Around the Horn

Good morning, bookies! Stand by for news.

*** Dateline: England. The publication of The Jewel of Medina has been postponed in Britain at the request of the author, who apparently wants to concentrate on its American launch instead. Let's hope this is simply a business decision and not one made because of threats from barbarians.

*** Dateline: Tennessee. The estate of the late, great SFF writer Andre Norton has been settled in a Tennessee Appeal's Court ruling. Unless a further appeal is made to the Tennessee Supreme Court, this should mean that Ms. Norton's works can get back on the market and some unpublished manuscripts may now see the light of day. The dispute was between her caregiver and one of her fans, both of whom were named in the will. It seems the will was not particularly well-written and caused confusion. Follow the money.

I never met Ms. Norton, although I probably could have if I'd gotten off my lazy butt, she lived in Murfreesboro, after all, and I will always regret that. They just don't make 'em like her anymore.


*** Dateline: Boston. In the category of 'sometimes-the-bad-guys-get-away-with-it', Misha Defonseca, who in 1997 wrote a chilling memoir of surviving the Holocaust entitled Misha, a Memoire of the Holocaust Years, who saw her tragic, terrifying work translated into 18 languages and made into a feature film in France, yesterday won a lawsuit brought by her publisher. See, the book was horrifying and told the story of surviving the Nazis by living with wolves. As awful as it was untrue. Defonseca made the whole thing up. But the publisher waited too long to file the suit, so says the judge. Too late, so sorry, so long. It seems Massachusetts has a one year statute of limitations on such things. Who says crime doesn't pay?

->->-> Here's one I'd like to read. Your friendly neighborhood bookseller is a big fan of Anthony Bourdain, all the way back to the days on AOL' s Hardboiled board when nobody knew who, or what, he was. (Yes, for all of my old AOL buddies, Tony was one of us in the days of Gone Bamboo) Anyway, I wouldn't miss 'No Reservations' these days for anything, even if he is starting to drag politics into it. And in the vein of irreverent restaurant humor comes a book titled Waiter Rant: Thanks For the Tip- Confessions of a Cynical Waiter by Steve Dublinica. This tells us all of the dirty little secrets your wait-staff doesn't want you to know...wait a minute. Maybe I don't want to read this, after all.

Mark your calendars: Michael Connelly will be in Oxford on October 30th at 6 pm, reading and signing The Brass Verdict at Square Books. Your friendly neighborhood bookseller considers Connelly to be among the top five crime writers working today, his series about LAPD homicide detective Harry Bosch to be among the great series of all times. But Connelly has other characters and isn't afraid to mix two series when the mood strikes him. (Example: A Darkness More Than Night teamed former FBI agent Terry McCaleb with Bosch) Following the success of The Lincoln Lawyer and its sort-of-hero attorney Mickey Haller, Connelly now brings Bosch into the mix, since he just happens to be Haller's cousin. This is one BBG will try not to miss. I've met Connelly several times before and he is always worth the trip.

BBG