from The Wall Street Journal

John McWhinnie, Rare Book Dealer, Dies

At a friend’s wedding in 2005, John McWhinnie once distilled some love letters that Orson Welles had written to Rita Hayworth in the 1940s  and read the short passage to the assembled guests.

McWhinnie, a New York dealer, scholar and collector of rare 20th century books, letters and ephemera, died on Friday.

“He figured out a way to make 60-year old mail feel completely contemporary,” said the friend, Bill Powers, a New York gallery owner.

McWhinnie, who was 43 years old, drowned during a snorkeling accident while on vacation in the British Virgin Islands with his wife Maria Beaulieu, a jewelry designer, said an aide to his business partner, Glenn Horowitz. Beaulieu survived.

McWhinnie served as adviser and dealer to artists and executives on their art and book buying, including contemporary artist Richard Prince, novelist James Frey and Daniel Loeb, a hedge fund manager.

“He has been one of the primary forces to bridge the gap between the art world and the establishment rare book world,” said Sheelagh Bevan, assistant curator of printed books at the Morgan Library & Museum in New York. “He was usually two years ahead of everyone else in elevating an overlooked group of artists or writers–Mary Beach comes to mind, but there are many others–to the point where institutions and private collectors took notice.”

“When he died he took with him so much specialized knowledge that will be lost to the dustbin of history,” Frey said.

[ click to read full article at The Wall Street Journal ]

from Refinery 29

James Frey’s Reading List: 6 Books You Need This Winter

By Kristian Laliberte

Even if one of your New Year’s resolutions wasn’t to read more, we think we could all benefit from less Bachelor-watching and more Bovary. PS, The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo was a book first. Jersey Shorewasn’t.

To help you get your literature on during the long, dark winter nights, we turned to author James Frey for awinter-reading hit-list. Whether you’re a fan of Frey or not, we think his six picks, which range from a tale of models-turned-terrorists to a kid’s book you’ll want to steal from your nephew, are the perfect (equally gripping) alternatives to, say, Emily Thorne’s quest for vengeance. PPS: Us Weekly doesn’t count as reading, either.

Start Slideshow

[ click to read at Refinery 29 ]

from MediaBistro’s eBOOKNEWSER

HarperCollins Saw 100 Thousand eBook Downloads on Christmas Day

By Nate Hoffelder on December 29, 2011 4:02 PM

It looks like everyone had a record number of eBook downloads on Christmas day. HarperCollins reported yesterday that their servers are just beginning to recover from the many new customers who downloaded eBooks this weekend.

Over 100,000 eBooks published by HarperCollins UK were downloaded on that single day. This was both a record high as well as over  times as high as the average daily downloads during December 2011.

[ click to continue reading at MediaBistro.com ]

from Vanity Fair

In Memoriam: Christopher Hitchens, 1949–2011

by Juli Weiner

Christopher Hitchens—the incomparable critic, masterful rhetorician, fiery wit, and fearless bon vivant—died today at the age of 62. Hitchens was diagnosed with esophageal cancer in the spring of 2010, just after the publication of his memoir, Hitch-22, and began chemotherapy soon after. His matchless prose has appeared in Vanity Fair since 1992, when he was named contributing editor.

[ click to continue reading at Vanity Fair ]

from The New York Daily News

Oscar Wilde’s tombstone now clean of lipstick kisses

Actor Rupert Everett and Oscar Wilde’s grandson have unveiled a makeover of the writer’s gravesite on the 111th anniversary of his death.

The tomb had become such a well-loved pilgrimage site — and had been so well-kissed — that it needed renovation. A glass screen now separates visitors from the stone itself.

Grandson Merlin Holland said his grandfather “would be incredibly touched by all the attention. After all he was sent out of England in 1897 a bankrupt, a homosexual and a convict … and the French took him to their hearts.”

