Famously harsh New York Times book critic Michiko Kakutani has clearly taken a liking to prolific New Yorker writer and "Deadline Poet" columnist for The Nation Calvin Trillin's latest political book: apparently moved to write a poem, she reviewed it in verse. You know, in the style of his book, also written in verse! "Trillin recounted this all with verve and élan/Charting the candidates’ every slogan and plan." Check out the excerpt—and then you can turn the table and judge her poetic efforts.
"McCain’s pick of Palin was more grist for the mill,
Caribou Barbie saw herself as a tool of God’s will,
At least that’s how Trillin saw the lass from Alaska,
Whom Republicans hoped would play in Nebraska."
And:
"Trillin praised the country’s choice to reboot
In verse that was witty, quick and acute.
What had begun two books back as a wry chronicle of woe
Became a tribute to the nation’s ability to grow." [NYT]
We appreciate the bold break from form, but reviewing a book in the style it was written is totally a Janet Maslin move—like she did with James Frey's new novel. Let's not ever imitate Maslin.
In yet another sign that the entire media industry is completely Obama-dependent, the President-elect's magic touch is being felt in book sales. Obama's mere mention on Sunday's 60 Minutes that he was reading a book about FDR without "specifically naming a title or author," 
Between the recession and the weakened state of publishing, nothing good has been predicted both for the industry and holiday book sales. But you'd never know it by the insane advances that celeb books—some submitted to publishers without so much as a proposal—are getting. In the wake of Tina Fey's $6 million advance for a book of humorous essays, Sarah Silverman's $2.5 million dollar advance for the idea of a collection of comedic essays, and a sure-to-be-huge advance for a Jerry Seinfeld book on the horizon (some estimate $7 million, which would put him on par with Tom Wolfe's last advance), many in publishing are railing against huge book advances that 
Vanity Fair editor and Spy founder Graydon Carter 
Our friend Nate Silver is already making canny career moves! The
JAP-y comedian Sarah Silverman, who used to be funny and fuck Matt Damon but is now mostly obnoxious, just sold a book to HarperCollins for $2.5 million, 
What's a really fast shortcut to addiction? Being a child star. Remember Full House, the lovably terrible situation comedy about the whitebread-dorky Tanner family, whose cast included infants Mary Kate and Ashley Olsen? Jodi Sweetin—the actress who played young Stephanie for eight years—went through meth-addiction hell and lived what she called a "double life." She's since gotten married, had a child, and acted in an indie TV pilot, Small Bits of Happiness. Today, reports the Observer, Sweetin 
Apocalyptic pronouncements have been made in publishing amidst the layoffs and rough economy; even megastore Borders is struggling. Barnes and Noble's chairman told the Wall Street Journal last week that "never in all my years have I seen a retail climate as poor as the one we are in;" he's preparing for a terrible holiday sales season. It might not be all bad, reports Motoko Rich 
Man-child Norman Mailer's voluminous 
Having run for mayor of New York 
Remember how the novel Jewel of Medina, Sherry Jones's book about the child bride of Muhammad, was going to set off a wave of Muslim outrage and violence? In the exhaustively-chronicled journey to publication for Jewel of Medina? Random House pussed out on publishing it due to some wingnut remarks by academic Denise Spellerg when they asked her for a blurb, so then other people decided rush in and publish it, including a British publisher who was rewarded with a firebomb in his mail slot. So then he decided not to publish it, and Jones quickly became a poster child for hysterical pre-emptory censorship. Well, now the book is out and Jones is doing her book tour. The "widespread violence" Spellberg warned Random House of isn't happening, and as the 
You know what's next for any lame duck president: the inevitable post-presidency memoir. Only problem, other than the fact that he struggles with basic grammar and syntax: Bush is a hugely unpopular outgoing president, and most of the country hates him. Publishers are wondering what the market for a potential Bush memoir would be, and the consensus is: um, awkward! No publisher is clambering to give him $15 million like they did Clinton; certainly "the foreign rights interest will be considerably less," says the 
Tatiana Boncompagni Hoover is a socialite married to a vacuum-cleaner heir, and likes to play up her tenuous ties to Italian royalty. She just wrote a thinly-veiled novel about life in the upper strata of Manhattan 
You're the leader of a global jihad and spend all your time fleeing from cave to cave and plotting only the vilest of terror attacks (gotta stay focused!). But extremist Middle Eastern editors are burning up your satellite phone with urgent demands for a book on how one "dispenses money, logistical support and training to radical groups in over 50 countries." Decentralized management is so hot right now! What's a would-be martyr to do? If you're Osama bin Laden, the answer of course is to hire a ghostwriter. Per 
If it wasn't inevitable from the get-go that Rupert Murdoch would, via tentacles that touch every distribution channel and medium, obtain an advance copy of Michael Wolff's biography of him, it certainly became so when the book landed in the hands of the News Corporation chairman's son-in-law Matthew Freud. Freud got it from a London newspaper negotiating serialization rights, Murdoch got it from Freud, and Wolff soon heard from Murdoch, 
The highlight of Sarah Palin's career? It's not her 
Charles Bukowski: not a fan! After reading the abominable Women—in which our protagonist kills time in his apartment while waiting for dozens of the silly crazy girls who write him letters to get off the plane and fuck him—I gave it to my (ex) boyfriend: "You'll love this." (He did.) Nothing wrong with earnestly-expressed chauvinism in literature. However, his limply pathetic meanderings allow the more discerning readers to assume that even though Bukowski was prolific with his women and his writing, he was—ultimately—a pretty bad lay.
