Georgia Bookstore Asks for Cash to Relieve Debt

By Edward Nawotka -- Publishers Weekly, 8/5/2008 7:17:00 AM

Wordsmiths Books of Decatur, Ga., which opened in June 2007, has launched a “Save Our Bookstore” campaign to pay off debt. “Our rent and expenses in our initial location were higher than expected,” said owner Zachary Steele, “and we need to raise fifteen, twenty, twenty five thousand dollars, to begin paying off creditors.”

In March, Wordsmiths moved from what Steele calls “an off-the-beaten path” location to a space on the town’s main square where business has been much better. “As I said on our blog: We are not fighting declining sales, nor are we fighting customer apathy, or even a lagging book market,” Steele reiterated. “We are fighting only the debt created by starting in the wrong location and we want a chance to get back on our feet.” Steele also blames part of the store’s debt on “a recent big-name author event requiring a massive up-front investment that didn’t pan out.” He declined to reveal details.

On Monday, Steele sent out an e-mail asking well wishers to donate money through the store’s Web site. In addition, he launched a “Friends of Wordsmiths” loyalty program, offering discounts and other benefits, with tiers ranging from $10 to $500. Fundraising is expected to last through mid month and efforts should conclude with a fundraising event featuring notable authors and musicians, yet to be determined, on the weekend of August 15-17. “I want people to know that I’ve done everything possible before putting my hand out, which is something I didn’t want to do,” said Steele.

Teenage readers eagerly await latest from vampire saga

Twilight fans celebrate release with their own Halloween
By EDWARD NAWOTKA Special To The Houston Chronicle
July 31, 2008, 6:33PM

If, driving in the wee hours this weekend, you spy in your headlights a vampire in a tuxedo accompanied by a teen in a prom dress, fear not. You're not hallucinating nor have you slipped into a time warp and landed on Halloween.

You're merely encountering one of the legions of teenage book lovers who will be lurking late into the night, marking the publication of Breaking Dawn, the fourth and presumably final installment in Stephenie Meyer's runaway best-selling Twilight Saga, which goes on sale at 12:01 a.m. Saturday.

Not familiar with Meyer? You're probably not a teenage girl or parent of one. Meyer's young-adult romances have become the most popular literary sensation since J.K. Rowling sent Harry Potter into his final battle with Voldemort last year.

The first three books in Meyer's quartet — Twilight, New Moon and Eclipse — tell the tale of two star-crossed lovers: high-school student Bella Swan and her boyfriend, Edward Cullen, a vampire. Jacob Black, Bella's closest friend, emerges as a rival for her affections. He happens to be a werewolf.

The first three books have sold 5.5 million copies across 28 countries. Earlier this year Time magazine picked the 35-year-old Meyer as one of the 100 Most Influential People of 2008. In May she published her first novel for adults, The Host, now in its 11th week on the New York Times best-seller list. The movie adaptation of Twilight arrives in theaters in December.

Breaking Dawn (Little, Brown, $22.99) promises to reveal which of her suitors, Edward or Jacob, Bella will choose. With a 2.5 million first printing, it's expected to be the best-selling book of the year.

In a pattern established by the Harry Potter phenomenon, many Houston booksellers are throwing special parties tonight leading up to the 12:01 a.m. on-sale time. Starting at 10 p.m. the Bookstop/Alabama Theater is taking prom-style photographs for those who show up dressed as one of the characters, while at 9:30 p.m. the Borders on Kirby will host a debate about whether Bella should choose Edward or Jacob.

Barnes & Noble in The Woodlands is hosting a Vampire Masquerade Ball, while at the Barnes & Noble at Town & Country Village the party includes a trivia and costume contest. Both start at 10 p.m.

"We're expecting hundreds of people," said Katrya Pekarsky, community relations manager at the latter store.

Blue Willow Bookshop on Memorial in west Houston will treat fans to red velvet cupcakes and commemorative T-shirts, starting at 11:17 p.m. Valerie Kohler, Blue Willow's owner, said while teenage girls "overwhelmingly" make up the book's audience, many adult women "are dying to find out what happens next."

Julie Landreth, a 37-year-old mother living in the Heights, is one such adult reader. She was introduced to the books in June by the 18-year-old baby sitter who cares for her son. Soon she was hooked.

"I like them because I can remember how it was in high school when I had my crushes, the dilemmas of dating," she said.

Meyer's ascendancy as a literary superstar happened fast. She has said the story for Twilight came to her in a dream in 2003. Her sister encouraged her to write the dream. Nine literary agents rejected her manuscript before it was pulled from the slush pile at Writers House, the company that represents top-selling romance novelist Nora Roberts. Not long after, Meyer had a three-book deal worth $750,000.

As a Mormon and mother of three, Meyer has been vocal about her desire to keep the books wholesome. They're virtually devoid of sex, drugs, drinking and foul language. Even the monsters struggle to be good, with the vampires choosing to feast on bears and other woodland creatures instead of humans.

Carlee Eberly, 18, a baker at Crave Cupcakes in Uptown Park, appreciates that the books don't deliver typical horror-novel fare. "They're not what you expect. There's no blood dripping from their teeth, for example." She pre-ordered the book from Blue Willow two months ago and plans to go to the launch party with her older sister, 20, and two of her friends.

As to the question of Edward or Jacob, Eberly opts for Edward. "He was Bella's first love," she says. "Jacob is more of a friend."

Iris Cronin, 11, a sixth-grader at Memorial Middle School, prefers Jacob.

"The whole thing about Edward hounding Bella for her mortal soul bothers me," she said. "Human experiences are interesting because they have an end. If you're a vampire, you'd have to witness all the rise and fall of mankind."

Plus, she added, Jacob "has a really cool motorcycle."

That Cronin would have such a sophisticated opinion of the books comes as no surprise: Her father is Rice University professor Justin Cronin, an acclaimed novelist who is himself writing a much-anticipated trilogy of vampire-themed novels. The first in his series, The Passage, is due in stores next summer.

In May, Meyer read from The Host at Klein Forest High School, sponsored by the Barnes & Noble at Champions Village, and drew more than 1,000 fans.

Among those in attendance was Hannah Nerdin, 14, a ninth-grader at Morton Ranch High School in Katy. She said meeting Meyer in person left her "speechless." As a member of the Mormon church, she had to get her mother Stacy's approval first.

The elder Nerdin, 34, called the books so entertaining they are like "crack for the suburban housewife" but conceded she had "mixed feelings" about her daughter reading them.

"It's troubling to me how obsessive Bella gets about Edward," Nerdin said. "I wanted to make sure Hannah knew there was life beyond boys."

Nevertheless, Nerdin was happy to pre-order Breaking Dawn and expects to have it delivered from Amazon.com sometime on Saturday.

For her part, Hannah just hopes her mother lets her read it first: "It is," she said, her voice breathless with anticipation, "the one thing I've been looking forward to the most all summer long."

Breaking Dawn Delayed for E-book Readers

By Edward Nawotka -- Publishers Weekly, 7/31/2008 3:24:00 PM

Excitement has been building for weeks, leading to tonight's midnight release of Stephenie Meyer's Breaking Dawn, as retailers across the country prepare for midnight parties. But one segment of the market— e-book retailers—is less than pleased: Little, Brown has opted to delay the release of the e-book version of Breaking Dawn until 24 hours after the print edition goes on sale. The e-book will become available for download at 12:01 EST on Sunday, August 3. Retailers were informed on Wednesday.

