Archive for November, 2010

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Display Brainstorming: December Edition

Tuesday, November 30th, 2010

by Sarah Statz Cords

December is:
National Tie Month
National Write a Business Plan Month
Read a New Book Month
Safe Toys and Gifts Month
Write to a Friend Month

Holidays and Special Days in December Include:
Dec. 1: Rosa Parks Day
Dec. 1: World AIDS Day
Dec. 2: Special Education Day
Dec. 2-9: Chanukah
Dec. 6: Saint Nicholas Day
Dec. 7: Islamic New Year (begins at sunset preceding day)
Dec. 10-17: Human Rights Week
Dec. 18: International Migrants Day
Dec. 21: National Haiku Poetry Day
Dec. 21: Winter Solstice
Dec. 25: Christmas
Dec. 26: Boxing Day (Canada and UK)
Dec. 26-Jan. 1: Kwanzaa
Dec. 26: National Whiner’s Day
Dec. 31: Make Up Your Mind Day
Dec. 31: New Year’s Eve

December Famous Birthdays
Woody Allen: Dec. 1, 1935
Richard Pryor: Dec. 1, 1940
Joseph Conrad: Dec. 3, 1857
Walt Disney: Dec. 5, 1901
Martin Van Buren (8th U.S. President): Dec. 5, 1782
Ira Gershwin: Dec. 6, 1896
Willa Cather: Dec. 7, 1873
Melvil Dewey: Dec. 10, 1851
Frank Sinatra: Dec. 12, 1915
Jane Austen: Dec. 16, 1775
Ludwig Van Beethoven: Dec. 16, 1770
Joseph Stalin: Dec. 21, 1879
Joseph Smith: Dec. 23, 1805
Mary Higgins Clark: Dec. 24, 1931
Stephenie Meyer: Dec. 24, 1973
Louis Pasteur: Dec. 27, 1822
Woodrow Wilson (28th president of the US): Dec. 28, 1856
Andrew Johnson (17th president of the US): Dec. 29, 1808
Tiger Woods: Dec. 30, 1975

December Historical Events:
Dec. 5, 1955: Montgomery bus boycott begins
Dec. 7, 1941: Pearl Harbor attacked
Dec. 8, 1991: Soviet Union is dissolved
Dec. 11, 1936: Edward VIII of England abdicates to marry Wallis Simpson
Dec. 13, 1991: (Formal) ending of the Korean War
Dec. 14, 1911: South Pole discovered
Dec. 16, 1773: Boston Tea Party
Dec. 17, 1903: First successful flight by the Wright brothers at Kitty Hawk, NC (also “Wright Brothers Day”)
Dec. 30, 1922: USSR established

Sources include: Chase’s Calendar of Events 2010; About.com

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RA Run Down

Sunday, November 28th, 2010

The readers’s 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 at raoblog@lu.com.

By Cindy Orr

New Titles On the Bestseller Lists This Week

Fiction

  • Clive & Dirk Cussler – Crescent Dawn
  • James Patterson – Cross Fire

    • Nonfiction

  • Laura Hillenbrand – Unbroken
  • Jay-Z – Decoded
  • Bethany McLean, Joe Nocera – All the Devils Are Here: The Hidden History of the Financial Crisis

    • And Climbing Toward the Top 10:

  • Todd Burpo, Sonja Burpo, Colton Burpo, Lynn Vincent – Heaven Is For Real
  • Siddhartha Mukerjee – The Emperor of All Maladies
  • Sarah Palin – America By Heart
  • Amy Sedaris – Simple Times
  • Barbra Streisand – My Passion for Design

    • To see the entire Most Wanted Mashup of this week’s bestselling titles, look to the righthand column.
    _______________________________________________________
    New, Noteworthy, and No-Brainer—To Be Published This Week:

  • Patricia Cornwell – Port Mortuary (Kay Scarpetta) – 1,500,000 copies. One-day laydown.
  • Anita Shreve – Rescue: A Novel – 400,000 copies. One-day laydown.
  • Anne Rice – Of Love and Evil (Songs of the Seraphim) – 200,000 copies.

    • Scroll down for the complete list, or click here.
    _______________________________________________________
    Our Under the Radar list this week is Best Mysteries of 2010. Look in the righthand column just under the Most Wanted Mashup for this list.

