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  June 4, 2008
 
• BEHIND THE NEWS
  • BEA 2008: Good News for Religion
  • Solid Trade Show for Liturgical Market
• SPOTLIGHT ON...The Coming Election
  • BEA Panel Looks at Evangelicals and Politics
• RELIGION IN REVIEW
  • Four Reviews Coming in Publishers Weekly on Monday, June 9
  • Two Starred Reviews Coming in PW on Monday, June 9
• RELIGION BESTSELLERS: May Christian Martketplace Bestsellers
• COMING ATTRACTIONS
• HOW TO SUBSCRIBE/UNSUBSCRIBE
BEHIND THE NEWS
BEA 2008: Good News for Religion
by Lynn Garrett
BookExpo America wrapped up this past Sunday (June 1) at the Los Angeles Convention Center. The consensus among religion/spirituality publishers who spoke with Publishers Weekly was that it was a good show, if quieter than last year's crowded BEA in New York.

Though all publishers are feeling the pressure from higher paper and fuel costs and contemplating higher book prices because of it, no one seemed poised to follow Thomas Nelson's lead and bail out of the industry's largest domestic trade event. "We still feel it's important to be here," said Janis Backing, publicity director for Moody Publishers, an evangelical Christian house based in Chicago. Her company, like many other religion presses, exhibited in the South Hall on the main exhibit floor. Some religion houses were also scattered throughout the smaller West Hall, but there is no longer a specified religion section there as in recent years.

Read the full story...
Solid Trade Show for Liturgical Market
by Jana Riess, with reporting by Marcia Z. Nelson
Sales and traffic were steady if unspectacular at RBTE, the Religious Booksellers Trade Exhibit, held May 27-30 in St. Charles, Ill. Despite the almost concurrent timing of BEA in Los Angeles, coupled with the high price of gasoline and airfares, show co-founder Bob Byrns said that attendance was "very comparable" to previous years. The show had approximately 155 exhibitors (in the range of prior years' 150-160 exhibitors), about 225 buyers, and upwards of 900 people in total attendance. 

The only factor Byrns cited as slightly reducing attendance was the controversial presence of Bishop Gene Robinson as an evening speaker: four Catholic stores protested the speech of the gay Episcopal bishop by boycotting RBTE. But Byrns said there had been minimal fallout from Robinson's presence and that most attendees took it in stride.

Read the full story...
 
SPOTLIGHT ON...The Coming Election
BEA Panel Looks at Evangelicals and Politics
by Kimberly Winston

Pollsters say evangelical Christians make up as much as a quarter of the electorate during a presidential election year, and they also make up the largest segment of the market for religion books. Given that and the surprises of this election process so far, PW hosted a panel on Saturday at BEA that looked at changes in American evangelicalism as November approaches.

"Evolving Evangelicals and the Presidential Election" featured four authors who have cast their eyes on evangelicals and politics: Randall Balmer, author of God in the White House (HarperOne, Jan.) Marcia Ford, author of We The Purple (Tyndale, Mar.), David Gushee, author of The Future of Faith in American Politics (Baylor University Press, Jan.) and Ron Sider, author of The Scandal of Evangelical Politics (Baker Academic, Feb.). It was moderated by PW's senior religion editor, Lynn Garrett.

