We’ve collected the books debuting on Indiebound’s Indie Bestseller List for the week ending August 26, 2012. Reported by independent booksellers around the country, the list gives you a peek at the books everybody will be talking about next month.

(Debuted at #4 in Children’s Fiction Series) Lorien Legacies: The Rise of Nine by Pittacus Lore: “Until the day I met John Smith, Number Four, I’d been on the run alone, hiding and fighting to stay alive. Together, we are much more powerful. But it could only last so long before we had to separate to find the others…” (August 2012)

(Debuted at #10 in Hardcover Fiction) Lionel Asbo: State of England by Martin Amis: “Lionel Asbo, a terrifying yet weirdly loyal thug (self-named after England’s notorious Anti-Social Behaviour Order), has always looked out for his ward and nephew, the orphaned Desmond Pepperdine.  He provides him with fatherly career advice (always carry a knife, for example) and is determined they should share the joys of pit bulls (fed with lots of Tabasco sauce), Internet porn, and all manner of more serious criminality.  Des, on the other hand, desires nothing more than books to read and a girl to love (and to protect a family secret that could be the death of him).” (August 2012)

continued…

New Career Opportunities Daily: The best jobs in media.

The poster who posed the question wrote, “Neil Strauss’ ‘The Game’ is kept behind the counter at my local Barnes & Noble because people frequently walk out the door with it, a salesperson told me. What else do stores stash back there?”

Quora user Tamara Troup wrote: “At our library some of the most frequently stolen books are the Law Enforcement Officers training manuals, the civil service exam prep books, and the ASVAB prep books.” Quora user Alice York wrote: “At the two  public high school libraries where I have worked: A Child Called It by David Pelzer (a book about parental abuse) and The Rose That Grew From Concrete poetry by Tupac Shakur.”

continued…

New Career Opportunities Daily: The best jobs in media.

Novelist and PEN World Voices chair Salman Rushdie will deliver the Arthur Miller Freedom to Write Lecture this year. The festival will feature Martin Amis, Margaret Atwood, Paul Auster, Graydon Carter, Michael Cunningham, Jennifer Egan, E.L. Doctorow, Tony Kushner, Herta Müller, Marjane Satrapi, Colson Whitehead and many other writers.

Rushdie had this statement in the release: “In an era of ever-expanding ‘screen-time,’ live/in-person readings, conversations and literary performances have never been more radical or more necessary … These live events break down the invisible walls that separate us into our own solitary computer pods and re-assert the importance of dialogue, activism, and community without borders.”

continued…

New Career Opportunities Daily: The best jobs in media.

Despite the cold snap yesterday, readers from all over New York City attended the sixth annual Brooklyn Book Festival. Reportedly, it is the largest book festival in the Northeast. In the video embedded above, you can meet some of the participating authors.

Pulitzer prize-winner Jhumpa Lahiri won this year’s Best of Brooklyn, Inc. award (BoBi). Lahiri was born in London, but now calls Brooklyn home. Each year, the festival recognizes a literary figure whose work embraces and speaks to the Brooklyn spirit. Previous recipients of the BoBi award include John Ashbery (2010), Edwidge Danticat (2009), Walter Mosley (2008) and Paul Auster (2007).

Festival founder and Brooklyn Borough President Marty Markowitz commented: “It’s all about the written word and how important reading is for all of us. Whether we’re kids who use reading to make ourselves into what we’re going to be in our life or whether you’re an elder person, like myself. Knowledge doesn’t stop at a certain age; it continues for life.”

continued…

New Career Opportunities Daily: The best jobs in media.

Today’s guest on the Morning Media Menu was Nancy Drew expert Jennifer Fisher–celebrating the 80th anniversary of the world’s most famous girl detective (pictured in a fancy new edition). In 2000, Fisher founded Nancy Drew Sleuths, an organization of “American and international fans and scholars” dedicated to the 80-year-old detective. Fisher talked about the life of ghostwriters in the 1930s, fan conventions, and how authors can build community online and in the real world.

Press play below to listen.

Here’s an excerpt about the life of a Nancy Drew ghostwriter: “The first ghostwriter, Mildred Wirt Benson, she wrote 23 of the first 30 books. For this particular kind of work, the ghostwriters were paid a flat fee. The fee was actually the equivalent of several month’s salary for a couple of weeks of work. It was actually pretty good money for what the job was … she definitely had to work for that paycheck, especially in the mid-1930s when her first husband became an invalid–she really had to step up the output to help the family.”

continued…

New Career Opportunities Daily: The best jobs in media.

Here’s an excerpt: “Auster, who is twenty-two, is already at work on her second album and is slated to appear in two films next year. Her father, the novelist Paul Auster, was standing in the crowd as well, listening with one knee bent against the back of his seat. He looked unabashedly proud. Sophie, at moments, became more like a kid than a star, as though unaccustomed to the power of her voice. ‘This one is my, uh, Aretha Franklin song,’ she said of her last act, rolling her eyes and mussing her hair. Salman Rushdie, who was sitting across from Auster and his wife, Siri Hustvedt, tried to take a picture with his iPhone.”

Find out more about Auster’s music on her MySpace page.

New Career Opportunities Daily: The best jobs in media.

Next week, Mary Gaitskill, Eric Bogosian, John Turturro, and others will read from stories written by inmates for PEN’s Prison Writing Program.

Author Stephen Fry defended Twitter and the Internets in a video interview about a generation of kids growing up online.

