Publishers Weekly articles from August 2007

Publishers Weekly archives from August 2007

Despite 'Hallows,' booksellers still cautious: second-quarter gains could be aberration.(Foreword)(Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, Books-A-Million Inc. and Barnes & Noble Inc.)
August 27, 2007... Sales of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows provided the expected lift to second-quarter sales at Barnes & Noble and Books-A-Million, but it was difficult to determine if the increase in the period was anything more than a temporary uptick...

A conversation with Len Riggio.(Foreword)(Interview)
August 27, 2007... It's been 20 years since Barnes & Noble chairman Len Riggio acquired the B. Dalton Bookseller chain, a deal that moved B&N from a largely New York area bookseller to a national powerhouse. In an interview with PW's Judith Rosen. Riggio...

Potter aids Hastings.(Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows sales boost Hastings Entertainment Inc. earnings)(Brief article)
August 27, 2007... Total revenue at Hastings Entertainment rose 2.3%, to $125.9 million, in the second quarter ended July 31, helped by $1.8 million in sales from Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows. Net income jumped to $1.9 million, from $179,000 in the...

New Bantam Dell imprint.(Bantam Doubleday Dell Publishing Group Inc. service which will publish titles simultaneously in trade and mass market paperback)(Brief article)
August 27, 2007... Bantam Dell is launching an imprint in February that will publish titles simultaneously in trade and mass market paperback. Bantam Discovery will release one title every month in both formats, beginning with Tess Stimson's The Adultery Club....

Who's reading what.(Foreword)(book preferences, New Yorker Festival)
August 27, 2007... Here's a newsflash for you: reading for pleasure is dead. We first heard about this, officially, a couple of years ago, when the NEA released its Reading at Risk survey, which concluded that 57% of Americans hadn't read a book in a year....

B&N stores avoiding 'Did It'.(Barnes & Noble Inc., If I Did It book)(Brief article)
August 27, 2007... Explaining that it doesn't believe there will be strong demand for If I Did It, Barnes & Noble will not carry the book in its traditional bookstores, although it will offer the title through barnesandnoble. com. Amazon will carry the book, as...

Globe buys Footprint.(Globe Pequot Press Inc. acquires Footprint Handbooks)(Brief article)
August 27, 2007... Globe Pequot Press has acquired Footprint Books, located in Bath, England, to strengthen its international travel list. Founded in 1924, Footprint has a backlist of 80 titles. Including revisions, GPP plans to publish 20 Footprint guides a...

T&F adds productivity.(Taylor and Francis Group PLC acquires Productivity Press Inc.)(Brief article)
August 27, 2007... A week after agreeing to acquire Howath Press, Taylor & Francis has bought Productivity Press. Productivity, based in New York City, publishes books designed to improve business practices, primarily in manufacturing, and has about 200 titles....

High School Musical.(By the Numbers)(merchandise)(Brief article)
August 27, 2007... 4.5 million: Number of High School Musical books sold by Disney worldwide. 3 million: Number of HSM 1- and 2-related titles sold in U.S. 60+: Number of HSM-related titles currently published by Disney worldwide. 33: Number of...

Harwood joins Borders.(Susan Harwood of Borders Group Inc.)(Brief article)
August 27, 2007... Borders Group has appointed Susan Harwood its new CIO. Formerly v-p of information technology at Books-A-Million, Harwood will oversee all of Borders's technology operations as well as take part in the relaunch of Borders.com, which is set...

Maguire Scholarship.(Elizabeth A. Maguire Scholarship Fund)(Brief article)
August 27, 2007... The Perseus Books Group has established the Elizabeth A. Maguire Scholarship Fund to honor the memory of Maguire, the v-p and publisher of Basic Books who died in April 2006 of ovarian cancer. The scholarship will provide aid to students...

Corrections.(Correction notice)
August 27, 2007... The War: An Intimate History 1941-1945, which Knopf will publish in September, is written by Geoffrey Ward. Our brief bio accompanying an essay by Ken Burns (PW, Aug. 20) stated erroneously that Burns was the author; in fact, he wrote the...