The reason cited for the change was that LBBYR parent company Hachette Book Group USA was concerned retailers would not be able to stagger the release according to time zones, thus potentially enabling e-book buyers in Western time zones to begin read the book before the print edition goes on sale in the same time zone. A spokesperson for Hachette acknowledged the company changed the release date at the last minute, and said the publisher "will manage this type of situation more efficiently in the future. We apologize for any confusion or frustration this change may have caused."

Kurt Johnson, director of operations at e-book retailer Booksonboard.com, lamented the decision. “It’s an example of a publisher treating e-book retailers and readers as second-class citizens,” said Johnson. “We have many irate customers.” Booksonboard had been offering the book for pre-order and those customers will now be forced to wait an extra day.

A poster on the Amazon Kindle blog was even more direct: “The torture has been extended,” they wrote.

To Woof or Not to Woof? 'The Story of Edgar Sawtelle' by David Wroblewski: Best-selling boy-and-his-dog story has parallels to 'Hamlet'

By EDWARD NAWOTKA / Special Contributor to The Dallas Morning New

There's something rotten in the state of Wisconsin.

David Wroblewski draws on disparate literary influences (Milne's Winnie-the-Pooh, Kipling's The Jungle Book and most notably Shakespeare's Hamlet) for a family saga set in the early 1970s in rural Wisconsin. The result, The Story of Edgar Sawtelle, is exemplary.

Fourteen-year-old Edgar is mute. Together with his father, Gar, and mother, Trudy, they breed "Sawtelle" dogs, precious, intelligent working animals, on their farm. Gar whelps the pups, Trudy (nee Gertrude) trains them and young Edgar names them with the help of a dictionary. Edgar's constant canine companion is Almondine, a creature who "simply worried whenever the boy was out of her sight," and becomes his guardian, of sorts.

The appearance of Edgar's uncle Claude (nee Claudius), following a 20-year absence, leads to the inevitable: murder most foul, strange and unnatural.

Subsequently, with Trudy in mourning, Edgar succumbs to anger, doubt and brooding and eventually absconds into the woods with a trio of dogs, all the while fomenting a plan to confront Claude.

That this book has become a national best-seller is no surprise; it is a about a boy and his dog, after all. (Marley & Me, anyone?) Yet it is not the most likely candidate for best-seller-dom: It is long (556 pages), leisurely (it takes more than 250 pages before parallels to Hamlet lock in place), it is set during an unfashionable period (the 1970s) in the middle of nowhere with a main character who is handicapped. So why has it resonated with so many readers?

The novel, as a form, is an old dog trying to learn a new trick. It has been struggling to find a way to entice an audience among people more accustomed to the short, addictive snippets of the Internet and the nonstop cacophony of television. What Mr. Wroblewski has done here with mute Edgar is produce a character that physically mirrors our own experience sitting in front of the television or the computer screen.

We can see and hear, but we can't talk back. Edgar can write and sign, as well as hear, but he cannot talk. We, like Edgar, are forced to be observers and thinkers, the perfect state for reading.

Theories aside, Mr. Wroblewski, a software designer who once lived in Austin, has done one verifiable thing: He's produced one of the most charming and absorbing novels this year, one in which even the digressions, about dog breeding or Midwestern electrical storms, prove interesting.

This is a book for long summer nights on the mythical porch swing to be read in the dying light. When you do read it, savor it, for treats like this are rare indeed.

Houston's Brazos Launches $1,000 Loyalty Program

By Edward Nawotka -- Publishers Weekly, 7/17/2008 7:17:00 AM

In 2006, more than a dozen investors contributed a minimum of $10,000 each to purchase Houston’s Brazos Bookstore.

“Since then,” said manager Jane Moser, “I’ve had so many customers come up to me and say they would have liked to have been able to invest in the store themselves. Of course, we can’t do that now so we’re doing something different.”

This week Brazos introduced a new multi-level loyalty program. Dubbed “Friends of Brazos,” annual membership starts at the $50 “Manuscript Level,” which bestows an invitation to one private author event, an evening with publishers' sales reps previewing forthcoming titles, and 20% off any in stock title four times a year. Subsequent levels, including “Paperback Level” ($150) and Hardcover Level ($500), offer more private functions, such as author dinners, and additional discounts. Membership tops out at the “First Edition Level” which costs $1,000 and offers, in addition to other benefits, a ticket to the UP Experience (a day-long seminar held in Houston in February that features featuring 20 speakers and is modeled on the TED [Technology Enterntainment Design] conference). “We can’t compete nose to nose with the chains on discounts, so we’re doing something different,” said Moser.

Asked if customers might balk at the idea of a $1,000 loyalty membership, Moser acknowledged that it might seem like a lot, “until one realizes The First Edition level is actually a bargain, considering a ticket to the UP Experience alone costs $1,000.”

The intention is to boost revenue while simultaneously making customers, quite literally, more invested in shopping in the store. “It’s a tough business,” said Moser. “We think anyone who becomes a Friend of Brazos is getting a lot for their money. It’s a mutually beneficial arrangement.”

Bookazine's Book Buddies

-- Publishers Weekly, 7/14/2008

If the Book Buddies had a theme song, it could be James Taylor's hit “You've Got a Friend.” The semi-formal group of booksellers organized by Ron Rice, sales manager of Bookazine, and Eileen Dengler, executive director of the New Atlantic Independent Booksellers Association, has so far convened twice at bookstores for a walk-through and store critique, followed by a lunch to talk through issues facing new booksellers and their stores.

“The group was formed with the idea of sharing concepts and techniques, as well as to foster friendships among booksellers and encourage a feeling of solidarity,” explained Rice. “It's important on a grassroots level for local booksellers to talk to each other.” Donna Fell, who took over ownership of Sparta Books in Sparta, N.J., last November, received the first Buddies visit in February. It was, said Fell, “perfect timing.”

“When I bought the store, the previous owner just handed me the keys and said, 'phone if you have any questions,' ” recalled Fell, “I was brand new to bookselling and owning my own business, so meeting the Book Buddies made me feel like I wasn't so crazy after all.”

One of the Buddies, Jason Rice, Bookazine buyer/sales rep, solicited publishers to provide marketing materials and posters on Fell's behalf. Others offered advice on everything from making best use of the ABA to how to host a story time for children. “It was the best experience I could have asked for,” Fell said.

The Book Buddies include booksellers, store owners and journalists, most of who work in the New York/Philadelphia/Washington, D.C., corridor. The second gathering of the Buddies took place June 13 at the recently opened Idlewild Books in New York City. Idlewild owner David Del Vecchio called the group “helpful and solution oriented,” and added, “We made numerous changes based on things they said, such as adding shelftalkers and some additional signage, and using smaller tables for displays.”

Rice intends to plan further Book Buddies outings in the future, though none are as yet scheduled. In addition, Rice would like to expand the program to other parts of the country, and has spoken with Wanda Jewell of the Southern Independent Booksellers Alliance (where Rice is on the advisory council) about doing something further south.

Margo Sage-El, owner of Watchung Booksellers in Montclair, N.J., said what she most appreciates about her outings with the Book Buddies is the opportunity to pass along some of her own hard-earned wisdom: “When I first bought my bookstore, I worked in a vacuum, except for visits from publishers reps, who I would always bug for information about other stores. So my feeling about the Book Buddies is, if anyone can learn from my struggle, that's great.”

