EarlyWord

Kitty Kelley, author of an unauthorized bio of Oprah, releasing tomorrow, has famously not been invited to many TV talk shows that usually vie for such high-profile books. The only show it is booked for is the Today Show this morning.

As of Friday, the book was in the 300’s on Amazon sales rankings and few details had been released (the media was a bit distracted by Oprah’s announcement that she is planning to host a prime-time show on her new network, OWN, which debuts in January).

But the print media has not been so reticent. Over the weekend, details began to leak and the book broke into the Top  20 on Amazon. It’s currently at #16, just behind David Remnick’s bio of Barack Obama (which is the lead review of the NYT BR this week) and well behind books about the founders that Glenn Beck is currently promoting. Today, the New Yorker, USA Today and the New York Times‘ Janet Maslin all parse Oprah, the book.

So, what’s the big “revalations”?

• Oprah won’t give her mother her phone number (but she does have people check on her daily, gives her a car and driver and provides her with $500 hats) –the UK’s Times Live
• Kelley names the boy Oprah gave birth to at 14 (or 15, sources differ. He died just weeks after he was born) — New York Times Magazine
• She once ordered two pecan pies and ate them both — New York Times Magazine
• Oprah lived with John Tesh briefely when they were both in Nashville (the New York Daily News)
• Kelley found out the name of Oprah’s father, but is not revealing it in the book (Janet Maslin, the NYT)
• Is she a lesbian? Kelley raises the question, but doesn’t give a definitive answer (the New Yorker)
• Her cousin claims that the sexual abuse Oprah has been open about just didn’t happen (USA Today)

Damning with faint praise, Maslin says,

After some hollow authorial claims of respect and admiration, Oprah just aims for the jugular. It doesn’t draw blood.

Part of the problem is that much of this has been revealed already, often by Oprah herself; the dieting, the James Frey brouhaha; “Ms. Kelley simply replays the televised version. She has nothing new to add to these stories.”

Library holds are averaging 1:1.

Oprah: A Biography Kitty Kelley Retail Price: $30.00 Hardcover: 544 pages Publisher: Crown – (2010-04-13) ISBN / EAN: 0307394867 / 9780307394866

Large Print from Random House

• $30; ISBN 9780739377857

Audio from Random House Audio

• CD: $50; ISBN 9780307749246

Celebrating her first appearance at #1 on the hardcover NYT best seller list this week is Patricia Briggs, for Silver Borne, the fifth book in her Mercy Thompson series, about a shapeshifter and auto mechanic in Washington State.

Silver Borne (Mercy Thompson, Book 5) Patricia Briggs Retail Price: $24.95 Hardcover: 352 pages Publisher: Ace Hardcover – (2010-03-30) ISBN / EAN: 044101819X / 9780441018192

Penguin Audio; UNABR; ISBN 9781101192566; $39.95
Audio downloadable from OverDrive

At #2 after 53 weeks on the list (and the paperback still not in sight) is The Help by Kathryn Stockett. It was last at #1 two weeks ago.

Ian McEwan’s Solar has been getting dozens of reviews (Entertainment Weekly said this black comedy is “… the funniest book Ian McEwan has ever written, though granted that’s faint praise given the things his characters have done to corpses over the years”). It hits the list at #6.

Solar Ian McEwan Retail Price: $26.95 Hardcover: 304 pages Publisher: Nan A. Talese – (2010-03-30) ISBN / EAN: 0385533411 / 9780385533416

Large Print; 978-0-7393-7778-9; $27
Adobe EPUB eBook downloadable from OverDrive

Slipping to #15 after four weeks is Viking’s big bet of the season, Angelology.

Jonathan Kellerman’s new Alex Delaware title, Deception, arrives at #4.

Deception: An Alex Delaware Novel Jonathan Kellerman Retail Price: $28.00 Hardcover: 352 pages Publisher: Ballantine Books – (2010-03-30) ISBN / EAN: 0345505670 / 9780345505675

RH Audio; UNABR; 9780739368954; $45
Audio and Adobe EPUB eBook available from OverDrive.

