Today’s guest on the Morning Media Menu was Adrian Todd Zuniga, founder of the Literary Death Match reading series. Press play below to listen on SoundCloud.

The author event “marries the literary and performative aspects of Def Poetry Jam, rapier-witted quips of American Idol’s judging (without any meanness), and the ridiculousness and hilarity of Double Dare.” The series continues to grow and will tape its first TV pilot in a week.

Zuniga shared advice for making your next author reading better: “Our big thing is to bring disperate people together, by mixing up actors, comedians and authors … That’s the basis of our success. If you and your three friends are going to do a reading, you’re going to get a certain audience. But the goal in readings is always to get the biggest audience possible.”

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The Literary Death Match reading series will shoot a television pilot on October 9 at the Largo at the Coronet in Los Angeles, creating two shows that the popular reading series can pitch to TV networks.

Would you watch the Literary Death Match on television? The organizers hope to raise $10,000 for the pilot on Kickstarter. In exchange for pledges, you can get tickets to the show and digital downloads of the TV pilots. Check it out:

The live show — a double-feature (two, full 40-minute shows) starring top literary, Hollywood and comedy talent — will be filmed by a top cinematographer, then edited into a pair of pitchable TV pilots. The pilot will star  Michael C. Hall (Dexter; Six Feet Under),  Susan Orlean (The Orchid Thief; Rin Tin Tin), the musician Moby (Play; Destroyed), comedian/author Jenny Slate (SNL; author of Marcel the Shell with Shoes On), host Todd Zuniga (LDM creator, and a LA Times “Face to Watch” for 2012), author Ben Loory (author of Stories for the Nighttime and Some for the Day) and many, many more TBA. (Via HuffPost Books)

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Earlier this month, the Fishbowl Improv poetry group released the video embedded above: “How to Read Poetry.”

We are sharing the video to make you laugh and to remind you how not to conduct yourself at your next author reading.

If you want to avoid putting your audience to sleep, we recommend following the advice of Literary Brooklyn author Evan Hughes: “Keep it relatively brief and engaging. Keep in mind that reading aloud is a tough way to engage an audience. It can work, but I think it is best to be concise and have a range of people on stage for a few minutes each.”

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All the proceeds from this undoubtedly surreal dining experience will support WikiLeaks. The top bid is currently £4,100–how much would you pay to dine with this duo?

Here’s more from eBay: “The lunch will be from 12 – 3pm on Saturday 2nd July at one of London’s finest restaurants. The meal will be followed by a Frontline Club event from 4pm – 6pm at The Troxy in East London where these two formidable forces will be discussing the impact of WikiLeaks on the world and what it means for the future.” (Via Gawker)

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According to CBC News Canada, Baker (pictured, via) copied a speech written by Harvard University surgery professor Atul Gawande. Gawande delivered “The Velluvial Matrix” at Stanford University’s June 2010 medical school commencement and published the speech in The New Yorker.

The Edmonton Journal reported: “In an apology letter to students Sunday, Dean Philip Baker admitted the theme and much of the content of his speech was similar to Gawande’s … In the letter, Baker goes on to apologize for failing to attribute the source and said he holds himself to the highest ethical standard. He says he apologized to Gawande, who was not upset by his use of the speech.”

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Here’s more about the tour: “There are twelve stories in Other People We Married, and each story takes place in a different location. Every month for the next year, I will read a story in its location, or as close as I can get. This blog will follow my travels, my snacks, my impulse-buys, and more. For bonus points, send me a photo of OPWM in an exotic locale, and I will post it here, and send you a postcard in return.”

Last year we spoke with David Daley, founder of Five Chapters and publisher of Straub’s book.

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On May 9th, Munoz will be at the Wilmette Theatre in Illinois for a Psycho screening, signing copies of What You See in the Dark and talking about how the Hitchcock film influenced his book.

Here’s more about the book: “The setting is Bakersfield, California, in the late 1950s. A dusty, quiet town, too far from Los Angeles to share that city’s energy, yet close enough to Hollywood to fill its citizens with the kinds of dreams they discover in the darkness of the movie theater. For Teresa, a young, aspiring singer who works at the shoe store, her dream lies in the music her mother shared with her, plaintive songs of love and longing. And in Dan Watson, the most desirable young man in Bakersfield, she believes she has found someone to help her realize those dreams.”

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Last night, Jodi Picoult appeared at the Union Square Barnes & Noble in New York City to promote her new title, Sing You Home. She surprised her fans with a free concert.

