Texas Pages

OK, this place is reaching a critical mass of zooiness. Star Wars characters are walking around; I just saw a storm trooper leading a life-size R2D2 around by remote control (say it ain't so, 3PO). John Hodgman of The Daily Show is signing his book More Information Than You Require, which pretty much sums up this whole glorious shebang. A few booths down, Vincent Bugliosi is signing copies of The Prosecution of George W. Bush for Murder. And in a few minutes, the New Press will be serving chilled shots of Swedish Vodka in honor of Henning Mankell's The The Eye of the Leopard.

UPDATE: The new Mankell translation is actually The Pyramid, a collection of mystery short stories featuring a patrolman named Kurt Wallander originally published in 1999 (Eye of the Leopard was his last one). And yes, they were serving shots of Swedish vodka at the New Press booth (you even got to keep the shot glass). There's a lot of afternoon drinking going on here: Cambridge University Press was serving beer (Bud and Sierra Nevada) and wine to promote it's new book Grape vs. Grain. Never let it be said that writers don't like to imbibe.

I've always had a thing for the university presses, maybe because I'm one of those perpetual college student types. So I quickly gravitated toward the university booths at Book Expo, where I found workers who were happy to explain their upcoming titles as the big boys of publishing grabbed maximum attention a few aisles down. Here's some of what I discovered, and what I'm looking forward to in the coming months.

For those of you who like sports and fabulous photos -- here's Rick Pitino signing Rebound Rules.

Why covering BEA is like covering 26,000 blind men describing an elephant:

I was chatting at the Ecco booth this morning. A publicist there told me he thought the show was slower and more relaxed this year, compared with the relative chaos and crowding of New York last year.

A few minutes later, I was checking out the offerings at Oxford University Press. There, the crew agreed - this year is much livelier than what they saw in New York last year.

For the record - given the LA Convention Center's slight more managable layout, the smaller crowd and the fact that the air conditioning here actually works, I would have to agree - it is less chaotic this year. Or maybe it's just that mellow California vibe working on me.

For those of you who come here for the fabulous photos, here's Ariana Huffington signing Right is Wrong: How the Lunatic Fringe Hijacked America, Shredded the Constitution, and Made Us All Less Safe.

The literary star of the breakfast panel was Andre Dubus III, whose new book The Garden of Last Days has generated some attention here. Mr. Dubus - who left the University of Texas at Austin with a degree in sociology in 1981- gave insight into what makes a writer tick when he talked about his upbringing. Yes, he was the son of a famous short story writer, but that, he noted, meant the family was poor. And after a divorce, his family moved a lot - something he says is common in many writers he knows. He became angry, and learned how to fight, and began to seek out situations where he could pick a fight with someone he thought was a bully.

I popped in -- just a bit late -- to a breakfast panel with Alec Baldwin, Magic Johnson, Philippa Gregory and Andre Dubus III this morning. Caught just enough of Ms. Gregory to understand why she packed 'em in at Arts & Letters Live in Dallas earlier this year. She's devastatingly funny, repeatedly using Mr. Baldwin as a foil as she spoke about marriage, love and some of the acrimonious marriage habits of the royalty she writes about. Each dig got increasingly louder laughs from the audience of several hundred.

"Would you like to take a break for a moment?" he suggested after one snarky aside.

"If you have any objections," she returned, "Mr. Johnson will represent me outside."

There you go, folks -- a look at some gen-u-ine literati. Who are all these people? Beats me. I'm just a humble books editor in Dallas.

Actually, these folks at the Knopf party Friday night (at Comme Ca in West Hollywood) were practicing the time-honored BEA ritual of party-hopping. This particular scene featured some very big names that mean a lot to people in publishing (Sonny Mehta) and at least one new author that anyone would recognize (Barbara Walters.) Anne Rice and Arianna Huffington were allegedly on site as well but remained unspotted by me. I did enjoy conversing with Amanda Boyden, author of the forthcoming Babylon Rolling, however.

Later in the evening, we headed to The London, for a cocktail party thrown by The New Yorker. Among those in attendance were chipper Starbucks-selected author Garth Stein (Art of Racing in the Rain), New York Times Book Review editor Sam Tanenhaus and author Salman Rushdie.