    _______________________________________________________
    News of the Week:

  • Here they come: the royal wedding books; first up: William & Kate: A Royal Love Story by James Clench – 9781402787843 on December 17
  • Judge orders Gawker to take down excerpts from Sarah Palin’s new book and then Harper and Gawker settle over excerpts from Sarah Palin’s book…Gawker will take them down and promise not to do it again
  • Read for a Cause
  • Cuyahoga County PL (OH) wins Urban Library Council’s top innovation award in the user experience catalog; allows patrons to receive reminder and renewal notices via text or phone and reply with a question, renew instantly, or pay a fine.
  • Italy is the latest country for Amazon, which adds to its US, UK, German, French, Canadian, Japanese and Chinese sites
  • Rand Paul lands a book deal for February release
  • The National Library of India’s secret chamber
  • California library’s Netflix-like borrowing fees don’t seem to be working
  • President Bush’s memoir passes the million mark in copies sold
  • Publisher of Misha Defonseca’s bestselling, but fraudulent memoir Misha: a Memoire of the Holocaust Years must pay the ghost writer $10 million; it’s complicated…very complicated
  • Publishers test demand for enhanced ebooks
  • Seattle schools “suspend” the use of Aldous Huxley’s Brave New World until teachers get training on how to teach it
  • Penguin to publish its classics in Arabic
  • Romance subgenre: Friends to Lovers
  • US Government, without warning, seizes dozens of websites guilty of copyright infringement after a controversial proposal was approved by a Senate committee this month

    • _______________________________________________________
    Books on Screen

  • Daniel Day-Lewis to play Lincoln in a movie to be produced by Stephen Spielberg…based on Team of Rivals by Doris Kearns Goodwin
  • The Chronicles of Narnia: The Voyage of the Dawn Treader coming December 10
  • Gulliver’s Travels starring Jack Black opens in theaters December 22
  • Coen brothers’ True Grit, based on the novel by Charles Portis, coming on December 25
  • I Am Number Four produced by DreamWorks, based on the YA book by Pittacus Lore (James Frey) will be released on February 18, 2011 with hopes of appealing to the Harry Potter audience

    • _______________________________________________________
    Awards

  • Debut author Amy Sackville wins John Llewellyn Rhys prize for her novel The Still Point

    • _______________________________________________________
    Authors

  • Truman Capote - interview from 1966 after writing In Cold Blood where he explains “his theory that reportage could be made every bit as effective and have every bit of emotional and intellectual impact, hit heart and mind at the same time, that fiction does at its absolute best.” (video)
  • Jonathan Franzen – to be on Oprah again on December 6
  • James Frey – does he protest too much? We posted about this before.
  • Chalmers Johnson – obituary
  • Norris Church Mailer – obituary
  • Vladimir Nabokov – his love letters to Vera, his wife of 52 years will be published
  • Rozsika Parker – obituary
  • Jodi Picoult – her next book is about wolves and the right to die
  • Hugh Prather – obituary
  • Patti Smith – interviewed by Jonathan Lethem (video)
  • Judith Viorst – author of Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day finds herself Unexpectedly Eighty

    • _______________________________________________________
    Lists

  • NPR’s Best Cookbooks of 2010
  • Winter Reading Suggestions from Barbara Hoffert of Library Journal (podcast)
  • New York Times 100 Notable Books of 2010
  • O Magazine’s Top 10 Books of 2010
  • November Catholic Bestsellers
  • Booklist Top 10 Sci-Tech Books of 2010
  • Book Beast’s Holiday Gift Book Guide
  • Books With Great Shopping Scenes
  • Guardian Books of the Year
  • New Statesman Books of the Year 2010
  • Quill & Quire Books of the Year 2010

    • _______________________________________________________
    Lighthearted Link of the Week

  • Bad Sex in Fiction Award 2010 Nominees
  • The Amazing Staircase
  • The way to Hogwarts is through Boston
  • Libraries in Literature Quiz
  • So You Want to Write a Novel (video)

    • Posted in RA Run Down | No Comments »

    Most Wanted Mashup: Hottest Books of the Week

    Sunday, November 28th, 2010
    FICTION

    NONFICTION
    • Glenn Beck and Kevin Balfe – Broke
    • George Bush – Decision Points
    • Nora Ephron – I Remember Nothing and Other Reflections
    • Laura Hillenbrand – Unbroken
    • Jay-Z – Decoded
    • Bethany McLean, Joe Nocera – All the Devils Are Here
    • Keith Richards - Life
    • Stacy Schiff – Cleopatra: a Life
    • Jon Stewart – Earth (The Book)
    • Mark Twain – The Autobiography of Mark Twain, vol. 1


