Category: publishing

“Jonathan Littell’s nearly 1,000-page Holocaust novel, ‘The Kindly Ones,’ went on sale Tuesday, but critics already have drawn fiercely partisan battle lines.” HarperCollins is sure to welcome the dust-up after having paid $1 million for the American rights to the book, which has “what publishers are increasingly searching for these days: controversy, splashiness, something for readers to get worked up about,” no matter “the quality of the prose or story therein.”

“Amazon.com Inc. plans to release a program Wednesday for reading electronic books on Apple Inc.’s iPhone, extending Amazon’s sales of digital books to devices beyond its Kindle e-book reader. Amazon’s software application, which can be downloaded free of charge, allows iPhone and iPod Touch users to read books or periodicals purchased on the Web or through their dedicated Kindle device, usually for $9.99.”

“A book critical of Standard & Poor’s credit-rating service will be published by John Wiley & Sons Inc. after the author took back his manuscript from S&P-owner McGraw- Hill Cos.” Author Barry Ritholtz has said that “he withdrew the manuscript from McGraw-Hill after the New York-based publisher edited a section in which he wrote that its S&P unit, Fitch Ratings and Moody’s Investors Service inflated their opinions in exchange for fees.”

Amazon was wrong to cave in to the Authors Guild demand that it enable the Kindle 2’s text-to-speech function only after getting authors’ and publishers’ okay. “Most fundamentally, there is no such thing as ‘audio rights’ in copyright law. Authors and publishers control the rights to create derivative works, such as audio books, but such works need to be ‘original works of authorship’ preserved in a permanent form.”

“A decision by Orient-Express Hotels Ltd. to back out of its plans to buy the former Donnell Library building in Midtown Manhattan is likely to deprive the New York Public Library of millions it was counting on. The sum was to help jump-start a $250 million renovation of its central library on Fifth Avenue at 42nd Street. … The company’s move is likely to stoke anxiety among cultural organizations with outstanding commitments vital to major capital projects.”

“Matt McCarthy, a graduate of Yale and of Harvard Medical School now working as an intern in the residency program at NewYork-Presbyterian/Columbia hospital in New York, has gained national attention in recent weeks for ‘Odd Man Out,’ his salacious memoir of his summer as an obscure minor league pitcher. … But statistics from that season, transaction listings and interviews with his former teammates indicate that many portions of the book are incorrect, embellished or impossible.”

“[A]s with many businesses, libraries could find their salvation in the internet. The number of people using the web for services including book renewals and catalogue inquiries was up by a record 20 per cent [in the past year], with more than 76 million web visits. This trend looks likely to increase as there are plans to remove the need for [library] visits altogether, with the imminent launch of nationwide internet borrowing.”

“Orient-Express Hotels Ltd. has told the New York Public Library that it is unable to complete the purchase of the Donnell branch … in Midtown for $59 million, the library said Monday.” The library, which last summer vacated the five-story building across the street from the Museum of Modern Art, was to have owned and occupied some space in the new 11-story hotel building.

“Publishers and authors now have the power to silence the Kindle 2 e-book reader. Amazon.com Inc. reversed course Friday on the device’s controversial text-to-speech feature, which reads digital books aloud in a robotic voice. The company gave rights holders the ability to disable the feature for individual titles. … [T]he Authors Guild had objected to the text-to-speech function, saying Amazon doesn’t have the right to essentially turn e-books into audio books.”

“Former Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich has landed a deal to write a book in which he will focus on ‘the discussions, the considerations and the factors involved in picking’ a U.S. Senate successor to Barack Obama…. Blagojevich’s publicity agent, Glenn Selig, said the deal was with an independent publisher, Phoenix Books, and was worth six figures. The news release said Blagojevich will expose the ‘dark side of politics’ that he witnessed as a former congressman and governor.”