Christmas Book Messages - Bah Humbug or Stocking Sugar Plum?

Christmas a time of giving and receiving. What - is open to interpretation. For many that morphs right into Consumerism and Capitalism, which in a state of Holiday irony had the two jaded C's receiving their grimy lumps of coal back in September when the world's markets crashed. Dirty hands mess up the ermine cuffs of the Christmas stockings of the really wealthy - they'll go for the whiz bang Kindle gadgetry. What should go into the stocking hung by the chimney with care is another matter entirely. My vote is a book, a real one with paper pages. What the book is about is left up to the giver. Less courageous givers keep it all cool with gift certificates. Givers who want to deliver a message tailor the offering. Tis the season and books send multiple layered messages.

Ebeneezer Scrooge had to have three nightmares before getting with the program right in time for Christmas Day. Dickens sends a bell ringing message to a stingy boss or an ungrateful co-worker. Dr. Seuss makes it easy to introduce children to the spirit of the day while watching a Grinch's ten sizes too small heart do horrible things in the community. A modern Cindy Lou is out there needing some encouragement - give them the book. Truman Capote shows people how to make a holiday memory in bad times without a direct family that lasts and warms the heart. Just stay away from a fruitcake - they seem to have a perfectly rum soaked shelf life of a hundred years.

A book. The Season. Tough times. Make a memory and send a message. The giver chooses the message.

King Family Feud Over Book Deal

The first family of nonviolence is practicing legal judo on each other, hoping for a clear take down of a brother or sister decision. Martin Luther King Jr.'s family have hamstrung and headlocked each other in courtroom combat over control of the King legacy and who has the right to authorize publishing what. The situation keeps boiling over every year. Their mother, Coretta Scott King's death and the sudden demise of oldest sister Yolanda in California, have added yet another breach between two siblings Bernice & Martin Luther King III and their brother Dexter. A very angry Penguin Group paid King Inc, run by Dexter Scott King, $1.2 million for a Coretta Scott King biography to be written by lecturer Reverend Barbara Reynolds, formerly of USA Today. Reynolds is the notorious figure that also shoehorned Reverend Jeremiah Wright into speaking with a surfeit of hubris at the National Press Club which made the Obamas drop him like a hot rock as their pastor.

Bernice, a licensed lawyer, mediator and Baptist preacher, has some of her Mom's private papers she has been shopping around for a separate book deal. About $300,000 of the advance was given to King Inc and split equally while Martin III and Reverend Bernice King say dexter did some wild and crazy stuff with the money that did not include them. Of which Dexter basically called them liars and said here is the evidence to show a split as outlined by Coretta Scott King's last will and testament which left ALL of her papers to King Inc and Bernice doesn't have the authority to get her own deal with items owned by King Inc.

The siblings are feuding over whether the documents should be turned over. Bernice King and Martin Luther King III maintain that their mother no longer wanted to work with Reynolds on the book. They are asking that the documents be distributed among Coretta Scott King's heirs and not given to the publisher.

"He signed the contract, but that's his job," Frankel said. "No one questioned when they got their share of the sale from the King papers whether Dexter had the authority to sign a contract. Nobody complained when they got their millions."

This follows years of feuding from even before Coretta Scott King's death. Word up publishing idiots, wrong book, the better book is about how the King family degenerated to this point and why the legacy is being tarnished by King's children in this way. I even have the title for you as a freebie, The Content of Their Character. Pulitzer Prize winning historian and the seminal biographer of MLK has a few things he would want to say, sure enough about how the King legacy is being handled and that includes Coretta's contribution to this family Armageddon.

Book Festivals & Book People

Bibliophiles come in all sorts of skin bindings, page palettes and an assortment of thicknesses and tallness.  Gathering book people together happens when local folks organize to put on a book fair or festival.  Those come in all sizes and genres too.  Even the current First Librarian Lady gets into the gig with her big event on the Washington mall named the national Book Festival.  For the past eight years, this event kicks off for the bow tie and formal gown bookies with Laura Bush inviting a host of authors - this final year including herself and her daughter, Jenna, to present works at various pavilions.

