a different way of operating. 

Am I saying that all stores should start buying everything non-returnable tomorrow? Perhaps not, but I bet a percentage of buying from particular publishers could be shifted to non-returnable for a nice bump in the bottom line right away. I applaud forward-thinking publishers like Harper Studio who are trying to shift the paradigm. 

Do I think going non-returnable is going far enough? Frankly, when I look further down the road, non-returnability is neutral compared to other innovations like a pure consignment model—you pay when you sell the book, the potential of local print-on-demand,  focusing on selling the consumer a shopping experience as opposed to an object, and as yet unforeseen technological and consumer innovations.

All I know for sure is that we can’t evolve to our next model before we figure this out. Books aren’t going away, but they way we handle them needs to. I am hopeful that we can use a little of our bountiful creativity to re-imagine and reinvigorate our way of doing business.  If BEA is any indication, we seem to be heading that way.

Kristen McLean is the executive director of The Association of Booksellers for Children (ABC), a national non-profit trade association for the children’s book industry.

1) For those who don’t you: Who is Ken Layne?

I run a political comedy website called Wonkette, where I’ve worked since 2006, and write for various publications, and also used to operate the websites Tabloid.net, Sploid and the L.A. Examiner.

2) What is your book about?

Here, we’ve got this nice blurb, the one you made me write: “Ken Layne’s THE LEFT COAST is a history of California’s culture, environment and politics framed by his bravely idiotic solo hike up the entire 1,000-mile coastline of America’s weirdest, most populous state.”

2.2) Why now? I mean, you’ve been approached before about writing a book.

Before this was a book idea, it was just something I planned to do after the completely exhausting 2008 campaign and election. And then I started thinking about how nice it would be to collect strange tales and stories at such a leisurely walking pace, in this fantastic setting with the pounding Pacific and the beach towns, the enclaves of the ultra-wealthy and camps of the homeless, the stretches of wilderness and military bases and railroad track, Mexican drug shipments rolling ashore on lifeboats, toxic harbors and sewage lagoons, and a million-dollar ocean sunset every day.

That’s a hell of a lot more fun than any other book project I’ve proposed or had suggested to me in the past.

3) Do you think your book will be written up in an article about the blog to book phenom? (That’s a joke, kind of.)

My timing is never good with these online fads, so probably not. Here is a true fact: I was the first historical human to cover the presidential nominating conventions, in Philadelphia and Los Angeles in the summer of 2000, as a damned Blogger. But nobody knew what blogging was, at the time, so I completely missed the historical 2004 election first covered by Bloggers.

Anyway, THE LEFT COAST isn’t a spinoff of a blog. I have, however, considered writing a fictional (or is he?) sidekick LOLcat character — constantly sending twee confessional postcards to himself (via Twitter), and just eating so much lasagna, and this is why he’s fat.

4) Tell me about David Geffen and his coastline.

I should not speak for David Geffen, because he has a clone army of lawyers, but published reports suggest that he would prefer California’s magnificent public oceanfront, which is supposed to be available to one and all, to be his coastline. For decades, Geffen fought access along a narrow corridor alongside his Malibu house — even though he accepted that corridor as part of a deal to expand the seaside mansion back in 1983.

In 2005, Geffen finally lost and the gates were unlocked. He’s not unique for wanting privacy at his beachfront house. His wealthy neighbors –  including my old boss, former L.A. mayor Richard Riordan — just want to keep the unwashed hordes and TMZ paparazzi off their beach.

Unfortunately for them, it’s not their beach at all. The socialist republic of California is not like Martha’s Vineyard or Jamaica, where the best beaches are private. We have coastal access laws here, and the entire shore is public property, up to the high tide mark at minimum.

Anyway, as my path runs from Mexico to Oregon, roadside access through a wall of Malibu mansions isn’t an issue. But it’s a regular conflict here because the rich and powerful and famous love to make their homes by the ocean, and the other 37 million Californians are mostly packed against that same beloved coast.

HarperStudio will publish Layne’s book in 2010.

What are your favorite covers? Share some with us in the comments section.

I feel like Rebecca and I are operating in a very different environment than Len Riggio is, and his comments, while probably true for Barnes and Noble, aren’t that relevant to us. That said, there’s no denying that the economy makes things difficult, not only for booksellers but for all businesses.  We realize that it might seem a little bit crazy to start a business in this environment.  But counterintuitively, an economic downturn can be the best time to get something started. In a way, everyone is hungry, and the stakes are a bit lower, so there are fewer obstacles to getting started.

And at the same time, we have this incredible community in Fort Greene that is champing at the bit for us to be open!   We’re hoping to create a neighborhood institution that will make enough of a profit to last for a long time, evolve and grow with the times, and give us a decent quality of life.

