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Political Wire has a post on Joe Biden's new book making the best seller list, the New York Times has it as number 15, total sales between 8000 and 15,000. The web site also mentions you can buy Promises to Keep:On Life and Politics at Amazon.
Well, best seller...? Amazon has it ranked at 8115, hardly a barn burner. As contrast, take the new book on the Duke LaCrosse case, Until Proven Innocent, by Stuart Taylor and K.C. Johnson, not even on sale yet. Amazon has it at 666.
Thousands of fans waited in line until the midnight sales of the new Harry Potter book began. All the enthusiasm for these books and the characters in them made me wonder how many boy babies have been/will be, named Harry?
Khaled Hosseini, author of the best selling novel, The Kite Runner, will have his second book on sale beginning, I think, today. Titled, A Thousand Splendid Suns, the story follows two Aghan women who struggle to survive in a harsh male dominated society.
Many people wait impatiently for the latest Harry Potter book, but learning Hosseini had written another book is more than exciting to me. I never had much interest in reading The Kite Runner, a book which was left at our house by my sister in law. Then one day I had nothing much to do and decided to give the book a try. I didn't put it down until I finished it. So this news about A Thousand Splendid Suns has me cleaning off the track shoes so I can beat what I know will be a rush of Hosseini fans in local bookstores.
A new book which is being talked about all over the blogosphere is The Dangerous Book for Boys. Let them run, get outside and skin their knees, play outdoor games, learn to tie knots. Looks like an amazing book which is bringing in discussions of games and outdoor activities which everyone used to play: Tag, throw a ball against a wall, play running bases, bounce or fly, hide and seek, build a fort or clubhouse, crack the whip, kick ball, play in a sandbox, etc etc.
Get them outside to play. What did you play at when you were a kid?
The New York Times has a story today about a Paris University literature professor who has written a book called, "How to Talk About Books You Haven't Read?"
The premise is you don't really have to take the time to read the whole thing, you can skim it. Mr. Bayard then offers tips on how to cover up ignorance of a “must-read” book.
Ha. Maybe I'll go to the bookstore and skim through it rather than buying it. If he says its OK to skim, it must be OK not having to buy the book. Irony from a professor of literature, Is the joke on him?
O J Simpson is on tour pumping his new book, If I Did It. He also sat down with Fox for an interview, supposedly one which was "unrestricted" in terms of what questions could be asked.
Must we go through this again? Having OJ back in public view can be as seductive as a bad highway accident. We don't want to see a tragedy, but we can't help slowing down to look. Don't watch that Fox segment and don't buy the book. Send a message through the ratings and book sales that we are finished with OJ and his dreamworld.
So You Wanna Know gives the list of the most popular, in terms of sales, books of all time and does it with some humor...some of which is funny some of which is not.
10-In His Steps: "What Would Jesus Do? author, Charles Monroe Sheldon, a Congregationalist pastor in Topeka Kansas in 1896--28,500,000 copies sold.
9-Valley of the Dolls Author Jacqueline Suzann, 1966. I remember this one and am absolutely shocked it has made this list after selling 30,000,000.
8-The Common Sense Book of Baby and Child Care. Author, Dr. Benjamin Spock. Enough said. 39,200,000 sold.
7-World Almanac Author, by committee. 40,000,000 sold
6-A Message to Garcia Author, Elbert Hubbard. Book thought to be a 'model for success' and sold 40,000,000 to 50,000,000 around the world.
5-McGuffey Readers Author, William Holmes McGuffey. Grade school readers tops the Dick and Jane series which I liked much better. Have been hunting for original paper bound first grade Dick and Jane readers for years to no avail. McGuffey sold 60,000,000
4-The Guinness Book of Records Author, everyone and anyone. 81,000,000 sold
3-American Spelling Book Author, Noah Webster. 100,000,000 sold.
2-Quotations from the work of Mao Tse-Tung Author, Mao. 800,000,000 sold with maybe a little bit of arm twisting.
And, number one. Any guesses? You know, I know you know...
1-The Bible Author according to the So You Wanna Know web site, God. They are trying to be funny but they're right. 6,000,000,000 sold but that is just a guess.
When number one daughter was here a few weeks ago she left a book she was reading...well actually I took the book...by Donna Leon. Since then I have been on the hunt for other books by this American woman who has lived in Venice, Italy for many years.
The books are centered around Guido Brunetti, a detective in the Venice police department. But these stories are more than the usual mystery story. Leon gives readers a view of Venice such that we can picture ourselves on one of the police boats, eating the many meals Brunetti eats with his family or in local restaurants, seeing the architecture, learning the history.
The characters continue through each book and I have come to like them all...or despise them depending...but I especially enjoy the police chief's assistant, a woman who fills her office with flowers and wears clothing of like colors. She is particularly skilled at using her computer to ferret out just about any information needed by Brunetti, who is eternally puzzled by this talent...and someone wary of the legality of it. Nice to see a woman in this role.
But if food is king in these books then thoughtful discourse between Brunetti and his wife, a teacher of American literature at the local university is queen. Readers see discussions about the environment, politics, government graft and patronage, raising of children, and of course, food. The plot lines are excellent as well.
Going on vacation or just lazing around on summer weekends and looking for something to read? Give Donna Leon's books a look.
Kermit Roosevelt, great great grandson of Teddy, and law professor at Penn has had his first novel published. In the Shadow of the Law has received rave reviews according to "article 3 groupie" who writes the Underneath their robes blog, a blog you really should be reading for the witty way in which she writes about Supreme Court gossip. But, back to Kermit, the guy is just too young looking to be a law professor. Isn't there some sort of age requirement? No? In any event, I plan to hunt down this book.
I came across a post by Kris of Dummocrats this morning where she wrote about reading a book by Jim Dwyer and Kevin Flynn called 102 Minutes. She peaked my interest enough that I went out and bought a copy for myself. Started reading it in Borders and the print just about jumped off the page.
The book is first hand accounts of many of the people caught in the Twin Towers on 9-11-01 and what they went through to survive. From the second paragraph of the author's note:
No single voice can describe scenes that unfolded at terrible velocities in so many places. Taken together, though, the words, witnesses, and records provide not only a broad and chilling view of the devastation, but also a singularly revealing window onto acts of grace at a brutal hour.
I paid 26 dollars. If you click the Amazon box at the top left sidebar on this page, you can get it for 17.16 and if you order within the next hour or two (4:30 CST) you can have it tomorrow. ( I wish I had seen that sooner. I'd be almost 8 dollars ahead. heh. If you scroll down the Amazon page to the reviews of the book, you'll find one by Rick Bryan who was on the 89th floor of one of the Towers. His story is as riveting as the book.