Grossman to Viking.(Deals)(Lev Grossman sold novel The Magicians to Viking)(Brief article)
August 27, 2007... Time book critic Lev Grossman has sold a new novel, The Magicians, to Molly Stern at Viking, in an auction conducted by Tina Bennett at Janklow & Nesbit. In the book, a brilliant and bookish young man unexpectedly finds himself admitted to a...

Current affairs.(Deals)(New York Times correspondent David E. Sanger's deal for his book The Inheritance: The World America Now Faces)(Brief article)
August 27, 2007... Chief Washington correspondent for the New York Times David E. Sanger has made a deal with Harmony's John Glusman for his first book, The Inheritance: The World America Now Faces. Michael Carlisle at Inkwell sold North American rights....

Rabbis and witches.(Deals)(The Book of Getting Even; A Light Far-Shining: A Novel of the Pendle Witches)(Brief article)
August 27, 2007... Roland Pease at Steefforth acquired world rights to the next novel by Benjamin Taylor, The Book of Getting Even, from agent Wendy Strothman. Set in the 1970s, the book follows the son of a New Orleans rabbi, a budding astronomer, who, on his...

A YA prophecy.(Deals)(world rights to The Prophecy of the Sisters book for young adults)(Brief article)
August 27, 2007... Nancy Conescu at Little, Brown for Young Readers has preempted world rights to The Prophecy of the Sisters, a YA gothic thriller trilogy by debut author Michelle Zink; Steven Malk at Writers House made the six-figure deal. The first book in...

Double Dijkstra.(Deals)(Sandra Dijkstra)(Brief article)
August 27, 2007... Agent Sandra Dijkstra has sold Kevin Maney's The Swap to Roger Scholl at Doubleday, who took North American rights. Maney, contributing editor at Conde Nast Portfolio and longtime tech columnist for USA Today, will examine the delicate...

Calendar: Sept. 2-8.(books and writers)(Brief article)(Calendar)
August 27, 2007... 9/2 Eliot Schrefer's The New Kid (S&S) is being called a new Talented Mr. Ripley. PW said Schrefer's "smart writing and a decadent world make for a genuine if guilty pleasure." 9/4 Knopf set a 750,000 first printing for Bill...

Led by India, exports rise 7%.(At Six Months)(book distribution)(Table)
August 27, 2007... Book exports rose 7.2%, to $974.0 million, in the first half of 2007, according to estimates from the U.S. Department of Commerce. Shipments to India shot up the most in the period, to $22 million, making the fast-growing country the seventh...

Midwest Connections builds bridges.(Collaborating)(marketing program)
August 27, 2007... One after the Midwest Booksellers Association launched its ambitious Midwest Connections regional marketing program, publishers and booksellers report that the program has increased visibility for the 13 titles that have been named as Midwest...

Bennett, Simonoff up at Janklow.(People)(Janklow & Nesbit's new directors)(Brief article)
August 27, 2007... Tina Bennett and Eric Simonoff have been promoted to directors at literary agency Janklow & Nesbit. Bennett reps authors Malcolm Gladwell, Laura Hillenbrand and others, while Simonoff counts Edward P. Jones and Jhumpa Lahiri among his clients.

Daniels to B&N.(People)(Jennifer Daniels of Barnes & Noble)(Brief article)
August 27, 2007... Jennifer Daniels has been named general counsel and secretary of the board of directors at Barnes & Noble. Daniels arrives from IBM, where she worked in the company's legal department for the past 16 years.

Together again.(Foreword)(founders of PMA, the Independent Book Publishers Association)(Brief article)(Photograph)
August 27, 2007... Five of the founders of PMA attended the memorial service August 17for the late association director Jan Nathan. Pictured left to right are Peggy Glenn, Firefighters Bookstore; Jim Levitt, PW; Carolyn Porter, Film-Video Publications; Kiran...

Ulysses Press builds on 'Mugglenet'.(Cashing In)(Mugglenet.com)
August 27, 2007... With more than 335,000 copies of Mugglenet.com's What Will Happen in Harry Potter 7 in print since its November 2006 publication, Berkeley, Calif.-based Ulysses Press plans to use the more than $2 million it will earn from its bestselling...

