On NBA, Question About How Commission Will Report

by Steven Zeitchik, PW NewsLine -- Publishers Weekly, 10/26/2004

Coordinating NBA table space and a possible podium appearance from the large group behind the 9/11 Report seems like a distinctly difficult (if enviable) job, and Norton says not everything has been resolved yet, only that "People within the commission are sorting out who's going to be available to come," according to Norton spokesperson Louise Brockett.

At first glance, the commission's whole premise of anonymous collaboration wouldn't seem to fit so well with the NBA's culture of giving books personalities and faces. To that, and to the question of whether the group at the podium would include executive director Philip Zelikow, chair Thomas Kean or vice chair Lee Hamilton, Brockett acknowledged, "It's a very extraordinary collective effort, but you can't have a hundred people speaking in unison."

Brockett did say we could expect at least two tables from Norton. And of course the house could always have its problem solved with a convenient, and equally desirable, result: the other Norton nonfiction nominee Will In The World taking the prize.