The biggest, hottest ticket in town was the secret party that Prince was throwing at his rented home up in the hills to promote his 21 Nights. Here are two words of advice for anyone attempting to attend a "secret party" in the hills of Hollywood:

I was reminded this evening that the highly buzzed Heretic's Daughter is by Kathleen Kent -- who is, indeed, a Dallas resident.

Grabbing galleys -- that is, pre-release, roughly bound copies of forthcoming books -- is a popular game for many BEA attendees, and Knopf certainly has its share of them this year. (They also have one of the hottest parties of the weekend; more on that later.)

Knopf publicity director Nicholas Latimer said that The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo had been popular, based on a Publishers Weekly story that deemed it an official "galley to grab." PW also anointed Toni Morrison's A Mercy, which comes out in November. And look for John Updike's The Widows of Eastwick in October.

As with the Editors Buzz Panel I attended earlier, the authors who read at the Emerging Voices session this afternoon are not guaranteed successes. Still, these are new writers who have managed to iimpress, and at least a couple are likely to find success.

First was Nami Mun (who scored a double by winning mention at the aforementioned Buzz panel), who read from Miles From Nowhere. She's not a dynamic reader -- she apologized ahead of time becuase her voice does tend to sound as if she's about to cry -- but her prose was powerful as she painted vivid scenes of a young woman living on some extremely hard streets.

Her editor had gone out of her way to point out that this was NOT a memoir, so I asked Nami afterward just how much of her actual life was in the novel.

For the second year in a row, Rue Judd, publisher of Bright Sky Press of Albany, Texas was able to provide some good perspective on BEA for me.

Rue has been coming to these events since 1981 -- although she says she might have missed one or two. Back then, her press might do half of its annual sales at the convention.

These days, she says, it's about networking. But it's still a selling opportunity, she says.

"The Barnes & Nobles, Borders and Amazons are here," she says. "They may not write their order, but they see us and do a lot of comparing."

I caught the tail end of Thomas Friedman's keynote speech, wherein he recapped his arguments from Hot, Flat and Crowded and encouraged the audience to act NOW to save the world for our children, and ourselves.

I then walked to lunch and ate a sandwich that came in a nonrecyclable plastic tub and soda in a cup that was also nonrecyclable. Both ended up in the trash.

Perhaps I should have listened to the whole speech.

Here's one for the beer lovers. This October, Houston's Bright Sky Press will publish Mike Renfro's Shine On!, a history of Shiner Brewery and beer. To mark the occasion, Bright Sky was to have frosty cold bottles for the enjoyment of all in the main exhibit hall Friday. One problem: the beer didn't show (at least as of early afternoon). Bright Sky's Ruina Wallace Judd had confirmation on the shipping, but the suds were still missing. More to come.

Well, I was supposed to. I checked out the party for Dennis Lehane's new book The Given Day last night at the Mondrian's Sky Bar on Sunset Blvd. (I feel so LA). Hung out with some nice publicists and some beautiful people, but I had to jet to see a movie (Get Smart) before the guest of honor arrived. That's the thing about LA: you have to allow an hour to get anywhere. And pay $20 for valet.

Then, fun after the flick: my buddy Scott took to me a Tiki dive bar in Silver Lake called Tiki T. Told me to order two Ooga Boogas. As the bartender poured, the bar's populace started chanting": "Ooga-Booga, Ooga-Booga" (add your own slurring). The more they chanted, the more dark rum he poured. Imagine a shady and colorful version of Trader Vic's and you'll get the idea. Good times. Hey, you know what Jack said about all work and no play.

Mr. Merschel has already dropped some info on the sheer size of this thing. But it's still hard to comprehend the scene. Row after row after of book purveyors pushing product. Some guy dressed as Shakespeare. People promoting apocalypse books with "prepare to meet thy doom"-style placards. As a newbie I have to say I'm pretty overwhelmed. In a good way, of course.

Gonna spend much of my day checking out Ignatius MacFarland: Frequenaut!, a new kids book by Freaks and Geeks creator Paul Feig. I'm supposed to talk to him near the end of the day, shortly before jetting (or crawling in traffic) across town to talk to Steve Carell. Stay tuned, and send the paramedics if you don't hear back.