PBS is beginning a week of programming about the Holocaust with a new adaptation of Anne Frank: The Diary of a Young Girl this Sunday, which is Holocaust Remembrance Day; all of the programs are based on books.

Monday, April 12

Among the Righteous, a documentary about Arabs who protected Jews during the Holocaust.

Among the Righteous: Lost Stories from the Holocaust’s Long Reach into Arab Lands ROBERT SATLOFF Retail Price: $26.00 Hardcover: 251 pages Publisher: PublicAffairs – (2006-10-30) ISBN / EAN: 1586483994 / 9781586483999

Tuesday, April 13

Blessed Is the Match, a documentary based on the diary of Hannah Senesh, who, at age 22,  parachuted into Nazi-occupied Europe to save the Hungarian Jews.

Hannah Senesh: Her Life and Diary, the First Complete Edition Hannah Senesh Retail Price: $19.99 Paperback: 325 pages Publisher: Jewish Lights Publishing – (2007-08-30) ISBN / EAN: 1580233422 / 9781580233422

Wednesday, April 14

Worse Than War, a documentary about state-sponsored genocide, from the Holocaust to Rwanda to Darfur, based on the book of the same title.

Worse Than War: Genocide, Eliminationism, and the Ongoing Assault on Humanity Daniel Jonah Goldhagen Retail Price: $29.95 Hardcover: 672 pages Publisher: PublicAffairs – (2009-10-06) ISBN / EAN: 1586487698 / 9781586487690

Kitty Kelley’s Oprah: A Biography goes on sale next week, but it may get short shrift on national TV: only NBC will interview Kelley (0n Weekend Today this Sat. and the Today Show, Mon. & Tues.), according to the New York Post.  Library demand for the book is moderate, so far, at those we checked.

Relatively few of the book’s details have been released so far, aside from the National Enquirer‘s headline about the “Big Gay Lie” of Winfrey’s relationship with Stedman Graham, as we reported earlier.

Perhaps not so coincidentally, Oprah herself is currently dominating entertainment headlines with the announcement of an evening talk show on the Oprah Winfrey Network, which launches in January. Reports also indicated that a book club show may be part of the lineup, with Oprah appearing on it occassionally.

Oprah: A Biography Kitty Kelley Retail Price: $30.00 Hardcover: 544 pages Publisher: Crown – (2010-04-13) ISBN / EAN: 0307394867 / 9780307394866

Large Print from Random House

• $30; ISBN 9780739377857

Audio from Random House Audio

• CD: $50; ISBN 9780307749246

Also Available Next Week:

Michael J. Fox’s A Funny thing Happened on the Way to the Future, (Hyperion) is the former TV and film star’s third memoir. He will appear on Entertainment Tonight on April 12 or 13, and Good Morning America on April 15.

FICTION

Yann Martel, Beatrice and Virgil, (Random House). Heavily anticipated, after the author’s beloved Booker winner, The Life of Pi, the new book’s reviews have not been strong, causing Kirkus to bring out some scary comparisons; “Like a Russian doll, the novel contains parables within parables…[the] dialogue sounds like Aesop filtered through Samuel Beckett.” PW was in agreement, but Booklist gave it a star. The new issue of Entertainment Weekly is in the Kirkus/PW camp, giving it a C+.

Anna Quindlen, Every Last One, (Random House). Entertainment Weekly reviews this title jointly with Anne Lamont’s Imperfect Birds (Riverhead, published last week), giving both books about parents trying to cope with teenage daughters C ‘s and saying, “Bottom line here? Fans of Quindlen and Lamott may want to give these two a skip.” Prepub reviews of both were very strong, however.

For more titles coming this week, go to BandN.com, Coming Soon.

