Publishers Weekly articles from April 2004

Publishers Weekly archives from April 2004

Book sales rose 4% in 2003, to $23 billion: restated figures show a smaller industry.
April 5, 2004... TOTAL BOOK INDUSTRY sales rose 4.6% in 2003, to an estimated $23.4 billion, according to estimates released by the Association of American Publishers. The 2003 figures were compiled by a new firm, Management Practice Inc., which restated...

New industry measurement.
April 5, 2004... Revised industry figures (see story above) show that total industry sales have increased a total of 36% between 1997 and 2003, growing at a compound annual growth rate of 5.3%. During that same time span, trade sales increased 21.4%, and rose...

Random House results skewed by currency changes.(News)
April 5, 2004... TOTAL REVENUE at Random House fell to 1.78 billion euros in 2003, from 2.0 billion euros in 2002, and operating EBITA dropped to 147 million euros from 168 million euros. Parent company Bertelsmann attributed the decline almost entirely to the...

Howard Publishing delays Warren title.(Waiting)
April 5, 2004... LESS THAN TWO months after announcing a $300,000 advertising campaign for Healing Choices by Purpose-Driven Life author Rick Warren (News, Feb. 2), Howard Publishing has delayed the planned August publication until 2005 at the earliest. A...

New fees, initiatives from Abebooks.com.(Expanding)(Advanced Book Exchange Inc.)
April 5, 2004... MORE SIGNS OF growth--and the prospect for additional growth--in the used book marketplace comes from Abebooks.com, which reported a 30% increase in sales in 2003. Cross merchandise sales at Abebooks--the value of the books sold on its various...

MediaBay restructuring debt.(Finance)
April 5, 2004... Struggling MediaBay has delayed the filing of its year-end report with the Securities and Exchange Commission until April 14, the company announced last week. MediaBay needs the extension to conclude negotiations with lenders aimed at...

Bloomsbury Publishing on the up and up.(Results 2003)
April 5, 2004... U.K. -- BASED Bloomsbury Publishing has posted a profit for the 10th consecutive year since introducing young wizard Harry Potter to the world. Pretax profits were up 38.3%, to 15.4 million [pounds sterling] ($27.7 million), and sales...

Academy celebrates fiscal surplus.(National Poetry Month)
April 5, 2004... ITS FINANCIAL FOOTING secure after a series of deficits, the Academy of American Poets is marking its ninth National Poetry Month by launching an online listing of poetry events and activities that will promote and publicize poetry every day of...

Entrepreneur press joins M-H Trade.(Business)(McGraw-Hill Trade)
April 5, 2004... Following a record 2003, Entrepreneur Press is looking for another solid year, said Neil Perlman, president of the publisher's parent company Entrepreneur Media. First quarter 2004 revenue, Perlman said, was 20% ahead of plan, and the April 1...

Melcher Media launches its own list.(Package This)
April 5, 2004... AFTER MORE THAN 10 YEARS as a packager known for inventively designed titles, Melcher Media is launching its own publishing program with seven titles on a list headed by a book from architect and designer Michael Graves. The books will now have...

NYU indie seminar set.(Tools)(New York University)
April 5, 2004... NEW YORK UNIVERSITY'S Center for Publishing will bold its second Management Forum for Independent Publishers April 23-24 at the Woolworth Building in New York City. The two-day program is designed for publishers with sales of between $1...

Claire Israel moves to Simon & Schuster.(People)
April 5, 2004... CLAIRE ISRAEL joined Simon & Schuster as director of electronic publishing March 29. She succeeds Keith Titan, who left to join Random House (News, Mar. 15). Israel will manage S&S's e-book operations and will work to bring new types of books...

Williams sisters strike again.(hot deals)(Serena Williams)(Venus Williams)
April 5, 2004... For the second time in a month, tennis superstars Venus and Serena Williams have signed a book deal, this one for a highly illustrated guide for young readers (8-up) called How to Play Tennis for DK. Publication is scheduled for as early as...

