Not Worth a Thread: The Book

[nacho]

Will it still be funny even if I have no idea what 50 Shades of Grey is. The entire phenomenon has passed me by. Thankfully, I think.

Well...whether or not it's funny is up to you! But, no, you don't need to be versed in 50 Shades of Grey to enjoy the review.

[RottingCorpse]

Oh, This is that S&M book. Got it.

[nacho]

By the way, RC, you spend more time asking to be convinced to read something than you would spend reading it. So... Want to come be a manager at APA and do that same thing but for 90k a year?

[RottingCorpse]

I can't read fiction anymore. It's the sad truth of my existence.

Will APA give me two - three days off a week for class over the next three years, after which I'll promptly quit?

[nacho]

I can't read fiction anymore. It's the sad truth of my existence.

Will APA give me two - three days off a week for class over the next three years, after which I'll promptly quit?

Yes. And they'll pay for it, too.

[Reginald McGraw]

This is awesome... A 50 Shades of Grey review on Goodreads. You have to go to it because it's gif heavy:

http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/340987215

Nice!

[nacho]

I need to stop compulsively buying the Publisher's Weekly pick of the week!

This week it's:


Safe House: A Thriller

The review:

Set on the Isle of Man, this beautifully plotted thriller from Ewan (The Good Thief’s Guide to Venice and three other mysteries starring professional thief Charlie Howard) offers as many twists and turns as motorcycle enthusiast Rob Hale encounters during the British dependency’s annual TT (Tourist Trophy) time-trial races. After a motorcycle accident catapults Rob into the hospital, he learns there’s no evidence that Lena, the attractive blonde he’d just met who was riding on the back of his bike, ever existed. Determined to prove Lena wasn’t a figment of his imagination, Rob teams with PI Rebecca Lewis in an investigation that becomes increasingly convoluted and dangerous as they uncover links to the suicide of Rob’s sister, Laura, a few weeks earlier and unearth surprising secrets about the mysterious Lena. Meanwhile, a number of ruthless players work at cross purposes, and Rob and Rebecca take a lot of hard knocks at their hands. Ewan’s carefully placed clues will elicit several “aha” moments from readers as his heroes battle toward understanding and resolution.

Last week, it was:

The Pharaoh: Life at Court and On Campaign

The review:

In this delightful and lavishly illustrated guide, Egyptologist Shaw (Royal Authority in Egypt’s Eighteenth Dynasty) introduces the fascinating lives and times of the pharaohs in elaborate detail, recreating in stories what it was like to be one. Pharaohs, who were treated as gods, were not all alike, nor did they all face the same circumstances during their reigns. As Shaw points out, the pharaohs of the Old Kingdom built the pyramids and then watched their power wane, despite a long period of artistic experimentation and territorial expansion. But with the death of Amenenhat IV, the 12th dynasty fragmented, as did Egypt, and the Hyksos came to rule the all-important Nile Delta. The outsiders were expelled eventually, and a new prosperity characterized the New Kingdom, where now-famous pharaohs such as Thutmose III and Rameses II walked tall in the halls of power. Drawing on archeological and literary evidence, Shaw reconstructs the lives of pharaohs, detailing everything from their inheritance of the throne to their elevation to divinity, from their lives of luxury in the palaces to their favorite pastimes: hunting, horsemanship, opulent festivals, and musical performances. The author helpfully provides brief biographies of most of the pharaohs, such as Hatshepsut, a strong female pharaoh who established important trading relations with one of Egypt’s neighbors, and Amenhotep IV, who briefly established monotheistic worship. Shaw’s captivating study is the perfect introduction to these fabled rulers.

[RottingCorpse]

What?!

http://www.avclub.com/articles/chuck-palahniuk-is-talking-about-a-fight-club-sequ,100628/

Chuck Palahniuk is talking about writing a Fight Club sequel, even though he's not supposed to do that

Chuck Palahniuk’s Fight Club is turning 17 soon, meaning it’s right about the age when it's most obsessed with Fight Club. So in order to capitalize on the interim before Fight Club moves on to never shutting up about David Foster Wallace, Palahniuk says he’s developing a graphic novel sequel to his most famous book, timed for 2015 (or possibly earlier), one that will “update the story ten years after the seeming end of Tyler Durden” and give Palahniuk’s most anti-consumerist screed a brand extension.