Kieling up at Bloomberg.(People)(Jared Kieling, Bloomberg Press)(Brief article)
August 27, 2007... Jared Kieling has been promoted from editorial director to publisher of Bloomberg. Also, Mary Ann McGuigan has been promoted from executive editor to editorial director.

Clarifications.(Correction notice)
August 27, 2007... To Sara Nelson's August 20 editorial: Midpoint, a distributor, is a separate company from Beaufort Books, a publisher. Eric Kampmann is a 52% owner of Midpoint and owns 100% of Beaufort Books. Beaufort's books are distributed by Midpoint. ...

Hardcover bestsellers/fiction.
August 27, 2007... Timing has worked for Brown this summer. First came the release of the Pocket edition of Ricochet, which hit the #1 spot on PW's mass market list (Aug. 6), followed this week by Play Dirty at #2. The book's plot is ripped from current...

Hardcover bestsellers/nonfiction.
August 27, 2007... Published May 15, The Abs Diet for Women has been on the bestseller radar screen for the past few months, but what placed it on the top 15 nonfiction top sellers was a recent 20/20 segment that featured a couple who lost about 30 pounds...

Paperback bestsellers/mass market.
August 27, 2007... Scott Spencer's debut novel, A Simple Plan, was published in 1993 and his second novel, The Ruins, 13 years later. On his Web site, he talks about what he worked on in the intervening years: "I spent five years working on a novel, which ended...

Paperback bestsellers/trade.
August 27, 2007... Things are still going swimmingly for Water for Elephants. It marks 18 weeks on PW's list, half of that time in the #1 spot. Algonquin is currently in its 14th printing, for a total of 942,000 copies. The book won both the Great Lakes...

Children's series and tie-ins bestsellers.
August 27, 2007... Get ready to hear a lot more about The Golden Compass in the months ahead. The book has already sold 2.5 million copies (the His Dark Materials trilogy has sold five million), and the New Line movie, starring Nicole Kidman and Daniel Craig,...

Audio bestsellers/fiction.(audiobooks)
August 27, 2007... Even after all the Harry Potter July 21 release hoopla has died down, the boy wizard's tales on audio still cast a long shadow on our list. The six previous titles in the series--likely taken along to the beach and on many family...

Audio bestsellers/nonfiction.(audiobooks)
August 27, 2007... Dyer, a perennial favorite of PBS viewers, gets an audiobook boost thanks to the debut of his latest special/ lecture for public television, Change Your Thoughts, Change Your Life, which aired nationwide in August. Those who seek more...

North Dakota.(United States of Bookselling)(book stores)
August 27, 2007... With 634,000 residents spread out over 70,000 square miles, 90% of it farmland, North Dakota averages only nine inhabitants per square mile--well below the national average of 80 persons per square mile. Because of its weak economy, harsh...

A flurry of sales for voyageur.(Independent Publishing)
August 27, 2007... A Caltech physics professor's fascination with the physics of snowflakes has become a hot-selling franchise for Minnesota's Voyageur Press, one of three imprints of MBI Publishing in St. Paul. Published with an 18,000-copy initial print...

Reigning cats and dogs: with all the attention from publishers, you'd think pets could read.(Pet Care)
August 27, 2007... In the words of Houghton Mifflin senior editor Susan Canavan, "There's no mistake about it: people have more thoughtful relationships with their pets than ever before." And thereby hangs a tail: dogs and cats have taken up residence in...

The Jack Kerouac I knew: in a forthcoming book, Jack Kerouac's agent reflects on the four years he spent shopping On the Road.(Cover story)
August 27, 2007... It was autumn of 1951, and I had been warned that Jack would be coming in. Two weeks earlier, Bob Giroux, of Harcourt, Brace, had called me. Giroux had edited The Town and the City, Jack's first and conventional novel. Jack had just been...

Writing what he knows.(Author Profile)(Richard Russo)(Interview)
August 27, 2007... On Richard Russo's last day on the job, in his final summer doing manual labor during college breaks, one of the carpenters on his crew told him, "Have a good life. You're going to go out and do other things, and you're going to forget about...

