Publishers Weekly's Best Books 2011

Publisher's Weekly presents its list of "Best Books 2011: The Top 10", including brief synopses.

• The Marriage Plot by Jeffrey Eugenides
• The Devil All the Time by Donald Ray Pollock
• State of Wonder by Ann Patchett
• After the Apocalypse by Maureen McHugh
• Bossypants by Tina Fey
• Catherine the Great by Robert K. Massie
• There but for the by Ali Smith
• Hemingway's Boat by Paul Hendrickson
• One Day I Will Write About This Place by Binyavanga Wainaina
• Arguably: Essays by Christopher Hitchens

See what the publishing industry thinks are the year's best reads.

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Where Would the Book Be Without Its Jacket?

Where would the groom be without his tuxedo jacket? Where would the book be without its cover jacket? In the same straights I’m afraid: just a guy with a shirt and tie, just a book with a cover and spine. That’s why jackets are important, both to grooms and books! That’s why a new weblog on Publishers Weekly is worth a read.

Called Jackets Required, this blog is a weekly column by Fwis, a design group that critiques book jacket design. The articles are short and pithy, but they offer a designer’s perspective on the artistic side of jacket design. If you’ve ever wondered what thought goes into creating a book jacket, this column will give you some interesting insights. And like any good blog, there’s a place for comments, so you can add your two cents or ask your daunting question to people who should have an educated opinion.

Why should you care? Think about how many books you’ve picked up off the display table because of what you saw on the jacket. Think about the ones you didn’t pick up. What made the difference? Maybe Jackets Required will discuss it and you can say, “Yeah, I thought so, too.”

This week’s Jackets Required column is on the book Loving Frank: A Novel.

One of Fwis’s project websites is called Covers and its tagline reads: “Covers is dedicated to the appreciation of book cover design.” They feature other articles including one on bookshelves that caught my attention. Those are some pretty wicked looking bookshelves! Take a look.

Fall Book Festivals Coming Soon

Publisher’s Weekly just published their fall book festival schedule saying, “Fall’s coming, and so are book festivals around the country which will celebrate authors, community, creativity and literacy.” They’re a great time to see what’s new in books and speak with some of the authors. The article includes a list of 42 locations including city, dates, website information, and contacts for publishers and booksellers. Here are just a few of the earliest sites:

The Atlanta Journal-Constitution Decatur Book Festival
Atlanta, Georgia – Aug. 31 to Sept. 2

Central Coast Book and Author Festival
San Luis Obispo, California – Sept. 8

Montana Festival of the Book
Missoula, Montana – Sept. 13 to 15

Wyoming Book Festival
Cheyenne, Wyoming – Sept. 15

Brooklyn Book Festival
Brooklyn, New York – Sept. 16

Fall for the Book Literary Festival
Fairfax, Virginia – Sept. 23 to 28

West Texas Book & Music Festival
Abilene, Texas – Sept. 25 to 29

Baltimore Book Festival
Baltimore, Maryland – Sept. 28 to 30

Georgia Literary Festival
Blue Ridge, Georgia – Sept. 28 to 30

South Dakota Festival of Books
Deadwood, South Dakota – Sept. 28 to 30

National Book Festival
Washington, D.C. – Sept. 29

Santa Barbara Book & Author Festival
Santa Barbara, California – Sept. 29

The Latino Book & Family Festivals
Houston, Texas – Sept. 29 to 20
Los Angeles, California – Oct. 12 to 14
Chicago, Illinois – Nov. 10 to 11

Orange County Children's Book Festival
Costa Mesa, California – Sept. 29 to 30

West Hollywood Book Fair
Los Angeles, California – Sept. 30

See the Publishers Weekly article for the rest of the locations and festival details.

Two More Translations of War and Peace Coming This Fall

Just what the world needs, two more translations of Leo Tolstoy’s War and Peace! According to Publishers Weekly (PW) there are already at least a dozen English translations, and “Just last year, Viking published a translation by Anthony Briggs that PW called ‘the most readable version on the market.’" Now Ecco (Harper Collins) will publish a version coming out September 4 and Knopf (Random House) will publish another one coming out October 16.

Why add two more to the confusing list of tomes? Says PW, “Ecco is calling its edition, translated by Andrew Bromfield, War and Peace: Original Version. It is essentially Tolstoy's first draft. Knopf contends that Ecco’s version is not the finished classic readers know. Ecco maintains its edition is more reader-friendly than Knopf's, translated by Richard Pevear and Larissa Volokhonsky, because it is shorter and more ‘narrative.’"

Really now, how can one choose a version to read? That's just too many choices without an educated speculation or someone's highly educated recommendation. I wouldn't know which to read, which represents a lot of pages to get bogged down in if I've made a poor choice. What's the value in adding two more volumes? Anyone knowledgeable enough about these two authors to know what they add to the story that already exists on War and Peace?

Potter Book and Audio Set Sales Records

Sales of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows set records on both sides of the Atlantic this past weekend. According to Publishers Weekly, publisher Scholastic sold 8.3 million copies in the first 24 hours in the U.S., while Bloomsbury sold 2.65 million copies in the U.K. in the first 24 hours. The audio version also set a record in the U.S. selling an estimated 225,000 copies, a 40% increase over Half-Blood Prince.

Independent booksellers in the U.S. reported brisk sales, with scattered reports of sell-outs! Apparently Scholastic limited the number of books that independents could order based on past Potter sales. The independent I frequent had a smallish display left for sale Saturday morning after a busy event Friday night, although tickets are sold for the Friday night event, from which book distribution are dependent, are sold well in advance. This independent actually is one of four stores, and I don't know how many copies the other three stores have on-hand.

Alexander Dumas' Lost "The Last Cavalier" Coming in October

If you’re an Alexander Dumas fan revel in the news. A lost work rediscovered and published in France in 2005 is coming to the United States in October, according to Publishers Weekly (PW). According to PW, “The Last Cavalier was found at the National Library in Paris two years ago by longtime Dumas scholar Claude Schopp.” PW further said, “The novel, which he said is very much in the vein of classic Dumas—it’s a revenge story set during the Napoleonic era.” The initial first printing by publisher Pegasus Books is set at 10,000. 752 pages.

Amazon.com lists The Last Cavalier as available September 12, 2007, but you can pre-order now. The description is quite exciting.