Books
War Horse Gets Spielberg Treatment
War Horse, originally a bestselling novel by Michael Morpurgo, has had a successful theatre run in London’s West End is is about to get the Hollywood treatment as Steven Spielberg has optioned the story and will personally direct the movie version of the story of life in WWI’s trenches as seen through the eyes of […]
Oprah
Uh oh, Kitty Kelley’s Oprah: A Biography, based on 850 interviews, promises to a tell-all tale of behind the scenes of America’s most influential and powerful women in America. Read a review in The Washington Post.
Not Without Hope
Not Without Hope by personal trainer Nick Schulyer tells the story of what happened when he went on a fishing trip with three friends, two of them NFL players. When their anchor got caught off the coast of Tampa, Florida, they made the mistake of trying to free it by tying it to the stern […]
Spoon Fed
In Spoon Fed: How Eight Cooks Saved My Life Kim Severson, explores her relationship with the cookery writers who gave her valuable insights into her own life just when she needed them most.
Appetite for America by
In Appetite for America: How Visionary Businessman Fred Harvey Built a Railroad Hospitality Empire That Civilized the Wild West Stephen Fried chronicles the life and times of railroad restrauteur Fred Harvey, who fed travellers and cowboys at the turn of the 20th century. But for the cowboys, there was the possibility of something else on […]
Single Black Female
Karyn Langhorne Folan, author of Don’t Bring Home a White Boy: And Other Notions that Keep Black Women From Dating Out, suggests that single African American women need to start dating outside their race if they are to find a partner. Part of the problem is that ‘good’ black men i.e. those with college degrees […]
Books to Inspire You
Barnes & Noble Review has published a list of recently published and forthcoming 20 books they’re excited about. In amongst them are a number that might (obviously or with a bit of creative thinking) make a good factual programme, such as: 36 Arguments for the Existence of God by Rebecca Goldstein – a novel about […]
Chicken Soup Gone Wrong
The Independent has a story about Oran Canfield, son of Chicken Soup for the Soul author and millionaire motivational speaker Jack Canfield. Oran has just written a memoir, Freefall, that tells how his father walked out on the family when Oran was a baby. Since then Oran has drifted through a series of jobs – […]
The Paris Review
The Paris Review has an extensive archive of Q&A interviews with authors dating back to 1953. Interviewees include Lawrence Durrell (1959), Ernest Hemingway (1958) and James Baldwin (1984). Explore more in The Paris Review Archive.
The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks by Rebecca Skloot
The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks by Rebecca Skloot (pub. 2 Feb 2010) is the fascinating and disturbing account of a poor black woman, who died of cervical cancer aged 31 yrs-old. During her treatment, cells were taken (unbenknownst to her) from her cervix, and extraordinarily, those cells are still alive decades after Henrietta’s death […]
Author Interviews
Treat yourself to some vintage black and white TV and listen to some author interviews from the archives: Boldtype has put together their favourite five sites featuring charming or combative author interviews. Clips include Paul Auster, Toni Morrisson, Isabel Allende and Ayn Rand. See them here.
My Grill by Pete Evans
Aussie TV chef Pete Evans has written a new book, My Grill, which giveshe BBQ with a sophisticated spin with dishes such as Spiced Lamb Skewers with Pomegranate Molasses, Baby Octopus with Smoked Spanish Paprika and Sweet & Sour Capsicum and French Toast with Figs. Hat tip: PSFK
Who’s Stealing Books?
The recession has led to a rash of shoplifters stealing books (at the rate of one per hour in one shop). The book that goes MIA most often in Austin, Texas? The Bible. However, in Manhattan, thieves have more literary tastes: Raymond Carver and Jack Kerourac are the most likely to walk off the shelves, […]
If Your Kid Eats This Book, Everything Will Still Be OK
Cory Doctorow over at Boing Boing posted a review of a book that should be required reading for paranoid parents everywhere: If Your Kid Eats This Book, Everything Will Still Be Okay: How to Know if Your Child’s Injury or Illness Is Really an Emergency by ER doctor Lara Zibners, who explains what ingested substances […]
Familiar Characters, New Writers
The Washington Post reports that publishers of familiar books have commissioned new writers to continue the series after their original authors died. Coming up is And Another Thing (sixth in the Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy), Dracula: The Undead and a new Winnie the Pooh book. This trend signifies a change in attitude among estate […]
Information is Beautiful
For his new book, Information is Beautiful, (The Visual Miscellaneum: A Colorful Guide To The World’s Most Consequential Trivia in the USA), David McCandless spent a year creating more than 200 visualizations to bring to life statistics and subjects from pop to philosophy. You can: Reduce your odds of dying in a plane crash (don’t […]
Man Trap: How to Get the Man You Want
Random House turned to an unorthodox method of promoting a new book, How to Get the Man You Want, by setting a ‘man trap’ in Auckland, New Zealand – a big wooden box propped up and baited with a six-pack of lager. Twenty men tried to grab the beer, but none were caught in the […]
Genesis Illustrated
Satirical cartoonist R. Crumb has turned his talents to the bible in The Book of Genesis Illustrated, which is essentially a graphic novel (“with nothing left out”). Read more in the Washington Post.
