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One of the key opposition leaders in Egypt is Mohamed ElBaradei. In March of 2010, he signed a deal with Holt’s Metropolitan Books imprint to publish a book on nuclear diplomacy in Iran, Iraq and North Korea.
Originally scheduled for release in June, the publisher just announced that the release date has been moved to April 26th; several blogs, including the Washington Post‘s Political Bookworm and the NYTArtsBeat, have reported the news.
The movie version of the best-selling book Abraham Lincoln, Vampire Hunter, directed by Timur Bekmanbetov, with Tim Burton as one of the producers, is being called one of the hottest projects in Hollywood right now. Last week, Benjamin Walker was announced as the lead; yesterday, it was reported that Joaquin Phoenix is the front runner for the part of Henry Sturgess, Honest Abe’s vampire-killing mentor.
Two other film takes on our 16th president are also in the works. Steven Spielberg is set to direct Lincoln, based on Doris Kearns Goodwin’s Team of Rivals, with Daniel Day-Lewis in the lead.
Coming April 15 is the Robert Redford film Conspirator, about Mary Surratt, the lone woman accused of conspiring in the assassination plot. Robin Wright plays Surratt, Evan Rachel Wood her daughter Anna and Kevin Kline plays Secretary of War Edwin Stanton. Lincoln is played by Lincoln impersonator Gerald Bestron. Since the majority of the film’s story takes place after the assassination, however, his screen time will be relatively short.
Conspirator is not based on a specific book, although, of course, there are many books on the assassination and several on Surratt specifically.
Abraham Verghese’s Cutting for Stone, at #4 the NYT Paperback Trade Fiction Best Seller list after 52 weeks, has just been optioned for a movie by Anonymous Content, the production group behind the Oscar Best Picture nominee, Winters Bone.
Librarians embraced the book, beginning with Verghese appearance at ALA Midwinter 2009 in Denver, where he spoke at the Breakfast and BookTalk sponsored by the AAP Trade Libraries Committee.
NPR announces that they are starting a “a book-club-meets-social-media experiment.”
Via Facebook, Twitter and NPR.org throughout February, readers of Laura Hillenbrand’s Unbroken can join guided discussions about the book (details at npr.org/bookclub). At the end of the month, there will be a live chat with Hillenbrand.
The NPR site also mentions, that you can “join in to discuss the book in your own community,” which may be an interesting opportunity for library book clubs. More details are promised soon.
Here at EarlyWord, we’re continuing our own experiment in social networking with GalleyChat the first Tuesday of every month. Please join us today, 4 to 5 p.m., Eastern, to find out whichmnew galleys other librarians are reading. Details at earlyword.com/galleychat.
How about you? Are you using social networking for book discussions or other library activities? Tell us what you are doing in the comments section.