On the other side of America, the 7th Annual West Hollywood Book Fair has 400 authors playing to an erudite, hipster laid back LA crowd in a park.  In San Francisco, home of the West Coast cultured literati and big earthquakes comes the aptly named Litquake.  Litquake morphs into Litcrawl then deigns to visit the outpost of Manhattan. 

Book gatherings of this sort are manna for booklovers like me for the panel discussions.  It affords the deeper understanding of author intent and displays the scope of detailed research that goes into penning book, be it a novel or footnoted seventh wonder of the nonfiction world.  The other bonus is being around authors and seeing how their forceful writing may come from somebody who mumbles.  Great stuff.

Parenting Advice From Britney Spears Mom Shapeshifts to Memoir

Spare me. Save trees. Do not expend brain cells on the pageant of irony that a bound non-comic book, distributed through a Christian bookstore, about parenting from Britney Spears' Mom would bring a reader. The aptly named cotton candy of how to parent books, Through the Storm: A Real Story of Fame, Family in a Tabloid World, streaks onto the stage amidst a seeming turnaround from her eldest daughter's serial tragic life. From being a ten year old Disney Mouse person, pop princess, a 55 hour Vegas marriage, annulment, KFed & his prior baby mama drama, marriage, Madonna kiss, babies, divorce, custody fight, ticket, child welfare investigation, rehab, baldness, rehab, court, tickets, fender bender, the saddest TV musical comeback followed by a besotted brainless press corps acknowledging her appearing normal as a ditsy receptionist on The Office. She is only twenty something and her father is her court appointed conservator. Britney is bouncing back.

Mommy Spears learns in the midst of Britney's drama saga, that her other Disney daughter is preggers at 16 and she delivers a baby girl, Maddie, at 17. Lynne gets a new granddaughter and it is deemed safe to release the book before anything else happens. Now it's a doorstop masquerading as a memoir rather than a tome on parenting after all that success. We are so in for a prank, Pulitzer or fireplace fertilizer starting on September 16, 2008.

Harry Potter in Arabic A No Go In Israel

In many cases all over the world, Harry Potter fans wait a YEAR or more for translations of the original books. Arabic reading Muggles in Israel are getting their supply cut off just as they about to learn the fates of Harry & Lord Voldemort. Israel's Ministry of Magic Pureblood Publishing (Trade Industry & Treasury) objects on legalities to the source of the Arabic translations originating from Israel's most undiplomatic version of Death Eaters, Syria and Lebanon.

Arab-Israeli publisher Salah Abassi told Israeli public radio on Monday that authorities ordered him to stop importing Arabic-language children's books from the two longtime foes of Israel.

"The trade and industry ministry and treasury warned me that importing those books is illegal," said Abassi, who imported the books through Jordan.

Let's see in the last two years, Israel destroyed the ominous threat of a Syrian nuclear facility and tried to bomb Lebanon back to the Phoenician era as the IDF chased down kidnappers and terrorists. Whether a state of war exists is important to the wooden puppet turned into a lying boy and the sacrificial boy lamb turned into a wizard as it forms the foundation of the Umbridge-like decree. Since 1939, before Israel was a vested nation, laws were set that prohibited trade with any nation at war with Israel, even if it involves selling beloved children's books. Seems the boy wizard, Hermione Granger & Ron Weasley caused other trouble last year in Israel on the Sabbath with some booksellers, risking fines, opening to meet the demand. Whatever will happen with Rowling's December's release of The Tales of the Beedle the Bard with all that commentary from the late Professor Dumbledore?

Maybe, Jiminy Cricket at the Ministry of Translation Magic can get the Italian born Pinocchio to join the IDF.

uh, oh who's translating...