2) How will Greenlight differ from McNally Jackson?

Being in SoHo, McNally Jackson has a very sophisticated, Manhattan vibe, which has served it very well and makes it a tourist destination as well as a destination for New Yorkers.  Greenlight will be much more of a neighborhood bookstore, a Brooklyn bookstore — smaller, slower, more casual, funkier.

I hope to be able to do a lot more one-on-one handselling with customers, which I sometimes didn’t have time for at McNally Jackson.  We’ve designed Greenlight so that almost all of the business of the bookstore will happen on the bookstore floor, so we’re always where the customers are. We’re also hoping to plan some interactive events — readings, discussions, even open mic nights — that wouldn’t make sense in Manhattan . Other than that, we’ll see as we go along!

3)  You already have a devoted following on Twitter. What would you say to a bookseller who says “but I don’t have time for social media, and I don’t believe it translates into sales”?

Not everything has to have a direct, observable sales correlation to be healthy for your bookstore in the long run.   It’s all part of getting more bodies into our store (or on our website), so we can show them how good we are or what we do.  (And if you shudder at the thought of Twittering yourself, chances are there’s a bookseller on staff who would be willing to tweet on the store’s behalf — maybe they already do!)

4) Will you sell books on your website?

YES!  We think it’s very important as a 21st century bookstore to offer our customers the option of shopping online, even if they use it primarily to see what we have in stock — for now, it’s less about hoping to make big bucks on the online sales and more about the marketing opportunities of e-commerce.  Exciting stuff!

“I really feel like my problem isn’t piracy.  It’s obscurity.” – Cory Doctorow

Now, basic knowledge of HTML is the new requirement for membership. At least according to me. Seriously, Kathryn, our Rotational Associate, came to us with HTML skills, and it comes in handy every single day — to the point where I realized I needed to learn 101 HTML skills to stay ahead of the curve.

Cut to a few weeks ago when I got an email from Maggie Hilliard at DailyLit telling me that their newly formed Digital Publishing Group was offering up a “free,” basic HTML class (I say this very quietly for fear that everyone’s going to realize what I already know — which is to say that this group is a gift to publishing and I’m afraid there won’t be room for me if I miss the email and don’t RSVP fast enough). To make this offer even more insanely appealing, the class was being taught by DailyLit founder Susan Danziger‘s husband, Albert Wenger, a partner at Union Square Ventures. Check out their portfolio and you’ll know why I placed such high value on this offering.

Space was limited. First RSVP, first serve.

To say I hit the “Reply YES” button so fast your head would spin, would be an understatement.

The class took place last night. I’d say there were about 25 people there — seemed to be a mix of age and gender (though mostly women, and mostly younger!) — and I’m proud to say there were 5 HarperCollins peeps in the crowd (woo hoo @DominicanPie — I should have known you’d be there. I knew as soon as I met you that you get it.).

It was the most potent, amazing, useful, 2.5 hours I’ve spent in a long, long, time.

THANK YOU ALBERT! And thank you Susan Danizger and Maggie Hilliard for bringing this group together. You guys are amazing, and Book Publishing is lucky to have you.

(Special thanks for Christine M. Chung for this link)

The effort resulted in the following:

–WHO IS MARK TWAIN?: 1013 subscriptions

–BURN THIS BOOK: 529 subscriptions

–EMERIL AT THE GRILL: 751 subscriptions

And if anyone out there hasn’t tried a book on DailyLit, you really must. You’ll be surprised at how fast they go down.

I asked Susan Danziger, the founder of DailyLit, a few questions:

1) What’s the biggest surprise you’ve found about your readers?

Our readers tend to be passionate, engaged readers 60% of whom have read between 10 and over 50 books in the last year (more than I’ve managed to do without DailyLit!)

2) Are most people reading fiction or non-fiction?

Most people are reading fiction since we started with classic, fiction books and then introduced non-fiction with contemporary works such as business series from Tom Peters and Seth Godin, language courses from Berlitz, and recipes from Emeril’s cookbook.

3) What’s been your most popular book and why?

Pride and Prejudice (available for free) has been the most popular book; no surprise that it’s been a huge hit.

4) Are most people reading DailyLit on their phones or computers? (not sure you can tell this)

Most people have been reading DailyLit on their computers at home or at work. We have a number of folks who read books via email so that their bosses think they’re reading work-related emails; others who read on their mobile phone while at Starbucks or even while brushing teeth in their bathroom, and even one fellow who reads in bed to avoid sex with his wife!

5) When we first spoke a year ago, publishers were nervous about giving you these books DRM-free. Has that evolved at all?