    MASS MARKET PAPERBACK ORIGINALS:

    Posted in Most Wanted | No Comments »

    Under the Radar: Best Mysteries of 2010

    Sunday, November 28th, 2010

    Posted in Under the Radar | No Comments »

    New, Noteworthy, and No-Brainer

    Sunday, November 28th, 2010

    TUESDAY FICTION

  • Kathryn Caskie – The Duke’s Night of Sin (mass market) – 9780061491030 – 125,000 copies.
  • Patricia Cornwell - Port Mortuary (Kay Scarpetta) – 9780399157219 – 1,500,000 copies. One-day laydown.
  • Troy Denning - Vortex (Star Wars: Fate of the Jedi, Book 6) – 9780345509208 - 100,000 copies.
  • James Patterson – The Murder of King Tut (graphic novel) – 9781600107801
  • Anne Rice – Of Love and Evil (Songs of the Seraphim) – 9781400043545 – 200,000 copies.
  • Anita Shreve – Rescue: A Novel – 9780316020725 – 400,000 copies. One-day laydown.

    • TUESDAY NONFICTION

  • Melody Beattie – Make Miracles in Forty Days: Turning What You Have into What You Want – 9781439102152
  • David Rohde & Kristen Mulvihill – A Rope and a Prayer: A Kidnapping from Two Sides – 9780670022236
  • Nassim Nicholas Taleb – The Bed of Procrustes: Philosophical and Practical Aphorisms – 9781400069972

    • WEDNESDAY FICTION

  • Wanda E. Brunstetter – Sarah’s Choice (Brides of Lehigh Canal) – 9781597894340 – 100,000 copies.
  • Alys Clare – Music of the Distant Stars (An Aelf Fen Mystery) – 9780727869418
  • Barry Hannah – Long, Last, Happy: New and Collected Stories – 9780802119681
  • Graham Moore – The Sherlockian – 9780446572590

    • WEDNESDAY NONFICTION

  • Joan Reardon, ed. – As Always, Julia: The Letters of Julia Child and Avis DeVoto – 9780547417714 – 50,000 copies
  • Xiaoda Xiao – The Visiting Suit: Stories From My Prison Life – 9780982015179

    • THURSDAY NONFICTION

  • Louis Auchincloss – A Voice from Old New York: A Memoir of My Youth – 9780547341538
  • Loren Steffy – Drowning in Oil: BP & the Reckless Pursuit of Profit – 9780071760812

    • Posted in New, Noteworthy, and No-Brainer | No Comments »

    RA in Libraries This Week

    Tuesday, November 23rd, 2010
  • La Grange Park (IL) Public Library supports over 40 book clubs
  • London (Ontario) Public Library offers program to practice downloading ebooks
  • Mid-Continent Public Library (MO): Books, Movies, Music, Lists, Coming Soon and more
  • Montgomery County Public Library (MD) features books on order
  • Mooresville (IN) Public Library’s RA Blog sports 82 (so far) book trailers that they created themselves

    • Posted in Tips and Fun Stuff | No Comments »

    RA Run Down

    Sunday, November 21st, 2010

    The readers’s 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 at raoblog@lu.com.

    By Cindy Orr

    New Titles On the Bestseller Lists This Week

    Fiction

  • David Baldacci – Hell’s Corner
  • Fannie Flagg – I Still Dream of You
  • Stephen King – Full Dark, No Stars

    • Nonfiction

  • George Bush – Decision Points
  • Nora Ephron – I Remember Nothing and Other Reflections
  • Stacy Schiff – Cleopatra: a Life

    • Mass Market Paperback

  • Mary Balogh – A Christmas Promise
  • B. J. Daniels – High Caliber Christmas
  • Lori Wilde – The First Love Cookie Club

    • And Climbing Toward the Top 10:

  • Tami Hoag – Deeper Than the Dead

    • To see the entire Most Wanted Mashup of this week’s bestselling titles, look to the righthand column.
    _______________________________________________________
    New, Noteworthy, and No-Brainer—To Be Published This Week:

  • Brad Thor – The Athena Project – 500,000 copies
  • Steve Berry – The Emperor’s Tomb – 300,000 copies
  • Steve Martin – An Object of Beauty – 200,000 copies
  • Janet Evanovich – Troublemaker (Barnaby and Hooker) (graphic novel)
  • Sarah Palin – America by Heart : Reflections on Family, Faith, and Flag – 1,000,000 copies
  • Edmund Morris – Colonel Roosevelt – 350,000 copies

    • Scroll down for the complete list, or click here.
    _______________________________________________________
    Our Under the Radar list this week is Hot Gifts for the Holidays. . . our prediction of what titles are likely to sell well before the end of the year. Look in the righthand column just under the Most Wanted Mashup for this list.