Random House Afraid of Book

Good golly Miss Molly, controversial books have been arbiters of fierce debate and discussion the world over since presses could belch them out. Good books are not about gentility or saving the sensitive readers sensibilities from a shock. Somebody, somewhere, will ALWAYS be offended. Now, a yellow bellied publisher fears doing what better independent publishers have done for a lifetime - put a perspective out there for the public to decide come what may. Instead, we have a vanguard of fraidy cat editors weighing a subset of a subset of the public reactions against a book they had already decided to publish. Then, they ran away from their decision. Truly, it would have been better to never say yes to the author Sherry Jones if the benchmark is somebody is going to be mad in academia.

"We decided, after much deliberation, to postpone publication," it added.

The decision was taken "for the safety of the author, employees of Random House, booksellers and anyone else who would be involved in distribution and sale of the novel," said the company's deputy publisher Thomas Perry in a statement.

The novel traces the life of A'isha, who is often referred to as Muhammad's favourite wife, from her engagement at the age of six, until the prophet's death.

Salmon Rushdie got a fatwa, a biographical book blathering security detail plus award worthy recognition on a lasting literary work. More context to comprehending the Islamic faith in all its permutations is a worthy publishing endeavor. Not everyone agrees within the faith, hence, Sunnis and Shias. There are degrees that are helped with a novel or book that advances the dicussion rather than staying stuck at a low level of knowledge. Now Random House has decided staying on empty think tanks to keep their speed right where it is, oh what will we do to make money off of more paper trash nobody will remember after the last page. Based on the objections of one non-Muslim Professor Spellberg with puritan pride issues deep in the heart of Texas. RH is trying to sugar coat it as we are oh so concerned about everybody in our supply chain, except the Muslim professor who was in favorite of publishing the book.

The One Time Only Tell All Tall Tales

For goodness sakes, since time immemorial the wannabe parasites have sold bits or anything that wasn't nailed down of others lives to interested third parties since the invention of people.  For the person being done up like a cherry-topped Christmas ham on paper, that doesn't make it easier to swallow.  It goes to who do/did you trust for all the good, bad ugly and indifferent reasons.  Filthy lucre beckons maiden and maven alike.  It spends the same.  That certainly isn't going to make the four time married Salmon Rushdie quiver with excitement or Madonna to name a children's hospital after her trash talking brother or get Princess Di's butler off the cooking sherry.  The tell all you can while you can book can only be written once, so avaricious publishers hype the hell out of them when they score one.

Not sure if the best selling Satanic Verses author would rather have a fatwa or give one on his ex-bodyguard once removed.  Said bodyguard may have been around for the Salmon Rushdie breakup with wife # 4, Top Chef Palate Princess, Padma.  Or maybe, Madonna just forgot to give a handsigned A-Rod baseball to her brother before he decided dishing on Life with Madonna paper was his path to the Ritchie riches.  The butler to Princess Diana lied at her inquest and wrote two fawning books to honor her as the world never imagined during her royally twisted ménage à trois marriage that everybody knew about because Andrew Morton got her version down on tape.  Can't imagine the Queen staying up late reading that one in bed with a flashlight.  But Her Majesty might note this:

The book, On Her Majesty's Service, published this week, claims the was locked in a cupboard while the officers went to a pub for a drink because they were "so fed up with his attitude".

It also claims that Rushdie was nicknamed "Scruffy" because of his unkempt appearance and that the author billed the police force £40 a night for putting up officers in his home. "We were paying, or rather the taxpayer was paying, Rushdie to protect him," the book says.

Some times the vipers are family or faux friends or household help.  But in today's book market, there is some sort of obsession with the inside scoop about the lives of people who garner some level of success.  Call this book genre what it is: payback gossip.

China's Knickers In Knots over Book Mentions

China is excising any mention of His Holiness, the Dalai Lama and the China-Tibet border dispute in Australian nonfiction books published for export to China. Memo to China censors: Facts are stubborn things and denying them does not make them less true, just the population of Chinese readers more ignorant.

All of this publishing drama because of a biography written by an ancestor, Felicity Jack, about an Australian, Robert Logan Jack that made a reference to the China-Tibet border. Amazing their eagle eyes can catch book references, but not the tons of algae problem at an Olympic site right beneath their uptight noses. China massacred Tibetans demanding freedom and blame the Dalai Lama for the heaps of censuring remarks tossed their way in the aftermath. China's One China policy goes for Taiwan and Tibet.