Stephen King Mystery Book Launch
Stephen King’s new book, Under the Dome, is being published in the UK on 10th November 2009, but in the run up to its release you can get involved in nation and web wide game to win the chance of early access to curl up with a special edition for the night in a hotel. […]
Twitter Book Club
The Book Studio takes the author tour online and lets you take part in a book club without leaving the comfort of your own sofa. Next up is Zoe Heller’s The Believers on 19th October 2009. If that’s not your thing, you can read reviews and interviews and watch video interviews with authors such as […]
How to Make Love to Adrian Colesberry
Adrian Colesberry is a biomedical engineer with a failed marriage behind him and a new career in front of him as a comedian, sexpert (he’s a volunteer sex ed teacher in high schools) and film extra (Spiderman, Entourage, Boston Legal and ER). Whilst not doing much on set, he wrote a “dirty, dirty book” called […]
Good Ideas in Storytelling
Douglas Coupland, author of Generation X, has just published his new novel, Generation A, and is at the start of a book tour across Canada, USA and the UK. What you might not know is that he is also a visual artist, sculptor, furniture designer and screenwriter. Read his quotes, including: “Quick. Name ten dead […]
All The Things That Can be Made From a Pig
Once upon a time, Pig 05049 was slaughtered and was made into dozens of products – not all of them bacon. Christien Meindertsma spent three years researching the products that can be manufactured from one pig and discovered a list that included cigarettes, porcelain, chewing gum, heart valves, ammunition and bio diesel. Everything was recorded […]
Designing Obama
Designing Obama is a book about how art was used during the presidential campaign to give voice to the American people. Scott Thomas, the Design Director of the Obama campaign has pulled together the artwork created by grassroots supporters and compiled it into a book alongside the official artwork created within the campaign. He’s taking […]
London Design Guide 2010
The London Design Guide 2010 is the first book of the press from new publisher Spotlight Press. If you are a design lover, it lists all the hotels, restaurants, galleries that are worthy of a visit, handily organised by neighbourhood. Find out more. Hat tip: Coolhunting
A Cultural History of the Vagina by Naomi Wolf
The New York Observer reports that Naomi Wolf is working on a new book, tentatively titled A Cultural History of the Vagina for Ecco Press. Previous publications include Misconceptions: Truth, Lies and the Unexpected on the Journey to Motherhood and The Beauty Myth.
The Greatest Wine Hoax of All Time
Visit Slate for a sour tale of wine fraud, defamation and a best-selling book called The Billionaire’s Vinegar. Michael Broadbent, a British wine expert, who has collected around 100,000 tasting notes for wines (some centuries old) over his six decade career, is suing the author of the book, which he alleges depicts him as being […]
Design that Empowers
Design Revolution by Emily Pilloton is a new book that features more than 100 designs that make the world better, from all-terrain wheelchairs to Braille Lego-style building blocks for blind kids and waterless washing machines, and a math playground. Emily also founded a non-profit design organization Project H. Watch a video about her aims and […]
Book Tour
If you’ve been wondering what Wired‘s Chris Anderson has been up to lately, he’s been running BookTour.com. It’s a free online directory of author events, which you can search by book, author, zip code or google earth maps. You can sign up to get updates when your favourite authors are in town, or you can […]
Extreme Architecture
Check out Coolhunting‘s review of Extreme Architecture, by Ruth Slavid, which features pictures of beautiful buildings ( unsurprisingly – why would you publish a book on ugly architecture?) designed to withstand extreme environments. The buildings are grouped into chapters according to the environment in which they were built —hot, cold, high, wet and space. They […]
Cool Hunting’s Summer Reading List 2009
Cool Hunting have just published their recommended reads for the summer, many of which might provide inspiration for factual programming, including: Squeezed: What You Didn’t Know about Orange Juice, Alissa Hamilton – the history of orange juice in the USA; Shop Class as Soulcraft: An Inquiry into the Value of Work, Matthew B. Crawford – […]
Three Little Pigs
Illustrator Steven Guarnaccia has a well-developed flair for mixing classic fairy tales with modern design. His Goldilocks and the Three Bears: A Tale Moderne tells the story of a Goldilocks who stumbles upon a ’50s style split-level house in the woods. She wanders in and tries out a Charles Rennie Mackintosh ladderback chair, a Danish […]
The Guinea Pig Diaries, AJ Jacobs
AJ Jacobs is an immersive, experimental kind of journalist and best selling author (one has led to the other). In 1997 he published The Year of Living Biblically, which is notable not only for reaching the NYT best seller list, but also because it featured in evangelical magazine Relevant and in Penthouse. It also resulted […]
Aaron Cohen: Slave Hunter
Aaron Cohen turned from drugs and rock and roll to become a slave hunter. He’s travelled the world – from Sudan to Cambodia – to find and free people from human trafficking and the sex trade. He’s risked his life countless times, and was rewarded last year with a Prize for Humanity. His story, and […]
Sarah Palin Memoir
HarperCollins is publishing Sarah Palin’s memoir in the USA in spring 2010. She’s reportedly excited to use her journalism degree to set the record straight about her upbringing, her family and last year’s presidential race. Palin will work with a collaborator to produce the book, which has yet to be started. She’s going to have […]
Favorite Wife: Escape from Polygamy by Susan Schmidt
In Favorite Wife: Escape from Polygamy, Susan Ray Schmidt tells of how she escaped from her marriage to the leader of a Mormon cult who was 23 years older than she when they married (she was 15), and who had 10 other wives. She suffered arguments, jealousy and death threats before she managed to escape […]
Regret the Error
Regret the Error is an online collection (and book) of apologies that newspapers have been forced to make for mistakes in their copy – they make for hilarious and sometimes tragic reading. The site’s edited by Canadian freelance journalist Craig Silverman – check him out.