[ click to read full article at NYDailyNews.com ]

from The Washington Post

[ click to continue reading at WashingtonPost.com ]

from Shelf-Awareness

[ click to read at Shelf-Awareness.com ]

from The Hub @ American Library Association

31 Days of Authors: an interview with Pittacus Lore, author of I Am Number Four (a 2011 Teens’ Top Ten winner)

by Gretchen Kolderup

Teen Read Week was October 16th through the 22nd, but here at The Hub, we’re celebrating all month long with 31 Days of Authors. On each day in October, we’ll bring you exclusive author interviews and profiles plus reflections on what YALSA-recognized books have meant to us. Today we feature an interview with Pittacus Lore, whose book I Am Number Four is #4 (of course!) on this year’s Teens’ Top Ten list.

Can you tell us about your own life on Lorien before its destruction? Were you a writer then, as well?

I was the ruling Elder of the planet, its political and military leader. We led a very peaceful existence. Our planet was healthy and flourished environmentally. Our people lived simple, beautiful lives, absent of hunger and war. I never expected the Mogadorian War, and I never expected to be fighting that war on earth, and documenting it in a series of books.

Is it hard to write and work with a publisher when you’re constantly on the run from the Mogadorians?

Ours is a covert war. Almost a cat and mouse game. The Mogadorians are trying to find us and kill us. We hide from them, and strike when we feel the time is right. Writing the books is a way of recording the history of the conflict. I also enjoy it, and it relieves some of the stress of fighting.

Have you seen the movie based on the story you wrote? What did you think about it?

I watched with all of the Loriens who are currently together. We went to a theater and nobody knew who we were. We had a great time. It was fun seeing #4 and #6 portrayed on a large screen in a big Hollywood movie. And it was great working with Mr. Bay and Mr. Spielberg. One thing, though, the Mogadorian are far uglier in real life.

[ click to continue reading at The Hub ]

from The Las Cruces Sun-News

Between the Lines: Finding time for great reads

By Mark Pendleton / For the Sun-News

LAS CRUCES — “Life is short! Read fast!” Every day I despair a little more of reading even a mere fraction of the books that interest me, let alone getting completely caught up on my “to-read” list. That’s one of the reasons I’m glad you’re here. Today I share a few books I think would be great reads, but just don’t have time to find out for myself. I hope that you’ll read them and tell me what you think.

Jimmy Gleacher’s “Paradise Rules” (also in the newly arrived fiction section) was a bit harder to bypass. James Frey, who has written some devastatingly hilarious stuff himself, calls it “wickedly funny,” so you know it’s got to be almost convulsion inducing! Seventeen year old Gates works the local golf club and his girlfriend wants him to lose his virginity to her, but he’s afraid to tell her he already has — to his 40-year-old godmother. Then there’s the high stakes scam at the golf club he’s gotten drawn into and the man he almost killed that are further complicating his life! I’ll not say any more, except to ask for someone to read it and let me know how it was.

The third book I need your help with is another coming-of-age story….

[ click to continue reading at The Las Cruces Sun-News ]

from USA Today

Profanity is making a splash in book titles

By Deirdre Donahue

Publishing used to be a gentleman’s profession. But the trend of using profanity in titles — already common in pop songs and even on Broadway — has now spread to books.

In the past year there have been three songs on Billboard’s Hot 100 chart with the f-word in the title. Chris Rock starred in the Broadway play The Mother—— With the Hat. And now publishing is awash with best sellers whose unprintable titles are, for the most part, being coyly disguised by asterisks and other symbols over select vowels on the jackets. They include:•S— My Dad Says by Justin Halpern. Originally a Twitter feed, the book became a CBS series that was canceled in May. It peaked at No. 9 on USA TODAY’s Best-Selling Books list.

•A——- Finish First by Tucker Max. Peaked at No. 14.

•Go the —- to Sleep by Adam Mansbach, illustrated by Ricardo Cortes, a parody of a children’s book directed at adults. Peaked at No. 6.

•Out this week: If You Give a Kid a Cookie, Will He Shut the —- Up? ($14.99) by Marcy Roznick, a parody, aimed at adults, of the 1985 children’s book If You Give a Mouse a Cookie…

[ click to continue reading at USA Today ]

from tastefully offensive

[ click to craft insults at tastefullyoffensive.com ]

from Esquire

“There Is No Truth,” He Said.

