Category: publishing

“Not many monthly comic books come with a glossary, but not many comics are like Unknown Soldier.” The series, published by an imprint of DC Comics, “is about Dr. Lwanga Moses, a Ugandan whose family fled the country for the United States when he was 7. He returns as an adult in 2002 with his wife, Sera, also a physician, hoping to put their medical skills to use in a part of the country that has experienced civil war for 15 years.”

“The Diccionario de pensamientos de Fidel Castro, or Dictionary of Fidel Castro’s Thoughts, runs to 339 pages and contains 1,978 of the former Cuban president’s sayings” – arranged alphabetically – “taken from the speeches, statements and writings he gave during the 49 years he ran the country.”

“The prisoners’ newspaper Inside Time has introduced strict checks on its poetry page because some contributors had copied out well-known poems and submitted them under their own names. In one case an inmate stole work by Robert Frost, the American poet, and another lifted song lyrics from James Brown, the soul and funk singer who died in 2006.” Poems compete for a monthly £25 prize.

“After the New York Times reported that the William Morris Endeavor agency would be officially advising clients to opt out of the Google settlement, the Authors Guild issued a statement of its own Monday afternoon claiming the agency was off base in its assessment and recommendation. In an open memo to agents and authors, the Guild … said WME’s advice to clients ‘contains several errors that are likely to sow some confusion.'”

“We possess the books we read, animating the waiting stillness of their language, but they possess us also, filling us with thoughts and observations, asking us to make them part of ourselves. … In order for this to work, however, we need a certain type of silence, an ability to filter out the noise. Such a state is increasingly elusive in our over-networked culture, in which every rumor and mundanity is blogged and tweeted.”

Justine Larbalestier’s Liar, to be published in October, is getting a redesign. “Bloggers, commentors and the author herself had criticized the publisher’s choice of a white girl with long, straight tresses for [the cover of] a novel about an African-American girl with ‘nappy’ hair.” Bloomsbury Children’s Books said the original design “was intended to symbolically reflect the narrator’s complex psychological makeup.”

“We have reached the point where contemporary science is so far out, to most people it is indistinguishable from magic. The notion, for example, that black holes might provide not only links between space but links to time is grounded in current theoretical thinking.”

“Many and various are the ways that books spring into our hands. The tale of how a certain book came into your life is, in effect, a courtship story: The chance encounter, the first shy glance, the recognition of a shared sensibility and finally — ah, bliss! — the consummation.”

“Textbooks have not gone the way of the scroll yet, but many educators say that it will not be long before they are replaced by digital versions — or supplanted altogether by lessons assembled from the wealth of free courseware, educational games, videos and projects on the Web.”

“What is striking about pseudo-histories and sciences is how repetitive they are and, despite their extravagant speculations, how limited their visions are. They are mechanical and lack the éclat – the surprises – of science and history. What is their allure? What are the circumstances of their rise and fall? What is – and was – their audience?”