Yes, publishers are definitely less concerned about the DRM issue these days. Since each of our books are divided into up to hundreds of installments, publishers have interpreted that as its own kind of DRM. Also, publishers realize that DailyLit is a great way to virally market their titles. For instance, we integrated with Twitter so that if you link your DailyLit profile to your Twitter account, books you start reading will be automatically tweeted to your followers. The first book we launched with this program in place, Who is Mark Twain?, let over 17,600 followers (from 33 tweets) know about that book in a period of 2-3 days (and according to my contact over at Powells.com, it made their bestseller list!)

DailyLit (www.dailylit.com) is the leading publisher of serialized books in digital form. DailyLit currently features over 1400 classic and contemporary books available for free or for a small fee. Short book installments are sent via e-mail or RSS feed and arrive in a reader’s inbox (or RSS feedreader), which can be read on a desktop, laptop or mobile device (including an iPhone or Blackberry) according to the schedule set by each reader (e.g. 7:00am every weekday). Installments can be read in fewer than 5 minutes, and additional installments are available on demand. DailyLit’s titles include bestselling and award winning titles, from literary fiction and non-fiction to romance and science fiction. Co-founded by a team of publishing professionals and technology experts, DailyLit is headquartered in Mamaroneck, New York.

A recent Times article “Kickin’ Down Madison Ave., Feelin’ Groovy” cited the election of Barack Obama as the driving force behind the shifting of the cultural tide (they also cited the musical Hair??).The piece quoted several marketing executives and advertisers who said things like “The ’60s era embodies the culture of thinking for yourself and taking a stand.” This made me smile. And, lo and behold, companies like Proctor & Gamble, Macy’s and General Mills all have 60s oriented campaigns -and let’s not forget this year’s Barney’s Holiday catalog!

That same day I read an amazing Esquire feature by Colby Buzzell that was evocative of the 60s in a very different way. (Colby is writing a book for us called OFF THE ROAD in which he travels across America and documents his experience.) His cover story, “Down & Out in Fresno and San Francisco” is a Kerouac-esque portrait of the crack filled Tenderloin district in San Francisco, a neighborhood he calls “the pot of shit at the end of the rainbow.” The article is dark and dizzying. I have no doubt that Colby’s book will reveal some deeper truths about contemporary America, because that’s what he does. And that is why I’m excited to publish him. But this Times article made me realize something: At the end of the day, I guess I’ll be selling the 60s, too.

Kassia Krozser and Kirk Biglione are top notch in my book, and I’d sincerely recommend anyone who wants to know more check out this site and what they are offering.

I love what Kirk says on this video about Twitter.

Next to Keith Richards, I might add.

The Facebook vanity url is like a personal calling card, a place you can direct people to connect with you online, especially if you don’t have your own website. Instead of searching for your profile within Facebook, friends, family, and everyone else on the web will be able to go directly to your page by typing in a vanity url, i.e. http://www.facebook.com/katie. Read more about it here. 

Now comes the hard part…deciding what your url should be. You only get one url and once it’s created your choice is set in stone. Choose wisely!

It’s the moment we’ve all been waiting for: the lease is finalized, the contractors are on their way, and we’ve got an opening date target for Fort Greene’s own independent bookstore! At last we can reveal the mystery location:

On June 1, Greenlight Bookstore became the official tenant of 686 Fulton Street, at the corner of South Portland — right in the heart of Fort Greene.

The space is about 2000 square feet — just right for stocking a wide variety of books in many categories, and for hosting great author readings and other events, while still feeling cozy. The funky layout has both wide open spaces and nooks and crannies, perfect for a quiet browse, for reading a picture book with a child, or for chatting with friends and neighbors over a cup of coffee from Marquet, right next door.

Follow Jessica on Twitter: http://twitter.com/booknerdnyc

In a taxi on the way to the Today Show. Wish my hair could look like this every day.

Fresh off the road for my new book BOYOLOGY, I pulled together a list of the 5 things every author should know before going on tour. Here they are:

1. Twittering is MUCH easier than blogging on the road. Thanks to my trusty iPhone, I wasn’t worryied about finding a wifi connection for my laptop so I could write an “official” blog post. Instead, I used twitter and dealt with the blog stuff when I got home.

2. Online event listings really do pull people out to events. I had a bunch of people mention that they saw my events online and that’s why they came. And other local media (TV, radio, print) is really important. Hard to get, but worth the effort of trying.

3. Be Nice. Remember that the booksellers are putting in extra hours (likely unpaid) to be at your events, your publicist is pulling her hair out to get you another radio interview in the market, and your mother has already purchased 5 copies of your book. (She can’t drive your Amazon ranking by herself). A thank you note after each event for the bookseller, and a little gift for your publicist will go a long way in showing your appreciation for all their hard work. You’ll have to figure out how to thank your mother on your own.

