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A USA Today article details a study that revealed Seattle is the nation’s most literate city. With all that rain keeping you inside, and all that coffee keeping you awake all night, I would think their ranking shouldn’t be a surprise. Minneapolis, Washington, D.C., Atlanta and San Francisco also placed in the top five. The [...]

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Back before the holiday, we featured an interview with mystery writer Brendan DuBois. Well, it turns out that the holiday gave the DuBois family much to be thankful for as Publishers Marketplace reported yesterday that a new book entitled Twilight was sold to Ruth Cavin at Thomas Dunne Books. Literary agent Liza Dawson represented DuBois [...]

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Harpers announced that Roger D. Hodge, a 38-year-old who has worked with the magazine since 1996, will take over the editor position in April. The New York Times ran an interesting profile of the new boss and discussed his childhood on a ranch in Texas. This little nugget in the article really caught my attention: [...]

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The excellent Syntax of Things gave a nice preview of the new issue of the Oxford American. I just got my copy so I can’t comment on much, but the SoT folks provide a detailed discussion of the magazine’s contents. I did notice that Marc Smirnoff’s Editor’s Box column focuses on the personality and painting [...]

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Several newspapers picked up an Associated Press report that provided Richard Howorth’s suggestions for 11 books that explain the South and all it’s complexity. Howorth is the owner of Square Books and a past president of the American Booksellers Association. His list is interesting and challenging. Certainly, you’ll have books you think he left out. [...]

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Guitar great Link Wray passed away at the age of 76. CNN provided a nice recap of his life and career. The article also included some great quotes about his influence on other guitar players. “He is the king; if it hadn’t been for Link Wray and Rumble, I would have never picked up a [...]

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It’s an unfortunate reality of the journalism and publishing business that magazines don’t succeed. And that sometimes they are given up for dead by the media conglomerates that own them. And so goes the fate of Sync. About twenty of the magazine’s employee’s will be laid off or transferred to other areas of the Ziff [...]

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Joe Queenan is one of my favorite writers and his New York Times book review of Generation Rx: How Prescription Drugs are Altering American Lives, Minds, and Bodies by Greg Crister makes me realize how nice it must be to have free rein from editors. As aspiring authors, we often aren’t given room to run, [...]

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Bestselling author Neil Strauss, who we recently interviewed, has the cover story for the new issue of Rolling Stone. Strauss travelled to London to interview Madonna and the piece, How Madonna Got Her Groove Back, describes her recovery from an equestrian accident, her work on the new albumn, and the various “Madonna moments” that people [...]

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Slushpile techie patron saint John is also an editor at computer publisher Apress and he’s “looking for a few good writers. I edit a line “after-hours” books – fun with Lego, gadgetry, etc. and I’m looking for folks who might get a kick out of writing books on the things they love rather then high-tech [...]

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Unusual item posted on eBay… I think the point here is that you have to pay $250,000 to get in on this action. Or maybe they will pay you a quarter million to write the story. I dunno. But “looking for a writer who is interested in collaborating on a true crime story. Invoves Fed. [...]

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I have some pages ripped out of an old Playboy magazine. They’re a little brittle from age and from all the moving around I’ve done since this 1997 issue hit the newstand. Looking at those pages now, the ads and cartoons are amusing, and amazing at how much has changed in just 8 years. Ads [...]

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One of my absolute favorite stories, and one that certainly makes editors/agents/record executives/movie producers/anyone-in-a-position-to-greenlight-a-creative-project cringe, is Kris Kristofferson landing a helicopter on Johnny Cash’s lawn in order to convince The Man in Black to record some of his music. The legend goes that Kristofferson was sweeping floors at Nashville area recording studios when Johnny Cash [...]

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William T. Vollman took home the National Book Award for Fiction last night. His novel, Europe Central was considered a longshot to win the award and Vollman “looked stunned as he found his way to the podium,” according to Publishers Weekly. Congratulations to a fantastic writer!

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