Sarah Weinman at Confessions of an Idiosyncratic Mind has an astonishing array of numbers showing where best-sellers get sold. Considering the number of authors who obsessively check their Amazon ranking, this is pretty interesting. Few people would think to check their Walmart rankings even if WalMart had rankings available to be checked... MJ Rose has a discussion of Sarah's numbers, and quotes some other authors.
A good many authors blog about the working process. For example, Sandra Scoppetone included all interested readers in the excruciating process of creating the second book in her series about Faye Quick, a private eye in New York City during World War II. The first in the series is just out, This Dame for Hire. We have it, it's pretty good. After an additional draft and a total reconstruction (she works without an outline), she recently completed the rewrites on the followup volume in the series, Too Darn Hot, and shipped it back to her editor. Phew! (There's a long list of authors who blog in the right-hand column at Beatrice. Neil Gaiman, anyone?)
There are a lot of blogs where readers (not necessarily librarians, reviewers, editors, authors, but 'just readers') like to talk about books, such as Nikki's World, and one I have lost (please let me know if you have the URL) where someone who has kept a reading log for the past several decades is blogging about what she's reading now and simultaneously about what she read thirty years ago this date.
Grumpy Old Bookman is recommending Robert Littell's thriller, Legends. (We don't have it, will try to order).
Literary Saloon points out points out that the Man-Booker Prize longlist comes out on August 10, and also that Forbes recently did a best book blogs list. These are mostly the same sites as were turning up in magazine articles months ago. Is the era of ferment in the discovery of a new medium already over?
LitBlog Coop is still talking about Kate Atkinson's Case Histories. They've also been posting about the nominated books they did not select. One of those is Marjane Satrapi's graphic novel Embroideries. It's on order.
You could do this kind of thing all day. Or just read a book.
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