Adaptation infinitum.(Fall Movie Tie-Ins)
August 27, 2007... D.H. Lawrence. Cormac McCarthy. Gabriel Garcia Marquez. Ian McEwan. Books by all these authors and more. are hitting screens this fall, in all genres: horror (Stephen King), suspense (Dennis Lehane), fantasy (Philip Pullman), sci-fi (Richard...

Printing in Italy: rare is the high-end art/photography book publisher, catalogue publisher or museum that doesn't have Italian printers on its favorite supplier list.(Printing in Italy 2007)(Graphicom, LEGO Group, Mondadori Printing, Printer Trento, Stabilimenti Tipografici Carlo Colombo, )(Company overview)
August 27, 2007... In the year 1471, Italian printers became truly their own masters. Before then, printing work was carried out by about 100 German typographers living in Italian cities. History, however, wasn't so sure who was Italy's first native printer:...

Harriet and Isabella.(Brief article)(Book review)
August 27, 2007... Harriet and Isabella PATRICIA O'BRIEN. Touchstone, $25 (352p) ISBN 978-1-4165-5220-8 Smooth flashbacks carry this inventive romp through a 19th-century New England scandal, which opens at the deathbed of Henry Ward Beecher, "the...

Beautiful Children.(Brief article)(Book review)
August 27, 2007... Beautiful Children CHARLES BOCK. Random, $24.95 (432p) ISBN 978-1-4000-6650-6 A wide-ranging portrait of an almost mythically depraved Las Vegas, this sweeping debut takes in everything from the bland misery of suburban Nevada to the...

The Devil's Footprints.(Brief article)(Book review)
August 27, 2007... The Devil's Footprints JOHN BURNSIDE. Doubleday/Talese, $23.95 (240p) ISBN 978-0-385-52209-0 In Burnside's first novel since his acclaimed memoir A Lie About My Father, random acts of cruelty unearth a town's dark secrets. In the...

Gods Behaving Badly.(Brief article)(Book review)
August 27, 2007... Gods Behaving Badly MARIE PHILLIPS. Little, Brown, $23.99 (288p) ISBN 978-0-316-06762-1 British blogger Phillips's delightful debut finds the Greek gods and goddesses living in a tumbledown house in modern-day London and facing a...

Stone Cold.(Brief article)(Book review)
August 27, 2007... * Stone Cold DAVID BALDACCI. Grand Central, $26.99 (400p) ISBN 978-0-446-57739-7 The modern-day paladins of the Camel Club are back in their third exciting adventure (after 2006's The Collectors). Justice-seekers Milton, Caleb,...

The Race.(Brief article)(Book review)
August 27, 2007... The Race RICHARD NORTH PATTERSON. Holt, $26 (352p) ISBN 978-0-8050-7948-7 Leaving courtroom thrills behind, Patterson crafts an absorbing and suspenseful account of a dirty run for the Republican presidential nomination. Sen. Corey...

The Almost Moon.(Brief article)(Book review)
August 27, 2007... The Almost Moon ALICE SEBOLD. Little, Brown, $24.99 (304p) ISBN 978-0-316-67746-2 Sebold's disappointing second novel (after much-lauded The Lovely Bones) opens with the narrator's statement that she has killed her mother. Helen...

The Best American Short Stories 2007.(Brief article)(Book review)
August 27, 2007... The Best American Short Stories 2007 EDITED BY STEPHEN KING WITH SERIES EDITOR HEIDI PITLOR. Houghton Mifflin, (448p) $28 cloth ISBN 978-0-618-71347-9; $14 paper ISBN 978-0-618-71348-6 King admits in his introduction that he prefers...

Options: The Secret Life of Steve Jobs: A Parody.(Brief article)(Book review)
August 27, 2007... Options: The Secret Life of Steve Jobs: A Parody FAKE STEVE JOBS. Da Capo, $22.95 (256p) ISBN 978-0-306-81584-3 In this tedious parody of the life of Apple founder Steve Jobs, the pseudonymous Fake Steve Jobs (identified in the New...

