The readers’ advisory librarian’s weekly update, from a scan of more than 100 blogs, newsletters, magazines, newspapers and television. This blog is brought to you by the Reader’s Advisor Online, the subscription database based on Libraries Unlimited’s Genreflecting Advisory series. We’d love to hear from you. Feel free to comment on any of our posts, or contact us here.

By Cindy Orr

This Week In Books
We’re still in a bit of a summer slump for newly published books, but don’t worry, the pace will pick up next week. Our list of New, Noteworthy, and No-Brainer (see directly below), is a little shorter than usual. But we have new novels by Robert Crais, Linda Howard, and Brad Thor, plus Jennifer Haigh’s The Condition, which is getting a lot of attention. In the nonfiction category, there’s the big Olympics book of the summer—Rome 1960 by David Maraniss, Confessions of a Subprime Lender by Richard Bitner, a new microhistory called Drink: A Cultural History of Alcohol, and the intriguing Up For Renewal: What Magazines Taught Me About Love, Sex, and Starting Over by Cathy Alter.

The Most Wanted Mashup (look to the right) has some new titles this week, including Jane Green’s The Beach House and Johanna Lindsey’s No Choice But Seduction plus Vincent Bugliosi’s The Prosecution of George W. Bush for Murder. There’s also Jill Bolte Taylor’s My Stroke of Insight: A Brain Scientist’s Personal Journey, the intriguing story of a brain scientist who studied herself after a stroke, and, of course, Tim Russert’s books have surged in sales since his untimely death.

Our Under the Radar list this week is Historical Mysteries (right hand column, scroll down). If you’re interested in this genre, don’t miss Sarah Weinman’s articles for Barnes & Noble as well:

A History of Historical Mysteries
Sarah Weinman, whose blog, Confessions of an Idiosyncratic Mind, has set a high standard for writing about the crime world, has a new article in Barnes & Noble News called “Dark Age Detection: Historical Mysteries, Part II“. It’s well worth reading—and if you missed it, take a look at “Ancient Plots: the Mystery in History,” which is Part I. I’m looking forward to Part III!

And Speaking of Mysteries
The summer issue of Mystery Scene Magazine is out. Check here for details.

Bless Me for I Have Sinned. It’s Been 3 Months Since My Last Novel…
Spectacular! I was upset when I couldn’t find Alison Bechdel’s wonderful Entertainment Weekly graphic essay on their website. But she posted it on her blog! You HAVE to see this.

Krakauer’s Next Book Withdrawn
Jon Krakauer’s next book—the story of Pat Tillman, the former football star killed in Afghanistan by friendly fire—has been withdrawn. The book was scheduled for a 500,000 print run and was to come out in October. It looks now as if the book won’t be out until next year—if at all.Read the full story here.

Surprise Bestseller: The Shack
A surprising bestseller lately is The Shack by William P. Young, a hotel night clerk, whose book was privately published by two pastors near Los Angeles. The slim volume has been on the bestseller lists since early June, and seems to be catching on because many of its readers buy multiple copies to give to friends. Read the full story here.

DCPL First to Offer iPod Compatible Downloadable Audiobooks
The District of Columbia Public Library became the first library in the world to offer audiobooks as MP3 downloads. The new format, called OverDrive MP3 Audiobook, is compatible with Apple iPod® and thousands of other MP3 players—including those from Creative, Sony, Samsung, Rio, and SanDisk—as well as most cell phones. This is great news for libraries whose patrons have asked if their downloadable audiobooks are compatible with iPod®.

Lists
Macavity Award Nominees
Loriene Roy’s Picks for Gay Pride Month
50 Best Ever Summer Holiday Books

Authors
Lee Child and also here
James Frey
Cynthia Ozick
Jincy Willett
Tobias Wolff

That’s all for this today, folks. Stay tuned this week for a list of some good nonfiction reads coming out in the next couple of months, reports on RA programs from the ALA Conference in Anaheim, and other goodies.

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The readers’ advisory librarian’s weekly update, from a scan of more than 100 blogs, newsletters, magazines, newspapers and television. This blog is brought to you by the Reader’s Advisor Online, the subscription database based on Libraries Unlimited’s Genreflecting Advisory series. We’d love to hear from you. Feel free to comment on any of our posts, or contact us here.

