Texas Pages

Author Catherine Coulter was one of the few signings today, but she still had a line for audiobook versions of Tailspin.

But it made me wonder -- for an audiobook, shouldn't an author just speak their name, instead of putting in in print?

Maybe it's time for me to go...

I only saw Ted Turner as he was leaving the center, but I've heard a couple of reports now that he was incredibly entertaining this morning at a breakfast presentation. His pending autobiography, Call Me Ted, has been highly publicized here.

I also hear from a couple of sources that John "I'm a PC" Hodgman was great, and that he stuck around three hours yesterday to sign books.

Dallas author Kathleen Kent's The Heretic's Daughter landed on the cover of the daily expo newspaper produced by Publisher's Weekly today. I would say she has had a good Expo. I missed her yesterday, but maybe we can catch up with her in Dallas before she is wildly famous and won't return our calls.

PW also highlighted former Austin resident Andre Dubus III today.

And they brought up a third book that has been mentioned by several people I have talked with: I See You Everywhere, by Julia Glass.

Between Mystic River, Gone Baby Gone and the upcoming Shutter Island (directed by Martin Scorsese), Dennis Lehane has become the most popular novelist to adapt for the movies. I sat down with him for a half hour Sunday afternoon to talk about his new epic novel The Given Day, and I had to ask him: do you ever write novels with movie adaptation in mind?

I mean it, these are certain to be some of the biggest books of fall.

Taschen always does amazing, strange work. I'm not sure who buys them, and they would not tell me sales figures, but they never fail to surprise and amaze.

One that caught my eye was The Circus: 1870-1950, 670 pages, $200, 11.4 by 17.3 inches, this is NOT reading for the flight home. But a quick perusal revealed some beautiful images -- I did not have time to scan all 900 of them, or all 200 vintage posters. But it will be a must-have for the circus-obsessed. And not likely to be on Kindle anytime soon, for that matter.

If you like football photography, start saving now for The Golden Age of American Football, 1958-1978, by Neil Leifer. Own one of 1,500 limited edition copies for $500. Or get a new popular edition of his Baseball: Ballet in the Dirt for a mere $39.99.

Of course, their most eye-catching title was one that I can't actually mention here. Well, I'll try, if you shoo the kids away first. Then click on.

Just another Sunday morning in Los Angeles....

Sunday is a quiet day at the Expo. Crowds have thinned as many industry types are either packing up to catch early flight back to New York or are perhaps just hungover. Or at least still exhausted from that Prince party. (Witnesses today allege that Cameron Diaz was there, followed closely by P. Diddy, and Eddie Murphy showed up around 3 a.m. Oh, and the witnesses say -- Prince rocks.)

In any case, I like dealing with tired publicists. They speak with honesty.

This morning, I stopped in at one booth and asked my standard question: "So, what's been popular?"

She didn't even try to spin me. "Anything free," she replied, clutching her Starbucks.

"Just drive under Julie Andrews and park in the garage." So said the security guard at the gate of the 20th Century Fox lot, where HarperCollins threw its Book Expo bash on a chilly Saturday evening. I've been writing about movies for 12 years, but this was my first time on a lot. I felt like finding Mr. DeMille and telling him I was ready for my close up.

As we prepare for a relatively quiet final day of the Book Expo, be sure to stop by GuideLive.com for our regular Sunday roundup.

In addition to our daily story about the Expo (blog readers should consider that story sort of an extended remix of what you have read here), you'll find reviews of:

Land of the Permanent Wave: An Edwin "Bud" Shrake Reader, a collection of the Texas legend's work, edited by Steven L. Davis.

A pair of Kennedy-related works: The Last Campaign Robert F. Kennedy and 82 Days That Inspired America, by Thurston Clarke, and Counselor: A Life at the Edge of History by JFK adviser Ted Sorensen.

The Cellist of Sarajevo by Steven Galloway -- we've included an excerpt.

Judy Alter's always-enlightening roundup of happenings in Texas publishing.

Plus some quick looks at new material from Ian Frazier and Gordon S. Wood and The Lincolns: Portrait of a Marriage
by Daniel Mark Epstein, who will be in Dallas later this week.

Happy reading!

William Shatner and Leonard Nimoy both held Saturday -- the former of his autobiography, Up Till Now, the latter his book of nude photos of full-size women, The Full Body Project -- but sorry, Trekkies, the only place you will see them together is here on this blog.

An amazing statistic from Mr. Shatner -- he signed 260 books, and got through them in about 25 minutes. I spoke with at least one publicist who was wide-eyed in awe -- he said they could barely keep up.

Here's an excerpt from The Cellist of Sarajevo, by Steven Galloway. It's reviewed today in GuideLive.