There is some kind of vampire book coming out today for kids or tweens and/or moms or something like that. Bookstores everywhere are apparently having midnight parties to celebrate the release. Wordsmiths is having a Black and Red Prom with acoustic goth music by Ferosha Akoustika (the band formerly known as The Wayne Fishell Experiment). Across Decatur Square, The Little Shop of Stories will be hosting their own Twilight Party as well. I think there are going to be a lot of young vampires milling around the Square tonight. Mrs. Got Books has read all of the Twilight Series books and will definitely be there. I haven’t read any of the books yet, but I loved that one guy on Sesame Street.
These guys have got to be related.
In other news, the longlist for the Booker Prize was announced this week. Big surprise – Count Sir Salman Rushdie made the cut. I think that even if he hadn’t released a novel this year, his grocery list might have still made it. The actual big surprise on the list is Child 44 by Tom Rob Smith, which I am told is a straight up thriller. Netherland is the most likely to end up in my TBR pile.
Here are the twelve books that made the first cut:
Also: Sir Salman is interviewed (podcast) on KCRW’s Bookworm.
I missed Salman (The Bard of Clifton Road) Rushdie’s recent reading of The Enchantress of Florence at the Carter Center last week, despite near constant reminders. (A Capella has a few signed copies left.) It figures that in the same week Sir Salman’s novel Midnight’s Children won the award for being the best novel of all Booker Award Winners.
The Believer magazine has announced the winner of their annual book award: Tom McCarthy’s Remainder. McCarthy’s book has been on my list of books to pick up for a while, since Remainder was often mentioned together with personal fave, The Raw Shark Texts. I do have McCarthy’s TinTin and the Secret of Literature in my to be read stack. Maybe it’s time to move that one on up.
The article also lists the results of The Believer’s reader survey. I recommend carrying the reader survey in your wallet for your next trip to the bookstore. There are some great titles on the list. Here’s my ballet for the reader survey:
Fresh off the heels of winning the Tournament of Books, The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao has won the Pulitzer Prize for fiction. At this point, Junot Díaz has to admit that Oscar’s life has been more zafa than fukú.
My review of Oscar Wao is here.
Yesterday marked the end of this year’s Tournament of Books. As always, The Morning News hosted a classy event. The winner by a landslide:
Here are how my brackets played out:
(click for larger view)
Since I had also wagered on Oscar Wao to win with actual cash, I’m actually in the running for some schwag. Schweet.
The Believer is now accepting votes from its readers for the best books of 2007, which will be published in the May 2008 edition. Timely, eh? In the interest of transparency, here’s my slate of candidates:
The NBCC is also taking votes for its quarterly (?) Good Reads recommendations. I chose the novel How the Dead Dream by Lydia Millet as best read of early 2008 (Fiction). The Winter Good Reads recommendations can be found here.
The NBCC Awards were handed out last night in New York City. The winners were:
- Criticism: Alex Ross – The Rest is Noise: Listening to the 20th Century (excerpt)
- Poetry: Mary Jo Bang – Elegy
- Biography: Tim Jeal – Stanley: The Impossible Life of Africa’s Greatest Explorer (excerpt)
- General Non-Fiction: Harriet Washington – Medical Apartheid: The Dark History of Medical Experimentation on Black Americans from Colonial Times to the Present (excerpt)
- Autobiography: Edwidge Danticat – Brother, I’m Dying (excerpt)
- Fiction: Junot Díaz – The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao (excerpt)
I’m starting to feel pretty good about betting on Oscar Wao to go all the way in The Tournament of Books.
The NYT’s Paper Cuts blog reports on the winners of the prestigious children’s book awards, the Caldecott and Newbury Medals. (Many thanks to Dr J for the link.) The Invention of Hugo Cabret (Caldecott Winner) looks spectacular. Amazon features a “deleted scene” from the book.
The shortlist of the Literary Review’s Bad Sex Award 2007 have been announced. As usual, The Guardian is there, with excerpts from the offenders contenders. The list is always good for a few belly laughs and some blushing.
I’ve only read one of the finalists, Gary Shteyngart’s Absurdistan, and I feel that I must come to the novel’s defense here. The fellow depicted in the excerpt is an independently wealthy 400-pound Russian who longs for the NYC hip-hop lifestyle. You try to write a scene featuring that guy gettin’ jiggy without sounding ridiculous. Also: the novel is called Absurdistan. Some level of absurdity might be expected.
Update: The award went to Norman Mailer. Talk about kicking a guy when he’s down.
Denis Johnson’s Tree of Smoke won the National Book Award for Fiction last night.
Other winners:
In a shocking coincidence, Oprah announced her new book pick on the same day that the National Book Awards were handed out. Crazy timing. Oprah’s new book will be Ken Follet’s 900+ page The Pillars of the Earth.
Billboard of the month: last week driving from Mississippi to New Orleans I saw an advertisement for the Zatarain’s Cajun seasoning company that reads “As seen on Okra.” Sadly, I did not have my camera. However, I did find a version of the sign on Flickr.
Each of the Booker short-listed novels will be made available for free (no pay) download. In this scenario, I think I can see myself checking out The Gathering. I also expect to finally get my Mr Pip on.