Putnam signs democrat star.(hot deals)(Bill Richardson)
April 5, 2004... Bill Richardson, the governor of New Mexico, is a senior party man, chairman of the 2004 Democratic National Convention, a former presidential envoy (to Saddam Hussein, among others) and U.S. Ambassador to the U.N. and reportedly a man admired...

New Orlean on Rin Tin Tin.(hot deals)
April 5, 2004... The next book by celebrated Orchid Thief author Susan Orlean is all about the extraordinary life, and later descendants, of the 1920s and '30s canine movie star Rin Tin Tin. The untitled book, which was bought by Geoff Shandler at Little, Brown...

New London base for U.S. agent.(hot deals)
April 5, 2004... Elizabeth Sheinkman at the Elaine Markson agency recently set up a branch office in London (see our British report, Mar. 8) and has already begun making deals for U.S. properties with U.K. publishers. So far she has sold a memoir by Indian film...

A memoir by a former CIA operative, Under Cover by Lindsay Moran, tells how an idealistic young Harvard grad joined the agency, served in strife-torn Macedonia and eventually left, her illusions shattered.(Short Takes)(Brief Article)
April 5, 2004... A memoir by a former CIA operative, Under Cover by Lindsay Moran, tells how an idealistic young Harvard grad joined the agency, served in strife-torn Macedonia and eventually left, her illusions shattered. It was won at auction by Jennifer...

HarperCollins Children's Books has bought the first in what is expected to be a series about "a Latina Nancy Drew.".(Short Takes)(Martika Galvez: The Jaguar of Uxmal, Michele Greene)
April 5, 2004... HarperCollins Children's Books has bought the first in what is expected to be a series about "a Latina Nancy Drew." It's called Martika Galvez: The Jaguar of Uxmal and is about a Mexican-American girl with mystic powers solving a kidnapping...

Eve Ensler, author of the long-running show The Vagina Monologues, has sold a new book to Random's Ileene Smith.(Short Takes)(Brief Article)
April 5, 2004... Eve Ensler, author of the long-running show The Vagina Monologues, has sold a new book to Random's Ileene Smith. It's V-World, a collection of frank essays, poems and unpublished monologues aimed at a female readership, and Smith got world...

Senior editor Alison Callahan at HarperCollins has signed a new novel by Tales of the City author Armistead Maupin.(Short Takes)
April 5, 2004... Senior editor Alison Callahan at HarperCollins has signed a new novel by Tales of the City author Armistead Maupin. It's called Michael Tolliver Lives and follows one of the author's best-known and best-loved characters through a typical day as...

Viz manga pulled from some Scholastic Fairs.(Culture Clash)
April 5, 2004... SHONEN JUMP, a monthly manga magazine used to preview the books of manga publisher Viz LLC, sparked a controversy after a Florida grade school teacher complained that a copy of the magazine purchased by a fifth grade student at a Scholastic...

Industry Stocks: March performances.(Market Watch)(Illustration)
April 5, 2004... Industry Stocks: March Performances COMPANY FEBRUARY 27 MARCH 31 % CHANGE Winners Books-A-Million 5.61 6.40 14.1% John Wiley ...

Holtzbrinck to buy Roaring Brook Press.(Acquisition)(Holtzbrinck Publishers)(Roaring Brook Press)
April 5, 2004... MILLBROOK PRESS HAS reached a preliminary agreement to sell its Roaring Brook Press trade imprint to Holtzbrinck Publishers. Millbrook began looking for a buyer for Roaring Brook shortly after it filed for bankruptcy in February (News, Feb....

Baker Book growth prompts name change.(Expanding)(Baker Book House Co.)
April 5, 2004... AFTER 65 YEARS as Baker Book House and a fiscal year that saw a 63% growth rate, the Grand Rapids, Mich.-based publisher has changed its name to Baker Publishing Group in an effort to better define its role in relation to its six divisions....

Book sales hit $117 million at Hastings.(Results 2003)(Hastings Entertainment Inc.)
April 5, 2004... SAME-STORE SALES of books rose 0.7% for the year ended January 31 at Hastings Entertainment and accounted for approximately 23% of revenue at the retailer, or $117 million. Total sales at Hastings increased 2.6%, to $508.3 million, and net...