By Cindy Orr

This Week In Books
Welcome to Summer–officially. We’re celebrating the season with baseball books in our Under the Radar section this week, and when I saw Mark Bowden’s The Best Game Ever show up on our Most Wanted list for the first time, it kind of surprised me that it’s about football. But, as my son reminds me, if you’re a basketball fan, you are extremely excited about the upcoming NBA draft. So I guess sports are big in any season, which reminds me to recommend Netherland by Joseph O’Neill. Have I mentioned it before? If I did, here we go again. I’ve finished reading it now. And if you’re wondering where my wandering mind has taken us, the narrator in Netherland plays cricket in New York (who knew?) after the trauma of 9/11. It’s well worth the read.

New to the bestseller lists this week are a few brand name authors, namely Jackie Collins, Jeffery Deaver, James Patterson and Douglas Preston. As always, look to the right for our Most Wanted Mashup. And directly below this blog entry, take a look at our weekly New, Noteworthy, and No-Brainer column for a selected list of titles to be published in the next seven days. Highlights include new books by Paulo Coelho, Ethan Canin, Diane McKinney-Whetsone, Joyce Carol Oates, Sylvia Browne, Danielle Steel, James Rollins, Deborah Crombie, Catherine Coulter, Meg Cabot, Lawrence Block, Barbara Ehrenreich, Dave Pelzer, Dick Morris and Eileen McGann. Wow, you’d think it were Fall. And that’s not even all of the titles, don’t forget to check out the complete list. And now to the rest of the news of the week.

The Breakout Book of the Summer?
The Wall Street Journal covers a book they think may be the breakout fiction title for the summer. The book has been championed by both Amazon and Costco, and as a result has been back to press seven times since its June publication. The reviews of The Story of Edgar Sawtelle by David Wroblewski have been pretty unanimously great, and we’re proud to have singled it out early even though its inital printing was modest. It’s already climbing the bestseller lists. It’s been a great year for dog lovers.

Barbara Walters Cuts the Sex
In the abridged audio version of Audition by Barbara Walters, the chapters about her affair with Senator Edward Brooke, indeed the parts about all of her relationships, were left out. According to Time, the publisher says Barbara thought they were the least important parts of her life and something has to go when you’re making an abridged version. Another reason unabridged is better…you never know if they’re going to leave out the good parts!

Romance Readers Let MSNBC Have It
Halfway down the first page of an excerpt from Danielle Steel’s new book Rogue on MSNBC.com, is an innocuous looking little insert—”Your turn! Vote: Do you read romance novels?” it says. But hordes of romance fans are understandably outraged by the slanted questions in the poll.

Here are the three choices as presented by MSNBC:

*Yes, yes, yes! Bodice-rippers are my ultimate escape.

*No way. I don’t touch those books.

*Sometimes, while on vacation or at the beach.

Okay…. so your choice is vote yes for the condescending choice of bodice-rippers, or vote sometimes because you’re ashamed, or vote no way if you’re one of those people who puts a wrapper on the romance so no one can see what you’r reading. Results so far are 52% yes, 27% no, 21% sometimes. Seems to me that means 73% said yes despite the offensive wording.

To sample some of the justified outrage of fans and writers, click here. Join the fun while you’re at it! Thanks to PW Daily for the heads up.

Richard and Judy
We have Oprah’s Book Club, but in the UK it’s Richard and Judy all the way. Four years after they began their club on daytime television, their titles account for 26% of the sales of the top 100 books in the UK. Click here to read all about the phenomenon, and to see their summer reading suggestions.

New Dennis Lehane Book Will Be Raimi Movie
Dennis Lehane’s September title—The Given Day—will be adapted into a movie directed by Spider-Man director Sam Raimi. Lehane’s book is set in turbulent 1919 Boston when WWI soldiers return and spread an influenza epidemic while the police department tries to unionize.

Can We Even Read Anymore?
The Atlantic has an interesting article about how the Internet is changing the way we read—even those of us who read a lot. Take a look here.

The Things You Find In Books
People use the funniest things for bookmarks (my favorite find was a piece of bacon once—seriously). ABEBooks.com has the story here. Care to share your worst find?

Lists
Beach Reads: Suggestions from Beach Towns
June BookSense Picks
Top 10 Books You Must Read to Save the World
Entertainment Weekly’s The New Classics – Top 100 Reads from 1983 to 2008–(perfect idea for a display)
Oprah’s Reading List for Stanford Grads
NPR’s Summer Reading – Political Books
Three Books for Teens Who Hate to Read
Reading for Place: Books for Travelers

Authors
Janet Evanovich
Alan Furst
Rupert Murdoch
Tasha Tudor Obituary
Gore Vidal Interiew – “I can’t name three first-rate literary critics in the United States”
David Wroblewski on the Golden Age of Dog Fiction

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