Betting, and winning, on indie publishing

Clint Greenleaf & Meg La Borde

by Edward Nawotka -- Publishers Weekly, 7/7/2008

You might call Clint Greenleaf, president and CEO of Greenleaf Book Group, a betting man. In March, he was sitting in the Fox News studio in Austin, Tex., serving as a commentator on the Fox Business Network's morning business roundup, when he saw his opportunity to win a longstanding wager. “A friend bet me when I started this gig that I would never be able to refer to Al Sharpton and the Ukrainian Orange Revolution in the same sentence on national TV,” says Greenleaf, a glint in his eye. He walks over to the iMac in his office and pulls up a clip of himself doing just that. (The son of a Ukrainian immigrant, Greenleaf speaks fluent Ukrainian.)

In fact, it was a bet that set him off on his current career. “I was 22, just out of college and working at Deloitte and Touche in Cleveland, when someone said to me, 'Clint, you don't seem so smart. How is it you're working as an accountant?' I told him, 'I dress the part: I wear a tie and shine my shoes.' 'Okay,' the guy says, 'if you're so smart, then why don't you write a book about it.' ”

The resulting self-published book, photocopied at a Kinko's, was Attention to Detail: A Gentleman's Guide to Professional Appearance and Conduct. Attention was eventually picked up by Adams Media, sold 12,000 copies and drew the attention of the Wall Street Journal. As a byproduct of finding distribution for the book, Greenleaf left accounting and opened his eponymous company in his parents' garage.

Meg La Borde was living in Austin working as a book publicist for Phenix & Phenix when Greenleaf phoned her about a book. When she asked Greenleaf what he did, he replied, “What do you need?”

“I had just gotten in some good self-published books that needed distribution, so I asked him if he did that,” she recalls. “I expected it would take months to set something up, and then he told me, '24 hours.' He called back in five hours to say it was all arranged through Ingram.”

Soon the two were collaborating on various projects, and lured by the youth and entrepreneurial spirit of Austin, Greenleaf decided to move operations from Cleveland to Texas in 2004. Today, Greenleaf Book Group employs 25 people—including La Borde, who serves as the company's chief operations officer—and is publishing 80–100 titles per year, using a collaborative model whereby the author pays for publication, and Greenleaf is responsible for production, distribution and marketing.

Greenleaf estimates revenue for 2008 will hit $8 million; in 2006, Inc. magazine listed Greenleaf among its 500 fastest-growing companies

The move to Austin has enabled the company to retain and attract talented staff. “We get résumés from people at big houses in New York begging to be hired just so they can move to Austin,” says Greenleaf. “It's the lifestyle we have here that's most appealing.”

Asked if he plans to write another book, Greenleaf demurs. Over the past year, he's been blogging about entrepreneurship for Inc.com. “I may turn that into another book at some point,” he says, admitting that he has other priorities, including his 14-month-old daughter, Suzie. (Greenleaf's wife is an attorney and not involved in the business).

At the moment, Greenleaf is focused on publishing other writers, and has lofty goals for his company. “I think we can reach $100 million per year,” he says. That's not stopping him from launching other businesses. His latest project is TreeNeutral.com, a company that helps publishing companies pay to plant new trees to replace those cut to produce paper for books. “We need to plant 20 to 60 to cover the print run for each new book we publish,” he says. “Starting this new company is the least thing I can do for my daughter.”

Larry McMurtry's 'Books': rambling, disorganized, dull

The 'Lonesome Dove' author leads us through a disappointing tour of his life as a bookseller

By Edward Nawotka
SPECIAL TO THE AMERICAN-STATESMAN
Sunday, July 06, 2008

In his new memoir "Books" — an account of his more than 50-year career as a "bookman" — Larry McMurtry states that "the antiquarian book trade is an anecdotal culture." To wit, I start thusly: In my 20s, I spent a summer working for an antiquarian book-seller. It was a prestigious place, just off Boston's posh Newbury Street, run by a married pair of blue-blood WASPs who hired their interns from Harvard and — in those pre-Internet times — researched the provenance of any book they didn't have immediate knowledge of by going down to the Boston Athenaeum, a members-only library dating back to 1807.

When I wasn't photocopying pages from yellowing Christie's auction catalogs to send to prospective clients, I was massaging conditioner into the cracked spines of old leatherbound books or carefully pulling a book from a high shelf for a customer to peruse while wearing the white gloves we provided for just such a purpose.

It was a heady experience for a book lover. The highlight of my time there was the day Umberto Eco, author of "The Name of the Rose," walked into the store, announcing, "I am Umberto Eco!" to no one in particular.

Of course, any sales job requires a propensity for fabrication, exaggeration and distraction. The owners of the store boasted that they were the dealer of record for the private library of Mary Baker Eddy, the founder of the Christian Science Church, which was true. What they were less likely to mention was that the majority of the company's profit was made trading in Victorian erotica, much of it slip-cased in purple velvet, and providing throwaway books (Thomas Hardy was a favorite) to interior designers who would have the leather covers dyed to match the décor of a client's house.

Yes, there once was a time when antiquarian bookselling was a trade practiced by wizened men and women with vast repositories of rare knowledge and a list of people in their head eager to pay hefty sums for hard-to-find volumes.

Now, the Internet has rendered much of the mystery of antiquarian bookselling — the specifics of buying and pricing — an open secret, and the barrier to entry is low enough and knowledge of the value of books so general that nearly anyone who wants to get into the game can. There are still high-end dealers such as Glenn Horowitz, who has brokered recent acquisitions at the University of Texas' Ransom Center and Texas State University's Southwestern Writers Center, but if you want something less exclusive, all you need to do is log onto eBay or drive over to the Half-Price Books on North Lamar Boulevard.

These thoughts and memories came to mind when I picked up "Books." Like myself, McMurtry was introduced to antiquarian books when he was a student, albeit one at Rice University in the late 1950s. And while my experience as a "bookman" was brief, McMurtry has lived a dual life as book dealer and writer for nearly six decades.

The first book he acquired for his personal library was a "lovely two-volume nineteenth-century 'Anatomy of Melancholy,' in calf with morocco labels," for which, he dutifully reports, he paid $7.50 to Ted Brown, owner of Brown's Book Shop. That book formed the foundation of a personal library that now amounts to some 28,000 volumes — about the same number of books contained in a typical Barnes & Noble; it's merely a fraction of the 300,000 books he has on offer at Booked Up, his bookstore in Archer City, near Wichita Falls.

"Books: A Memoir" is what McMurtry describes as "a hasty account of my life in books" and amounts to a paean to the accumulation of those volumes. It offers sometimes detailed, sometimes vague and, yes, sometimes hasty recollections about the acquisition of everything from individual volumes to entire libraries — most of them from long-gone book dealers of yesteryear.

Like many of the bookshops it describes, it is rambling and disorganized. It is also inexcusably dull.

Here's a writer who in his long life has accumulated anecdotes in the same way he accumulates books — did you know that Thomas Pynchon lived near the Houston Ship Channel in the 1960s? — yet hasn't bothered to shape them into a narrative. He merely rambles like an old man on a porch swing with an endless supply of lemonade to keep him lubricated and lugubrious.

One random five-page stretch (pages 93-98) finds him ranging from Houston, where he worked in a now defunct store called The Bookman; to the story of how he got his first literary agent, Dorothea Oppenheimer; to the auction of the Washington, D.C., bookstore Lowdermilks; to the opening of Booked Up in Washington, D.C.; to a discussion of the impact of real estate prices on bookstores and why he moved Booked Up to Texas. All this, with a reference to writing the script for "The Last Picture Show" sandwiched in between.