The annual Booker Prize winner is usually a no-brainer purchase for me. Even if I haven’t heard of the book prior to the announcement, chances are it will turn out to be an excellent read. This year’s winner though…eh, I don’t know.
The Booker Prize was awarded last night to The Gathering by Anne Enright. The Booker’s web site calls the story an “exhilaratingly bleak family epic.” Are they trying to minimize book sales?
Has anyone read it?
Update: Posts elsewhere have me rethinking my initial gut reaction to the Booker winner:
…In short, just about everyone else.
Update 2: The publisher has just announced a reprint run of 75,000 copies, which just goes to show what I know.
This year’s Booker Prize Short List has been announced.
I’ve been meaning to acknowledge and thank Ragdoll at My Tragic Right Hip for kindly recognizing us with the Thoughtful Blogger Award. In some circles, such an award is an oxymoron, like jumbo shrimp or compassionate conservatism. Not here. We are humbled by the recognition and will try not to let if go to our heads. This award is going on the mantle over the fireplace. Stay classy, Ragdoll.
The Guardian’s book blog will be reading a Booker longlist title a week and writing about each one. This week though, they judge the books’ chances by checking out the covers, the heft, and the jacket blurbs. Worth a read for the least pretentious overview of the nominated books that you may ever see. Examples:
Fortunately, closer inspection reveals that the type is quite big, and there are lots of spaces. Plus, the skulls and tombstone motifs give it an appealing gothic edge.
I know it’s wrong and I know it’s immature, but I find this guy’s middle name rather amusing.
A half-ruined family photograph on the front and mention of “Dublin”, “sexual history” and “lyricism” on the inner sleeve elicit the big yawn response.
Plus, the book is only 130 pages long, so I’m all for it.
Galley Cat has a nice round up of the reaction to the Booker longlist, which is really handy when you don’t have time to do that sort of thing yourself. Mister Pip by Lloyd Jones and Consolation by Michael Redhill are emerging as possible contenders to the Ian McEwan hegemony.
The longlist for this year’s Booker Prize were announced yesterday. Is it me, or is Booker season longer than hockey season? I haven’t read any of these novels. Actually, I haven’t even heard of any of the books – with the exception of Ian McEwan’s. McEwan is required by British law to to make the list.
Said list:
As I’ve said, I am unfamiliar with everyone here except McEwan. If you’ve got a recommendation, I’d love to hear it in the comments. Unless it’s Winnie & Wolf – I’m not too keen on fiction featuring Hitler.
We’ve been honored with the Thinking Blogger Award. Beth (the Toronto One) of Books Etc. found herself tagged with the TBA meme and was forced to choose five blogs to recognize with this prestigious award. She randomly selected five of her most read blogs from a hat, and we were one of the five selected.
However we were selected, it is nice to be recognized, and we are honoured (I’m going with the Canadian spelling here as a tip of the hat to the selection committee) to have even been in the running. Here’s what Beth had to say about us on her blog:
Baby Got Books — because reading this blog is like taking a Continuing Education course in Contemporary Literature with the added bonus of it being taught with wit, humour and a delightful dash of sarcasm.
I’m blushing on behalf of all of us here at BGB. I think that I’ll use that if we ever craft a mission statement. Thanks, Beth.
Or, BGB plays catch-up with last week’s news…
The National Book Critics Circle Awards were announced last week. The winners were:
My thoughts: I’m surprised by Desai’s win. She bested Richard Ford, Dave Eggers, Cormac McCarthy, and Chimanda Ngozi Adichie (more on him her in a minute). I was pulling for Ford and Eggers. The Lost sounds completely heartbreaking. Weschler’s Convergences book sounds amazing. It will be mine.
The Morning News’ Tournament of Books started on Thursday while we were still groggy. Why start on a Thursday? Who knows. Two of the matches are now history. Half of a Yellow Sun by Chimanda Ngozi Adichie defeated Gary Shteyngart’s Absurdistan in Match 1 of Round 1. In Match 2 of the first round, The Echo Maker by Richard Powers lost to Claire Messud’s The Emperor’s Children. In Round two, the brackets steer these two winners to judge Jessa Crispin of Bookslut. She loathes The Emperor’s Childen, so find a chump and bet accordingly.
And in perhaps the most sought after award of all, the “Ghetto Burger” from Anne’s Snack Shop was named the Best Burger in the United States by the Wall Street Journal’s Raymond Sokolov. Also rans, The Vortex and The EARL, make Atlanta the best city in the US to get a burger, says the article. I’ve never stepped up to the Ghetto Burger at Anne’s, but I can vouch for the other two restaurants. Perhaps a field trip is in order…
It must be March. The annual “Tournament of Books” is about to get underway at The Morning News. The contenders have been selected (scroll down), but the brackets have not been set up yet. I’ll keep you posted.
In other news: the preferred version of our unofficial theme song has been melded to the video of the Sir Mix-A-Lot original. Before you click on the link, please put down any beverages that you don’t want shooting out of your nose. Download the mp3 of the song here.
Awards, Books, Happenings | Tim | 
August 1, 2008 9:03 am | 
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