Read the full story...
RELIGION IN REVIEW
Four Reviews Coming in Publishers Weekly on Monday, June 9
Knowing Right from Wrong: A Christian Guide to Conscience
Thomas D. Williams. FaithWords, $19.99 (224p) ISBN 978-0-446-58201-8
Williams, a Catholic priest, ethicist and CBS News Vatican analyst, challenges the popular notion that conscience is always an inerrant guide in this thoughtful look at a timely topic.
READ FULL REVIEW
The Other Islam: Sufism and the Road to Global Harmony
Stephen Schwartz. Doubleday, $24.95 (272p) ISBN 978-0-385-51819-2
Schwartz, a journalist and convert to Islam, offers Sufism, the mystical branch of Islam, as an aid to the United States's efforts to fight extremism.
READ FULL REVIEW
Welcome to the Revolution: A Field Guide for New Believers
Brian Tome. Thomas Nelson, $12.99 paper (240p) ISBN 978-0-8499-2005-9
Tome pastors a megachurch in Cincinnati that draws a large number of attendees unfamiliar with the Christian faith.
READ FULL REVIEW
Find Your Way Home: Words from the Street, Wisdom from the Heart
The Women of Magdalene with Becca Stevens. Abingdon, $10 paper (120p) ISBN 978-0-6876470
This little book begins with a brief introduction by Stevens, author of Sanctuary and founder of the remarkably successful Magdalene, a Nashville home for women overcoming drug abuse, prostitution and/or incarceration.
READ FULL REVIEW
Two Starred Reviews Coming in PW on Monday, June 9
Acedia & Me: A Marriage, Monks, and a Writer's Life
Kathleen Norris. Riverhead, $25.95 (352p) ISBN 978-1-59448-996-9
In this penetrating theological memoir, Norris (The Cloister Walk) details her relationship with acedia, a slothful, soul-weary indifference long recognized by monastics. Norris is careful to distinguish acedia from its cousin, depression, noting that acedia is a failure of the will and can be dispelled by embracing faith and life, whereas depression is not a choice and often requires medical treatment. This is tricky ground, but Norris treads gingerly, reserving her acerbic crankiness for another section where she convincingly argues that despite Americans' apparently un-slothful lives, acedia is the undiagnosed neurasthenia of our busy age. Much of the book is taken up with Norris's account of her complicated but successful marriage, which ended with her husband's death in 2003. The energy poured into this marriage, Norris argues, was as much a defiant strike against acedia as was her spiritual discipline of praying the Psalms. Filled with gorgeous prose, generous quotations from Christian thinkers across the centuries, and fascinating etymological detours, this discomfiting book provides not just spiritual hope but a much-needed kick in the rear. (Sept. 16)
A Visual History of the Bible: The Tumultuous Tale of the World's Bestselling Book
Donald L. Brake. Baker, $29.99 (304p) ISBN 978-0-8010-1316-4
Not unlike an epic story, the history of the formation and translation of the Bible is filled with intrigue and adventure, heroes and knaves. Considering how much ink has been spilled about the Bible's purported meanings, it's surprising how few authors have captured the excitement of its evolution from disparate manuscripts to accepted canon to bestselling book. Brake, who is president of Multnomah College and has a Ph.D. from Dallas Theological Seminary, takes the reader on a wonderful journey through several thousand years of history (though the heaviest emphasis is on the 15th century to the present), marking the people, events, and crises through which the Bible has had to pass, finally emerging in our time as a versatile and vital document. Nearly every page contains an illustration, chart or other visual aid to assist the reader. Refreshingly readable and lavishly illustrated, this volume is essential to anyone wanting to understand the Bible and its hazardous journey through the ages. (Sept. 15)
BESTSELLERS: May Christian Marketplace Bestsellers
Hardcovers
  1. Mistaken Identity
    Don & Susie Van Ryn, Colleen Newell, Whitney Ceraks. Howard/Simon & Schuster
  2. Dead Heat
    Joel C. Rosenberg. Tyndale
  3. 3:16: The Numbers of Hope
    Max Lucado. Thomas Nelson
  4. Walking with God
    John Eldredge. Thomas Nelson
  5. Love and Respect
    Emerson Eggerichs. Thomas Nelson
  6. Landmines in the Path of the Believer
    Charles F. Stanley. Thomas Nelson
  7. Blink of an Eye
    Ted Dekker. Thomas Nelson
  8. One Month to Live
    Kerry & Chris Shook. Waterbrook
  9. Heaven
    Randy C. Alcorn. Tyndale
  10. Have a New Kid by Friday
    Kevin Leman. Revell/Baker

Paperbacks

  1. The Shack
    William P. Young . Windblown Media
  2. The Forbidden
    Beverly Lewis. Bethany House/Baker
  3. 90 Minutes in Heaven
    Don Piper with Cecil Murphey. Revell/Baker
  4. Someday
    Karen Kingsbury. Tyndale
  5. The Five Love Languages
    Gary Chapman.. Moody/Northfield
  6. The Purpose Driven Life
    Rick Warren. Zondervan
  7. Jesus Calling
    Sarah Young. Thomas Nelson
  8. Dear to Me
    Wanda E. Brunstetter. Barbour
  9. The Case for Christ
    Lee Strobel. Zondervan
  10. Fasting
    Jentezen Franklin. Strang Communications
All rights reserved. ©2008 CBA Services Corp. and Spring Arbor Distributors by Evangelical Christian Publishers Associations.
 
 
 
 
COMING ATTRACTIONS
In the next issue of Religion BookLine (June 18) look for a profile of Kathleen Norris, author of Acedia & Me.
 

PW Religion BookLine from Publishers Weekly
Editors: Lynn Garrett (lgarrett@reedbusiness.com);
Daisy Maryles (dmaryles@reedbusiness.com)
Contributing Editor: Jana Riess

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