Avalon's Ortenberg resigns.(Sudden Change)(Neil Ortenberg)(Avalon Publishing Group)
April 5, 2004... IN A SURPRISING announcement, Neil Ortenberg, executive v-p of the Avalon Publishing Group responsible for the five imprints that make up its New York group, has resigned after less than a year in the job. As PW went to press, Ortenberg was...

I've got a secret.(news)(Sophie Kinsella, Random House Inc.)
April 5, 2004... Bestselling Shopaholic author Sophie Kinsella kicks off her first-ever U.S. book tour and celebrates her latest hardcover bestseller, Can You Keep a Secret?, at a champagne toast at the Random House offices hosted by Bantam Dell president and...

Basic to rush gay marriage book.(Opportunity)
April 5, 2004... THE ESCALATING CONTROVERSY over gay marriage is getting the attention of book publishers, with two trade houses in as many weeks revealing plans to speed titles on same-sex matrimony to market. Basic Books has signed historian George...

Correction.(news)(Correction Notice)
April 5, 2004... Correction: In our March 29 story about PGW's new clients, Contemporary Press was misidentified as Contemporary Books.

Clarke hits the mark.(behind the bestsellers)(Richard A. Clarke, Against All Enemies: Inside America's War on Terror)
April 5, 2004... You don't need to check the charts to see who's leading the nonfiction hardcover bestseller list. Unless one has been doing a Rip Van Winkle, it's hard not to take in the fact that every major broadcast and print news organization, here and...

Trump's triumph.(behind the bestsellers)(Donald Trump, Trump: How to Get Rich)
April 5, 2004... The publisher's promotional headline says it all: "First, he made a billion dollars. Then, he made The Apprentice. Now, The Donald shows you how to make a fortune, Trump style." Before the March 23 on-sale date of Trump: How to Get Rich, Random...

The secret's out ...(behind the bestsellers)
April 5, 2004... Sophie Kinsella's Can You Keep a Secret? is the author's first smash hardcover bestseller. Following the megasuccess of her Shopaholic trilogy--Confessions of a Shopaholic, Shopaholic Takes Manhattan and last year's Shopaholic Ties the...

The Clarke factor: 'Against All Enemies' reinforces an already strong market for political titles.(book news)
April 5, 2004... After selling about 170,000 copies in its first week on sale and dominating headlines for two straight weeks, former White House antiterrorism adviser Richard Clarke's Against All Enemies (Free Press) is on track to become the year's...

Reviving the First Celebrity Chef.(Leave It to Walker)
April 5, 2004... A celebrity chef has both a book and a show coming out simultaneously this spring. Nothing new there--only this celebrity chef isn't shouting "Barn!" on the Food Network. In fact, he's not even alive. In May, Walker & Co. will publish Ian...

A profitable arrangement: Valley Bookseller uses feng shui-like techniques for profit rather than aesthetics.(bookselling)
April 5, 2004... Feng shui is all the rage, and now booksellers are also analyzing their physical surroundings in an effort to create a more harmonious environment charged with positive energy. Joci Tilsen and Jim Bout, co-owners of The Valley Bookseller in...

Indie checks into Library's old location.(Synergy)( Chestnut Tree Books)
April 5, 2004... Talk about bookstore-library synergy. Early this summer, Chestnut Tree Books, a new independent bookstore, plans to move into shopping center space that the Princeton Public Library has been using temporarily while its main building in downtown...

Merchandising 101: how publishers and retailers can work together.(audio)
April 5, 2004... Most audio publishers would agree that getting attention for audiobooks at the retail level has frequently been a challenge. But in the current tough economy, it's more important than ever that retailers and publishers capitalize on the kinds...

Save the dates.(BEA)(BookExpo America)
April 5, 2004... The Audio Publishers Association is gearing up for its busiest season, and has announced the dates and locations of its major spring events. The organization's annual educational conference, APAC, w be held Thursday, June 3, 2004 at the Union...

