TODAY'S NEWS

LA Times to Fold Standalone Book Review
By Rachel Deahl
According to a former staffer, the Los Angeles Times is folding its standalone Sunday book review section, laying off two dedicated book editors. The last standalone section will be the July 27 one. Steve Wasserman, a former editor of the Los Angeles Times Book Review, sent out an e-mail Monday morning, protesting the changes at the embattled Tribune-owned daily.

Nancy Sullivan, executive director of corporate communications at the paper, confirmed that the book review staff has been cut from five to three and that, moving forward, book review coverage will be placed in the Calendar section of the paper where it will share space with features. She would not comment further on any staff cuts or the future of the book review, saying that more definitive news would be issued next week. She added that the paper "remains committed to book review coverage. What form that takes is what’s under evaluation." Read on »

Courant Books Editor Goldberg Victim of Layoffs
By Rachel Deahl
The books editor at the Hartford Courant, Carole Goldberg, was laid off yesterday in a round of cutbacks at the Connecticut newspaper. According to features editor Nadine Hazell, the paper's book review section will continue, being overseen by editors in the features department. When asked how the section would be affected by the loss of Goldberg, Hazell initially said it would not. But, when asked if there would be a shift in the number of reviews run, she said that "the newspaper’s reorganizing and it’s difficult to say at this point." Goldberg, a longtime NBCC member, has been the books editor at the paper since 2002. The Courant, like the Los Angeles Times, is a Tribune-owned paper.

Brashares’s ‘Sisterhood’ Set to Expand
By John A. Sellers
Next January, Delacorte Press Books for Young Readers will publish 3 Willows: The Sisterhood Grows, which follows three girls entering the same high school featured in the author’s bestselling four-book series, The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants. “These three girls are going off to high school and their big fear is how things will change,” said Wendy Loggia, executive editor at Delacorte, who edits Brashares. “They’re already seeing some of the middle-school connections and friendships start to shift. It doesn’t come as easy for them—there are no magic pants in this sisterhood.” Random House plans a 500,000-copy first printing, and the Listening Library imprint will publish the book simultaneously in audio. Read on »

TiVo Teams with Amazon for On-Screen Product Purchasing
By Lynn Andriani
TiVo and Amazon have partnered to provide consumers with the ability to purchase physical products from Amazon.com on their TVs, using their TiVo remote control. The “Product Purchase” feature will allow TV advertisers to market products sold through Amazon.com on any broadcast or cable network, any TV show, or via any of TiVo’s interactive advertising features. Read on »

S&S Unveils Tricked Out Web Site for Night of the Gun
By Rachel Deahl
Further positioning David Carr’s The Night of the Gun as the anti-James Frey addiction memoir, publisher Simon & Schuster has built a companion Web site that, if anything, calls to mind the Smoking Gun’s takedown of A Million Little Pieces. The site, www.nightofthegun.com, is outfitted with videos, pictures, letters and other tidbits from Carr’s life and descent into drug addiction, which he “investigates,” through interviews and research, in the book, which got an announced first printing of 50,000.

David Rosenthal, executive v-p and publisher of S&S, who thinks Carr “redefines the memoir genre” with the book, said the site offer readers more, giving them “essential research material that, in a different era, would have ended up gathering dust in a filing cabinet.”  Read on »

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AUTHORS ON THE AIR

Authors on the Air: MatchDotBomb; Cop in the Hood; Stella Rimington
This morning, Today hosted Mario Batali, still at the Italian Grill (Ecco, $29.95), which PW’s starred review deemed “an essential collection for any serious backyard cook.” Read on »

PICTURE OF THE DAY

Literary Lansing
Eight hundred people attended the Michigan Author Homecoming hosted by the Michigan Humanities Council on July 10 at Michigan State University in Lansing. The event was celebrating the end of this year's Michigan Great Read program. Pictured (from left): MSU alumni Richard Ford; Thomas McGuane; Jim Harrison; and moderator Bill Castanier.
photo credit: Lynne Brown, courtesy Michigan Humanities Council. Submit your pictures here »

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