The book features a 10-track CD by music teacher Ellen Wilber– Picoult wrote  the lyrics for the album. Wilber performed three songs at the bookstore event: “Sing You Home,” “Faith,” and “Sammy’s Song.” The “Sing You Home” song is featured in the book trailer embedded above.

Picoult also shared the back story for this novel, revealing that her oldest son Kyle came out as a homosexual while she wrote the book. She explained: “I have wanted to write about gay rights for a long time … People who are gay want the same thing straight people want. They want to be happy … there’s not much mystery to it.”

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It’s a great example of the do-it-yourself attitude that writers, readers, and publishers need to tap in the future. Follow this link for more information about the next reading, held tomorrow night (February 26) in Chicago.

Here’s more from HTMLGIANT interview: “The intimacy makes you responsible in a different way too. Even if you just come to listen it is never passively. Everyone is an active participant just by the fact of their being there. Plus, what is better than live, personal entertainment? Hearing poetry in someone’s living room, you can’t help but feel that it’s actually for you. Or that the pleasure of reading or being read to is so much a part of that.”

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The reading features a group of talented writers sharing the backstory to their six-word memoirs. So far, readers include: Deb Kogan, Rachel Sklar, Baratunde Thurston, Darin Strauss, Michele Carlo, Sara Barron, and Elizabeth Wurtzel.

You can buy tickets to the reading here. Here’s more about the interactive event: “Everyone will have the chance to share a Six-Word Memoir during the audience participation Six-World Slam. Then we invite you to hang out by the 92YTribeca’s beautiful bar and share more stories and drinks.”

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Levithan (pictured next to an espresso book machine) read at McNally Jackson Books earlier this week. He explained that he used The New York Times’ Book of Words You Need to Know to pick out words for the book. While writing, he followed the dictionary format, telling the story in a non-linear way.

After the reading, the author fielded audience questions. When asked to pick his favorite word, Levithan said “wonder.” He concluded the night with an encore reading of one of his favorite entries in the book,  ”elegy.” What is your favorite word?

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Hosted by Chris Verlander, Kodak’s director of book segment marketing (pictured), the panel discussion was moderated by Jim Milliot, the editorial director at Publisher’s Weekly. Here are some highlights from the wide-ranging discussion.

Liz Scheier, the editorial director of digital content at Barnes & Noble, talked about success stories with eBook bundles. She said one unnamed publisher saw a massive increase in an author’s sales when they gave away the first book of a series for free. She also suggested publishers try “lifestyle bundles,” selling related eBooks together (like a pregnancy guide and a parenting handbook).

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Four potential dates volunteered; two men and two women were asked a series of funny questions to determine compatibility. The audience voted by cheering on who they felt should go on a coffee date with Homes. The winner (pictured), was asked whether or not she would make a good stalker. She answered “yes.”

At Happy Ending events, authors are required to do two things. First, they must give a 10-minute reading. Then they must perform a risk on stage–hence Homes’ choice to speed-date.

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Thirty writers and actors joined a marathon reading of the classic holiday tale, A Christmas Carol at New York City’s Housing Works Bookstore Cafe before the holidays. In an article about the event, Bookish compared the reading to a similar reading staged by Charles Dickens in 1867. Editor’s note: We’ve added some commentary from Housing Works Books below.

A trailer for an animated adaptation is embedded above. Here’s more from  Bookish: “Dickens was greeted with eager fans who waited for tickets overnight in the cold, wrapped in blankets and huddled around bonfires to keep warm. The cops were called in for crowd control. On the first night of his New York tour, a sold-out audience of more than 2,000 literary socialites and powerful businessmen gathered in the grand Steinway Hall by Central Park. They cried, laughed, and interrupted with applause during Dickens’ reading.”

According to the article, only about “a half-dozen” of the attendees stayed for the entire 3-hour reading. Literary enthusiasts aren’t what they used to be in the 19th century. Bah, humbug!

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We caught up with Bussel before her event to find out why she is ending the series. She also shared advice about how to run a better literary reading.

Q: Why are you ending this reading series?
A: It was not an easy decision to end ‘In The Flesh,’ but I realized that I’ve been losing money on it, because I pay for food, photography and videography. I do get a cut of the bar, but that doesn’t cover everything, and then once I decided to end it, I realized just how much time it takes each month to book readers, promote the event, and generally organize it.

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