The future of the written word, and the liberation of James Frey. With space aliens.

By John H. Richardson

 

Illustrations by Nathan Fox

 

Published in the November 2011 issue

Things start to get weird when Frey locks the door to his office and pulls down the blinds. That’s James Frey, author of the famously fraudulent memoir A Million Little Pieces, a big lug with a shaved head who could pass for a member of the Russian mob — small forehead, big jaw, small pursed mouth constantly chewing gum. I figured he was going to punch me out.

Rule number one in journalism: Don’t call the person you are interviewing a fucking asshole.

What happened is, I was interviewing Frey at his offices in SoHo. The subject was his unusual new publishing business, Full Fathom Five, which was about to release the world’s first e-book with a soundtrack. The soundtrack actually syncs up with how fast you’re reading — music, gunshots, the ardent moans of young lovers. Amazing. Frey made me a cup of cappuccino, asked about my family. But then I had to ask about the three-part Oprah controversy and he started talking about postmodernism and Andy Warhol with the strong suggestion that A Million Little Pieces wasn’t really a giant fraud but some kind of sophisticated performance art. “Anyway, there is no truth,” he said. “It’s all fiction. In my experience, 80 percent of reporters just tell flat-out lies.”

So I said, “A guy who has an affair and his wife asks him if it’s really true and he says, ‘No, but what is reality anyway’ isn’t a sophisticated postmodernist, he’s a motherfucking asshole.”

Frey asked me to step outside.

I stood in the hall talking to his staff and my smartphone started going nuts. He’s about to pull the plug! What the hell is going on? Are you really swearing at him? Step outside and call me! Calm down!

Which, of course, just pisses me off even more. Micromanaging panties-in-a-bunch editors, bane of my existence.

Some time passes. I find that I like Frey’s bright young crew, doubtless brutally exploited. Then Frey opens the door looking even more nauseous than he did when Oprah was carving him a new outlet for his writing. He barks at the staff to clear out and motions me in, locks the door, and pulls down the blinds.

I say, “Look, maybe we got off on the wrong foot. Or in your case, the wrong cloven hoof.”

I’m kidding.

He ignores me. “You want the truth? I’ll show you the fucking truth. See that laptop?”

An ordinary MacBook Pro on the desk, a futuristic matte silver shell.

“Open it.”

I hesitate.

“Trust me.”

[ click to continue reading at Esquire ]

from The Globe and Mail

MY BOOKS, MY PLACE

Daniel MacIvor, the distracted reader

DANIEL MACIVOR

From Saturday’s Globe and Mail

Published Friday, Sep. 30, 2011 4:30PM EDT

I’ve never been a curl-up-in-a-quiet-place-with-a-good-book kind of person. Mostly, I like to read in places where I have to fight distractions; in airports, in restaurants, in noisy parks. The distraction helps me create a greater focus. I do read in bed as well, because I’m constantly fighting the distraction of sleep.

The book I’m reading now is The Final Testament of the Holy Bible, by James Frey. It’s the story of the return of the Christ in the guise of a contemporary bisexual, recovering alcoholic who moves into an inner-city housing project.

It’s classic Frey, provocative yet heartbreaking. I’ve been a fan of Frey’s since A Million Little Pieces. When that book first came out, I read the review in The Globe and Mail and bought the book that day – well before Oprah blessed and then later damned it.

It remains one of the truest feeling books I’ve ever read on addiction, and his Bright Shiny Morning is probably the best book written on modern life in Los Angeles. I love his work because it feels authentic to the brutality of modern life without dismissing the light in all of us that fights to shine.

Daniel MacIvor is a Canadian actor, playwright, theatre director and film director. His play His Greatness is currently onstage at Factory Theatre in Toronto.

