In the latest Mediabistro feature, she talks about her writing process and gives tips to fellow journos who want to write a book. Below, an excerpt:

You interviewed more than 1,200 individuals. What skills do you possess that made people feel comfortable sharing their stories and information?

I always go into interviews with a great sense of gratitude for the courage it takes to share one’s story, particularly one so painful and heartbreaking, things that they had deep within themselves and had just gotten to the point of being able to share. So I think being an empathic listener, someone who was truly wanting to understand what they had endured — those are things I think they could pick up and sense in me. I also think they felt I had a sense of connection with them.

For more, read Hey, How’d You Write a New York Times Nonfiction Bestseller, Isabel Wilkerson? [Mediabistro AvantGuild subscription required]

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Julianne Moore and Tom Hanks (Credit: StarPix)

Game Change, HBO’s much buzzed-about film based on the 2008 presidential election and the 2010 book of the same name, held its premiere party at Ziegfeld Theatre last night.

Just a few of the celebs FishbowlNY spotted in attendance and on the red carpet: Julianne Moore, who does a spot-on, yet subtle portrayal of Sarah Palin; Sarah Paulson, who plays senior McCain campaign adviser Nicolle Wallace; the film’s executive producer, Tom Hanks, and his wife Rita Wilson; Jeff Zucker; Arianna Huffington; Monster’s Ball producer Lee Daniels; and just about every political pundit in town.

Unlike the book, which focused on all the candidates in the election, the movie zeroes in on John McCain‘s choice (or should we say, his advisers’ decision) to pick Palin as his running mate. And, while many are praising Moore for the way she humanized the Alaskan governor, Ed Harris brought his A-game too. Everything from his mannerisms to his posture were so McCain-like, it was eerie.

Game Change premieres this Saturday, March 10 on HBO. If you don’t mind a spoiler, head over to our sister blog TVNewser for a full review and peep more photos from the event after the jump.

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Malmont chatted with hosts Jason Boog of GalleyCat and AgencySpy‘s Matt Van Hoven about Operation Warrior Library:

“It’s a real non-political way for us to just help out,” he said. “No matter how any of us feel about the war, we’re all trying to help soldiers who are friends and neighbors get through the day over there. And these books go right there and they get passed around for weeks and months on end from one person to another so they stay in circulation and they help pass the time.”

Recently, Operation Warrior Library learned that audiobooks were in demand. The foundation contacted GalleyCat, whose readers helped collect 1,500 audiobooks to send overseas. Up next: Operation Warrior Library for Kids.

Learn more about the Warrior Library here.

You can listen to all the past podcasts at BlogTalkRadio.com/mediabistro and call in at 646-929-0321.

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Costa opened the discussion with a story about a freelance writer who pitched him recently. The writer said his rate was 15 cents per word. Is this this future of journalism?

Both Dash and Gittins agreed that measuring the rate a writer is paid based on number of words is outdated. Today, it’s all about being entrepreneurial, creating a brand and building a following. “If you can go to Dan and show that you have 10,000 avid followers, your rate per word will go up,” Gittins said.

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“I wrote a novel because — well, I’ve always been a good story teller and thought, if I can write the way I talk: it’ll be amazing!” she told FishbowlNY. “I just wanted to write about women in general.”

Read on for more insight on “Mercury” from the author

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Froelich is challenging readers to guess who inspired 10 characters from her book with the winner receiving a signed copy of the book and an invite to one of two book parties.

It may sound easy for people in the know, but this challenge might turn out to be harder than expected. Explains Froelich:

“I have not included any of my current colleagues (as I’d like to keep my job, thank you very much), nor are they all based solely on one person. In fact, most are an amalgam. The characters may not be based on people in the field in which they are described.”

For what its worth, we think this one will be the easiest to guess: “Kitty Foil, a teen starlet who accuses one of the main characters of ‘box-blocking’ her with a film director at the Met gala. A 17-year-old actress who’d been raised in the Disney farm leagues, Kitty brags about losing her virginity to Mick on a tour bus, keeps running to the bathroom to “powder her nose,” gets very drunk and ends up doing improbable yogic positions in rollerblades before wreaking havoc on the gala.”

Any guesses? Leave them below or go tell Paula. Winners will be picked Monday. We’ll keep you posted.

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Like Joe Gould’s Secret. Written by genius New Yorker scribe Joseph Mitchell, it told the tale of a Greenwich Village eccentric named Joe Gould who clucked like a sea gull and was writing a 1000+ page book called An Oral History of Our Time.

Only the book never existed outside of Gould’s head. It made for a great story (and a so so Stanley Tucci film), but noone ever got to read Oral History.

On the 50th anniversary of Gould’s death in a Long Island mental hospital, the Times‘ Sewall Chan penned a tribute to Mitchell (and Gould) for City Room:

Mitchell wrote that he realized the truth after introducing Gould to several publishers that had expressed interest in publishing excerpts of the work. (Gould had claimed that he had been rejected by 14 publishers and had hidden the manuscript for safekeeping during the war.) Mitchell confronted Gould with the truth, and Gould only replied, “It’s not a question of laziness.” Mitchell returned to his office at The New Yorker:

My anger began to die down, and I began to feel depressed. I had been duped by Gould – I didn’t think there was much doubt about that – and so had countless others through the years. He had let me up the garden path, just as he had led countless others up the garden path. However, I had thought about the matter only a short while before I came to the conclusion that he hadn’t been talking about the Oral History all those years and making large statements about its length and its bulk and its importance to posterity and comparing it to such works as “The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire” only in order to dupe people like me but also to dupe himself.

Recommended.

— Neal Ungerleider

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