Digital The Kindle’s Ugly; Can I Customize It, Please? By Neal on Nov. 23, 2007 - 8:48 AM Michael Hyatt, the president/CEO of Thomas Nelson, has been playing with his new Kindle, and while he acknowledges, it’s “certainly not a major advance over, say, the Sony Reader,” he’s jazzed about the fac ...
Book Biz Charles Saatchi to the 101st Power By Neal on Nov. 23, 2007 - 8:19 AM Here’s a clever little idea for a book, from the pages of the Guardian: 101 different photographs of a wax dummy of Charles Saatchi in “silly and sinister costumes.” Sculptor Robert Gordon McHarg III created HIM ...
Publishing Happy Thanksgiving! By Neal on Nov. 21, 2007 - 3:05 PM Last night, I got invited to a lecture at the almost-ready-to-open Astor Center by Andrew F. Smith, the editor of the recently published The Oxford Companion to American Food and Drink, about the origins of America’s Thanksg ...
Digital Don’t Throw the Kindle on the Woodpile Just Yet By Neal on Nov. 21, 2007 - 2:43 PM OK, now the critics of Amazon.com‘s e-book device are just getting mean: “Kindle is what happens when a non-cool company attempts to do a closed service: a car crash.” That’s Chris Heathcote, as quoted by A ...
Events Catching Up with Last Week’s Parties By Neal on Nov. 21, 2007 - 1:53 PM Last Wednesday night, while the National Book Awards were going on at Times Square, the New-York Historical Society was holding its annual “History Makers Gala” at the Cathedral of St. John the Divine, paying tribute t ...
Events Scene @ SFWA Fall Reception By Neal on Nov. 21, 2007 - 1:38 PM Monday night I got to hang out at the annual New York reception for the Science Fiction Writers of America, where I finally got to say hello to Norman Spinrad, and also met up with Delia Sherman and Michael Swanwick. The party, he ...
Publishing Regan vs. HarperCollins et al: Would She Throw the Election? By Neal on Nov. 21, 2007 - 11:58 AM Jeff Bercovici takes a political perspective of sorts on the New York Observer‘s Judith Regan profile, zeroing in on Leon Neyfakh and Doree Shafrir‘s reporting on Regan’s rejection of a $6.5 million settlement fr ...
Book Biz A Pitch Letter Full of Overblown Hype? Shocker! By Neal on Nov. 21, 2007 - 11:41 AM Remember yesterday’s item about the auction that’s being conducted right now over the unheralded genius of American letters whose work “will permanently alter the landscape of publishing and the consciousness of ...
Reviews Good News for Newspaper-Based Book Reviewing By Neal on Nov. 21, 2007 - 11:23 AM Scott McLemee reports for Inside Higher Ed on an uptick in reviews for university press non-fiction, at least at the Austin American-Statesman, where Roger Gathman launched a new column Sunday. In his article, McLemee praises Gath ...
Digital Putting the Kindle in Historical Perspective By Neal on Nov. 21, 2007 - 10:48 AM “The problem with the American public is that they have short memories,” an anonymous reader writes in this morning. “When I think of [Amazon.com]’s support of Kindle, I am reminded of the Segway. Remember ...