"The writer who should have written a masterwork about the second-hand book trade was Anton Chekhov, the genius of small frustrations and little failures," McMurtry writes. It's an apt observation — Chekhov, primarily a short story writer, was a master of the wedding of compression and gravitas that the subject calls for. McMurtry, who has written just one short story in his entire life ("There Will Be Peace in Korea," published in the Texas Quarterly in 1964), simply isn't up to the task. He tries — this book's 259 pages are divided into 109 chapters — but the attempt comes across as, at best, episodic, and at worst, batty.

Part of the problem is that McMurtry has already written at some length about reading and bookselling elsewhere, especially in his highly regarded essay collection "Walter Benjamin and the Dairy Queen" — a fact he readily acknowledges. Sadly, "Books" is also consistent with his recent nonfiction books "The Colonel and Little Missie" and "Oh, What a Slaughter," much of which read as if he's cleared out his old filing cabinets and been given carte blanche by Simon & Schuster to publish what he finds there.

If you're really interested in McMurtry's books — that is, the ones he owns, not the ones he writes — you'd be better off making the pilgrimage to Booked Up, where you can see them for yourself. There's no substitute for shopping in a well-stocked antiquarian bookstore. The employees will, doubtless, be able to recommend a book to hold your interest this summer, even if this particular book isn't it. But take that trip now; if the litany of defunct bookstores that litters these pages is any indication, time is of the essence.

Texas writer Edward Nawotka covers the South for Publishers Weekly and is a nationally syndicated book critic.

Oxford’s Square Books Gets Campy

By Edward Nawotka -- Publishers Weekly, 7/1/2008 7:40:00 AM

Mississippi in mid-July isn’t at the top of most travelers' wish lists. For starters: it’s damn hot. Then there are the mosquitoes, some almost the size of hummingbirds.

But Richard Howorth, owner of Square Books in Oxford, is undaunted. When he saw he had six notable authors scheduled to read at the store in an eight-day span, July 10-17, he dubbed the week “Camp Square Books.”

Howorth, who also serves as Oxford's mayor, figured the top-notch roster of authors would be enough to entice book lovers to come and spend a few days and some of their discretionary income. He’s negotiated discounts with local hotels and restaurants to lure holiday makers.

Camp kicks off with an appearance by Julia Reed, followed by Jack Pendarvis, Martin Clark, Brett Lott and burgeoning bestseller David Wroblewski. The week culminates with Andre Dubus III.

“Even with gas at $4 gas, we hope get a lot of visitors from Memphis – which is only an hour away by car – and up from Jackson,” said David Swider, Square Books’ art director and publicist for the event.

“Campers” can pre-register online or at the store. Camp will start each day at 10 a.m. and feature different activities, including poetry lessons, a tour of Faulkner’s house Rowan Oak, and a visit to the literary archive at Ole Miss, where Faulkner’s Nobel Prize Medal resides. Author events begin at 5 p.m. and will be followed by socializing and drinking at the City Grocery restaurant.

All events will be free and, promises store manager Lyn Roberts, if not cool, then at least bug-free. “Since what we have planned mostly will be indoors, there won’t be any insects,” said Roberts.

SIBA Aims to Sell 100,001 Books

by Edward Nawotka -- Publishers Weekly, 6/27/2008 10:46:00 AM

Wanda Jewell wants to sell 100,001 copies of the Southern Independent Booksellers Alliance’s annual book prize winners between the time the prizes are announced at the Decatur Book Festival over Labor Day weekend and the end of the year. “We’re going to have a publicity blitz for the nominees and winners prior to the awards, advertise afterwards, and put them in a center spread in the holiday catalog,” said Jewell.

The prize plan is the latest of SIBA’s efforts to reach out directly to consumers. The first of these was the launch last year of “Lady Bank’s Commonplace Book.” Edited by Nicki Leone, former manager of the now defunct Bristol Books in Wilmington, N.C., “Lady Banks” is a monthly e-mail newsletter that highlights new books through interviews and reviews, most of them derived from material that has already appeared on SIBA member Web sites and blogs.

It is sent to 3,000 consumers whose replied to a survey bound into the back of last SIBA holiday catalogs. In addition, 1,300 stores receive the newsletter, as do a further 2,000 people in the industry.

Now a year old, Jewell is looking to generate revenue from the newsletter through “Lady Banks’ Bookshelf” – a marketing program that advertises five individual books each month. For $300, authors and publishers can have a cover image of their book appear across all of SIBA’s marketing vehicles and link to a permanent page about the book on the site.

Jewell has also launched a separate advertising push under the rubric “Put Your Money Where Your South.” Starting in April, Jewell has been offering $1,000 package of banner advertising across SIBA’s various Web sites, e-mail blasts and newsletters for half price. “So far,” SIBA executive director Wanda Jewell reports, “we’ve had a dozen authors and a handful of small presses with one or two books take advantage.”

Lastly SIBA is expanding its “Authors Round the South” Web site, which lists author appearances at SIBA stores, to include listings of author availability and terms. Dubbed “STARS” – as in the Southern Touring Author Registry Service – the program will “be like a mini speaker’s bureau,” said Jewell. The plan is that anyone interested in booking an author for an event, such as a civic or school group, will need to arrange it through a SIBA member store. Initially, STARS will be free to authors, but “after a year should they wish to continue participating, they will be asked to become SIBA members,” said Jewell.

TV Documentary Chronicles Indies' Challenges

by Edward Nawotka -- Publishers Weekly, 6/16/2008

Paperback Dreams, a new documentary by San Francisco filmmaker Alex Beckstead, chronicles the history of Bay Area bookstores Cody's Books and Kepler's Books and Magazines, and in doing so, it offers a microcosm of the struggles faced by many independent booksellers over the past 50 years.

The film, which will run on PBS stations starting in November, begins with the opening of Kepler's near Stanford University in 1955, documents Andy Ross's purchase of Cody's in 1977 and follows the impact of the Internet age of the late 1990s. It ends with the closing of Cody's San Francisco location and a depiction of Kepler's ongoing struggles to remain open.

Ross, who now works as a literary agent, and Kepler's president Clark Kepler are featured in the film, along with Powell's bookstore owner Michael Powell, Grove Atlantic publisher Morgan Entrekin and others.

A native of Salt Lake City, Beckstead grew up shopping at the King's English Bookshop, Sam Weller's Zion Bookstore and the now-defunct Waking Owl. After he moved to San Francisco, Beckstead became a fan of Kepler's and Cody's. “I worked in Menlo Park on documentaries and bought a lot of my books for research at Kepler's,” Beckstead said. “When I heard Kepler's was closing [briefly in 2005], I was shocked: it's in one of the most affluent, educated cities in America—just 15 minutes from Stanford University—and it made me realize that if an independent bookstore couldn't survive there, there must be a larger story.”

To research the film, Beckstead followed developments at the stores over the past years and interviewed dozens of insiders. Production wrapped last September. Funding came from the Independent Television Service, KQED Public Television and the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, along with numerous donors. The total cost was approximately $300,000—half the typical budget for an hour-long PBS documentary.

Beckstead said his research revealed four elements essential to the survival of an independent bookstore:

1. Own your own building. “It's why Cody's moved off of Fourth Street; it's why Kepler's closed in 2005—a big hike in your lease can put you out of business.”
2. Hire experienced staff. “Bookstores that work have people that have been in the business for six, eight, 10, 20 years. That's a big part of why Green Apple Books and Moe's Books have survived in San Francisco.”
3. Sell used books. “There's an art to knowing how to buy and sell used books. The margins are good, but it is a deep pond to jump into.”
4. Figure out some way to sell books online. “Stores need to find a way to break their geographical boundaries. A corollary to that is to sell books outside your store—at school events, local film festivals. Kepler's has been really successful in that regard.”