Continuing at #1 on the NYT Manga best seller list this week is Warriors: Clan in Need, the new title in the wildly popular series (which is also popular in its prose format). Meanwhile, the manga-influenced version of another wildly popular title, Twilight is #1 on the Hardcover list.

So, why is Warriors on the Manga list, while the manga-influenced Twilight is not? These placements highlight a debate among comics and manga readers as to how to best define manga for the US readers. Manga is simply the Japanese word for comics but it has evolved to define a particular style. What constitutes that style, however, is highly debatable. Some say it should only include titles originally published in Japan by Japanese creators.  Others expand the definition to include manga-influenced titles, like both Warriors and Twilight. This then raises debate about how many manga elements a title needs to include (the Graphic Novel Reporter gives a good rundown of manga style). Does only art style come into it, or should the other aspects of manga including symbols, pacing, and storytelling techniques be necessary?

But, in the end, readers don’t care so much about these distinctions; they just want to know if particular titles appeal to fellow manga fans. Dramacon by Svetlana Chmakova is a US-produced title that is beloved by manga fans because it adopts not only the visual style but also the intricacies of symbols, pacing, and layout that make manga a recognizable art form.  The popular series Megatokyo and stand-alone works like June Kim’s 12 Days occupy a more complex middle spot between manga and western comics sensibility.

On the other hand, the Warriors graphic novels are not particularly appealing to manga fans (they’re appealing to Warriors fans, but that’s a whole other kettle of fish).

I am a librarian who believes, for the purposes of creating lists and organizing collections, it’s easiest to define manga strictly as comics produced in Japan for a Japanese audience.  Once you start including titles from outside Japan as manga, it becomes increasingly difficult to determine a line between manga and non-manga. As art styles and influence grow more intermingled, it is problematic to leave the term up to individual tastes or publisher’s marketing schemes.  The most important thing, however, is consistency, something which is not happening on the New York Times lists.

The Warriors series has appeared on the manga list multiple times, as have other US created manga-style series including Vampire Kisses: Blood Relatives from Ellen Schreiber and Maximum Ride by James Patterson. On the other hand, Scott Pilgrim, a series with marked manga influences, appears on the softcover lists, as does Adam Warren’s Empowered and X-Men: Misfits, both of which are clearly manga-style in terms of art.

How does the NYT decide what is manga and what is not? It seems they simply take the publishers word for it. If a publisher calls a title “manga” it goes on that list; when a title has no designation, it goes on either the hardcover or paperback lists.

As a result, sometimes true manga titles don’t appear on the manga list. Last year, A Drifting Life by Yoshihiro Tatsumi, a stunning memoir by one of the founders of gekiga, or dramatic manga aimed at adult men, showed up on the softcover list, with no indication that the list makers realized that it was manga. Even more troubling, Death Note: L Change the World appeared for many weeks on the manga list even though it is a prose novel and thus not even a graphic novel. Death Note is indeed a best-selling manga series, but L Change is a novel spin-off, and its continued placement on a graphic novel best seller list made it appear that the New York Times list makers weren’t quite paying attention.

In selecting, we need to be aware that all the titles on the manga list may not appeal to manga fans. Buying Warriors or Vampire Kisses will not be a way to satisfy your readers’ demand for more manga.

Beginning on PBS Masterpiece Theater a week from Sunday is a two-part series based on Andrea Levy’s Small Island.

About Jamaicans coming to London to find a better life in the late 1940’s, the book won both the Orange and the Whitbread Prizes in 2004. It was well-reviewed here, with the San Francisco Chronicle called it a “triumph,” lauding the author’s remarkable narrative skills,

Using multiple narrative voices and regular flashbacks, the plot unfolds fanlike, from the middle. Where some authors risk frustrating the reader with several narratives, Levy uses the technique like a prose conductor.

Picador has released a tie-in.