As the author elaborates on his website, “Nowadays, Tyler is telling the story, lurking inside Jack, and ready to launch a come-back. Jack is oblivious. Marla is bored. Their marriage has run aground on the rocky coastline of middle-aged suburban boredom. It’s only when their little boy disappears, kidnapped by Tyler, that Jack is dragged back into the world of Mayhem.” (A world that’s been existing for 10 years without him, apparently, Mayhem having turned the anarchic destruction of civilization into a remarkably steady pastime. "Don't forget that next week is the bombing of a Bank Of America, and our annual spaghetti dinner.")

Palahniuk promises this will all be very “dark and messy,” as any story would have to be that confusingly resumes Jack’s journey by having him just get married and move to the suburbs, where the things you own end up being registered as part of the home inventory recommended by your insurance. Or perhaps Palahniuk is just looking to destroy something beautiful, potentially wrecking Fight Club by tacking on an unnecessary continuation, all as just another lesson in our learning to let go.

[nacho]

Palahniuk is such a fucking hack...of course he'll go back to the well.

I love the commentary on the movie with the screenwriter and Palahniuk where, basically, the screenwriter complains about how awful the book is and Palahniuk agrees with him at every turn. He's the James Patterson for the hipster set.

[RottingCorpse]

Forbes list of top-earning authors:

http://www.forbes.com/sites/jeffbercovici/2013/08/12/the-worlds-top-earning-authors-with-50-shades-e-l-james-debuts-at-no-1/

[nacho]

The most unsurprising list made!

[monkey!]

The most successful Mills & Boon novel ever written.

[nacho]

I read this a while ago... She's been kicking this story around for ages. It's the sort of life work thing that haunts WVA writers, I think.

http://www.amazon.com/Quiet-Dell-Jayne-Anne-Phillips/dp/1439172536

It's going to be her Pulitzer.

Based on this: http://www.wvculture.org/goldenseal/fall07/crime.html

And, for those not tuned to WVA history, we know the story better as Night of the Hunter: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harry_Powers

[nacho]

I should start a "is Amazon the devil" thread:


http://publishingperspectives.com/2014/06/amazon-demands-new-terms-from-uk-publishers/

The Bookseller reports that “UK publishers have raised concerns about Amazon’s new contractual arrangements, with the giant retailer pressing for improved terms from a number of publishers, even as its stand-off with Hachette Book Group continues in the U.S.”

Better discounts on wholesale contracts are one issue, but The Bookseller also reports that Amazon has begun introducing a number of new clauses in publisher contracts. One raising red flags is a stipulation that if a book is out of stock from its publisher, Amazon would then have the right to “supply its own copies via its print-on-demand facilities.” Publishers, according to The Bookseller, are concerned that the clause would give over to Amazon control over their own inventories.

And in a separate development, “the European Union’s Directorate is understood to have approached major UK publishers over an investigation into Most Favoured Nation (MFN) clauses – the term came under the spotlight during the inquiry into the shift to the agency model in 2010, but the EU is looking at a new review focused specifically on MFN.”

The Bookseller reports that in the UK, a number of publishers have talked to them as part of the paper’s investigation into Hachette’s dispute with Amazon, which was also now putting them under “heavy pressure.” It was reported that among Amazon’s new demands are “adjusting terms so that e-books and physical books have parity,” with the adjustment being in the direction of physical, “which traditionally attracts a higher percentage for the retailer compared with e-books. It was also reported that Amazon is “understood to be targeting academic terms, which have historically been more favorable to the publisher. The retailer also wants to impose a ceiling on the digital list price of e-books in preparation for 2015 when the retailer will have to begin imposing the standard 20% rate of VAT on digital titles.”

The new contracts are also said to include MFN clauses, meaning that books cannot be sold for a lower price than Amazon’s, even on the publisher’s own website. The Bookseller also reports that Amazon “appears to want matching terms where a publisher enters into a new business arrangement, for example with a subscription service.”

At the same time, according to The Bookseller, “the use of MFN clauses is thought to have come under the Brussels spotlight, with the same EC competition authorities which earlier investigated publishers over agency pricing. Within the last few weeks, it is understood that some publishers’ sales personnel have been summoned to meetings in Brussels, said to be ‘much more friendly’ than the meetings held while agency pricing was being investigated.”

And while it’s true that the EU has looked into MFN clauses in the past, they have never been ruled illegal. But, “under the terms of price-fixing settlements entered into by the five settling publishers in 2012, those publishers are forbidden until 2017 from entering into any agreement for e-books which contains a retail price MFN clause.”

[monkey!]

Amazon is the devil.

I used to think Microsoft would be the big daddy corporation that RoboCop would fight for....