Bowl of Cherries.(Brief article)(Book review)
August 27, 2007... * Bowl of Cherries MILLARD KAUFMAN. McSweeney's, $22 (334p) ISBN 078-1-932416-83-1 Nonagenarian Kaufman--twice nominated for screenwriting Oscars in the 1950s and a cocreator of Mr. Magoo-makes his fiction debut with this...

The Dilemma.(Brief article)(Book review)
August 27, 2007... The Dilemma PENNY VINCENZI. Overlook, $25.95 (662p) ISBN 978-1-58567-949-6 The prologue to this robust, complex family drama--first published in the U.K. in 1996 by the bestselling author of Sheer Abandon--finds wealthy, charismatic...

Pandora's Daughter.(Brief article)(Book review)
August 27, 2007... Pandora's Daughter IRIS JOHANSEN. St. Martin's, $25.95 (384p) ISBN 978-0-312-36804-3 Orphaned at 15 and raised by her Uncle Phillip, the adult Megan Blair is an Atlanta pediatrician who hears terrified voices. Revelation comes when...

The Last Secret of the Temple.(Brief article)(Book review)
August 27, 2007... The Last Secret of the Temple PAUL SUSSMAN. Atlantic Monthly, $24 (560p) ISBN 978-0-87113-972-6 A bestseller overseas, Sussman's follow-up to The Lost Army of the Cambyses opens at Jerusalem's Holy Temple in the year 70, jumps to...

Redemption.(Brief article)(Book review)
August 27, 2007... Redemption LEE JACKSON. St. Martin's Minotaur, $24.95 (288p) ISBN 978-0-312-36344-4 Set a few years in the future, Jackson's fiction debut zeroes in on a small Montana town squeezed by economic strife and sharply curtailed civil...

The Courtyard.(Brief article)(Book review)
August 27, 2007... The Courtyard MARCIA WILLETT. St. Martin's/Dunne, $13.95 paper (368p) ISBN 978-0-81230668-7 A chance tea shop meeting between an elderly pensioner and a beautiful young mother blossoms into friendship in this treat from British...

The Winter of the World.(Brief article)(Book review)
August 27, 2007... The Winter of the World CAROL ANN LEE. Harper Perennial, $13.95 paper (336p) ISBN 978-0-06123881-9 A British biographer of Anne Frank (Rose of the Earth), Lee opens her fiction debut with an enormous 1920 London funeral procession...

Waterbaby.(Brief article)(Book review)
August 27, 2007... Waterbaby CRIS MAZZA. Soft Skull, $14.95 paper (320p) ISBN 978-1-933368-84-9 Titled after the Charles Kingsley fairy tale, this dizzying novel opens on epileptic, prematurely retired Tam Marr-Burgess, who is "pushing 46," and whose...

Strange as This Weather Has Been.(Brief article)(Book review)
August 27, 2007... Strange as This Weather Has Been ANN PANCAKE. Shoemaker & Hoard, $14.95 paper (357p) ISBN 978-1-59376166-0 A hard-living Appalachian family weathers a contemporary coal boom in the debut from West Virginia native Pancake. Soon after...

When to Walk.(Brief article)(Book review)
August 27, 2007... When to Walk REBECCA GOWERS. Canongate, $14 paper (240p) ISBN 978-1-84195-946-7 British writer Gowers follows her nonfiction work on Victorian criminals, The Swamp of Death, with a fictive weeklong journey inside the head of Ramble,...

Jazz & Twelve O'Clock Tales: New Stories.(Brief article)(Book review)
August 27, 2007... Jazz & Twelve O'Clock Tales: New Stories WANDA COLEMAN. Black Sparrow, $24.95 (160p) ISBN 978-1-57423-212-7 The sharpest stories from Coleman, a 2001 National Book Award finalist in poetry for Mercurochrome, provide unsettlingly...

A Northern Thunder.(Brief article)(Book review)
August 27, 2007... A Northern Thunder ANDY HARP. Bancroft, $25 (288p) ISBN 978-1-890862-53-4 In Harp's debut, Will Parker, a small-town Georgia lawyer and Desert Storm Marine vet, is recruited for a dangerous mission: to identify and photograph a...

