Amistad, the HarperCollins imprint specializing in African-American literature, recently launched a blog, and one of their first entries tackles the long-running debate over 'black authors' sections in bookstores. As in, to quote the pseudonymous editor writing the blog, "Will only black people buy my book if I'm shelved in the African-American interest section?"

"I think it would be wrong to put Toni Morrison's books (or Walter Mosley's or Edward Jones's) in an African-American section," says one commenter, with the immediate caveat that "I do think it's reasonable to have a section for books on African-American history or books that focus on African-American identity, the same way there are sections for books that focus specifically on Russian history or gender studies or economics." (Which raises an interesting question: If a literary-themed African-American section exists in a given store, at what point on the aesthetic calculus would an "African-American novelist" be able to vault out of it, or a "gay novelist" to move off that shelf?) "The very idea of seeing Morrison's Beloved next to My Cousin's Baby Mama Drama in Church wit' Da Booty on Top by Tukewl Mochaboy makes me cringe," adds Diane Williams of Black Author Showcase; on the other hand, "I've also overheard customers in large bookstores ask 'Where are the Black books?'"

The blog is running a poll on the subject; so far, "shelve literary titles in general interest section" is just barely ahead of "institute 'post-racial' bookstores [and] eliminate all African-American interest sections." In addition to making your feelings known there, perhaps you'd like to tell us what you think about this issue?

(And, no, you don't need to point out that My Cousin's Baby Mama Drama... isn't in the Amazon catalog. We can spot hyperbole all on our own, thanks.)

You'll recall Thursday's NY Times article about the fashionable new steampunk aesthetic, which dwelled primarily on the neo-Edwardian clothing with a nodding references to the movement's literary origins in science fiction and fantasy from the 1980s and '90s. Now we find out that this article was the paper's second pass at explicating steampunk, as freelance journalist Richard Morgan (who isn't the British science fiction writer) uses his own website to publish an article the Times spiked last summer that focuses primarily on the intellectual underpinnings of the movement's design principles:

"Steampunk is the future as dreamt by the past, and so is like a learned alternative to science fiction... Although technically steampunk has been around since the 1980s, it has flourished in recent years among those who jive with the excitement of the last turn of the century more than the current one. These are not Luddites, but rather ordinary folks nostalgic for a time before every machine was digitally muddled. It is the opposite of the iPhone aesthetic; instead of being sleek, subtle and vaguely magical, steampunk is clunky, candid and obliging."

So why has this version of the steampunk story been collecting imaginary dust in a metaphorical drawer for nearly a year? The only thing I can think of is that somebody decided "an 1890 Olivetti sidestrike typewriter, a brass gyroscope, swinging magnifying glasses on a stand, and an old accordion-style camera" wasn't as 'sexy' as "petticoats, old military storm coats, goggles and aviator caps with an Amelia Earhart flair." Among the many differences between the two articles, the one I found most amusing was that the fashion-oriented piece has plenty of quotes from "Jake von Slatt" of The Steampunk Workshop, while Morgan's tech-centric article supplies the additional detail that von Slatt's real name is Sean Slattery. This gets even better when you go to the website and realize Slattery's full steampunk persona is "Hieronymous Isambard von Slatt." It's a good thing he's just a fun-loving anachronistic gearhead, and not a phony memoirist—or else the Times editors would be feeling pretty silly right about now, given their renewed commitment to identity vigilance.

(via BoingBoing)

As far as nascent literary subgenres go, there may be none sadder than the maternal counter-memoir. As we wait for Augusten Burroughs' mom to come out with her version of the truth, we can -- if we're French-- already read Lucie Ceccaldi's take on her son Michel Houellebecq's dysfunctional childhood, which he fictionalized in 'The Elementary Particles.'

Angelique Chrisafis, who interviewed her in the Guardian, says that while "literary theorists welcome the precious psychological insight into the biggest voice of a generation," everyone else might just find the situation sad: Ceccaldi says that her son is an "evil, stupid little bastard" and adds that "this individual, who alas came from my womb, is a liar, an imposter, a parasite and above all - above all - a petit arriviste ready to do absolutely anything for money and fame." One senses that Houellebecq won't be sending any Teleflora bouquets or Hallmark cards her way this or any other year.

Last night Christopher Erkmann from HarperCollins's art dept showed me the coolest cover ever for the mass market edition of Kevin J Anderson's The Last Days of Krypton which comes out this September. Remember those holographic buttons when you were a kid. You know the ones where if you change the angle you can see an eye wink, or skeleton walk. Well, that technology has finally been updated for the 21st century by Extreme Vision and its called lenticular 3D. There's serious depth when you look at this cover straight on and then when you tilt it back and forth you see the Superman logo zoom out of the explosion right at you. If you're going to be at San Diego Comicon make sure to check out the cover flats they're giving away since this photo doesn't really do it justice. Rumor has it there's another super secret advance holographic prototype cover coming up from Harper (shhhhh). If the first step in selling a book is getting someone to pick it up, these books will sell like hotcakes. Actually, hotcakes aren't selling so well these days, so they'll sell like something that really sells well. Like Beer?

