Michael Hainey’s memoir, After Visiting Friends, (S&S/Scribner) came out in February, was an IndieNext pick for March, racked up many admiring reviews, and is now gaining new fans. It was on the Today Show yesterday, and  will be reviewed in this Sunday’s NYT Book Review.

The book is about Hainey’s quest to find out what really happened to his father, a Chicago newspaperman, who died unexpectedly when the author was six years old. Reports simply stated that he had died “after visiting friends.”

Libraries are showing heavy holds on modest orders.

HBO has begun promotion for its Liberace biopic, Behind the Candelabra, which premieres on May 26th. It features Michael Douglas in the lead, with Matt Damon, as his lover, Scott Thorson (pictured, at left, on the cover of the March 15 issue of Entertainment Weekly).

It is based on Thorson’s 1988 memoir, Behind the Candelabra: My Life With Liberace, which is being re-released by Tantor Audio in three formats; print, audio, and ebook on May 2.

This may be the last film directed by Steven Soderbergh, who, after 26 films in 24 years, has announced he is taking a break from filmmaking and will turn his attention to other interests (among them, importing cognac from Bolivia. What may be his last theatrical film, Side Effects, is currently playing in theaters).

Interviewed in The Hollywood Reporter, the director says he is very happy with his swan song, “I think people are gonna be surprised at how intimate it is, and that there’s no attempt to make fun of them or … to make them seem like cartoons… at the end of the day, [it's just] two people in a room … there’s just a lot of rhinestone in it.”

An emotional segment featuring Susan Spencer-Wendel, author of the memoir, Until I Say Good-bye: My Year of Living with Joy, (Harper) was broadcast on The Today Show this morning. She has also been featured in USA Today and on NPR’s Weekend Edition. Upcoming is a feature on Inside Edition with Deborah Norville and another  in People

The book rose to #6 on Amazon sales rankings today and holds are growing in libraries.

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The subtitle of the book Wave only hints at the heartache that lies within; A Memoir of Life After the Tsunami (Rh/Knopf; RH Audio; BOT). In it, Sonali Deraniyagala, a British citizen originally from Sri Lanka, recounts how she struggled to cope with the loss of her husband, two sons, ages 5 and 7, and both her parents to that catastrophic event.

The book is currently receiving a round of media attention, with glowing reviews from Laura Miller in Salon, “a spare, radiant book … The extremity of Deraniyagala’s story seizes the attention, but it’s the beauty of how she expresses it that makes it indelible,” the NYT and a feature on NPR Morning Edition. It is also the #1 Amazon Editors’s pick for the month and is even considered “required reading” by the NY Post.

In spite of the attention, however, library holds are relatively light. The story may be a difficult sell, but as Miller attests, the writer’s “extraordinary gifts” reward those who are willing to try it.

Dr. Ben Carson has become the “New Conservative Folk Hero,” declares Atlantic magazine, since he confronted President Obama at the National Prayer Breakfast, a venue that isn’t known for making news (see below; as the Atlantic advises, “Things don’t get interesting for a while, so you might want to skip to about halfway through”).

The soon-to-retire head of pediatric neurosurgery at Johns Hopkins Hospital has even been called on to run for President in an editorial in the Wall Street Journal.

His latest book, America the Beautiful, published last year and now available in paperback (HarperCollins/Zondervan), has been in the top ten on Amazon for the last two weeks, rising as high as #1 and appears on the March 3 NYT Paperback Non-fiction Best Seller list at #12. Libraries are showing heavy holds.

Media attention is in the works; Carson appeared on NPR’s On Point today, he will appear on Glenn Beck’s internet TV show on Thursday and on FOX’s Lou Dobbs show.

Also on the rise are Carson’s other titles, also from Zondervan;

Gifted Hands: The Ben Carson Story by Ben Carson  (1992)

Gifted Hands, Kids Edition: The Ben Carson Story (ZonderKidz Biography) by Gregg Lewis and Deborah Shaw Lewis (2009)

Think Big: Unleashing Your Potential for Excellence by Ben Carson  (2005)

Take the Risk: Learning to Identify, Choose, and Live with Acceptable Risk by Ben Carson M.D. and Gregg Lewis (2007)

The Big Picture by Ben Carson and Gregg Lewis (2000)

Jenni Rivera, an American singer who became popular in Mexico for developing an “urban ranchera” style of music, was killed in a plane crash in December. Today, the Atria imprint of S&S announced that her memoir will be released in July, in both Spanish and English.