Bloodfever.(Brief article)(Book review)
August 27, 2007... Bloodfever KAREN MARIE MONING. Delacorte, $22 (320p) ISBN 978-0-385-33916-2 Monig's latest feverish Fae dispatch (after Darkfever) finds that in Dublin "the walls are coming down between Man and Faery." That means that the Buffy-like...

Twisted Sister.(Brief article)(Book review)
August 27, 2007... Twisted Sister NATALIE M. ROBERTS. Five Star, $25.95 (328p) ISBN 978-1-59414-573-5 In this solid sequel to Sisterwife, Roberts brings back Kelsey Waite, a single Mormon mom, and her daughter, Tia, who are happily living as a family...

Absolution.(Brief article)(Book review)
August 27, 2007... Absolution MIRIAM HERIN. Novello Festival (John F. Blair, dist.), $22.95 (320p) ISBN 978-0-9760963-9-9 This impressive Novello Literary Award-winning debut skillfully combines a contemporary courtroom thriller with a subtle look back...

Frankenstein's Bride.(Brief article)(Book review)
August 27, 2007... Frankenstein's Bride HILARY BAILEY. Sourcebooks, $16.95 paper (512p) ISBN 978-1-4022-0870-6 Set in London in 1825, this labored rift on Mary Shelley's horror masterpiece shows the potential pitfalls authors face when writing sequels...

Honeymoon Husband.(Brief article)(Book review)
August 27, 2007... Honeymoon Husband SHIRLEY MARKS. Avalon, $21.95 (192p) ISBN 978-0-8034-9852-5 Blue-eyed blonde naif Hannah Roberts can't believe her luck when she wins a Hawaiian wedding trip. She also can't believe it when Earl, her fiance of five...

Lovestoned.(Brief article)(Book review)
August 27, 2007... Lovestoned T.P. CARTER. Kensington/Dafina, $15 paper (352p) ISBN 978-0-7582-1429-4 Carter (Behind Those Eyes) explores the life of Islam, a tortured American artist who leaves his adopted London for hometown New York City to...

The Wednesday Letters.(Brief article)(Book review)
August 27, 2007... The Wednesday Letters JASON F. WRIGHT. Shadow Mountain (shadowmountain.com), $19.95 (304p) ISBN 978-1-59038-812-9 In the wake of his bestselling Christmas Jars comes a sweetly crafted story from Wright, a Virginia businessman. Jack...

After the Leaves Fall.(Brief article)(Book review)
August 27, 2007... After the Leaves Fall NICOLE BAART. Tyndale, $12.99 paper (350p) ISBN 978-1-4143-1622-2 In her promising debut novel, Baart writes compellingly about a young girl's struggle with loss, love, identity and faith. Julia Bakker knows...

The Deadly Neighbors.(Brief article)(Book review)
August 27, 2007... The Deadly Neighbors MERRY JONES. St. Martin's Minotaur/ Dunne, $24.95 (384p) ISBN 978-0-312-35621-7 Jones's intense third Zoe Hayes mystery (after 2006's The River Killings) finds Zoe, a therapist and pregnant single mom, visiting...

Bowled Over.(Brief article)(Book review)
August 27, 2007... Bowled Over KASEY MICHAELS. Kensington, $14 paper (304p) ISBN 078-0-7582-0884-2 In this entertaining sixth Maggie Kelly mystery (after 2006's High Heels and Holidays), the scatterbrained mystery novelist faces a more dysfunctional...

The Snake Stone.(Brief article)(Book review)
August 27, 2007... * The Snake Stone JASON GOODWIN. Crichton/Farrar, Straus & Giroux, $25 (320p) ISBN 978-0-374-29935-4 Early 19th-century Istanbul's teeming mix of nationalities, religions and cultures comes alive in this vibrant sequel to the...

False Witness: A Sister Agatha Mystery.(Brief article)(Book review)
August 27, 2007... False Witness: A Sister Agatha Mystery AIMEE AND DAVID THURLO. St. Martin's Minotaur, $23.95 (272p) ISBN 978-0-312-32212-0 The pallid fourth Sister Agatha mystery from the Thurlo husband-and-wife team (after 2006's Prey for a...

