THE COLLECTED STORIESHeinrich Böll
How to Keep Your Volkswagen AliveChristopher Boucher
After a decade of litigation, a judge has ruled that the publisher of a bestselling Holocaust memoir, Misha: A Memoire of the Holocaust Years, by Misha Defonseca, which turned out to be fabricated, does not have to pay Defonseca $22.5 million previously awarded by a…
In a story that claims “subterfuge, jealousy and dirty tricks in the world of literature,” London’s Daily Mail reports that the reader’s reviews section on Amazon — which “offers supposedly independent verdicts from customers” — has actually turned into a place where “rival publishers are…
Literature’s newest Nobelist, Mario Vargas Llosa, has admitted that he censored his 1963 novel The City and the Dogs and other early work for publication in Spain “after being invited to lunch by the chief censor, Carlos Robles Piquer, who wanted the novel published but…
According to a report in the Wall Street Journal, 15-year-old news site Salon.com is seriously “exploring opportunities to merge with or be acquired by another media company.” The site has lost about $15 million over the last five years. A internal Salon memo by CEO…
More and more, we find ourselves in awe of the quality, depth and variety of places on the internet talking about books. Thus, we’ve decided to take a year-end look at how those places talked about our titles. (Read the kickoff.) The point is to…
Remember Amazon’s Kindle Singles? (You might recall that MobyLives had some fun with the idea earlier this fall.) Upon its announcement it seemed like a contrived way to anticipate and corner a market before a healthy, robust, and, dare we say, organic new ecosystem of short,…
A brilliant economist, social activist, and bestselling author–Raj Patel is a wonderful man. We knew that already. That’s why we published his book Stuffed & Starved: The Hidden Battle for the World Food System. But is he also the messiah? As previously reported on MobyLives (and The…
“It sounded like a better, lighter way to pack for a trip to Germany: a Kindle with a Lonely Planet travel guide in lieu of an 844-page brick of a book,” says Anick Jesdanun. “Yet to my surprise, the 10-day visit to Munich, Dresden and…
This is the fifth installment of a series by artist Mahendra Singh on the process of adapting Lewis Carroll’s classic nonsense poem, The Hunting of a Snark, into a graphic presentation. Like most of Carroll’s work, this poem has seen various iterations since it was written in 1874 but…
“It’s just really, really gotten to me…I just can’t sleep at night,” Graham Arader, New York rare-book dealer and a leading bidder for a copy of James Audubon‘s Birds of America, told Ellen Gamerman of the Wall Street Journal recently for a story about the behind-the-scenes…
In the CNN interview below, Jeb Bush, George W.’s older brother, admits to an interviewer that, regarding his brother’s new book Decision Points: “I haven’t read it, but I’ve bought 40 copies. And it’s far more important to buy 40 copies than to read it.”…
People have been predicting for a while that, in the accelerating war over ereaders, Amazon would eventually do what it does and simply gut the price of the Kindle. Even though the first generation Kindle — meaning, not that long ago — cost $399, many…
This is the fourth installment of a series by artist Mahendra Singh on the process of adapting Lewis Carroll’s classic nonsense poem, The Hunting of a Snark, into a graphic presentation. Like most of Carroll’s work, this poem has seen various iterations since it was written in 1874 but…
Reading (via, via) Gargoyle Magazine‘s 1983 interview with recent National Book Award-winner Jaimy Gordon (Lord of Misrule), I was struck with what a different literary world the young Gordon seemed to inhabit. For starters, most of the writers she speaks of as important literary figures have…
So, kind of in continuation from last week’s fun and slightly book-related post on obscure words — book do contain words, after all – is a relatively new blog. I give you: Better Book Titles. The blog’s creator, Dan Wilbur, acknowledges that as readers we…
Professional Carwash and Detailing News reports “Ira A. Feinberg, a carwash consultant with a 40 year history in the carwash industry, has published a new book for the carwarsh industry, Make Your Fortune Washing Cars.” The book is a comprehensive guide, covering every aspect of…
Sarah Palin‘s publisher, Rupert Murdoch, has sued Gawker for showing photos of the 21 pages from Palin’s forthcoming book, America By Heart: Reflections on Family, Faith and Flag last week. As writer (and former publisher) Paul Carr notes in an astute commentary, “It wasn’t long…
Leaders in the Jewish community have expressed dismay over comments in Pope Benedict’s new book. According to a Reuters’ wire story: Jewish leaders reacted with dismay Sunday to comments in Pope Benedict’s new book that his wartime predecessor Pius was a “great, righteous” man who…
Adapting to budget shortfalls has been a perennial issue for librarians in the United States since the beginning of the Great Recession. Case in point, just months after New York libraries avoided massive layoffs this summer by cutting services, according to the Wall Street Journal New…
My fellow Americans: Ever known anyone so envious of sophisticated British literary culture and history that they moved to England and developed a British accent? Me too. But for people like me who don’t want to move to Britain because there are too many Americans…
More and more, we find ourselves in awe of the quality, depth and variety of places on the internet talking about books. Thus, we’ve decided to take a year-end look at how those places talked about our titles. (Read the kickoff.) The point is to…
As this website explains — well, we don’t know what it says as we don’t read German. However, there are a few clues as to what’s up — first of all, there’s the fact that the thing is called either a “sitzmoebel” or a “bookinist.”…
Bad news out of Michigan on Friday. The Detroit Free Press reports that the “Borders Group plans to close 17 Borders superstores nationwide after the holidays.” The troubled Ann Arbor-based book store chain announced last week that it had launched a website redesign in an…
I hate mentioning Sarah Palin. Lord knows she gets enough press for someone who ought not to be getting any. In fact, let’s briefly consider her career trajectory and see if it makes sense why we continue to devote resources in the service of covering…
This is the third installment of a series by artist Mahendra Singh on the process of adapting Lewis Carroll‘s classic nonsense poem, The Hunting of a Snark, into a graphic presentation. Like most of Carroll’s work, this poem has seen various iterations since it was written in 1874 but…
There’s lots of talk and speculation about what The Daily (the iPad-only news publication that is a joint venture between Rupert Murdoch‘s News Corp. and Apple) will do and look like. One rumor from The New York Observer is that the publication will use news-gathering drones.…
Here’s an interesting interview with Patti Smith, hosted by the PEN America Center back in May. Smith, who just won the National Book Award in non-fiction for Just Kids, her memoir about her early life in New York City rooming with photographer Robert Mapplethorpe, talks…
Earlier this fall a MobyLives story reported that the Connecticut attorney general‘s office had interviewed indie booksellers as part of an investigation into pricing agreements between publishers and Apple and Amazon. The point of the investigation was to uncover whether, as American Bookseller’s Association head…
Whenever I’m tempted to say that something about our contemporary lives is radical or new, I’m reminded of the scene in No Country For Old Men where the retired, crippled deputy tells the sheriff played by Tommy Lee Jones: “Whatcha got ain’t nothin new. This…
The other day a coworker, studiously engaged in research on the internet, just happened to come across this rather addictive point-and-click flash-based video game inspired by Moby Dick (be prepared to lose 5 minutes if you click on the link). It’s a very limited game,…