Both editions immediately moved up Amazon’s sales rankings, with the Spanish-language title, Inquebrantable, (S&S/Atria) rising higher, currently at #79, well above the English-language Unbreakable at #230.

This is just the second time we’ve seen a Spanish-language edition outstrip the English; the first was La Reina Del Sur, (Alfaguara), the tie-in to Telemundo’s popular 2011 telenovela. It did not break into Amazon’s Top 100, however.

Shirley MacLaine had “no comment” for ABC’s 20/20 Show on Friday’s interview with her daughter Sachi Parker about her book, Lucky Me: My Life With–and Without–My Mom, Shirley MacLaine, (Penguin/Gotham), which releases tomorrow.

It seems she’s changed her mind. A story in Entertainment Weekly‘s “Shelf Life” about some of the book’s “weirdest moments” includes this update:

EW has received a statement from MacLaine in response to allegations from the memoir: ‘It’s a painful moment for me as a mother and as someone who values the truth. I’m shocked and heartbroken that my daughter would make statements about me that are virtually all fiction. I’ve praised her lovingly and truthfully in my own autobiographies. I’m sorry to see such a dishonest, opportunistic effort from my daughter for whom I’ve only ever wanted the best.”

UPDATE: after reports that the video of the interview caused problems for those trying to browse using Internet Explorer, we have taken it down. Link to it here.

In the midst of a media blitz for his book, Hitmaker, (Hachette/Grand Central), music mogul Tommy Mottola appeared on the Today Show with Matt Lauer yesterday. Gossip columnists (and Lauer) are fascinated with the section of the book in which he apologizes to ex-wife Mariah Carey, but his career is as legendary as his personal life (check the Huffington Post interview and the New York Observer story).

The book is rising on Amazon Sales Rankings (currently at #143), but libraries are not showing holds.

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Getting a large boost from the latest of Tina Brown’s “Must Reads“ segments on NPR’s Morning Edition is Bend, Not Break: A Life in Two Worlds by Ping Fu and MeiMei Fox (Penguin/Portfolio, 12/21/12). Now at #33, it is moving up Amazon’s Sales Rankings and shows increased holds in libraries on modest ordering.

At eight years old, Ping Fu was taken from her parents during China’s Cultural Revolution and placed in a re-education camp, where she ate dung and dirt and endured gang rape. She survived, wrote a thesis about infanticide in China and, as a result, was forced out of the country. She came to the U.S. with next to nothing and went on to become a tech entrepreneur.

She was interviewed about her business on the Daily Beast yesterday:

 
Brown says of the book,”Her philosophical thoughts … her stoic ability to understand the patient lessons that she learned and apply them to her thoughts about survival and love … it’s very, very moving, indeed.”

Sonia Sotomayor had a lot going on these last two days. She conducted the official swearing in of the Vice President yesterday, followed by the ceremonial swearing in today. In between, she had to get to New York to speak at a Manhattan Barnes and Noble about her book, My Beloved World (RH/Knopf; RH Audio; BOT). In fact, according to Reuters, she had to leave Sunday’s event early to catch her train.

The book has received admiring reviews for Sotomayor’s candor about challenges she has faced and made a swift rise to #7 on Amazon’s Sales Rankings. The Spanish-language edition, Mi mundo adorado (Vintage Espanol) is also rising and is currently at #288.

Reviews:

NYT Book Review 

Washington Post

L.A. Times

NPR Morning Edition

The former commander of the forces in Afghanistan, General Stanley McChrystal, appears on on The Daily Show with Jon Stewart tonight.

His memoir, My Share of the Task, (Penguin/Portfolio), which was released yesterday, is already at #15 and rising on Amazon sales rankings, as a result of media attention, including McChrystal’s appearance on CBS Sunday Morning, coverage in the New York Times and a review in The Wall Street Journal.

