Short Takes

Maureen O'Brien at Harper Entertainment pre-empted a bio of stricken singer Luther Vandross by Atlanta music critic Craig Seymour; it was a world English deal with Caron Knauer at the Caron K agency.... NBC and Andrews McMeel are getting together to do a pair of multimedia books this fall: one on the history of the Today Show, and another on Operation Iraqi Freedom: The Inside Story. Both will be packaged with a companion DVD. Andrews McMeel president Tom Thornton made six-figure deals with the network for each of the books and plans large first printings.... A British YA novel, How I Live Now by Meg Rosoff, was won at auction last week by Wendy Lamb Books at RH Children's. The tale of a New York teenager sent to live with eccentric English relatives was sold by agent Nancy Gallt on behalf of U.K.'s Felicity Bryant agency.... A book celebrating the president as a convinced Christian was signed at Nelson's W Publishing. It's A Man of Faith: The Spiritual Journey of George W. Bush by former Time correspondent David Aikman, bought for world rights from agent Kathryn Helmers.... Margaret Marbury at Red Dress Ink has bought an anthology by a group of top "chick lit" writers whose sale will aid a charity called War Child. Planned for publication in fall 2004, Girls' Night In was sold by Deborah Schneider at Gelfman & Schneider.... Jed Donahue, who has just joined the new Crown Forum imprint, made his first buy with Hard America, Soft America by Michael Barone of U.S. News & World Report, whose thesis is that American youngsters are growing up with little accountability and are unable to cope with competitive stresses as their elders do. It was bought from Glen Hartley at Writers' Representatives.... Little, Brown's Judy Clain made a three-book deal for work by widely published South African novelist Deon Meyer not published here before. It was a North American rights deal with Isobel Dixon at U.K.'s Blake Friedmann agency; first to appear is a chase thriller, Heart of the Hunter.