[ click to read at The Globe and Mail ]

from LISTVERSE

10

Refute

“Refute” means to “disprove with evidence” and yet it’s commonly used, even by professional writers, to mean “rebut” which carries a similar meaning but isn’t quite so strong, as it can also mean “argue against.” The example here (“Simon Cowell refutes ‘scandalous’ claims he helped billionaire hide assets from wife he was divorcing”) is from a recent Daily Mail article. For those outside the UK, the Daily Mail is a newspaper which regularly rages against falling educational standards. A special mention to Sarah Palin who invented a new word “refudiate”; the usage suggests she meant repudiate.

[ click to continue reading about the literally chronic enormity of these bastardizations of the language ]

from BOOKTRYST

The $175,000 Dust Jacket Comes to Auction

by Stephen J. Gertz

Sotheby’s Oct. 10, 2011. Est. $150,000-$180,000.

The incredibly rare and desirable dust jacket to the first edition of F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby is coming to auction via Sotheby’s-New York Library of an English Bibliophile Sale Part II on October 20, 2011. It is estimated to sell for $150,000-$180,000. An excellent copy of the first edition, first printing of The Great Gatsby, a book that in near-fine/fine condition sells for $7,000-$10,000, is included with the dust jacket.

The dust jacket is in the corrected first state, i.e. the “j” in Jay Gatsby on the rear panel was printed in lower case and carefully hand-corrected in ink to upper-case by the publisher. No uncorrected copies of the first state dust jacket are known to exist. In the second state of the dust jacket the “J” was corrected by  the printer.

[ click to continue reading at BOOKTRYST.com ]

from 720 ABC Perth

[ click to listen at 720 ABC Perth ]

from The New York Times

[ click to read at NYTimes.com ]

from MediaBistro’s GalleyCat

Heartbreaking Borders Photograph

By Jason Boog on September 14, 2011 2:23 PM

Reddit user Jessers25 took the photo embedded above at a Borders going out of business sale. In the photo, a Thomas Jefferson quote sat on a bare wall with a pile of dismantled bookshelves: “I cannot live without books.”

The photo has spawned hundreds of comments and a raging debate about the future of bookstores.

No matter what you think about mega-bookstores or Borders management, this is a sad year for everyone who loves books.

[ click to continue reading at MediaBistro ]

from Shelf Awareness

La Casa Azul Goes for the Green

Aurora Anaya-Cerda, who founded La Casa Azul Bookstore online in 2008, has launched a campaign to raise $40,000 in 40 days to open a bricks-and-mortar store in East Harlem in New York City. A donor will match the money raised.

The 40K in 40 Days campaign is intended to finance inventory, fixtures and café equipment and, most important, provide the deposit for the retail space, all of which would allow La Casa Azul Bookstore to open its doors next year. Incentives for the campaign, which is being conducted on indiegogo.com, include gifts such as autographed books, T-shirts and naming a bookshelf. All donors will automatically become Founders’ Circle members and their names will be added to the store’s donor wall.

For 10 years, Anaya-Cerda has worked and volunteered in six bookstores, taken many business classes, attended two booksellers schools and traveled around the country studying bookstores and meeting with authors and publishers. The bricks-and-mortar store, she said, will offer author signings, book clubs, story times for children and a community meeting space. The store will sell new and used books, coffee, pastries, art, clothing and locally made cards and gifts.

Since the online store was established, La Casa Azul Bookstores has hosted more than 60 events in local cultural institutions, schools and cafes. The bookstore also established the annual East Harlem Children’s Book Festival and works with schools and non-profit organizations to promote literacy.

On her website, Anaya-Cerda wrote, “I need your help to get this project off the ground. Help me establish La Casa Azul Bookstore in East Harlem to continue connecting people, books, and the ideas they bring together. I can’t do this work without you.”

[ click to read at Shelf-Awareness.com ]

from NPR

Things We Say Today And Owe To Shakespeare

by EYDER PERALTA

A 20-year-old girl named Becky from London posted a picture of one of the pages of her Moleskine notebook on Tumblr. It has, as they say, gone viral and less than a week later is making waves across the Internet.