Scarecrow.(Brief Article)(Audiobook Review)
April 5, 2004... SCARECROW MATTHEW REILLY, READ BY SCOTT SOWERS. Audio Renaissance, abridged, four CDs, 5 hrs., $24.95 ISBN 1-55927-988-5 The seemingly indestructible Marine captain Shane "Scarecrow" Schofield returns in this high-octane adventure...

The Best Awful.(Brief Article)(Audiobook Review)
April 5, 2004... THE BEST AWFUL CARRIE FISHER, READ BY THE AUTHOR. Simon & Schuster Audio, abridged, four cassettes, 5 hrs., $26 ISBN 0-671-88538-3 Fisher's (Postcards from the Edge, etc.) powerful and partly autobiographical tale of mental illness...

Mr. Paradise.(Brief Article)(Audiobook Review)
April 5, 2004... MR. PARADISE ELMORE LEONARD, READ BY ROBERT FORSTER. Harper Audio, unabridged, six CDs, 8 hrs., $34.95 ISBN 0-06-058627-3 Leonard (Tishomingo Blues, etc.) has long been the master of sparse, precise language. Consequently, his prose...

Absolute Friends.(Brief Article)(Audiobook Review)
April 5, 2004... ABSOLUTE FRIENDS JOHN LE CARRE, READ BY THE AUTHOR. Time Warner AudioBooks, abridged, six CDs, 65 hrs., $31.98 ISBN 1-58621-663-5 * Le Carre's angry, ultimately heartbreaking novel focuses on Ted Mundy, a good-natured British expat in...

Queer Eye for the Straight Guy: The Fab 5's Guide to Looking Better, Cooking Better, Dressing Better, Behaving Better, and Living Better.(Brief Article)(Audiobook Review)
April 5, 2004... QUEER EYE FOR THE STRAIGHT GUY: The Fab 5's Guide to Looking Better, Cooking Better, Dressing Better, Behaving Better, and Living Better TED ALLEN, KYAN DOUGLAS, THOM FILICIA, CARSON KRESSLEY AND JAI RODRIGUEZ, READ BY THE AUTHORS. Random...

Genome War.(Brief Article)(Audiobook Review)
April 5, 2004... GENOME WAR JAMES SHREEVE, READ BY ERIK SINGER. Random House Audio, abridged, five CDs, 6 hrs., $29.95 ISBN 0-7393-0994-3 Serendipity, not to mention pure entrepreneurial tenacity, played a huge role in the quest to unravel the complete...

Animals, Inc.: a Business Parable for the 21st Century.(Brief Article)(Audiobook Review)
April 5, 2004... ANIMALS, INC.: A Business Parable for the 21st Century KENNETH A. TUCKER AND VANDANA ALLMAN, READ BY JIM WARD. Time Warner AudioBooks, abridged, three CDs, 3 hrs., $24.98 ISBN 1-58621-507-8 Managers and small business owners who are...

The fab one.(PW Talks with Ted Allen)(Ted Allen)(Interview)
April 5, 2004... PW: What do you think of the audio adaptation of Queer Eye (reviewed on p. 22)? Ted Allen: [The producers] did so much more with it than I ever thought they would. When I go on the road, I like to download This American Life from...

Audio bestsellers.
April 5, 2004... Fiction [1] The Da Vinci Code (abr. CD). Dan Brown. Read by Colin Stinton. Random House Audio. Five CDs, six hours, $29.95 ISBN 0-7393-0204-3 [2] The Five People You Meet in Heaven (unabr. CD). Mitch Albom. Read by Erik Singer....

Celebrating the art of William Steig: the Eric Carle Museum pays tribute to his book illustration.(children's books)(Heart and Humor: The Picture Book Art of William Steig, Eric Carle Museum of Picture Book Art)
April 5, 2004... "Heart and Humor: The Picture Book Art of William Steig," on view through April 25 at the Eric Carle Museum of Picture Book Art in Amherst, Mass., was planned long before the artist's death last October at the age of 95. Nick Clark, founding...