    _______________________________________________________
    News of the Week:

  • Booklist gave President Obama’s children’s book a great review. Then, USA Today reviewed it, then Fox News took USA Today’s article and um…well, changed the headline. . . a couple of times. The earlier one said “killed.”
  • Barnes & Noble ships Nook color early and it scores a good review in the Wall Street Journal
  • eReader holiday guide
  • The New York Times estimates that over 1.3 million ereaders will be sold over the holidays. Are you ready? Do your patrons know which ones are compatible with your service
  • Product placement in books?
  • Youthful brains are being rewired by technology, can’t focus long enough to read; on the other hand, who says our way is the right way? and maybe we’re just passing through the Gutenberg Parenthesis
  • HarperCollins sues Gawker for leaking snippets from Sarah Palin’s new book
  • Jordan’s banned books store
  • A new site called Lost Book Sales has debuted. Its purpose: to provide a place to report frustrating experiences that resulted in failed book sales…interesting reading
  • Amazon to buy publication rights to the literary titles of Toby Press
  • Kobo announces the ability to give ebooks as gifts
  • ALA Midwinter’s big name speakers include Armistead Maupin, Richard Rhodes, Kathy Reichs, David Levithan, Stewart O’Nan, Susan Vreeland, Vernor Vinge, Richard Rhodes, Andre Dubus III, Elizabeth Adler, Paula McLain, Conor Grennan, Richard Louv, Luann Rice, Ted Danson, and Nancy Pearl with Neil Gaiman.
  • 9 questions to ask before you accept a speaking gig
  • The world’s greatest bookshops
  • Nancy Pearl Presents: Books That Make Great Gifts webinar for PLA December 13
  • What the Authors of LJ’s Top Ten Best Books are doing next

    • _______________________________________________________
    Books on Screen

  • The Coen brothers plans to release a new movie version of True Grit on December 22 results in sales surge for the novel by Charles Portis
  • Twilight director takes on Red Riding Hood
  • Hot new movie based on the book 127 Hours: Between a Rock and a Hard Place by Aron Ralston
  • The 30 Best Books to Movies

    • _______________________________________________________
    Awards

  • Debut novel wins Governor General’s Award
  • IMPAC Dublin Award Longlist
  • Costa Book Awards shortlist

    • _______________________________________________________
    Authors

  • Samuel Martin Burke – obituary
  • Larry Evans – obituary
  • Megan McKinney - pleads guilty to defrauding FEMA and the SBA of more than $400,000 in a Katrina fraud; and apparently it’s not at all her first scam job
  • Tawni O’Dell – what happened when her publisher told her she had a “biker chick” name, which is not cool for a literary writer
  • Sara Paretsky – chosen Grand Master of Mystery Writers of America
  • Ridley Pearson – interview (video)
  • Jennifer Rardin – obituary
  • E. C. Tubb – obituary
  • Kurt Vonnegut – has his own memorial library

    • _______________________________________________________
    Lists

  • Library Journal’s Top 10 Books of the Year
  • And...LJ’s Next 18
  • LJ Best Books 2010: Niche Nonfiction
  • Observer Books of the Year
  • Kirkus: Best of 2010: Children’s and Teens
  • Library Journal’s Best Genre Fiction of 2010
  • The Observer’s Best Books of 2010
  • Guardian’s 10 of the Best Angels in Literature
  • November 2010 Indie Next List
  • Flavorwire’s 10 Contemporary Books That Challenged White, Male Literary Dominance
  • Hudson Booksellers Best Books of 2010
  • Pat Conroy’s Favorite Southern Writers
  • 20 Vintage Sleaze Reads (mostly by Donald Westlake)
  • 20 Essential Works of Noir Fiction

    • _______________________________________________________
    Lighthearted Link of the Week

  • Gift Guide for Library and Book Lovers
  • Library School Hurts So Good

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    Most Wanted Mashup: Hottest Books of the Week