“The bad news,” added Beckstead, “is if you haven't been doing these things for 10 to 15 years, it's not likely you'll catch up.”

Beckstead held a preview screening of Paperback Dreams for booksellers during BEA, and said he plans to work with bookstores to set up screenings of the documentary in their hometowns. “I want stores to use this film as a conversation starter and an opportunity to tell their community their own story.”

Beckstead also plans to launch a wiki on www.paperbackdreams.com that will offer tips on how stores can shoot their own videos. “The thing is, there are very few, if any, people who dislike an independent bookstore,” Beckstead said. “But they don't do a good job of getting their own story out. If anything, I hope this film makes people take a little more interest in the stores in their communities.”

Three Ways of Looking at Hemingway: A.E. Hotchner, Nathaniel Rich and Joyce Carol Oates

By EDWARD NAWOTKA / Special Contributor to The Dallas Morning News
books@dallasnews.com

Ernest Hemingway's reputation as hunting- and fishing-obsessed outdoorsman, fond of both drink and women, makes it sound as if he would have been as at home in Texas as he was in Cuba or Key West.

The only problem would have been his inability to play football. As quoted by A.E. Hotchner in his new book The Good Life According to Hemingway, he admits "I was not good at football ... I couldn't figure out the plays. I used to look at my teammates' faces and guess who looked like they expected the ball." The Good Life, a compendium of stories and aphorisms, is one of a trio of new books offering a perspective on the writer's legacy.

Mr. Hotchner, 87, calls himself "The Last Man Standing" among Hemingway's old friends. He met Hemingway in 1948 and traveled extensively with the writer, adapting For Whom the Bell Tolls and The Nick Adams Stories for television. After Hemingway's death in 1961, he wrote three other books about the man nicknamed "Papa."

The words he collected here, Mr. Hotchner claims, don't appear in Hemingway's work, but are nevertheless familiar ("Courage is grace under pressure" is credited to him, for example, as is "Never mistake motion for action"). It's vintage stuff, with Hemingway talking about his writing, famous friends, explorations. Of course, vintage isn't always desirable. Take, for example, Hemingway's opinions of women. (You can look up the quotes on your own.)

Mr. Hotchner – "Call me Hotch," he says when I reach him by phone at home – says he compiled this book as one last attempt to "show off Hemingway's use of language and imagery" to a new generation of readers. "Hemingway kind of invented his own language and left out adjectives," Hotch explains.

Indeed, it is Hemingway's terse, unembellished writing rather than his mythic lifestyle that has had the strongest influence on American letters.

"I see more fiction submissions employing that type of plain style than any other," says Nathaniel Rich, senior editor at The Paris Review.

Mr. Rich used Hemingway's larger-than-life persona as a model for Constance Eakins, a fictional writer at the center of his new novel The Mayor's Tongue. A highly entertaining, erudite book, The Mayor's Tongue tells parallel stories that eventually dovetail. The first is about an old man lamenting the disappearance of his best friend. The second concerns a recent college grad who befriends Eakins' biographer (a figure who, coincidentally, sounds a bit like Mr. Hotchner) and finds himself compelled to search for the long lost Eakins in Italy.

Eakins is depicted as part monster, part man and all myth, the type of adventurer scribe largely absent from today's literary scene.

"The he-man writer no longer really exists today," Mr. Rich says by phone from his office in New York, "It's anachronistic and grotesque, though deeply appealing."

In Wild Nights, Joyce Carol Oates offers her own portrait of Hemingway, albeit one taken from the very end of his life as he contemplates suicide. The story, titled "Papa at Ketchum, 1961" is one of five fictional accounts of the deaths of other writers, which include Poe, Twain, Dickinson and Henry James.

Here, Ms. Oates takes the opposite tack of Mr. Hotchner and Mr. Rich, depicting the writer, Papa in this case, as entirely diminished, "a sick broken-down old drunk with quivering eyelids, palsied hands, swollen ankles and feet" and no sexual capacity.

She imagines Hemingway as a bitter misogynist who, she asserts, would have murdered his fourth wife, Mary (here called "the woman"), along with killing himself. It's a powerful, if merciless, and original portrait. It also stands in almost direct contrast to Mr. Hotchner's treatment.

Which you prefer ultimately depends on how you choose to remember Hemingway. He was, it seems, many things to many people. Of all these, perhaps Mr. Rich's doppelgänger, one hewn entirely from imagination, is the closest we might ever get to the truth.

Edward Nawotka is a freelance writer in Houston.

Three questions with Emily Giffin

Emily Giffin, whose Love the One You're With sits at No 3. on the New York Times Bestseller list, was in Texas this past week. Here's some of what she had to say about her new book and life as a bestselling author (including a great anecdote with a surprise ending about dining with an Texas NBA legend):

What is the new novel about?

The one that got away. It's about the conflict between following your bliss and being loyal to those you already have in your life. In the book, Ellen, 33, a photographer in New York City, has been married only three months when she runs into an old flame who makes her question her decision. She has an emotional journey. I had this happen so early in her marriage because I didn't children to complicate things -- they change the whole emotional landscape. I actually think the first year of marriage is the hardest and is filled with analysis.

In the novel the protagonist moves from New York to Atlanta, where you live. Do you require the story to have autobiographical element as a catalyst that gets you to start writing?

A few years ago, I moved from London to Atlanta, so that is similar. And while my books are not autobiographical, I do like to have something to help me identify with the characters in the books. In Something Borrowed, my first novel, the main character is turning 30 and I was turning 30 as I wrote it. In the second book, Something Blue, we have little in common other than the fact we both lived in London. In Baby Proof - well, I had twin boys the time... But with this book, no I've never had second thoughts.

What is the most surprising thing to happen to you since you've become a bestselling author?

My third grade teacher, Mrs. Dando, came to a reading I gave in Philadelphia. She still had a class photo of ours which I'd sent to her to say "you're my favorite teacher." Another time, I was having lunch with former Houston Rockets basketball player Ralph Sampson, who is a family friend. All through lunch there were these two attractive women who kept looking over at our table. Ralph is 7'4" and is used to a lot of attention. The women started walking over and I said to him, "You must get this all the time." Then they stopped at our table, leaned over and said, "Are you Emily Giffin?" Now that surprised both of us.

James Bond Gets a Retro Makeover

By EDWARD NAWOTKA / Special Contributor to The Dallas Morning News

He is, for many, the archetype of the secret agent: debonair, blithe, sexy, deadly. His Sobranie cigarettes and Walther PPK handgun are iconic.

But even though half the people on the planet are said to have seen a James Bond film, he didn't start off as the fabrication of Hollywood, but as a literary concoction, spawned from the imagination of author Ian Fleming.

Born 100 years ago today, Fleming penned a score of Bond novels, starting with Casino Royale in 1953, and two books of Bond short stories. Since his death in 1964, nearly two dozen additional novels starring 007 have been penned by a trio of authors: John Gardner, Charlie Higson and Midland's Raymond Benson.

Add to this list Sebastian Faulks, whose new Bond novel, Devil May Care, arrives in bookstores today.

