GalleyCat readers around the globe have joined our annual Pet Parade, sending photos of their literary pets.

Novelist P.I. Barrington sent a photograph of her literary dog, writing: “This is Gizeh, my Malamute/Timberwolf, acting as beta reader and editor for Isadora DayStar, my dark sci-fi adventure! She refused to take the specs off once I put them on her!”

More photos follow below–we will collect all the entries at this link.

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Out of all the literary mixtapes we posted this year, the most popular list was our collection of free samples from the 2012 Hugo Award winners.

Below, we’ve linked to free samples of all the winners–including the complete text of the winning novella, novelette, short story and graphic story. Be sure to check out John DeNardo‘s SF Signal blog, winner of the best fanzine award.

Here’s more about the awards:  “The 2012 Hugo Award winners were announced on Sunday evening, September 2, at the at the Hyatt Regency Hotel in Chicago. The ceremony was hosted by Chicon 7 Toastmaster John Scalzi.”

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E.L. James became the first author to be named Publishers Weekly‘s Person of the Year.

Many members of the publishing community, such as Washinton Post fiction editor Ron Charles, have shared their opinions about this announcement. Celebrities have also weighed in on the Fifty Shades of Grey trilogy.

As rumors continue to circulate about a film adaptation, we’ve rounded-up four videos featuring celebrities reading the book.

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This week, Bedford/St. Martin’s is hiring an editor, and Cambridge University Press needs a global supply chain director. Meanwhile, Random House is hiring an eBook assistant production manager, as well as an advertising operations director. Get the scoop on these openings and more below, and find additional just-posted gigs on Mediabistro.

• Editor Bedford/St. Martin’s (New York, NY)
• Global Supply Chain Director Cambridge University Press (New York, NY)
• eBook Assistant Production Manager Random House (New York, NY)
• Advertising Operations Director Random House (New York, NY)
• Direct Mail Assistant Manager Oxford University Press (New York, NY)

Find more great PR jobs on the PRNewser job board. Looking to hire? Tap into our network of talented PRNewser pros and post a risk-free job listing. For real-time openings and employment news, follow @MBJobPost.

Here are some handpicked titles from our Coming Attractions page. Want to include your book? Just read our Share Your New Book with GalleyCat Readers post for all the details.

Pearls of Pleasure by Chantilly White: “Gwen Coffey’s marriage is collapsing, three years after her firefighter husband, David, survived a terrible blaze. New panic attacks send Gwen into a dark abyss of terror every time they make love. In therapy at David’s insistence, one question burns in their minds–will the doctor’s treatment plan save their once fiery passion, or will the flames of Gwen’s fear devour their love?” (September 2012)

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The ninth annual Morning News Tournament of Books (ToB) will commence in March 2013.

So far, 15 finalists have been revealed. Three titles from the “pre-tournament playoff round” are currently in the running for the sixteenth and final slot. We’ve included the two lists below.

Here’s more from the announcement: “The ToB is an annual springtime event here at the Morning News, where 16 of the year’s best works of fiction enter a March Madness-style battle royale. Today we’re announcing the judges and final books for the 2013 competition as well as the long list of books from which the contenders were selected.”
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Readers around the globe have unwrapped new tablets and eReaders this holiday season. Below, we’ve included a long, long, long list of free and legal eBooks you can download right now for any device.

Explore our Project Gutenberg lists and click “read this eBook online” to sample the book without downloading anything.

If you have an iPad, iPad Mini, iPhone or iPod Touch, you can download the ePub edition. If you have a Kindle or a Kindle Fire, you need to download the Kindle edition. If you have a Nook, Sony eReader or a Kobo, you should download the ePub edition.

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Editors Shannon O’Leary and Joan Reilly have raised more than $16,000 for their contemporary comics anthology, The Big Feminist BUT.

Some of the writers and cartoonists who will be contributing pieces for this collection include Jeffrey Brown, Gabrielle Bell, Lauren Weinstein and Josh Neufeld. We’ve embedded a video about the project above–what do you think?

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A memoir about Star Wars and culture has been removed from Amazon’s Kindle Store.

UPDATE: The book has returned to the Amazon Kindle Store. AppNewser has more details:

Amazon has removed the self-published Stars Wars memoir A Long Time Ago: Growing up with and out of Star Wars from the Kindle Store citing trademark as the reason. The author, Gib Van Ert explained the removal in an email to  Boing Boing. He writes that Amazon’s “emails are vague, but they seem to being saying that I have to have Lucasfilm’s permission before selling on their store a book that talks about Star Wars.” According to the book’s Amazon listing, it is a personal memoir about growing up in the era of Star Wars.

For the second time this year, Jessica Sorensen has topped our Self Published Bestsellers List with another new adult novel. Check out our What Is New Adult Fiction? post for more about this booming genre.

To help GalleyCat readers discover self-published authors, we have compiled lists of the top eBooks in three major marketplaces for self-published digital books: Amazon, Barnes & Noble and Smashwords.

We update these lists every week, tracking how writers perform inside these booming marketplaces. You can read all the lists below, complete with links to each book. If you are an author, check out our Free Sites to Promote Your eBook post and our How To Sell Your Self-Published Book in Bookstores post and our How to Pitch Your Book to Online Outlets post.

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