It’s a simple thing: Becky wrote down, the “things we say today which we owe to Shakespeare.” It’s phrases like “send him packing,” “makes your hair stand on end,” and “lie low.”

[ click to read full post at NPR.org ]

from Abe’s Books

Rapper 50 Cent loses to author Chinua Achebe

I love this story. Super tough rapper 50 Cent has just had his candy ass handed to him by 80-year-old Nigerian novelist Chinua Achebe. It appears 50 Cent had not read Things Fall Apart, Achebe’s ground-breaking novel from 1958, or even knew of its existence, and he spent much of 2010 making a movie with the same title.

Achebe had a word in his shell-like (that means ear) and now the movie, about a football player diagnosed with cancer, has been renamed. This Guardian story says 50 Cent offered the author $1 million in order to use the title, Things Fall Apart, but Achebe said no.

Chinua Achebe is my hero for today. Imagine turning down $1 million?

I’d love to see more rapper versus author fights. Next up…Eminem versus Jonathan Franzen with an undercard of Ol’ Dirty Bastard from the Wu-Tang Clan versus Margaret Atwood. I’d pay to see James Frey against Snoop Dog because Snoop would blow him up although Frey would do a lot of trash talking.

[ click to read at Abe’s Books ]

from The New York Times

[ click to read at NYTimes.com ]

from Shelf Awareness

Obituary Note: Michael Stern Hart

Michael Stern Hart, founder and head of Project Gutenberg and considered by many to have invented the e-book, died on Tuesday. He was 64.

According to Dr. Gregory B. Newby, Hart told this story of how he had the idea for e-books. “He had been granted access to significant computing power at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. On July 4, 1971, after being inspired by a free printed copy of the U.S. Declaration of Independence, he decided to type the text into a computer, and to transmit it to other users on the computer network.” E voila!

Newby added: “Hart was an ardent technologist and futurist. A lifetime tinkerer, he acquired hands-on expertise with the technologies of the day: radio, hi-fi stereo, video equipment, and of course computers. He constantly looked into the future, to anticipate technological advances. One of his favorite speculations was that someday, everyone would be able to have their own copy of the Project Gutenberg collection or whatever subset desired. This vision came true, thanks to the advent of large inexpensive computer disk drives, and to the ubiquity of portable mobile devices, such as cell phones.”

[ click to read at Shelf Awareness ]

from The New York Times

[ click to read at NYTimes.com ]

from BuzzFeed

Roald Dahl’s Weird And Hilarious Letter To A Class Of Children

CULTURE BUZZ: When a group of students sent a letter to Roald Dahl asking him questions about his short story collection “The Wonderful Story of Henry Sugar and Six More,” this was the author’s response. What a weird, hysterically funny man.

[ click to read at buzzfeed.com ]

from PaperSpecs

Going Forward with the Flipbacks

August 30, 2011

Hodder & Stoughton, a UK publisher, recently introduced a paperback book format that’s the size of an iPhone. Called Flipbacks, the books are one-third the size of traditional books.

They’re lightweight, feel nice in the palm of your hand and fit conveniently in a back pocket or purse. Some booksellers are already thinking of them as a great alternative to the e-reader … Flipbacks are always fully charged.

Only a few titles have been published in the format so far: The Other Hand by Chris Cleave; The Adventures of English by Melvyn Bragg; Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy by John le Carré; Shades of Grey by Jasper Fforde; A Million Little Pieces by James Frey; Misery by Stephen King; Liar’s Poker by Michael Lewis; Cloud Atlas by David Mitchell; One Day by David Nicholls; My Sister’s Keeper by Jodi Picoult; Piece of My Heart by Peter Robinson and Cold Mountain by Charles Frazier.

Flipbacks have been launched in Spain, France and Australia to date with deals pending in Germany and Scandinavia.