So, I emailed Paul Di Filippo this morning, any "what hath I wrought?" feelings after reading this morning's NY Times feature on steampunk? The Times credits the science fiction author with naming the subculture, which has spread from literature to fashion, via a collection of novellas published in 1995, which you should totally track down and read. "Now I have to watch for assassins sent by K.W. Jeter, actual coiner of the term," he quipped. It's true: Jeter coined the term back in 1987 to describe a wave of sci-fi novels with Victorian-era settings, among which one might recommend, off the top of one's head, William Gibson and Bruce Sterling's The Difference Engine and Tim Powers's The Anubis Gates. (If you've got more recommendations, don't keep them to yourself.)

Beyond that, Di Filippo asks, "Where's my gold-plated, coal-powered Orgasmatron?" Good question. After reading the article, mine is: Is anybody really watching the film of The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen, which is pretty godawful, or are they heading straight for the comic book?

(photo: Robert Wright/NYT)

On Amazon's Omnivoracious, Heidi Broadhead asks the question "Sloane Crosley, Why Are You So Funny?" Well, it turns out Heidi "found that Crosley had not only created Plexiglas-encased diorama sets for her essays, she had also narrated video tours of them."

However, this isn't the first time dioramas have played a part in quirky book publicity story angles and sidebars. Rudolph Delson's Maynard & Jennica inspired French sculpey artist H5L5N5 to recreate nine scenes from the book including Joan Tate getting drunk on Bloody Marys while waiting for her son.

Many diorama artists are finding inspiration from authors for their work. In a post on Fine Scale Moddler (I check it every day) Bultenibo "was inspired by the American author H.P. Lovecraft and his horror short stories, especially the short story "Call of Cthulhu". In the diorama I tried to model a scene were some tentacle monster just has been summoned to the Earth to raise hell." See all the angles of this AWESOME diorama here.

I hope Arkham House publicity is paying attention. This is a great opportunity for them, especially with the premiere of the latest Lovecraft film adaptation, Beyond the Dunwich Horror, coming up on May 23.

Well, this being Galleycat, I couldn't help but include this link to a youtube video of someone's cat that fell asleep on their 300 diorama. THIS IS LOLARTA?

Every publicist hits a wall with bookings. With the number of venues shrinking, the competition tougher, and the chances of getting into Harvard better than getting your author on NPR David Brown (assistant director of publicity at Atria), decided to take matters into his own hands by starting his own media outlet: Dr. Blogstein's Radio Happy Hour which debuted on BlogTalkRadio on February 13, 2007. The weekly internet radio program airs live each Tuesday night at 9:00 pm Eastern featuring guests from the worlds of books, movies, current events and music. He even has his own theme song performed by the Long Island Beatles cover band, The Moptops (if you listen carefully, you'll recognize its Dr Robert sped up).

With mentions in Page Six, Hardball with Chris Matthews, and the Star Ledger, Brown's alter ego Dr Blogstein is making the news. "This is what I set off to do," says Brown. "The bigger I could make my show, the better venue I would have for my authors. No sense in having a tiny radio show, I want to build it up as big as I can get so they can benefit from it." And with guests like Niki Taylor, Dick Van Patten, Evander Holyfield and Shirley MacLaine, he's doing just that.

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Unless you're a gemologist, there's only one context in which you'll ever hear the word 'lapidary': a review, like Michiko Kakutani's review of Jhumpa Lahiri's 'Unaccustomed Earth': "Ms. Lahiri writes about these people in 'Unaccustomed Earth' with an intimate knowledge of their conflicted hearts, using her lapidary eye for detail to conjure their daily lives with extraordinary precision." "Mercurial" and, famously, "limn" are also, to blurbers and book reviewers, what "jai alai" is to crossword puzzles. To be fair, though, there really is almost no other way to say "characterized by an exactitude and extreme refinement that suggests gem cutting."

Thanks to everyone who wrote in to point out that the rap pastiches in 'Indecision,' 'Absurdistan' and 'Maynard & Jennica' pale in comparison to the ones in Tom Wolfe's 2005 take on the kids today, 'I Am Charlotte Simmons.' This novel not only posits the existence of rappers named "Dr. Dis" and "C.C. Good Jookin'," it contains the deathless made-up lyric, "Yo, you take my testi-culls, suck 'em like a popsi-cull." Ew.

Rudolph Delson's 'Maynard & Jennica', Gary Shteyngart's 'Absurdistan' and Benjamin Kunkel's 'Indecision' all have something in common besides the frequency with which they're spotted on NYC's subways: These popular books all contain homages to hip-hop. We could try to tease out the sociocultural implications of these (white) authors' occasionally funny, sometimes tone-deaf parodies of rap, but this isn't grad school, it's a blog. So let's just see whether Delson, Kunkel, or Shteyngart are going to win any freestyle battles anytime soon! Get ready. Or, as Delson's invented rapper Puppy Jones would put it, "Y'all can't rhyme for (scratch). Puppy's got a list. And he's gonna learn y'all, yo. Uh oh, here we go!"

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