Mr. Faulks was a curious choice by the Fleming estate to take up the Bond baton. Unlike his predecessors, he was known as a writer of cerebral literary fiction and nonfiction, rather than thrillers. His best-known work, 1993's Birdsong (3 million copies sold worldwide), examined the horror of World War I; his 2001 novel Green Dolphin Street was set during Kennedy-era Cold War, with a worldly newspaperman as his hero.

It is to the year 1967, the year after Fleming's last book – Octopussy – was published, that Mr. Faulks returns Bond.

Rather than plopping him into a conventional cloak-and-dagger setting, Mr. Faulks sets him amid the nascent hippie scene. On returning to London from a sabbatical that has taken him to Paris and Rome, Moneypenny informs him that M has – Gasp! – taken up yoga. Bond is forced to learn deep-breathing exercises.

Not only has the world changed, so has Bond: When, early on in the book, Bond is invited up to share a nightcap with a seductive woman in her hotel room, he – Gasp! Choke! – turns her down, at least initially. (She is one-half of a set of twins, after all.)

Fortunately, the villains are no different. Bond faces off against Dr. Julius Gorner, a Lithuanian mad scientist with the literal hand of a gorilla, and his sidekick, a Vietnamese assassin memorably named Chagrin (the French word for "pain" or "grief," we are told). Gorner stokes a deep resentment of the "stuck-up" and "xenophobic" English derived from not fitting in while he was at Oxford: "He hated England because he felt it had laughed at him, and he decided to devote his life to destroying it." The trail takes Bond from London to Paris to Tehran and beyond.

Though it takes nearly half of the short novel (just 270 pages) to build to much action, the payoff is eventually worth it as Bond, Gorner and associates leave a trail of mayhem across a small swath of the globe.

While some of this sounds as if it skirts the edge of parody (A man with a gorilla hand! Twins with only a small strawberry birthmark on an upper thigh to distinguish them!), it is dutifully close to echoing Fleming's own plotting and prose. In particular, Mr. Faulks does an excellent job of mimicking Fleming's obsessions, from Bond's bathing habits – scalding hot shower, followed by a blast of cold – to his cataloging of food, clothes and exotic women. Fans will revel at the familiar references to his earlier adventures.

In much the same way Sean Connery is to many people the original and best movie Bond, Fleming too is the best and original. Though Devil May Care is no literary landmark – Mr. Faulks said it took him only six weeks to write – it comes commendably close to the original and, provided you know what to expect, provides some real, retro pleasure.

Edward Nawotka is a freelance writer in Houston.

A Chain Grows in Dubai

by Edward Nawotka -- Publishers Weekly, 5/26/2008

“Americans are just waking up to the opportunity to sell books here,” said Isobel Abulhoul, founder and owner of Magrudy's, a chain of eight mostly English-language bookstores headquartered in Dubai. “We order stock from both the U.K. and America, and fly in books five days a week.”

Magrudy's was founded in 1975 as a toy store, but quickly changed focus to selling books and has since expanded to include seven stores in Dubai and one in Abu Dhabi, as well as several book kiosks. Three more stores are slated to open this year, two in Al Ain and another in Dubai. (Al Ain, Dubai and Abu Dhabi are all part of the United Arab Emirates.)

Shopping in a Magrudy's is virtually indistinguishable from shopping at a chain or large indie bookstore in the U.S. or the U.K., with English-language titles accounting for 90% of its inventory. It has a similar look and feel to U.S. stores, as well as many of the common trappings, including loyalty programs and information booths. The most obvious difference is a prominent section of titles in Arabic.

The most popular English-language categories, reports Abulhoul, are fiction, mind/body/spirit, business and management, and books that teach Arabic. Perhaps the biggest attraction for the English-speaking community is the significant selection of children's books. “Kids were always treated as second-class citizens at stores here in the U.A.E., so catering to them and to parents is a big part of our business,” Abulhoul said.

Magrudy's frequently purchases both U.K. and U.S. editions of the same books. While customers from the U.K. “inevitably prefer books from the U.K.,” Abulhoul said that many of her international customers were educated in the U.S. and tend to buy U.S. editions. The lack of customs duty in the U.A.E. means her biggest expense is shipping, which she maintained is not passed along to the customer. “I sell books at the U.K. or U.S. price and right now, the U.S. prices are much more competitive,” she explained.

Magrudy's sees only two or three American sales reps per year, if any. “Americans are losing out by not trying to take advantage of this,” says Abulhoul. “Every time I want to shift a big order of books from the U.K. to U.S. edition, I get a call from the U.K. publisher or distributor undercutting the U.S. price. They are much more aggressive.”

Abulhoul believes some reticence on the part of Americans in doing business with the U.A.E. stems from a concern about censorship, since all books imported into the U.A.E. must be approved by the government. “Yes, it is something we have to put up with,” she said. “But approval is often had in a day or two, and embargoed books can be looked at early.” Books about Islam or Middle East politics are likely to be delayed longer, and religion books not about Islam and books with overt sexual content are likely to be blocked entirely. She's also had trouble getting entire series of Japanese manga past the censor.

Though a growing number of educated expats are moving to the country—Dubai's population is expected to reach 1.8 million by 2010, with 50,000 to 75,000 of them white-collar expats—Magrudy's has only recently begun to see competition from international booksellers. Borders opened a 16,000-sq.-ft. franchise store in 2006, adding a second, 1,200-sq.-ft. satellite store last year.

Increasingly, the U.A.E. is attracting attention for its many new cultural and literary programs. The newest addition is the Emirates Airlines International Festival of Literature. Scheduled to run annually, the first will be held February 26–March 1, 2009, and Abulhoul is one of the organizers. She said about two dozen authors have committed to attend, including Frank McCourt and Karin Slaughter. “We want 60 authors in all,” she said. The airline has committed title sponsorship for three years.

Rick Riordan is on the verge of something big

By EDWARD NAWOTKA
For the Houston Chronicle

In April, children's book publisher Scholastic, the company that brought Harry Potter to America, flew San Antonio author Rick Riordan to Bologna, Italy. There, Riordan's job was to help explain The 39 Clues — a forthcoming multiplatform series for children incorporating books, collectible cards, video games and $100,000 in prize money — to international publishing executives.

The 39 Clues is important to Scholastic since it represents the publisher's first serious attempt to replicate Harry Potter sales. Riordan (with a long "i," like "fire") was hired to write The Maze of Bones, the first in the 10-book series, and to create the overall storyline.
An affable 43-year-old who stays in touch with his sons while he travels by joining them online to play World of Warcraft, Riordan is already a proven star in children's book world and appears to be the right man for the job.

So far, the storyline remains a mystery, although it does involve a Da Vinci Code-like conspiracy linking famous figures from history. Riordan is no help: "I don't want to jump the gun and talk about it just yet," he said by phone last week between appearances in New Jersey and New York.

He's on the road to promote the The Battle of the Labyrinth, the fourth novel in his best-selling series Percy Jackson and the Olympians. Chronicling the adventures of contemporary teenagers who happen to be the children of Greek gods, the series debuted in 2005 with The Lightning Thief and has continued one book per year. In all, the first three titles have sold 1.6 million copies in 15 countries.

"Last year there was kind of an explosion of awareness among kids," Riordan said. "Part of that was Al Roker picking The Lightning Thief for his book club on the Today Show, but a lot of it was word of mouth."

The Battle of the Labyrinth, released in a cool 1 million first printing, is on pace to outsell in its first week what 2007's The Titan's Curse sold in its first three months.
Despite his success, Riordan has done little to change his life other than leave his job as a middle-school teacher at St. Mary's Hall in San Antonio.