4. The perfect pre-tour gift is a Starbucks card. If you’re ever thinking about giving your author a “good luck on the road” present, get them $20 to Starbucks. One of my friends gave me one and I was so grateful to have it since most of my meals ended up being at Starbucks. And with my early morning 6:00am flights every morning, I started each day with a lot of coffee!

5. Do Not, I repeat, DO NOT, take red-eye flights.

Extra Credit: Buy some books! No one has better reading recommendations than a local bookseller. Take their advice on what’s hot and support them by getting it at their store. Can you believe I had never read John Green’s Looking for Alaska and I’m a teen author? I ended up bringing 11 books home. Not only will I be smarter, but I think I’m actually a little bit stronger from lugging my suitcase around.

“Why write? As soon ask, why rivet? Because a number of personal accidents drifts us toward the occupation of riveter, which preexists, and, most importantly, the riveting gun exists, and we love it.

Think of a pencil. What a quiet, nimble, slender, and then stubby wonder-worker he is! At his touch, worlds leap into being; a tiger with no danger, a steamroller with no weight, a palace at no cost. All children are alive to the spell of pencil and crayons, of making something, as it were, from nothing; a few children never move out from under this spell, and try to become artists. I was once a rapturous child drawing at the dining-room table, under a stained-glass chandelier that sat like a hat on the swollen orb of my excitement.”

This short little letter Updike sent back in October is now its own piece of literary nostalgia (as is the much talked about interview with Cheever)

A few observations:

1) Attendance: I’m just guessing here, but there seemed to be fewer people overall than last year. Maybe it’s the economy, not sure. The good news though is that I saw many more book publishing people. That’s a really good thing as far as I’m concerned. In fact, if I were boss , I’d send dozens of people from all different departments to conferences such as these — especially when in New York. I’d make it mandatory. Editorial, sales, marketing, publicity — could all benefit from hearing these speakers. To my mind, it would be money well spent.

2) Twitter had a much bigger role this year (obviously). I was on Twitter last year for the conference, but not really working it — though I did have one of those ah-ha moments last year when I saw Robert Scoble demonstrated on the big screen that people were watching the conference live and responding around the world in real-time. This year everyone was on Twitter, there was a hashtag (#mbcircus), and you could get live responses during the conference. For instance, day one, there was not an outlet in sight. Crazy. I mentioned this on Twitter — and the next day they had outlets everywhere. Love that! Thank you Mediabistro.

3) Steve Rubel from Edelman was a standout again this year. He talked about how companies can successfully use social media by appointing “corporate all-stars” and empowering them to connect with customers through social media. This is better than any advertising or marketing that money can buy. Great examples are @comcastcares from Comcast, @scottmonty from Ford, and Kelly from Quicken @quickenloans.

4) John Byrne from Business Week was another standout. John spoke about Business Week’s “Engagement Strategy” where they encourage their journalists to connect with the commenters on the site and let the conversation inform their stories. They also reward their top commenters by naming the Top 100, and even inviting the Top 10 to New York to have dinner with the editors. As far as I can see, John Byrne is creating the future of journalism and I trust any future being forged by him. He seems to “get it” in a visceral way. I’d hitch my wagon to John’s if I were in journalism.

5) Valeria Maltoni from Conversationagent.com and Eileen Gittins from Blurb.com were also inspiring. If I wanted to publish a book, I would seriously consider using Blurb and Conversationagent.

6) Carmen Ruest from Cirque du Soleil came and spoke, and then some of the performers did a unicycle act. I’m not sure what the connection was to the conference (I had to step out to take a call and missed most of her talk) — but the performance was an enjoyable end of the day touch.

Wow. I love them! Every service company should take note. And lessons.

Mark my words, next year there will be MUCH more of this type of thing.

Check out Comcast Cares on Twitter: http://twitter.com/comcastcares

and Comcast Bill: http://twitter.com/ComcastBill

and Comcast Bonnie: http://twitter.com/ComcastBonnie

Apple, Verizon, Cablevision, UPS, AT&T……take note!

Since photos of Michelle Obama in sleeveless J. Crew started popping up, women across America have been doing bicep curls at their desks.  And let’s be honest…how many of you seriously considered starting a vegetable garden when Mrs. Obama dug her own at the White House?  Mrs. Obama has made some clear, strong statements that have resonated across the nation, becoming the perfect spokeswoman for a better America.  But Amanda Hesser thinks something is missing.  Check out her op-ed from the New York Times, and see what she has to say to “The Commander in Chef.”

You can also join the fight against literary censorship by signing The Right to Read petition here.

A bacon cone filled with scrambled eggs and country gravy topped with a biscuit.