[ click to read at paperspecs.com ]

from Idolator

Madonna’s ‘Sex’ Book Still The Most Sought-After Out-Of-Print Title

Long before Lady Gaga crafted her book of 350 black-and-white photos with Terry Richardson, Madonna unleashed her scandalous watercooler tome Sex. And even though it was released nearly 19 years ago (and coincided with Madge’s aptly-titled 1992 albumErotica), it turns out the Material Girl’s naughty coffee table offering has toppedBookfinder.com’s annual fall list of the 100 most sought-after out-of-print titles in the United States.

“The list differs from year to year as trends change and books get republished,” Bookfinder.com notes in the ninth annual installment of its Fall Report. The site also refers toSex as “Madonna’s nearly perennial number one” on the list.

[ click to continue reading at Idolator.com ]

from Rolling Stone

Petra Nemcova, James Frey Remake Iconic Maxell’s Commercial

Cassette culture is revived and well: all it needed was a supermodel, controversial author and ironically, an iPhone app to breathe new life into it. A new ad from Booktrack features Petra Nemcova and James Frey in an uncomfortably provocative master and servant scenario while paying sly homage to Maxell’s classic “Higher Fidelity” commercial, which blew people away in 1983. British fans may recall the U.K.-only version that featured Bauhaus’s Peter Murphy; younger fans may be more familiar with the late Ryan Dunn’s parody of the clip. In any case, Maxell’s ad is a nugget of Eighties ephemera that manages to keeps on giving.

Booktrack’s take on the iconic ad skips the analog nostalgia, but amps up the style and sound quotients to make its selling point – enhancing your e-book experience with synchronized soundtracks – a little sexier. Nemcova poses as Frey’s coquettish (Marchesa-clad) maid, donning erotic accessories from Kiki de Montparnasse and Christian Louboutin…

[ click to continue reading at RollingStone.com ]

from SELF Magazine

Summer Beach Read: The Power of Six

Tuesday, August 23, 2011 at 1:12 PM  |  posted by Laura Brounstein

The Power of Six, “by” Pittacus Lore, is the latest book from James Frey’s Full Fathom Five and, like its predecessor, I Am Number Four, it is a furiously fun foray into the fight facing the teenage survivors of the planet Lorien.

 

Not only do these teens have to struggle against alien predators, the Mogadorians, but they also need to learn how to handle their adolescent inclinations — both earthly (I like two girls!) and not (can I harness my powers, my Legacies, effectively enough to save the planet?).

While John Smith, the hero of I Am Number Four is a central character of this book as well, he is now joined by two other Loriens, Numbers Six and Seven. They are two very different girls, Six is a hardened battle veteran and Seven is just coming into her Legacies, but their characters develop richly as the book progresses, giving what could otherwise be just another YA genre romp some heart and heft.

[ click to continue reading at SELF.com ]

from The Wall Street Journal

‘I’m Done Writing Books,’ Says Frey

By MIKE VILENSKY

Booktrack, a new start-up that adds soundtracks to e-books, launched in style Wednesday night at Yotel in Midtown. The company, backed by Facebook co-founder Peter Thiel, matches “synchronized music, sound effects, and ambient sound” to text, according to its press release. The project has author James Frey, an early Booktrack supporter, so excited that he’s retiring from writing books altogether.

“I’m done writing books,” he told a reporter at the reception. “The only books I’ve written are the ones with my names on them, and I’m never writing another book. I have other things to do in life. I’m not bored with it—I’m still going to do television shows and movies and videogames. I just like having other people write books for me, you know?”

Presumably, those “other people” are employees at Full Fathom Five, Mr. Frey’s book company, which has recently been characterized by New York magazine, Gawker, and other media outlets as “a factory” and a “sweatshop.”

“I don’t care what people say,” he said. “I don’t think it’s factory-like. I think we just systematized the production of books, and it’s going well. I don’t think that characterization is accurate at all, but it makes me laugh.”

[ click to continue reading at WSJ.com ]

from MTV’s Hollywood Crush

‘The Power Of Six’ Debuts Today: Author, Lorien Elder Pittacus Lore Speaks

Posted 8/23/11 4:39 pm ET by Amy Wilkinson in Page Turners

“They tried to catch Number Four in Ohio…and failed. I am Number Seven. And I’m ready to fight.”