He also made news today by supporting gun control on MSNBC’s Morning Joe.

We know how Janus felt; we had barely caught our breath from the multitude of 2012 best books lists (our selected links at right) when the first of  2013 reared their heads.

Huffington Post, “Best Books Of 2013?: Our Picks For The Year’s Biggest Reads”

The Atlantic, “Books to Look Forward to in 2013”

Flavorwire, “Flavorpill’s 30 Most Anticipated Books of 2013“

The Huffington Post gets it right that the title The World’s Strongest Librarian (Penguin/Gotham, May 2) will “win over bookstores and libraries;” it got our attention. Subtitled A Memoir of Tourette’s, Faith, Strength, and the Power of Family, it’s by Josh Hanagarne, a librarian at Salt Lake City Public Library who writes a blog about books and weight lifting.

Also on the HuffPo list, as well as Flavorpill’s, is a novelization of a life that is ripe for it, Zelda Fitzgerald’s (but, wait, haven’t dozens of others, including her husband, already done that?);  Z, by Therese Anne Fowler (Macmillan/St. Martin’s, March 26). Notes The Atlantic, “we’ll gladly read a hundred novelizations of her life. Especially if they’re all like this one, which lets us into a 17-year-old Zelda’s head.”

Anticipation is already high for Stephen King’s Dr. Sleep, the sequel to The Shining, coming on Sept. 24 (just before the premiere of the new film adaptation of his debut novel, Carrie) as well as  Elizabeth Strout’s The Burgess Boys,(Random House) her next novel after her 2009 Pulitzer  Prize winner, Olive Kitteridge.

On NPR’s Morning Edition today, cartoonist Ellen Forney talks about her memoir of her own mental illness in the graphic novel Marbles. Several libraries are showing heavy holds on light ordering.

The book is also on the Washington Post‘s list of the ten best comics of 2012.

Marbles: Mania, Depression, Michelangelo, and Me: A Graphic Memoir Ellen Forney Retail Price: $20.00 Paperback: 256 pages Publisher: Gotham – (2012-11-06) ISBN / EAN: 1592407323 / 9781592407323

Susannah Cahalan was a rising young NY Post reporter when she began to exhibit signs of schizophrenia. She was admitted to a hospital where a doctor finally diagnosed her as suffering from a rare brain disease that would have killed her if left untreated.

She talked about her experience two years ago on the Today Show, saying she hoped her story would help others. Indeed it did; the family of another young woman with similar symptoms was watching.

Susannah Cahalan published a memoir this week, Brain on Fire  (S&S/Free Press; Highbridge Audio), and appeared on the Today Show again this morning, this time with the young woman whose life was saved by her earlier appearance.

Additional interviews are scheduled this week for NPR’s Fresh Air and ABC’s Katie. The book is reviewed on the NPR web site.

Holds are heavy on light ordering in most libraries.

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Next week, new memoirs arrive from Pulitzer Prize winning novelist Richard Russo and romance author Daneille Steel, along with a posthumous essay collection from David Foster Wallace and historian Thomas E. Ricks’ critique of the American military since WWII.  Booker finalist Emma Donoghue also returns with a historical story collection. Usual suspects include  George R.R. Martin, Richard Paul Evans,  Karen Marie Moning, Jennifer Chiaverini, Newt Gingrich and William R. Forstchen, plus there’s a new young adult novel from Fiona Paul.

Memoirs

A Gift of Hope: Helping the Homeless by Danielle Steel (RH/Delacorte; Thorndike Large Print) is the perennially bestselling author’s memoir of the 11 years she has spent working anonymously with a small team to help the homeless people of San Francisco after her oldest son committed suicide. Kirkus says, “With poverty programs shutting down, while at the same time, more people are homeless, Steel has felt the need to drop her anonymity and go public. A simple but moving call for action.”

