Bookish News and Publishing Tidbits 9 March 2012

Recently on RIASS:

I'm also over on Australian Women Online talking about theAustralian Women Writers Challenge'and with a feature on'Twelfth Planet Press's Twelve Planets series

Just a note that I'll be tango dancing my way through Argentina in April, and would love to receive some guest posts to feature during that time. Feel free to drop me a line at readinasinglesitting@gmail.com.

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Breaking news: International bestselling author Stephen King will read his new audiobook,'The Wind Through the Keyhole.''It is the first time in more than a decade that King will narrate a full-length audiobook.'Hodder Audio will publish the CD and audio digital download editions of'The Wind Through the Keyhole'simultaneously with the Hodder hardcover and ebook on April 24, 2012.'The Wind Through the Keyhole'audiobook will also offer an exclusive audio preview of King's upcoming novel, Doctor Sleep, the eagerly-awaited sequel to his classic,'The Shining, to be published in 2013. Stephen King will also read the excerpt from Doctor Sleep.'The Wind Through the Keyhole'is both a stand-alone novel and a wonderful introduction to Stephen King's epic seven-volume masterpiece,'The Dark Tower.''I've spent a lot of time with the character of Roland Deschain and the Dark Tower universe over the years. Now that I am revisiting that world, it felt like a fine time to lend it my voice,' said King.

Other bookish stuff:

How I Learned to Stop Hoarding & Give Away Books:

Why, I wondered, do I allow'American Psycho'to sully my collection? I loathed it. And'The Secret Life of Bees? A book I disliked so much I could only refer to it by inserting the words 'shitty, shitty' into the title.'Worse than the books I'd read, disliked, and still kept were the books that I knew I was never going to make the time to read. These were usually books given to me as gifts by well-meaning men I'd been romantically involved with. I have a theory that some men, usually the ones who are not right for you, will try to bend your taste to their will no matter how often you proclaim that fantasy is just not your thing.

Author'Natalie Whipple on things she wishes shed done differently:

I wish Id spent more time living and less time waiting.'Sitting around refreshing my inbox got me nowhere. It sounds harsh, but I wasted a lot of time letting The Wait torture me. I could have been living, doing new things, gaining experiences that would create new stories for me to write. Writing, while it is a lot of work, also requires inspiration, and I let myself get low on that.

Enough with terrible names in YA, people!

In recent YA we have, among the girls: Rhine, Aria, Gaia, Cassia, Puck, Trella, Katla, Pressia, and Ever. You get the picture. All pretty names on their own, but when lumped together begin to sound like a preschool play date in Kitsilano, circa 2008.'The boys, in many ways, come off much worse. Cricket? Patch? These are names for Webkinz, not heroes. Nailer? 'Elder? Four? What the hell is going on here? Are authors mixing up their baby name books with their dictionaries?

Jessica Au on choosing a 90s setting for her YA:

The early nineties was pretty much pre-Internet, pre-mobile phones, so the time you spent on your own was really yours, which left plenty of room for your thoughts to run away from you. A lot adolescence can be seen as being very social (friends, relationships, and who you have around you), but another part of me has always felt that it can be a very isolated period as well. There's so much you might not be able to convey, even to those closest to you. That kind of introversion, and the complexity of that changing internal world, was something I really wanted to explore. I felt that the loneliness of a coastal town, without the presence of any digital technology, would really amplify that.

Publicist Nas Dean on book promotion:

An author should connect with her readers via social media. This interaction is which make a reader pick up a certain authors' book in the bookshop. And readers would'say'if they liked a book. So an online verbal review on social media counts as much as a written review. Anything once written online is saved there forever. It won't fade. Just Google a sentence and it will come up again.

Nathan Bransford on whether were looking at a self-publishing bubble:

The ease of entry into the self-publishing game is only getting smoother. Right now its still somewhat challenging to make your book available in all channels, but those barriers are coming down. There is a massive supply of books in the pipeline.'Get used to the self-publishing boom. Were just getting started.

A radio interview with Halina Wagowska (see our review of her memoir)

How a book cover is printed

Wild'by Cheryl Strayed optioned by Reese Witherspoon

The Orange Prize long list has been announced

Ernest Hemingways list of 17 books that hed prefer to read again for the first time over earning a guaranteed $1 million per year

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Bookish News and Publishing Tidbits 9 March 2012