Diane von Furstenberg is a noted fashion designer, responsible for creating the looks-good-on-every-woman wrap dress. She is also married to IAC's Barry Diller—who is, for his part, a noted homosexual! DVF has created a comic book for DC Comics called 
The book-publishing industry is famously glacial. Who knew, for example, when Amit Chatwani sold his blog-based satirical book about high-livin' finance playboys, 
Fake memoirist and most self-important author of our time James Frey is selling his Manhattan apartment. It was listed for $5 mil originally, but he recently took $500,000 off the asking price. (When times are hard, we all have to make sacrifices.) From a Curbed commenter: "He needs to up his meds and hold his ground on the price." Also: "make sure the square footage is right, he may be lying about that too." As Frey's tattoo says, "Fuck the bullshit, it's time to throw down." [
Can a publisher somewhere please grow a pair and not keep letting fundamentalist assholes who want to see the world revert to the good old days of the 13th Century run their houses? The Jewel of Medina, Sherry Jones' historical novel about the little girl wife of Muhammad that Random House dropped because it was afraid of offending crazy people, is now on shaky ground with its British publisher. When that publisher, Gibson Square, was firebombed a couple weeks ago, they said they 
My writing teacher says we should all go to the shrink to get "un-blocked." Maybe she's on to something: Joseph O'Neill, hottie Netherland author, has one. Page Six reports that the former London barrister was nervous about his novel-writing dream until his shrink told him to get on with it already and move to the States to write. Result: "One of the most remarkable post-colonial books I have ever read."-the New Yorker. [
Last week, Nobel Prize secretary Horace Engdahl 
The personal library of Walker Digital founder Jay Walker includes an actual Sputnik I satellite, ruby-bound books, and "a framed napkin from 1943 on which Franklin D. Roosevelt outlined his plan to win World War II." Not that we care or are jealous. [More photos on 
Hey, do you have a 1,000 page manuscript based on "Wagnerian opera, Lou Reedian post-punk, the philosophy of Schopenhauer, Jungian psychology, the life and death of cities, French aestheticism, the magic of memory, gay identity and—most importantly?—cats"? Hah, good luck selling that. But wait... what if a blind query to a big-deal William Morris agent resulted in the book getting sold? That's what happened to editor and 
Honestly? We'd rather read a book-length history of the Hillary Clinton campaign 
"Want to go see Choke this weekend and have your name in Chuck's next book?" Um, as what? A snuff film victim? A gangbang participant? This is super-graphic Fight Club author Chuck Palahniuk we're talking about. He's taking the grassroots (read: hopeless) approach to finding viewers for his new movie: "all you have to do is get as many people as you possibly can to go see Choke this weekend" and get your name in a future book. Why? Because a bunch of big movies are coming out at once, and they're desperate.
You don't get into writing for the money, but a few people do manage to get rich from it. Forbes made a list of the ten wealthiest authors of the last year. Harry Potter author J.K. Rowling won, of course, making over $300 mil. Whut-ev-ah. James Patterson and Tom Clancy came in second and third, and Ken Follett made the list thanks to Oprah choosing Pillars of the Earth for her holy book club.. [