Candy Cane Murder.(Brief article)(Book review)
August 27, 2007... Candy Cane Murder JOANNE FLUKE, LAURA LEVINE AND LESLIE MEIER. Kensington, $16 paper (304) ISBN 978-0-7582-2198-8 Three big-name cozy writers contribute candy cane-themed novellas to this entertaining yuletide anthology. Levine's...

The Devil's Whisper.(Brief article)(Book review)
August 27, 2007... * The Devil's Whisper MIYUKI MIYABE, TRANS. FROM THE JAPANESE BY DEBORAH STUHR IWABUCHI. Kodansha, $24.95 (256p) ISBN 978-4-7700-3053-5 Miyabe (All She Was Worth), Japan's bestselling mystery author, should garner new fans in the...

Loving Memory.(Brief article)(Book review)
August 27, 2007... Loving Memory GERALD HAMMOND. Severn, $27.95 (192p) ISBN 978-0-7278-6534-2 A stolen memory card leads Edinburgh's Det. Insp. Honey Laird out of maternity leave and into a murder investigation in this undistinguished mystery from...

The Octopus on My Head.(Brief article)(Book review)
August 27, 2007... The Octopus on My Head JIM NISBET. Dennis McMillan (www. dennismcmillan.com), $35 (236p) ISBN 978-0-939767-57-1 Black tar heroin and murder infuse this quirky, highly literary novel, as smalltime San Francisco guitarist Curly Watkins...

A War of Gifts: An Ender Story.(Brief article)(Book review)
August 27, 2007... A War of Gifts: An Ender Story ORSON SCOTT CARD. Tor, $12.95 (128p) ISBN 978-0-7653-1282-2 Card returns to his Hugo and Nebula award-winning Enderverse saga (after 2005's Shadow of the Giant) with a heartwarming novella for the...

Nova Swing.(Brief article)(Book review)
August 27, 2007... * Nova Swing M. JOHN HARRISON. Bantam Spectra, $16 paper (272p) ISBN 978-0-S53-385014 In this dense quasi-noir tale set in the universe of Light (2004), Harrison introduces Vic Serotonin, a ne'er-do-well who makes his living running...

Fatal Revenant: Book Two of The Last Chronicles of Thomas Covenant.(Brief article)(Book review)
August 27, 2007... Fatal Revenant: Book Two of The Last Chronicles of Thomas Covenant STEPHEN R. DONALDSON. Putnam, $27.95 (640p) ISBN 978-0-399-15446-1 This thought-provoking sequel to 2004's The Runes of Earth opens with a bang. Watching from the...

The Merchants' War: Book Three of the Merchant Princes.(Brief article)(Book review)
August 27, 2007... The Merchants' War: Book Three of the Merchant Princes CHARLES STROSS. Tor, $24.95 (336p) ISBN 978-0-7653-1671-4 Readers unfamiliar with Stross's Clan Corporate (2006) and its predecessors should hunt them down before diving into this...

Empyre.(Brief article)(Book review)
August 27, 2007... Empyre JOSH CONVISER. Del Rey, $13.95 paper (304p) ISBR 978-0-345-48503-8 Robert Ludlum meets William Gibson in this dystopian spy thriller, the sequel to 2006's Echelon. Five years after taking down the corrupt, world-controlling...

Air Apparent.(Brief article)(Book review)
August 27, 2007... Air Apparent PIERS ANTHONY. Tot, $24.95 (320p) ISBN 978-0-7653-0410-0 In this meandering 31st Xanth novel, Hugo, son of the Gorgon and Good Magician Humfrey, vanishes from his cellar, where the body of a murdered man just as suddenly...

PW talks with Catherynne M. Valente: giving monsters a voice: turning traditional fairy tales inside out, Tiptree Award--winner Valente lets witches, demons and beasts tell their own stories of seeking--and not always finding--happily ever after.(Q&A)(Interview)
August 27, 2007... The tone of In the Cities of Coins and Spice (Reviews, Aug. 20) is much darker than the first Orphan's Tales book, In the Night Garden. Was that intentional? Yes. To some extent I knew that I wanted to have the first half of the second...