Small Island Andrea Levy Retail Price: $15.00 Paperback: 448 pages Publisher: Picador – (2010-03-30) ISBN / EAN: 0312429525 / 9780312429522

For his new book, Bruce Feiler turns from Biblical history (Walking the Bible, etc.) to a much more personal story; his “lost year” dealing with aggressive cancer treatments. Worrying about his daughter’s lives without him, he formed the “Council of Dads,” six men he asked to be there for his girls at key moments in their lives. Even Kirkus was moved.

The book will be getting heavy promotion leading up to its May 1 publication, beginning with the cover of USA Weekend this Sunday. Other major media hits will include a profile in People (4/23), interview on the Today Show (4/28) and Fox’s Glenn Beck Show (week of May 3) and a one-hour documentary on CNN on Father’s Day weekend.

The Council of Dads: My Daughters, My Illness, and the Men Who Could Be Me Bruce Feiler Retail Price: $22.99 Hardcover: 256 pages Publisher: William Morrow – (2010-05-01) ISBN / EAN: 0061778761 / 9780061778766

HarperAudio; UNABR; 9780061988493; $29.99
Will be available as an Adobe EPUB eBook from OverDrive.

In a thoughtful essay in Sunday’s NYT BR, children’s editor, Julie Just points out that bad parents (rather than simply absent ones) are making their way in to children’s books,

…some of the most sharply written and critically praised works reliably feature a mopey, inept, distracted or ready-for-rehab parent, suggesting that this has become a particularly resonant figure.

She sees the trend in best selling fantasy series such as  Twilight, Shiver and The Hunger Game and in several well-reviewed YA titles such as,

Once Was Lost Sara Zarr Retail Price: $16.99 Hardcover: 224 pages Publisher: Little, Brown Books for Young Readers – (2009-10-01) ISBN / EAN: 0316036048 / 9780316036047

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How To Say Goodbye In Robot Natalie Standiford Retail Price: $17.99 Hardcover: 288 pages Publisher: Scholastic Press – (2009-10-01) ISBN / EAN: 0545107083 / 9780545107082

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Wintergirls Laurie Halse Anderson Retail Price: $9.99 Paperback: 288 pages Publisher: Speak – (2010-02-23) ISBN / EAN: 014241557X / 9780142415573

And younger readers are treated to distracted parents in Neil Gaiman’s Coraline.

Fictional parents in current literature  are being presented with very real flaws, making them vivid and believable. That’s one of the reasons I was so taken with Shiver and How to Say Goodbye in Robot.

I love this video created by Dorling Kindersley in the UK.

Trust me, watch the whole thing.

NPR’s monthly You Must Read This series on NPR’s All Things Considered, presents authors passionately recommending books they love.

Last night, Heidi Durrow, whose first novel The Girl Who Fell From the Sky is heavily reserved in many libraries, talked about one of her favorites, Passing, by Nella Larsen, a prominent writer during the Harlem Renaissance, who later died in obscurity.

Durrow, who is the daughter of an African American father and a Danish mother, says,

Passing is among my favorite books because it’s about being defined by what other people see and the desire to transcend that.

You may not identify with being a light-skinned African-American, but you have probably felt at some point that what was most important about you wasn’t visible.

The book is available in several editions, including this mass market paperback with a strikingly modern cover:

Passing Nella Larsen Retail Price: $6.99 Paperback: 84 pages Publisher: Wilder Publications – (2010-02-25) ISBN / EAN: 1604599944 / 9781604599947

And a trade paperback from Penguin, with a cover more reflective of the harlem Renaissance:

Passing (Penguin Classics) Nella Larsen Retail Price: $11.00 Paperback: 160 pages Publisher: Penguin Classics – (2003-02-04) ISBN / EAN: 0142437271 / 9780142437278

Former skinhead Frank Meeink was interviewed on NPR’s Fresh Air last night (listen here).

Meeink once recruited kids to be skinheads and even had a cable access talk show called The Reich. Imprisoned at 18, his exposure to people with other backgrounds caused him to begin questioning his beliefs. He now lectures on racial acceptance for the Anti-Defamation League. Working with the Philadelphia Flyers (Meeink grew up in South Philadelphia), he created a hate prevention program called “Harmony Through Hockey.” His memoir, Autobiography of a Recovering Skinhead was published recently.