Elsewhere by Richard Russo (RH/Knopf; RH Audio; BOT Audio) is the Pulitzer Prize-winning author’s heartfelt memoir about his fraught relationship with his fascinating but difficult mother from his childhood through her death. Librarians on GalleyChat say it’s so good that they were hard-pressed to decide what to read after finishing it

Full of Heart: My Story of Survival, Strength, and Spirit by J.R. Martinez with Alexandra Rockey Fleming (Hyperion) is an inspirational memoir by an American soldier who served in Iraq and survived burns over more than one third of his body and went on to become a beloved Dancing with the Stars contest winner.

Nonfiction

Celebrate: A Year of Festivities for Families and Friends by Pippa Middleton (Penguin) is by Prince William’s sister-in-law. Her family’s business is party supplies, so she has some background. It’s already getting advance media attention.

The Generals: American Military Command from World War II to Today by Thomas E. Ricks (Penguin Press; Thorndike Large Print) chronicles the decline of U.S. military leadership over the last 70 years. PW says, “His faith in the ability of great generalship to redeem any misadventure can sometimes seem naive. Still, Ricks presents an incisive, hard-hitting corrective to unthinking veneration of American military prowess.” His previous titles, Fiasco and The Gamble were both best sellers.

Both Flesh and Not: Essays by David Foster Wallace (Hachette/Little, Brown; Hachette Audio; Thorndike Large Print) gathers 15 essays not published in book form, including  ”Federer Both Flesh and Not,” which many consider to be the author’s nonfiction masterpiece. 

Train Tracks: Holiday Stories by Michael Savage (Harper/ Morrow) is a collection of personal stories that celebrate family, home, and the holidays by the bestselling author and radio host.

Returning Favorites

Astray by Emma Donoghue (Hachette/Little Brown; Little Brown Large Print; Hachette Audio) is a story collection by the Booker prize finalist and million-copy bestseller Room. Set in Puritan Plymouth, Civil War America, and Victorian England among other locales, the stories turn on telling historical details inspired by newspapers and other documents. LJ says, “Donoghue has created masterly pieces that show what short fiction can do. Not just for devotees of the form.”

Usual Suspects

The Lands of Ice and Fire by George R.R. Martin (RH/Bantam) is a 16-page book of maps, intended for the gift market, but we are including it in case you get requests for the “new George R. R. Martin book.”

A Winter Dream by Richard Paul Evans (Simon & Schuster; Simon & Schuster Audio; Thorndike Large Print) is based on the Biblical story of Joseph and the coat of many colors – only this time Joseph is a CEO ousted from the family business. LJ says, “More sparkly holiday hope from the author of the outrageously best-selling The Christmas Box, soon appearing in a 20th-anniversary edition.”

Iced by Karen Marie Moning (RH/Delacorte) begins a much-anticipated new urban paranormal trilogy, set in the world of the author’s bestselling Fever series.

The Giving Quilt by Jennifer Chiaverini (Penguin/Dutton; Thorndike Large Print) finds the quilters at Elm Manor working on a Thanksgiving quilt to benefit a real charity that’s a favorite of the author. This one has been climbing in Amazon’s sales rankings, to #65 in contemporary women’s fiction.

Victory at Yorktown by Newt Gingrich and William R. Forstchen (Thomas Dunne Books; Macmillan Audio) is this duo’s third novel about George Washington during the Revolution. Kirkus says, “Augmented with character sketches of lesser-known patriots, the book brings Washington to life as a resolute and bold general.”

Young Adult

Venom by Fiona Paul (Penguin/Philomel) starts a romantic trilogy about a 15 year-old Contessa in Renaissance Venice who’s on the path to an arranged marriage when she falls in love with an artist who helps her investigate the murder of a friend. PW calls it “a steamy but fairly predictable romance.”

Movie Tie-ins

Les Miserables by Victor Hugo, translated by Norman Denny (Penguin Trade Paperback) ties into the film of the musical which arrives in theaters on Christmas Day. It stars Hugh Jackman, Russell Crowe, Anne Hathaway and amanda Seyfried.

On the Road: Movie Tie-in, by Jack Kerouac (Penguin Trade Pbk) ties into the movie arriving December 21. Directed by Walter Salles, it stars Garrett Hedlund, Sam Riley and Kirsten Stewart.