Disney brings comics series to U.S.(Part of a Global Plan)(W.I.T.C.H.)
April 5, 2004... W.I.T.C.H., a comics magazine for girls that originated in Italy and is now the fastest-growing girls' comic in the world, has spawned magazine and book publishing programs throughout Disney offices worldwide, in 64 markets. This spring...

School dons author's name.(children's bookbag)(Bill Wallace Early Childhood Center)
April 5, 2004... West Elementary School in Chickasha, Okla., has been renamed the Bill Wallace Early Childhood Center in a dedication ceremony that took place on March 28. Wallace, the author of 34 books, almost all aimed at middle-grade readers, including the...

A crazy kind of event.(children's bookbag)(Crazy Hair Day)
April 5, 2004... It was a case of love at first sight when Jennifer Case, the deputy director of the San Diego Children's Museum, saw Barney Saltzberg's picture book Crazy Hair Day (Candlewick, 2003). To help get the word out about the book, Case organized a...

Faeries, goblins and other magical creatures.(children's bookbag)(Simon and Schuster Inc.)
April 5, 2004... Simon & Schuster has put together an event kit that brings the world of The Spiderwick Chronicles into bookstores. The bookseller kit contains a trivia game, riddles, collectible trading cards, paper dolls to dress in different outfits, and...

Golden Kite winners announced.(children's bookbag)(2003 Golden Kite Awards)(Jerry Spinelli)(Loren Long)(Lisa Yee)(Robert Byrd)(Amy Timberlake)
April 5, 2004... The Society of Children's Book Writers and Illustrators has announced the winners of the 2003 Golden Kite Awards. The winner for fiction was Milkweed by Jerry Spinelli (Knopf), with the nonfiction award going to Robert Byrd for Leonardo:...

Sheila Gilbert: DAW Books.(more hardcovers on tap)
April 5, 2004... If the phenomenal success of the movie The Lord of the Rings: Return of the King (and in fact of all three films in the trilogy) proved anything, it's that there is a huge audience for works that immerse people in a new world--if only...

Diana Gill: HarperCollins Eos.(trade paperbacks, welcome!)
April 5, 2004... For all but the first four months of Eos's six-year presence on the planet, Diana Gill has fueled its flights of science fiction and fantasy. "We do about 40 titles a year," she says, "12 hardcovers, six trade paperbacks and 20 to 28 mass...

Patrick Nielsen Hayden: Tor Books.(trying graphic novels)
April 5, 2004... There are some who insist that the key to expanding the market for science fiction and fantasy books is to publish works that transcend the genre--downplaying certain conventions of the category to appeal to a more general audience. "I...

Ginjer Buchanan: Ace/Roc Books.(fantasy is where it's at)
April 5, 2004... For Ginjer Buchanan, senior executive editor and marketing director at Ace/Roe, one of the biggest trends continues to be fantasy. "Basically this is a trend we've been seeing for maybe the past five years," she says. Today's hot and dark...

Anne Groell: Bantam Dell Publishing Group hail to weirdness.
April 5, 2004... The challenge for the science fiction and fantasy category, as Bantam Dell senior editor Anne Groell sees it, is not just to attract readers but to keep them coming back. "The paradigm of the field is 12- to 15-year-olds who discover it...

Byron Preiss: ibooks cross-pollination, baby.
April 5, 2004... It's one thing for ibooks publisher Byron Preiss to associate with Mantis or Griffinkins, but now he's started to "cross-pollinate" with more than book characters--he's moved on to figures from TV, film, comics and computer games....

Betsy Mitchell: Del Rey tracking younger.
April 5, 2004... "For a while science fiction was aging, but now it's trending younger," says Del Rey editor-in-chief Betsy Mitchell. Whatever the reason, Harry Potter or the pendulum swinging back, she's happy to see more children's lines like Yearling (also a...

James Baen: Baen Books mining military might.
April 5, 2004... After a decade in the science fiction field, James Baen founded Baen Books in 1983, and is still its president and publisher. When asked to consider trends in this category in the last couple of years, he replies, "One to two years is a fairly...