I hope you are getting the sense that this event is definitely a "you'll never know exactly whom you'll run into" experience. For example, you might be sitting in a press office, and suddenly, at the table next to you, is a genuine comedy legend -- Stan Freberg.

He and his wife, Hunter, are here to do business -- they are pitching a book on their life together, and are hoping to sign a deal soon. (Which further blows my pet theory that this event is all about the parties, but at this point, I don't care.)

Hunter has Dallas ties by the way -- her mother was from our fair city.

In an impromptu interview, he told a couple of stories and discussed some ongoing work.

The books discussed at the BEA Editors Buzz panel are not guaranteed to be excellent, or even good. But they are an indication of what some of the top editors at the top publishing houses are most excited about. So one way or another, you will probably be hearing about the titles pitched this morning as the first big day of the big expo.

And it apparently will be a big year for bad kids and witchcraft. Here's what was "buzzed:"

Sara Nelson, editor in chief of Publishers Weekly, says her favorite book for the fall season is Philip Roth's Indignation, coming in September from Houghton Mifflin.

An acknowledged Roth fan, she says, "I'm not saying it's the best best, but it's up there among his best."

One more celebrity sighting for the evening: At a party thrown tonight by publisher Sourcebooks at the Autry National Center, Marty Stuart performed a few numbers to promote his forthcoming photo book/CD Country Music: The Masters. Wife Connie Smith joined him.

Nikki Giovanni gave an excellent history lesson in discussing her children's book, Hip Hop Speaks to Children. And regular Dallas Morning News contributor Alan Cheuse did a reading from his new novel, To Catch the Lightning, which has already been marked for coveted "buzz" by Publisher's Weekly. Alan did a reading that definitely made me want to go back for more. The book comes out in October.

I met Russ Lawrence this evening. He's a onetime Texan (having attended Southern Methodist University in the 1970s), a current Montanan (operator of the Chapter One Book Store in Hamilton) and as of this week, the former head of the American Booksellers Association.

Russ was quite aware of the bookselling situation in Dallas -- and pointed to the pending arrival of Legacy Books as a sign of optimism for independent booksellers as a whole.

"To have a 25,000 square foot book store opening in Dallas, which has been bereft [of independents], is big news," he said.

Russ said that as chain stores and Internet retailers took over the bookselling scene, the number of independent stores nationwide had dropped from 5,000 to about a third of that. But in the past two to three years, the pendulum has started to swing back the other way, he says.

Chris Vognar's previous post mentioned the daunting space that awaits us. Here is a partial view of what we'll be plunging into tomorrow.

Surely, there's gotta be a good book or two in there somewhere.

UPDATE:

Here are some exact statistics on the scope of the Expo:

So I have made it to the cavernous Los Angeles Convention Center, home of Book Expo 2008. It's the American publishing industry's big publishing pow-wow; I'm here with esteemed books editor Mike Merschel. It seems the Lakers are playing right next door at Staples Center (bye-bye Spurs)?, which makes for some nasty traffic. My plan for the evening: A quick stop at a cocktail party for Dennis Lehane at the Mondrian on Sunset (his upcoming novel, The Given Day, is a sprawling 1918 Boston tale), then off to a screening of Get Smart. Yeah, I'm doing movie stuff down here also. Supposed to talk to Steve Carell on Friday, and Lehane, the man behind Mystic River and Gone Baby Gone on Sunday. The exhibition hall is just getting set up, but it already looks daunting. More to come.

OK, so maybe I missed Jessica Simpson on my flight. But I did strike up a conversation with the woman in the seat in front of me, who turned out to be none other than Sharon Anderson Wright, President/CEO of Half Price Books. Who, frankly, was much more interesting to me.

And during a pleasant conversation at the baggage claim and rental car counter, she shot down my notion that the expo has become primarily a big literary schmoozefest, where grabbing party invites and free galleys is somewhat of a game for booksellers, librarians and reviewers.

This is a business event for Half Price, which has about 10 people on the ground buying, selling, scouting and networking.

"We aren't spoon-fed our books," Sharon said. "We have to work."

OK, point taken. But maybe we'll cross paths at a party later on.

Was that Jessica Simpson sitting in first class on our flight from Dallas to LAX? I have no idea. But a guy on the way to the baggage claim said so, and he looked trustworthy.

Maybe I'll run into Jessica at the expo. She can read, can't she?