Smart Bitches Trashy Books | All of the romance, none of the bullshit.

How did you get started covering all things book? What is the scope of your responsibilities for the AP?

Hillel: Basically, I started covering books (around 15 years ago) because they were there, piles of them, begging to be written about. My scope is as big as the industry, and that is many, many piles of books.

What conventions or conferences do you look forward to? You coming to RWA National in San Fran this year? (If so, I shall buy you drinks. Many of them.)

I love attending BookExpo America, which - judging from the one that just ended - is apparently more fun for reporters than it is for publishers. I have never covered an RWA convention, although the AP has. But thanks to your generous offer, I will put in a request, for medicinal purposes only.

If RWA gives you a press pass and you go to San Fran, I will be so excited I will spin around and buy you martinis until you cannot stand up. Seriously, it would be a real treat to meet you and talk books and coverage.

This sounds like gushing. You promised no gushing.

What do you personally think of some of the more dire predictions at the BEA as pertains to booksales, ebooks, and the decrease of consumer spending on books? For example, I’d think that in a depressed economy, books become cheap entertainment. Instead of a $10 movie, a $7 paperback lasts longer. Hardbacks, understandably, are a luxe item but books across the board? What’s your call?

It wouldn’t be a booksellers convention without dire predictions, kind of like a political convention without balloons. But there is plenty to be worried about. Publishing has consolidated a lot over the past decade and isn’t nearly as “recession proof” as once believed. More books keep getting released, but more people are not buying them. The world accelerates, but reading doesn’t. And if, a real `if,’ e-books ever take off, anything is possible.

But there remains a deep, and wide, affection for books.  Millions of kids didn’t line up at midnight for “Harry Potter” because their parents, or some marketer, or their parents, told them to. The well-told story never goes out of fashion, and it works beautifully on paper.

What author do you want to stalk and go through their garbage until you get arrested? Anyone? Nobody? Ok, then, what authors do you really, really dig, but not in the going-through-the-trash sense?

I don’t have to stalk authors, thank goodness, I just request an interview. I don’t have to stalk authors, thank goodness, I just ask for an interview.  And since I don’t drive I find authors who do. So, thanks for the lift, Russell Banks, Joseph Ellis, Louise Erdrich, S.E. Hinton, Richard Wilbur ....

Are you exclusively a reporter of bookishness or do you also write fiction, longer prose, or, poetry or LOLCats?

I remain exclusively a reporter of bookishness, but I should pay more attention to LOLCats, the great art form of the 21st century.

If you had an ebook reader (do you?) which book(s) would live on it permanently? And if you say Chicago Manual of Style or Struncks or the Times or something, I’ll bang my head on my desk.

I’ve seen, held, but never owned an e-book reader. There’s some talk among publishers about sending advance copies of books in digital form to journalists; that would interest me.

Thank you, Hillel, for answering my nebby questions. And yes, oh yes, if the publishers in the world wanted to send advance copies in digital form, I’d be so full of glee you’d hear me in Australia.

The photographer, Rich-Joseph Facun, didn’t think he had a great picture when he took the shots of Knilans, but the Pilot photo director thought the picture illustrated “[a]ll the joy of the day.” While other photo editors “complaints about the insinuations of sexuality in the shoe color and the crossed ankles” the photo ran anyway.

And yup, the complaints rolled in. Detractors were a minority, and they objected to the sexuality in the image as predicted.
Some insisted that a more innocent picture, that of a 5 year old waiting for his father, should have been the front-page above the fold image to portay the sailors’ homecoming. Yet again, I am struck by the desexualization and the preference for “wholesome or patriotic” images, which underscore a preference for chaste innocence when it comes to portrayals of military figures.

But the majority applauded, and the public editor, who is also an associate professor of English at Old Dominion, wrote:

...many readers were reveling in that giddy anticipation that accompanies the long-awaited arrival of a loved one.

With that moment came a flash of insight. Our military neighbors deserve to be celebrated for their sacrifices - sacrifices the rest of us seldom share.

For that awareness, we are indebted to Candice Knilans and her love of pink.

I wonder if Ms. Knilans is now a bit hyperaware of her choice of footwear when she leaves the house. 

First: what do you get when you cross Avenue Q with World of Warcraft? A video that still cracks me up like cheeze crackers no matter how many times I watch it. Note: not entirely work safe, but really, is any video?

Have I ever mentioned that I have a weakness for Bollywood videos? I do. This is Aishwarya Rai in Bunti aur Babali, dancing to Alisha Chinai singing Kajra Re. I could watch this over and over. In fact, I do. I have the song on my iPod. It’s long as hell but I totally dig it.

And finally, I just received this from Soni: ToeJam featuring David Byrne, and an Utterly Not Safe For Work OMGPLS 70’s naked party - with way too much fun on the censoring. Pong?! I nearly fell off my chair. ETA: Fixed - new link!