    Sunday, November 21st, 2010
    FICTION

    NONFICTION
    • Glenn Beck and Kevin Balfe – Broke
    • George Bush – Decision Points
    • Portia de Rossi – Unbearable Lightness
    • Nora Ephron – I Remember Nothing and Other Reflections
    • Ina Garten – The Barefoot Contessa: How Easy Is That?
    • Bill O’Reilly – Pinheads and Patriots
    • Keith Richards - Life
    • Stacy Schiff – Cleopatra: a Life
    • Jon Stewart – Earth (The Book)
    • Mark Twain – The Autobiography of Mark Twain, vol. 1


    MASS MARKET PAPERBACK ORIGINALS:

    Posted in Most Wanted | No Comments »

    Under the Radar: Hot Gifts for the Holidays

    Sunday, November 21st, 2010
    Nonfiction
  • George W. Bush – Decision Points
  • Ina Garten – The Barefoot Contessa: How Easy Is That?
  • Laura Hillenbrand – Unbroken: A World War II Story of Survival, Resilience, and Redemption
  • Sarah Palin – America by Heart : Reflections on Family, Faith, and Flag
  • Rachel Ray – Look + Cook
  • Keith Richards – Life
  • Patti Smith – Just Kids
  • Barbra Streisand – My Passion for Design
  • Rick Warren – The Hope You Need: From the Lord’s Prayer
  • Jay-Z – Decoded
    •  Fiction
  • David Baldacci – Hell’s Corner
  • Tom Clancy – Dead or Alive
  • Patricia Cornwell – Port Mortuary
  • Dirk Cussler and Clive Cussler – Crescent Dawn
  • Ken Follett – Fall of Giants
  • Jonathan Franzen – Freedom
  • John Grisham – The Confession
  • Robert Jordan, Brandon Sanderson – Towers of Midnight
  • Stephen King – Full Dark, No Stars
  • James Patterson – Cross Fire
    •  Books for Youth
  • Carol V. Aebersold, Chanda A. Bell – Elf on the Shelf
  • Suzanne Collins – Mockingjay
  • Barack Obama – Of Thee I Sing: A Letter to My Daughters
  • Jeff Kinney – Diary of a Wimpy Kid: The Ugly Truth(and others)
  • C. S. Lewis – 60th anniversary edition of The Chronicles of Narnia (boxed set)
  • Mary Pope Osborne – Magic Tree House boxed set
  • James Patterson – The Gift
  • Rick Riordan – The Lost Hero
  • J. K. Rowling – Harry Potter Paperback Box Set
  • Brian Sibley – Harry Potter Film Wizardry
    •

    Posted in Under the Radar | No Comments »

    New, Noteworthy, and No-Brainer

    Sunday, November 21st, 2010

    TUESDAY FICTION

  • Steve Berry – The Emperor’s Tomb (Cotton Malone) – 9780345505491 – 300,000 copies.
  • Larry Bond & Jim DeFelice – Edge of War – 9780765321381 – 175,000 copies.
  • Orson Scott Card – Pathfinder (YA) – 9781416991762
  • Janet Evanovich – Troublemaker (Barnaby and Hooker) (graphic novel) – 9781595825735
  • Erin Hunter – Night Whispers (Omen of the Stars)(children’s) – 9780061555152 – 200,000 copies
  • Peter James – Dead Like You (Detective Superintendent Roy Grace) – 9780312642822
  • Debbie Macomber – Moon Over Water (mass market paperback reissue) – 9780778327431
  • Steve Martin – An Object of Beauty – 9780446573641 – 200,000 copies. One-day laydown.
  • Diana Palmer – Magnolia 9780373774753 – 91,000 copies.
  • Al Roker and Dick Lochte – The Midnight Show Murders – (Billy Blessing) – 9780385343695 – 50,000 copies.
  • Deborah Swift – Lady’s Slipper – 9780312638337 – 75,000 copies.
  • Brad Thor – The Athena Project – 9781439192955 – 500,000 copies.
  • Stephanie Tyler – Promises in the Dark (Shadow Force)(mass market paperback) – 9780440245971 – 200,000 copies.

    • TUESDAY NONFICTION

  • Thomas Bernhard – My Prizes: An Accounting – 9780307272874
  • Kim Kardashian – Kardashian Konfidential – 9780312628079
  • Christian Lander – Whiter Shades of Pale: The Stuff White People Like, Coast to Coast, from Seattle’s Sweaters to Maine’s Microbrews – 9780812982060
  • Edmund Morris – Colonel Roosevelt – 9780375504877 – 350,000 copies
  • Sarah Palin – America by Heart : Reflections on Family, Faith, and Flag – 9780062010964 – 1,000,000 copies.

    • Posted in New, Noteworthy, and No-Brainer | No Comments »

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