Thus concludes the synopsis for Pittacus Lore’s second “Lorien Legacies” novel, “The Power of Six,” which hits bookstore shelves today. The novel picks up where the preceding “I Am Number Four” left off, with the titular Number Four (John), Number Six and Sam on the run after a deadly confrontation with the enemy Mogadorians.

John is once again a central focus in this second effort from co-authors James Frey and Jobie Hughes (who use the pen name Pittacus Lore), but the novel also introduces us to Number Seven, a young woman named Marina living in Spain, whose protectors may not have her best interests at heart.

In anticipation of the novel’s release, we were granted an audience (via email, that is) with author/Lorien elder Pittacus Lore himself, who (very succinctly) answered a few of our burning questions. Read our entire interview after the jump!

Hollywood Crush: Your latest is titled “The Power of Six” but revolves quite a bit around Number Seven. How did you decide on the title, and were you worried there would be any confusion that the book was about Six?

Pittacus Lore: The title “The Power of Six” refers to the remaining six Lorien who are on Earth, and their collective power, but also Number Six whose power is on full display near the end of the book.

Will Number Four continue to be a narrator in each of the series’ books?

For as long as Number Four is alive, he will be a major part of the books.

Number Five is glaringly absent. Can you tell us anything about what he/she is up to?

I write about the events as they happen. It is not important to find the other Loriens in the order of their numbers, just to find them at all. We know now where Number Five is.

Your name appears in this second novel.

I am Pittacus Lore, the ruling Lorien elder, the planet’s leader and military ruler. It’s natural that at some point I would appear in the books being written about our war with the Mogadorians.

Can you give us any update on plans for the film adaptation of “The Power of Six”?

Mr. Michael Bay would be the best person to speak to about it. I am sworn to a vow of silence.

Okay then…

[ click to continue reading at Hollywood Crush ]

from McGill-Queen’s University Press

John Glassco on Social Media and James Frey

Canadian Bookshelf recently sat down with Brian Busby, author of A Gentlemen of Pleasure: One Life of John Glassco, Poet, Memoirist, Translator, and Pornographer. John Glassco (1909-1981) is best known for his Memoirs of Montparnasse, the controversial chronicle of his youthful adventures and encounters with celebrities in the Paris of James Joyce, Gertrude Stein, and Ernest Hemingway. Less known are his poetry, his instrumental role in the foundation of modern translation, and his numerous - and widely popular - works of pornography.

JW: What do you think Glassco would make of the James Frey controversy and the rise in popularity of creative non-fiction? Did Glassco consider himself a made-up self? I’m also trying to imagine what Glassco would do with social media, if he would subvert or embrace it.

BB: It’s interesting to consider what relationship, if any, Glassco might have had with social media. He was, at heart, very much an Edwardian—though he was just four months old when that era ended. His own tastes were to a large extent rooted in the years enjoyed by Edward VII. We see this in his final fantasy, Guilt and Mourning, an unpublished novel set in a Montreal that has somehow avoided the technological advances of the 20th century. Had Glassco lived to be a centenarian—or even a mere nonagenarian—I very much doubt that he would have taken to social media except in one key area: his sex life. Here, the world would have become a less lonely place. I dare say it would be much easier to meet people who shared his interests over the Web than through personal ads.

As to Frey, I wonder how much attention Glassco would have paid the controversy; he had so very little interest in the prose of his own time. That said, he did enjoy a good hoax—and perpetrated some of the very best. We might get a sense of his reaction to the Frey controversy through his own memoirs. In a letter to Kay Boyle, he writes, “I look on the real value of ‘memoirs’ as being not so much a record of ‘what happened’ as a re-creation of the spirit of a period in time.” So he telescopes and rearranges time, invents dialogue and encounters, dresses “naked facts” and in the end produces a work that Malcolm Cowley considered “the most accurate picture of Montparnasse”.

[ click to continue reading at McGill-Queen’s University Press ]