"I still live in the same house and drive the same car," he said. "My philosophy is that my life is already complicated enough, and I don't want it to translate to my private life."
Riordan really hasn't left school behind. A significant part of his time is spent visiting bookstores and schools. The school visits allow him not only to promote his books but also to "test out (his) jokes."

Among his frequent destinations, perhaps because of its relative proximity to home, is Houston.
"It seems like I'm there every two weeks," Riordan said. "The kids in Houston have been very receptive and appreciative."

Riordan's local fans include 12-year-old David Cremins, a sixth-grader at Memorial Middle School.

"It's really interesting how he uses ancient Greek myths and history and turns it into modern-day scenarios and battles," said Cremins, who checked out The Battle of the Labyrinth from Houston Public Library last Friday and finished the next day. "I've read all four now, and it's definitely one of my favorite series."

Cremins estimates that half of the 30 kids in his sixth-grade class are fans, many of them boys. Riordan's ability to appeal to pre-teen boys — a demographic frequently identified as "reluctant readers" — is especially unusual.

One reason may be the personal element the author has injected into the books. While Percy may be a son of Poseidon, he also has dyslexia and attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder. So does one of Riordan's two sons.

"My son was in second grade when he was diagnosed. At the time he was only interested in Greek mythology, so when I ran out of the original stories, he told me to make one up."
For nearly a decade before Percy came along, Riordan was known for his mystery novels featuring San Antonio private investigator Tres Navarre. The series, which debuted in 1997 and includes seven books, are, he warns on his Web site, "grown-up mysteries with R-rated content."

Though Riordan won numerous industry awards for the mysteries, he found his calling in writing for a younger audience.

"I was always a storyteller in the classroom, and my students would ask me why I wasn't writing for children," he said. "It took me a long time to figure out that they were right."
The Tres Navarre series, along with the Percy Jackson series, will end next year, Riordan said. But Percy will live on in movies, starting with the Thanksgiving 2009 release of The Lightning Thief. Chris Columbus, the man who directed the first two Harry Potter movies, is adapting it for the screen.

In 2010 Riordan will begin a new series based on Camp Half-Blood, a New Jersey summer camp for demi-gods depicted in Percy Jackson and the Olympians, all but ensuring he'll be a regular on the road and a frequent visitor to our town.
At some point he might even find time to visit Greece.

"The closest I've ever gotten is Malta, where it is rumored the Cave of Calypso is supposed to be," he said. "I would like to go."

Dubai-based Translation Project Promises More Arabic Books

By Edward Nawotka -- Publishers Weekly, 4/17/2008 12:45:00 PM

Last year the Abu Dhabi Authority for Culture and Heritage (ADACH) of the United Arab Emirates launched “Kalima,” a project to translate books into Arabic; its stated aim was to translate 100 works. Late last month, the ruler of Dubai, Sheik Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, upped the ante: His eponymous foundation launched a similar project, albeit one that aims to translate 365 books in its first year – or, in other words, one per day.

Dubbed “Tarjem” (meaning “translation” in Arabic) the project’s stated goal is to “develop the level of information transfer from knowledge-producing countries, especially in North America, Scandinavian countries, and East Asia;” to this end, fully half the titles translated are expected to be business and management books, with the remainder divided among literature, history and sciences. The Foundation already offers grants to writers and supports a one hour-long radio book show, launched earlier this month in Dubai.

Unlike Kalima, which empanelled a group of scholars and literary to select a list of suitable titles, Tarjem is asking authors to submit books for consideration. According to its Web site, the organization is seeking through its various projects to lay “the foundations of a pan-Arab literary renaissance.”

Creatures of the night captivate young readers of Stephenie Meyer's 'Twilight' series

By EDWARD NAWOTKA / Special Contributor to The Dallas Morning News

Which do you prefer: the vampire or the werewolf? If the question sounds strange to you, you're probably not a teenage girl, or the parent of one.

Those in the know understand there's a rivalry between vampire Edward Cullen and werewolf Jacob Black for the affection of the all-too-human Bella Swan.

Still lost? We're talking about the protagonists of Stephenie Meyer's Twilight series of young adult novels, which include Twilight, New Moon and Eclipse. These steamy books by a Phoenix mother of three have sold 5.5 million copies across 28 countries.

Time knows who she is: Last month, it named her one of the 100 most influential people of 2008 and asked whether she's "the new J.K. Rowling."

And local fans know who she is: More than 350 were in line at 7 a.m. Tuesday at Stonebriar Centre in Frisco to get their hands on her new book The Host, which would entitle them to one of 1,000 tickets for her appearance May 10 at Centennial High School in Frisco. (Sorry, it's sold out.)

Ms. Meyer, speaking via phone after a reading at Minnesota's Mall of America earlier this week, notes that her phenomenal success still feels a bit "dreamlike."

It suits. Ms. Meyer says the original idea for Edward and Bella came to her in a dream in 2003. Her sister encouraged her to submit it to publishers. A year later, after being rejected by nine agents, the book was plucked from the slush pile of unsolicited manuscripts at Writers House, the literary agency responsible for Nora Roberts and Neil Gaiman, among others.

Four years on, she now has her own personal publicist and is enjoying assisting with the filming of the movie version of Twilight, due in theaters Dec. 12. Oh, and then there's the millions of fans.

Walking into the auditorium at Centennial High School will still bring jitters, she says. "I'm kind of shy, so a big crowd of people is kind of my worst nightmare." She says the hardest part is walking down the hall and hearing them screaming for her.

"Then you get to the stage and look at the fans' faces," she says. "Seeing all the kindness coming toward you makes everything easier."

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The Host, a sci-fi tale about alien body snatchers, is billed as Ms. Meyer's first book for adults. But it doesn't stray far from the formula that made the Twilight series so successful, echoing the story line of a woman whose affection is divided, and dishing up plenty of romance without (much to the relief of millions of parents) sex.

Once bitten by the books, Ms. Meyer's fans tend to become obsessed. Among them are Chandler Nash, 15, Tori Randall, 14, and Ally Kiger, 14, all of Arlington. They comprise the the Bella Cullen Project, a Twilight tribute band.

Their MySpace songs, including "Sexy Vampire," have been downloaded a quarter of a million times. (Sample lyric: "Stephenie Meyer's the queen of all vampires/ How does she make this stuff up? She's got to be some form of genius/ with Twilight she's hit the jackpot.")

On the all-important vampire-werewolf question, Chandler says "she's undeniably a Jacob" person, Tori is "equally divided," while Ally equivocates, saying "it depends on the day."

Alicia Norton, 25, of Flower Mound, is on the side of the vampires. "The vampires are the good guys, the moral ones," she explains. "Werewolves are not."

Ms. Norton was part of a cadre of friends affiliated with the Grapevine-Grand Prairie-based Web site www.twilightseriestheories.com who camped out overnight at the Stonebriar Centre Barnes & Noble to be first in line for tickets Tuesday. The store's community relations director, Debra Stapleton, says such dedication is not unusual among the author's fans.

"She's only visiting 11 cities this tour; we have people flying in from as far away as Virginia and Georgia to see her," says Ms. Stapleton.

While The Host may be riling up her fans, it is only building further anticipation for the final installment in the Twilight series, Breaking Dawn, scheduled for publication Aug. 2.

"That will be a real event," says Diane Roback, children's book editor of Publishers Weekly, the trade magazine of the book business. She cites the fact that the book will get midnight launch parties and a 2.5-million-copy first printing (compared with 500,000 copies of The Host).

