Category: publishing

“Poems written by Guantanamo Bay prisoners about their lives as US captives have been compiled in a book that will be published with an endorsement from the former US poet laureate Robert Pinsky. [Most of the poems] expressed religious faith, nostalgia for childhood homes or yearning for family. Others are angry, disillusioned or questioning.”

The 70th Carnegie Medal for outstanding children’s literature has been won by Just In Case, “Meg Rosoff’s uncompromising novel about a 15-year-old Luton boy’s existential crisis… The Carnegie is the UK’s longest-running award for children’s writing and, although the winners take home no prize money, it is one of the most coveted.”

A hacker is claiming that he has seen the ending of the yet-to-be-released final installment in the Harry Potter series, and has posted the identity of the characters who are killed off on his website. “He claims to have hacked into the computer system at publishers Bloomsbury.” Author JK Rowling and her publisher are reportedly unimpressed, and are reiterating their earlier caution that fans of the series should beware false online rumors.

A raft of correspondence between author Flannery O’Connor and her friend Betty Hester was unsealed last month at Emory University in Georgia, and scholars have been poring over the letters ever since. “Many of the letters to Hester reveal O’Connor’s sharp, quick wit and her passion for religion, philosophy and literature. The two talked extensively about writing and Catholicism — to which Hester converted briefly at O’Connor’s prompting.”

Studies have shown that children in the UK start to lose interest in reading for pleasure somewhere around age 11. What to do about it? Give every 11-year-old in the country a free book, perhaps.

“While Nobel laureates and children’s laureates gather at the South Bank Centre next week for the official London literary festival, an underground literary adventure is under way, courtesy of an enterprising collective of London bloggers.” Yes, London’s book fest has acquired a fringe.

“The verses would be no more than the erotic, if masterful, outpourings of a prodigious poet and Nobel laureate were it not for the fact that they appear to talk of his amatory adventures with a series of nuns. But now that a Spanish publishing company has decided it is time to publish the erotic musings of Juan Ramón Jiménez, an outraged order of nuns has asked for his poems to be silenced.”

“The outcry over promotional fees is nothing new. Every year Waterstone’s or one of the other chains offers its promotional ‘packages’, and an outraged publisher leaks them to the press. Dark talk of “bungs” ensues. That is a caricature. Booksellers will not promote any old book simply because the publisher will pay: they cannot afford to take up space with duff titles during the most important selling season of the year. They select. Nevertheless, what they select under these conditions is predictable.”

“In a confidential letter to publishers seen by The Times, Waterstone’s has set out what it expects them to pay if they want their books to be well promoted in its network of more than 300 stores this Christmas. The most expensive package, available for only six books and designed to “maximise the potential of the biggest titles for Christmas”, costs £45,000 per title.”

“It turns out that having a good vocabulary is shatteringly important. It’s fairly easy to teach our little geniuses to read. But how well they understand, and how much they learn for the rest of their lives, depends directly on how many words they acquire before they turn 18.”