News
Dan Wickett of Emerging Writers Network sends us this link to the latest e-panel he’s moderated. This one puts together two Southern women writers and two lit bloggers to discuss (what else?) labels. The writers are Quinn Dalton and Tayari Jones (both of whom have second books out shortly) and the bloggers are Carrie Frye (of Tingle Alley) and Gwenda Bond (of Shaken and Stirred). A small sample:
Quinn Dalton: I guess cross-shelving works well if they are going to stock more than one copy of your book.
Carrie Frye: I can see pros and cons. Malaprop’s has a huge Gay/Lesbian section, and it’s meant as a service to customers.
Dan Wickett: I think at times it makes it difficult to find certain authors.
Tayari Jones: Well, I think only difficult for people who don’t really look for these writers.
Gwenda Bond: Anything that helps the audience find the books. It’d be great if one big bookstore with no categories did, but in practice I doubt it would work.
Tayari Jones: It kills me how people say, I was looking for Toni Morrison and I had to go to the black section!” I always wonder how many years they’ve been shopping and only now realized that the “Literature” section has no diversity.
In related author news, Quinn Dalton recently contributed a guest essay on Beatrice.com about whether authors should hire indy publicists.
RAWI, the Arab American writers’ association, will host its first conference June 3-5 in New York City. The indomitable Helen Thomas, veteran White House correspondent, will give the keynote address. Panels, discussions, and workshops will be held on such varied topics as scriptwriting, language teaching, hybridity, and criticism. I will be moderating a panel on literary blogs and I still need one more person to round out the discussion. So, if you are a lit blogger, and are Arab American or interested in issues of concern to Arab American writers, send me an email with a bio at llalami AT yahoo DOT com.
Well, that’s it for me this week. The one and only Randa Jarrar takes over tomorrow and every Friday. I will be back on Monday with more news, a review, and another edition of Goodies to Go. Have a good weekend!
The Associated Press has just run a piece about the LBC‘s plans for its Read This! selection.
While he won’t reveal the inaugural nominees (there are five) until after May 15, he said that they include a novel in translation, experimental fiction and a graphic novel. Two of the books are from major publishing houses and three are from “pretty small houses,” including Brooklyn-based Soft Skull Press.
“I’m absolutely delighted,” Soft Skull publisher Richard Nash wrote in an e-mail. “The Lit Blogs are now doing what e-mail and the Web couldn’t pull off: connect writers to readers more smoothly.”
Should the Soft Skull book be selected, he added, “we’ll go to town promoting it” and the literary blogging community.
Another nominee is published by Pantheon Books, a division of Random House. Senior publicist Michiko Clark said that, while Pantheon is very excited to be among the picks, the house is taking a wait and see attitude.
Only another four weeks to go before the announcement. Should be fun.
The savvy Susannah Breslin takes a fresh approach to the sale of her book, Porn Happy.
Lately, I’ve been on the hunt for a literary agent for Porn Happy. I like to think of it as akin to a goldfish swimming amidst the sharks. Although, it’s only a game, after all. When I was a freelance writer and TV pundit in Los Angeles, I never had an agent. It seemed like one too many pieces of luggage; I already had so much baggage. I don’t like doing things how they’re supposed to be done.
Read the rest here.