Which means: It may be time to make up your mind on that vampire-werewolf question. You're likely to be hearing it again soon.

Race Relations in Black and White: Mat Johnson's Incognegro

From the Houston Chronicle -- May 4, 2008

By Edward Nawokta

Texans might recall that in 1959 Dallas journalist John Howard Griffin darkened his skin and traveled through Louisiana and Mississippi for six weeks, passing himself off as an African-American. His resulting book, Black Like Me, reminded America of the racism then endemic in South.

Griffin wasn't the first journalist to conceive of passing for the sake of a story. From 1918 to 1928, NAACP activist Walter White went undercover to investigate lynchings and race riots across the country.

Though African-American, White had blond hair and blue eyes, which gave him the appearance of a Caucasian. He used that to gain the confidence of racist mobs who boasted to him about their crimes — accounts he then published in the New York papers.

His mission was risky, and White had a few close calls of his own when his identity came to light.

White's heroic acts inspired Mat Johnson's latest project, the graphic novel Incognegro (art by Warren Pleece, published by Vertigo, a division of DC Comics). Johnson is a recent addition to the faculty of University of Houston's Creative Writing Program.

Incognegro tells the story of the fictional Zane Pinchback, an intrepid reporter for the New Holland Herald, who, in the mold of White, travels undercover through the South to report on lynchings.

When the book begins, Zane is back in Harlem, angling for a job as managing editor of the paper.

Then he learns of yet another lynching about to take place, in Tupelo, Miss.

A black man is accused of murdering a white woman, and what compels Zane to risk his life once again is news that the man scheduled to hang is Zane's own darker-skinned brother.

If this sounds like the setup for a preachy history lesson, fear not.

Johnson has used this historical material as the basis for a classic noir crime story, one that includes satisfying doses of deceit, moral ambiguity and plenty of R-rated violence.

Along the way, Zane will face down the Klan, greed, ignorance and a family of separatist hillbillies fomenting a religious race war.

Johnson, who moved to Houston from New York in 2007, is best known as a conventional fiction writer.

The author of two novels, Drop (2000) and Hunting in Harlem (2004), as well as the novella The Great Negro Plot (2007), he turned to writing graphic novels in 2005, with a short run of comics starring Papa Midnite, a character developed from the Hellblazer series.

"I've been preparing to write this particular story all my life," Johnson said in a recent interview. Like Zane, he's often taken for a Caucasian. "I grew up looking very European — my father is Irish and my mother is black — so I've been fascinated with those who've had similar experiences in the past." Johnson so closely identified with the main character that Vertigo photographed him to use as the cover image.

Johnson delights in the challenge of writing graphic novels. "You have to ask yourself odd questions," he said, "such as how do I structure the story so that all the big 'reveals' — key events — appear on even-numbered pages, so a reader sees them only after turning a page."

A novel, he said, is much more fluid; with comics "you're fitting the story into the form."

Increasingly, authors are using the graphic format to reinterpret nonfiction storylines. Recent years have seen graphic versions of the Sept. 11 Commission report and biographies of Ronald Reagan and Malcolm X.

As it happens, the Incognegro character and the graphic novel form, which is most often associated with superhero characters, are perfectly matched.

The pen name "Incognegro" is essentially a superhero's alias: "I don't wear a mask like Zorro or a cape like the Shadow, but I don a disguise nonetheless," says Zane while straightening his hair and tie before setting off for Tupelo.

In the black-and-white panel drawings by Pleece, a UK artist, African-American and white characters are not shaded differently to indicate race.

Yet through efficient visual shorthand (hair and clothing styles) the novel manages to comment on both racial and class differences.

"It's interesting to consider the different ways people look at the literary stuff and the graphic stuff," Johnson said. "People expect literary stuff to be smart and sophisticated, but not necessarily a good read, while the graphic novel is supposed to be a good read but not smart and sophisticated.

"In recent years, graphic novels have been gaining respect. Jonathan Lethem has a graphic novel out. Michael Chabon published The Escapist, which came out of his novel The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay. The thing I like most about graphic-novel readers is they are really passionate."

In the future, Johnson said he's likely to juggle conventional fiction, graphic novels, teaching and raising his family — he's brought a wife and three children with him to Houston.

And somewhat to his surprise, he'll be making a home here in Texas.

"Before I moved, I was teaching at Bard College in upstate New York and wasn't at all certain I was going to like Houston. I heard it was hot and there wasn't much of a literary scene. But there's a lot more here than I initially thought — writers and artists especially. It's affordable to live."

And he added, "The people here are genuinely nice."

'Incognegro' gets graphic with crime noir

By EDWARD NAWOTKA
Special to the Journal Sentinel

Posted: April 12, 2008

Incognegro. By Mat Johnson. DC/Vertigo. $19.99.

In 1959 Dallas journalist John Howard Griffin darkened his skin and traveled through Louisiana and Mississippi, passing himself off as an African-American for six weeks. His resulting 1961 book, "Black Like Me," reminded America of racism that was then endemic to the South.

Griffin wasn't the first journalist to conceive of the idea of passing oneself off as a member of a different race for the sake of the story.

From 1918-'28 NAACP activist Walter White went undercover to investigate lynchings and race riots across the country.

Though African-American, White's blond hair and blue eyes gave him the appearance of a Caucasian, a trait he used to gain the confidence of racist mobs who boasted to him about their crimes - accounts he then published in the New York papers. His mission was risky and White had a few close calls of his own when his identity came to light.

White's heroic acts became the inspiration for author Mat Johnson's latest project, the graphic novel "Incognegro," published by Vertigo (a division of DC Comics).

"Incognegro" tells the story of the fictional Zane Pinchback, an intrepid reporter for the New Holland Herald who in the mold of White, travels undercover through the South to report on lynchings.

When the book begins, Zane is back in Harlem, angling for a job as managing editor of the paper, when he learns of yet another lynching about to take place in Tupelo, Miss. A black man is accused of murdering a white woman, and what compels Zane to risk his life once again is the news that the man scheduled to hang for the crime is Zane's own darker-skinned brother.

If this sounds like the set-up for a preachy history lesson, fear not. Instead, Johnson has used this historical material as the basis for a classic noir crime story, one that includes satisfying doses of deceit, moral ambiguity and plenty of R-rated violence. Along the way, Zane will face down the Klan, a family of separatist hillbillies fomenting a religious race war, and simple-minded ignorance and greed.

Johnson is best known as a prose writer. The author of two novels, "Drop" (2000) and "Hunting in Harlem" (2004), as well as the novella, "The Great Negro Plot" (2007), he's also no novice at penning graphic novels, having already published a short run of comics starring Papa Midnite, a character developed from the Hellblazer series, in 1995.

Referring to Incognegro, Johnson remarks, "I've been preparing to write this particular story all my life." Like Zane, he is often confused for being Caucasian.

"I grew up looking very European - my father is Irish and my mother is black - so I've been fascinated with those who've had similar experiences in the past." He so closely identified with the main character that Vertigo took a portrait of Johnson for the cover photo.

As it happens, the Incognegro character and the graphic novel form - which is most often associated with superhero characters - are perfectly matched. In the panel drawings, done in black and white by UK artist Warren Pleece, the African-American and Caucasian characters are not shaded differently to indicate race. The drawings still manage, through efficient visual shorthand (hair and clothing styles), to comment on racial and, in particular, class difference - something that would require long, descriptive prose passages to convey in a conventional novel.