It is one of those things that make you go hmmm, as Australian publishers got this message before. Now UNSW Press and Melbourne publisher, Hardie Grant, have seen this issue before. Keeping 1,500,000,000 people under intellectual lock and key is going to get harder not easier, somebody should tell the Chinese bureaucrats.

Twilight, Teens & Vampires

Completely missed, ignored or insanely oblivious to the whole brouhaha happening in damp Forks, Washington. No worries because Harry Potter wasn't working for me until Order of the Phoenix. Jordan, Edward mix it up over a teenager character named Bella with a bit of a Goth twist in a rainy landscape. Some book people and editors at Entertainment Weekly have completely fallen out of the trees onto their pointy heads hyping the Twilight series as the next Harry Potter, uh no. It does have just under 2,000 people gushing over it on Amazon.

Bringing the funny to the comparison is the Edward Cullen actor in the Twilight movie was Cedric Diggory in the HP movie, making that the only tie between the two media entities. Bella burgers and midnight parties are rare with few authors drawing crowds to offset the event costs. In September, Brsingr the third installment of the Christopher Paolini fantasy series will bring out a fair few fans too.

Movie kickoff for Twilight holds a last choice in a 3 for $20 sale DVD appeal. However, the artistic book jacket for Breaking Dawn by Stephanie Meyers kicks ass. Supposedly it's the last one in the series, we will see after everybody finishes counting their filthy lucre while seeing the clamor from the bitingly committed teen girl fan base.

My Vote for Old Fashioned Paper Books

Holding the book in your hand, then fingers as the plot or information compels them to turn the pages on automatic pilot, thereby finally winning a coveted spot in a bibliophile's library is the story of a good book finding Heaven.  Here, read my E-Book techo gadget is just close to the same.  Kindle costing in at $360US has new competition from Sony at $300US for the hearts and minds of the tech savvy bliblioratti.  Electronic books are an individual media.  All books travel with you in the sterile, yet densely packed device.  For those who enjoy sharing a good read and will not panic when the book stays over night with a friend, handing over the electronic version will not happening.  It is the equivalent of giving up the whole library cold turkey - that's a Hell No.  Can you imagine leaving the damn thing on an airplane?  Now that's money down the tubes as each reading edition has to be bought too.

Getting an E-Book and the hard copy is pricey and the province of wealthy readers.  Sony versus Kindle is boring.  Each E-book device is upgrading and doing other business hocus pocus to entice a wary audience of book lovers to commit.  Its like the Blue Ray thing - eventually there will be a standard and an open format that will benefit reader, publisher and author.  I personally can't see myself with a device and calling myself a reader.  I do electronic reading on one device.  Mine is called a laptop.

LA Times Kills Book Coverage

For the Love of Money, literature shall fall behind Oliver Twist to ask for a second helping chance.  The newspaper business in general suffers the bonfire of the inanities as alternative media grows in power in scope.  Little reason to wonder why subsections of the newspaper are suffering humiliating removals from their pages as dollars shift to cover the inane rather than the profound.  The LA Times announced their latest cutback by shoving Books deep inside the Calendar section, struggling like a tired soldier behind enemy lines.

One pertinent issue is the business model allowed for a small cadre of professionals to choose which books were reviewed without encompassing book reading communities.  More focus on what were people anticipating and their involvement is/was necessary, especially in markets that show potential and growth (people of color), rather than a focus on important works appreciated by an erudite few.  Publisher Condé Nast is freaking out that they even needed to get 40,000 more copies of the Vogue Italia edition featuring an all black sumptuous edition after a brown out in recent years, thinking it permanent.  The still necessary book section being dissed and squeezed smacks of the wayward quest for nonexistent profits chasing the wrong model.  Quality of life issues involve culture, but hey, The LA Times don't need no stinkin' book culture.

One thing they did well under former editor Steve Wasserman was the LA Times Festival of Books. How do you have a Book Fair when the book section is dead, killed by its own publishing parent?