In a True Slant interview about “Eating Animals,” Jonathan Safran Foer talked about his move from vegetarianism to a vegan lifestyle: “my basic stance on the issue is, I’d say, forgiving–but still quite firm. I am transitioning to veganism, and I don’t like, run home and eat 1,000 eggs or something.”

Paul Auster talked about a time when all aspiring poets wanted to start their own magazines.

Beating the annual listmakers by a month, Amazon.com unveiled the Best Books of 2009.

New Career Opportunities Daily: The best jobs in media.

Barnes & Noble has launched a new mystery blog entitled Ransom Notes, featuring posts by Anne Perry, John Sandford, Louise Penny, and Robert Crais.

International authors sign a petition supporting the release of Roman Polanski, including Bernard-Henri Levy, Salman Rushdie and Paul Auster. A petition excerpt: “Seventy-six years old, a survivor of Nazism and of Stalinist persecutions in Poland, Roman Polanski risks spending the rest of his life in jail for deeds which would be beyond the statute-of-limitations in Europe.”

The Book Bench features an upcoming short film based on an Elmore Leonard story, directed by Joseph Gordon-Levitt from 3rd Rock from the Sun.

The Rumpus publishes a timely essay: “A Short, Personal History of Small, Independent Publishing (1995-2009).”

New Career Opportunities Daily: The best jobs in media.

According to the betting site Ladbrokes, Israeli author Amos Oz has the best odds of winning–the 4 to 1 favorite. The long shots are William H. Gass and Paul Auster, both with 100 to 1 odds. Bob Dylan clocks in with 25 to 1 odds. Americans Joyce Carol Oates and Philip Roth both have strong 7 to 1 odds. Haruki Murakami and Thomas Pynchon both weigh in with respectable 9 to 1 odds.

Here’s more from Monsters & Critics: “The Swedish Academy’s choice is due to be announced in October at a date yet to be announced. In recent years, the academy that awards the coveted prize, has made some surprise choices, including the 1997 selection of Italian playwright Dario Fo.”

New Career Opportunities Daily: The best jobs in media.

Alexie made a controversial point about readership: “All of us are writing for college-educated middle-aged white women,” he said. “Look around you. Count!” The audience ruefully complied, testing his generalization.

Grushin recalled how she moved to the United States as a 17-year-old student and read American writers for a year straight, hoping to strike up literary conversations. “I thought I could come here and talk to people about what I read–boy was I wrong!” she said, and the audience giggled nervously. She recounted telling an American teenager that her favorite authors were Ernest Hemingway and F. Scott Fitzgerald. “I’ve never read those Russian writers,” replied her young friend.

Auster concluded the discussion with an unwavering faith in his country’s pool of writers. “This is what makes American literature so vital–it’s so full of talent that these things bubble up anyway; despite the recession, despite declining literacy rates, there are as many poets now as there ever was.”

New Career Opportunities Daily: The best jobs in media.

What do Joan Acocella, Paul Auster, David Markson, Don DeLillo, John Updike, William Vollmann, Deborah Eisenberg, Stephen Sondheim, Reynolds Price, Richard Ford, Garrison Keillor, Jim Harrison, Mary Gordon, John Corigliano and many, many more luminaries in the literary, artistic and music worlds have in common? They all sat on the stage at the American Academy of Arts & Letters‘ Annual Ceremonial, held in the organization’s Harlem-area auditorium to honor the best and brightest in the arts. Some, like Gold Medal for Fiction winner Updike, have been members for nearly half a century; others, like Dana Spiotta, Junot Diaz, Tony D’Souza and Adam Rapp, received generous monetary awards honoring their recent writing-related outputs.

It may just be my own biased viewpoint that makes me think the Academy is a well-kept secret within the current state of the arts community, but then, it might not: while the turnout was strong, it was decidedly bereft of publishing professionals and those under the age of 35. And Academy President Ezra Laderman‘s opening remarks, highlighting how “we’re in an extraordinary time for the arts” thanks to questions about intellectual property, the decline of a proper arts curricula in any American school and eschewing artistic endeavors for market forces, had just the barest whiff of the old school. And yet it was remarkably clear how much the Academy, and its members, care about the arts and about ensuring that promising writers and artists continue the non-profit’s legacy, and how old school values produce a certain dignity that’s easy to admire. One need only listen to Updike’s spare remarks about how his induction into the Academy as its then-youngest member helped further his career by exposing him to peers as well as “magi-like writers” whom he revered. Bestowing awards onto Diaz and Spiotta is a step to the future, and I look with interest to see which younger writers the Academy recognizes from here on in.

continued…

New Career Opportunities Daily: The best jobs in media.

But to those like Powell’s bookstore co-owner Brad Jonas, CIROBE is a treasure trove of good stuff, from the early editions of Barack Obama‘s DREAMS FOR MY FATHER – which he bought at 22 cents a copy back in the day – to authors like Terry McMillan or Paul Auster he would never have discovered brand-new. “Remaindered books are given a rebirth,” he said. “It’s a chance for readers to discover authors that they didn’t read when the books first came out.” David Crane, who buys for Columbia Marketing, a London book firm, agrees.”This side of the business is important. this isn’t just selling books cheap. It’s about buying a book at the right price at the right time. This is the futures market for books. Some people are less likely to take a chance with an author at $25 but for $4 they will.”

New Career Opportunities Daily: The best jobs in media.