And speaking of Hillel Italie, he also reports on what friends of the late journalist and historian David Halberstam are planning for THE COLDEST WINTER, Halberstam's final published work that will be released by Hyperion this October. Joan Didion, Seymour Hersh, Doris Kearns Goodwin and others will read coast to coast to spread the word about Halberstam's account of the Korean War.

"He thought that it was the best work he had done since The Best and the Brightest," says Halberstam's widow, Jean Halberstam, referring to her husband's book on Vietnam. "He had been thinking about doing this book since he was in Vietnam. It was always in the back of his mind." Highlights of the promotional tour will include Didion reading in New York City; former basketball great Bill Walton in La Jolla, Calif.; Hersh in Washington, D.C.; Anna Quindlen in Milwaukee, and Goodwin and fellow author Samantha Power in Cambridge, Mass.