Jaime Levine: Warner Aspect urban legends.
April 5, 2004... When questioned on the latest trends in this category, Warner Aspect editorial director Jaime Levine tells PW, "I would say dark fantasy is gaining ground. Although there are still a lot of vampires, more often than not writers are only using...

Crossings then and now: David Hackett Fischer.(pw interview)(Interview)
April 5, 2004... For David Hackett Fischer, Washington's Crossing was roughly a decade in the making. Yet its publication this spring could not be more timely. The story behind Washington's remarkable campaign at Trenton is a story of choices and turning...

Secret Smile.(Brief Article)(Book Review)
April 5, 2004... SECRET SMILE NICCI FRENCH. Warner, $24 (304p) ISBN 0-446-53347-5 * Nobody does the dark underside of sex in the city better than the British couple who write as Nicci French, and their latest (after 2003's Land of the Living) is one of...

A Girl Becomes a Comma Like That.(Brief Article)(Book Review)
April 5, 2004... A GIRL BECOMES A COMMA LIKE THAT LISA GLATT. Simon & Schuster, $22 (320p) ISBN 0-7432-5775-8 "A girl becomes a comma like that, with wrong boy after wrong boy," muses the narrator of Glatt's keenly observed debut. "She becomes a pause,...

Hidden Prey.(Brief Article)(Book Review)
April 5, 2004... HIDDEN PREY JOHN SANDFORD. Putnam, $26.95 (400p) ISBN 0-399-15180-X Det. Lucas Davenport has battled some real demons over the past 15 Prey novels and drifted in and out of lust and love with a host of women. But now he's happily married to...

The Place Will Comfort You.(Brief Article)(Book Review)
April 5, 2004... THE PLACE WILL COMFORT YOU NAAMA GOLDSTEIN. Scribner, $22 (224p) ISBN 0-7432-5135-0 Set in Israel and suburban America, this funny, moving debut collection mines the rich complexities of cultural dislocation in the idiom of in between. "I...

Sarah.(Brief Article)(Book Review)
April 5, 2004... SARAH MAREK HALTER, TRANS. FROM THE FRENCH BY HOWARD CURTIS. Crown, $24 (304p) ISBN 1-4000-5272-6 Yet another entry in the burgeoning subgenre of fictional portraits of biblical women (see, for example, Rebecca Kohn's retelling of the...

The Laying on of Hands.(Brief Article)(Book Review)
April 5, 2004... THE LAYING ON OF HANDS BRENDA RHODES MILLER. Broadway/Harlem Moon, $12.95 paper (256p) ISBN 0-7679-1556-9 With its clarity and economy, Miller's debut about God-given gifts reads like a first-person parable, as 80-year-old Charlotte Tyler...

Beautiful Somewhere Else.(Brief Article)(Book Review)
April 5, 2004... BEAUTIFUL SOMEWHERE ELSE STEPHEN POLICOFF. Carroll & Graf, $14 paper (224p) ISBN 0-7867-1321-6 Alien abductions and a magician's vanishing acts figure as heavy-handed metaphors for the desire to escape from oneself in this first novel....

American Desert.(Brief Article)(Book Review)
April 5, 2004... AMERICAN DESERT PERCIVAL EVERETT. Hyperion, $24.95 (304p) ISBN 0-7868-6917-8 * When UCLA professor Ted Street sits up in his coffin at his own funeral, mayhem ensues in this smart, satirical and engrossing novel by prolific Everett (Glyph;...

Adventures of the Artificial Woman.(Brief Article)(Book Review)
April 5, 2004... ADVENTURES OF THE ARTIFICIAL WOMAN THOMAS BERGER. Simon & Schuster, 522 (208p) ISBN 0-7432-5740-5 Prolific novelist Berger (The Feud, Little Big Man) updates the Pygmalion myth with this witty, dark comedy: instead of a lovely Galatea, the...

True North.(Brief Article)(Children's Review)(Book Review)
April 5, 2004... TRUE NORTH JIM HARRISON. Atlantic Monthly, $24 (400p) ISBN 0-8021-1773-2 If the sins of the fathers are visited on the sons, what should a son do to provide moral recompense? let Harrison's earnest, initially riveting new novel, narrator...