Our Choice by Al Gore
In November 09, Al Gore publishes another book: Our Choice. In it he outlines a global plan to tackle the problem of climate change using information gleaned from Solutions Summits he’s had with creative experts over the last few years.
Biography: Mr America
Bernarr MacFadden was the original American muscleman. In this biography, Mark Adams describes his rise from poverty-stricken orphan to millionaire health nut behind Charles Atlas. He advocated a diet rich in milk and veggies and lots of exercise and sex for recreation. He also founded a long-running fitness magazine (Physical Culture) and was at the […]
Grade by Grade: Excellent Elementary Education Made Easy by Trish Wilkinson
We’ve all been through school, but who teaches the parents how to shepherd their own children through the often challenging and confusing education system? Trish Wilkinson knows from first hand experience that parents need support to navigate the school system, so she’s written a book, supported by an excellent website that is aimed at helping […]
A Classical Education: Stuff You Wish You’d Been Taught at School by Caroline Taggart
A Classical Education by Caroline Taggart takes you on a journey through the Classical world that is still relevant today – explaining common Latin expressions (vice versa / status quo) and idioms (Herculean task), classical architecture and Aristotle’s influence on logical argument. It is published in June 09.
Dangerous Books Not For Boys and Girls
Do you have dangers lurking on your bookshelves? Millions of books are being stripped from library shelves and charity shops across the UK as new legislation means that books printed before 1985 are now banned due to concerns about lead in the books’ ink. Parents and librarians are dismayed/incensed, while scientists say there’s nothing the […]
Library Porn
Libraries by Candida Hofer and Umberto Eco is a stunning book of photographs of library shelves. And that’s much more exciting than it sounds. Get a sneak peek here.
Chagall: Love and Exile by Jackie Wullschlager
Chagall: Love and Exile by Jackie Wullschlager is a biography of Marc Chagall that uses rare Russian archives and previously unpublished correspondence between the artist and his first wife, Bella. It traces his life from poor boy in Vitebsk, the Russian Jewish settlement that inspired his paintings, to the Parisian-based millionaire with a flat on […]
QueryFail – What Literary Agents Say Behind Your Back
A couple of days ago there was a bit of a hoo hah in the book world, as literary agents Lauren E. MacLeod and Colleen Lindsay decided to twitter about some of the worst query letters they’d received. It divided people into those who thought it gave a valuable insight in how to pitch, and […]
Books That Make You Dumb
Books That Make You Dumb is a chart that uses information collected about the SAT scores, (designed to measure critical thinking abilities), of US college students and superimposed the favourite books of the students at various universities. Colleges with a lower average SAT scores correlated with students who had Fahrenheit 451 and The Color Purple […]
Banned Books Week
Banned Books Week is 26 September – 3 October 2009 in the USA. The American Library Association has published a list of the most banned or challenged books: And Tango Makes Three, by Justin Richardson/Peter Parnell – Anti-Ethnic, Sexism, Homosexuality, Anti-Family, Religious Viewpoint, Unsuited to Age Group The Chocolate War, by Robert Cormier – Reasons: […]
A Blueprint for a Safer Planet: How to Manage Climate Change and Create a New Era of Progress and Prosperity
A Blueprint for a Safer Planet: How to Manage Climate Change and Create a New Era of Progress and Prosperity by Nicholas Stern suggests how the world will need to adapt in order to survive unavoidable global warming. He argues that it will take international cooperation on a scale never seen before – he looks […]
Khubilai Kan’s Lost Fleet
Khubilai Khan’s Lost Fleet by James Delgado is the true story of the destruction of Khubilai Khan’s (Ghengis’s grandson) huge navy after he tried to attack Japan with his inherited fleet. The outnumbered Japanese prayed, and the next day Khan’s nave was destroyed by a divine wind – the kamikaze. A second, bigger attack was […]
Hitler’s Private Library
Hitler’s Private Library by Timothy Ryback explores the vast collection of 16,000 books that Hitler collected and loved to read, giving an original perspective on the emotional and intellectual life of a dictator. This extraordinary book provides us with remarkable insight into Hitler’s private world. Hitler was a passionate reader and had a vast collection […]