The book rose to #112 (from #14,721) on Amazon.

Autobiography of a Recovering Skinhead: The Frank Meeink Story as Told to Jody M. Roy, Ph.D. Frank Meeink, Jody M. Roy Retail Price: $15.95 Paperback: 316 pages Publisher: Hawthorne Books – (2010-03-16) ISBN / EAN: 097901882X / 9780979018824

Penguin Group announced yesterday that they are publishing a new Tom Clancy thriller on Dec. 7th under their Putnam imprint. The news has picked up by the press around the world, from The Guardian to ABC News

Titled Dead or Alive, the book brings “the combined forces of a crew of Tom Clancy’s toughest characters, from Jack Ryan to John Clark” (The Guardian) together to fight “the terrorists who threaten western civilisation” (Putnam press release).

It’s the first book Clancy has published in 7 years. Most recently, he’s developed videogames and a Clancy-branded series of original paperbacks.

The AP reports that Putnam will release 1.75 million copies.

Dead or Alive Tom Clancy Retail Price: $28.95 Hardcover: 848 pages Publisher: – (2010-12-07) ISBN / EAN: 0399157239 / 9780399157233

Sarah Weinman is one of the few people writing thoughtfully about mysteries in the mainstream media these days (as well as on her own site, Confessions of an Idiosyncratic Mind). This week, in the L.A. Times, she explores the appeal of the unreliable narrator, pointing out some classics (Ira Levin’s A Kiss Before Dying, Dorothy Hughes’ In a Lonely Place and Patricia Highsmith’s books).

She also chooses two newly-published titles.  She describes Jesse Kellerman’s prose as a “silken sheen covering deep existential skeletons” in his new book The Executioner as well as his earlier works.

The Executor Jesse Kellerman Retail Price: $25.95 Hardcover: 352 pages Publisher: Putnam Adult – (2010-04-01) ISBN / EAN: 039915647X / 9780399156472

Audio; UNABR; Penguin Audio; 11 Hours | ISBN 9781101154779

The second book may have the best title and cover of the season, Hello Kitty Must Die, which refers to the main character’s efforts to escape the stereotype of the well-mannered Asian American girl. A first novel, it’s available in paperback and hardcover from indie crime fiction publisher Tyrus Books, in Madison Wisconsin. It’s been well-reviewed in both Library Journal and Publishers Weekly. Weinman is a fan, but admits that the book’s audience may be limited to those who,

…cackle and gasp at the book’s opening line — “It all started with my missing hymen” — and are compelled to move on. For those who recoil, well, that’s your loss, but Fiona Yu doesn’t really care what you think or if she’s offended anyone.

Hello Kitty Must Die Angela S. Choi Retail Price: $14.95 pbk/ $24.95 hdbk Publisher: Tyrus Books – (2010-04-01) ISBN: 9781935562023; pbk/ 9781935562030; hdbk

As part of his high-profile media tour, Richard Phillips, the captain of the boat that was held hostage by Somali pirates last year, was interviewed last night by obvious fan, Jon Stewart. Phillips’ book, A Captains Duty, was released yesterday.

The Captain was also interviewed  on NPR’s Fresh Air (listen here) last night.

The book rose to #135 on Amazon.

A Captain’s Duty: Somali Pirates, Navy SEALS, and Dangerous Days at Sea Richard Phillips, Stephan Talty Retail Price: $25.99 Hardcover: 304 pages Publisher: Hyperion – (2010-04-06) ISBN / EAN: 1401323804 / 9781401323806

Tantor Audio; UNABR

On Sale Date: 04/26/2010
Trade 9781400116867 8 Audio CDs $29.99
Library 9781400146864 8 Audio CDs $59.99
MP3 9781400166862 1 MP3-CD $19.99

Adobe EPUB eBook available from OverDrive