Logic.(Brief Article)(Book Review)
April 5, 2004... LOGIC OLYMPIA VERNON. Grove, $22 (272p) ISBN 0-802 I-1771-6 Vernon's follow-up to her acclaimed debut, 2003's Eden, is a dark and harrowing portrait of catastrophically scarred people in rural Valsin County, Miss. The sad story of Logic...

Wakefield.(Brief Article)(Book Review)
April 5, 2004... WAKEFIELD ANDREI CODRESGU. Algonquin, $24.95 (320p) ISBN 1-56512-372-7 Like many modern heroes, the titular protagonist of Codrescu's latest novel knows neither what he wants nor where he's going. So when the devil appears, Wakefield, a...

The Priest.(Brief Article)(Book Review)
April 5, 2004... THE PRIEST FRANCINE RIVERS. Tyndale, $14.99 (240p) ISBN 0-8423-8265-8 In her Lineage of Grace series, the award-winning Rivers successfully explored the lives of five biblical women. Here, in the first of her Sons of Encouragement series,...

A Town Called Ruby Prairie.(Brief Article)(Book Review)
April 5, 2004... A TOWN CALLED RUBY PRAIRIE ANNETTE SMITH. Moody, $12.99 paper (256p) ISBN 0-8024-3557-2 In the first installment of the Coming Home to Ruby Prairie series, Smith dishes up a lightweight tale of smalltown life, sprinkled with plenty of...

Clearing the Aisle.(Brief Article)(Book Review)
April 5, 2004... CLEARING THE AISLE KAREN SCHWARTZ. Downtown Press, $13 paper (368p) ISBN 0-7434-7110-5 For 20-something Rachel Silverstein, finding the right guy to marry was the easy part--she'd known her now-fiance, whom she met during her freshman year...

Maid Marian.(Brief Article)(Book Review)
April 5, 2004... MAID MARIAN ELSA WATSON. Crown, $23.95 (307p) ISBN 1-4000-5041-3 Light and entertaining, if occasionally cloying, this debut novel presents an account of Maid Marian, the legendary romantic interest of Robin Hood. An orphaned heiress, Lady...

The Ocean Between Us.(Brief Article)(Book Review)
April 5, 2004... THE OCEAN BETWEEN US SUSAN WIGGS. Mira, $19.95 (384p) ISBN 0-7783-2035-9 A midlife marital crisis threatens the stability of a squeaky-clean navy family in Wiggs's latest, which overcomes a listless, saccharine start thanks to a rousing...

The Moon in Its Flight: Stories.(Brief Article)(Book Review)
April 5, 2004... THE MOON IN ITS FLIGHT GILBERT SORRENTINO. Coffee House, $16 paper (268p) ISBN 1-56689-152-3 This collection of new and old stories from poet and novelist Sorrentino (Mulligan Stew) hews to a self-consciously modernist agenda. Many of the...

A Loving Scoundrel: a Malory Novel.(Brief Article)(Book Review)
April 5, 2004... A LOVING SCOUNDREL: A Malory Novel JOHANNA LINDSEY. Atria, $25 (368p) ISBN 0-7434-5625-4 Lindsey's formula for bestselling historical romance features modern-thinking heroes and heroines in old-fashioned clothing, who meet in scenes...

The Grrl Genius Guide to Sex (With Other People).(Brief Article)(Book Review)
April 5, 2004... THE GRRL GENIUS GUIDE TO SEX (WITH OTHER PEOPLE) CATHRYN MICHON. St. Martin's, $23.95 (352p) ISBN 0-312-31638-0 In this rollicking romantic comedy-cum-self-help guide, Michon offers the disastrous escapades of her fictional alter ego, also...

The ABCs of Love.(Brief Article)(Book Review)
April 5, 2004... THE ABCs OF LOVE SARAH SALWAY. Ballantine, $12.95 paper (176p) ISBN 0-345-46703-5 Written in brief entries from "ambition" to "zzzz," Salway's confident debut novel chronicles the existential ups and downs of British 20-something Verity...