TOP 100 BOOK SITES
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| Fiction Chronicle Novels by Mattox Roesch, Nick Cave, H. M. Naqvi and Sam Savage. feeds.nytimes.com |
Sarah Palin going great guns at the tills Former vice-presidential candidate's memoir racks up 300,000 sales on its first day in shopsSarah Palin's memoir, Going Rogue, has become one of the bestselling non-fiction books in history after it sold 300,000 copies in its first day on sale.Palin's publisher HarperCollins told American press that Going Rogue has proved so popular it has been forced to print an extra 300,000 books after an initial print run of 1.5m, with about 300,000 sold on 17 November – its day of publication – alone. Going Rogue is currently sitting at the top of Amazon.com's bestseller list, ahead of Stephenie Meyer, Dan Brown and Stephen King.Palin's first-day sales are behind Bill Clinton's, whose 2004 memoir My Life sold 400,000 in its first 24 hours, but ahead of Hillary Clinton's, whose autobiography Living History broke records when it was published in 2003, selling 200,000 copies on publication day. The figures are nonetheless a long way behind fiction sales: Brown's The Lost Symbol sold more than 1m copies in the US, UK and Canada in its first day in the shops, while Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows sold 2.6m copies in its first 24 hours in the UK alone.Fans have been turning out in their thousands to meet Palin, who last week embarked on a three-week, 14-state tour of the American heartland. "I'm most looking forward to meeting many of you, shaking your hands, and telling you, 'Thanks for loving America'. I'll give you a scoop here and tell you what's on the book's Dedication Page – it's dedicated to you – Patriots – who love the USA as much as I do," the former Republican vice-presidential candidate wrote on her Facebook page before she set off. "I can't wait to see you! God bless the fight for freedom! Keep up the great work, Patriots who love this country."Palin was paid a reported $7m (£4.4m) advance for Going Rogue, which has been the subject of fierce discounting in the US. Last month Wal-Mart cut its pre-order price to $10 from its RRP of $28.99, with Amazon and Target both matching the price. It is currently on offer on Amazon for half-price.But one independent bookshop, in Santa Cruz, California, is offering a different sort of incentive to customers: a bag of "Just Plain Nutz" to those who buy Going Rogue at full price. "Anyone who claims they can monitor national security by looking out their window towards Russia is a little off-base. The nuts are a perfect statement for thepolitics of Sarah Palin," Casey Coonerty-Protti, manager of Bookshop Santa Cruz, told her local paper.The store has so far only sold one copy of the memoir. "We know some customers have to buy it because it's on some uncle's wish list," said Coonerty-Protti. "But it's not a big seller for the Santa Cruz market. We haven't had a lot of interest in selling the book anyway."Those hoping to judge Palin's prospects for a presidential run in 2012 will no doubt be further encouraged by these figures. Barack Obama's bestselling memoir, Dreams from my Father – first published in 1995 – has spent more than 150 weeks in the New York Times bestseller lists. According to book trade magazine Publishers Weekly, together with his political essay The Audacity of Hope it sold just over 239,000 copies in the US in 2008, eclipsed in a single day by Palin. But whether she will still be picking up new readers in a decade's time remains to be seen.PublishingSarah PalinAlison Floodguardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2009 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds feeds.guardian.co.uk |
Oxford to reform voting rules for poetry professor post Oxford University tonight announced changes to the centuries-old tradition of voting for its professor of poetry post, instead introducing processes that bring it something closer to the 21st century.The vote, every five years, has been called a "kamikaze convention", and this year descended into embarrassing farce when Ruth Padel felt compelled to resign after nine days in the job.For some, the arcane voting rules are the problem. Any member of Oxford's convocation, which includes all 300,000 or so Oxford graduates, can vote as long as they turn up in person on a given day. When Padel was elected in May, fewer than 500 people actually voted. Under the new proposal, everybody eligible will be able to vote online, or in person, over a longer period.Oxford hopes to avoid a repeat of this year's election which saw Padel quit after she was implicated in a smear campaign against her main rival, Derek Walcott.Walcott, a Nobel laureate, pulled out of the election when details of a sexual harassment claim made against him by a student at Harvard in 1982 became a dominant theme of the campaign. Padel admitted passing on material relating to this to two journalists.Oxford now hopes to fill the post, vacant since Sir Christopher Ricks finished his five-year term last year, by autumn 2010. But some believe the voting changes could make the election even more of a bun fight.Judith Palmer, director of the Poetry Society, said: "It just feels like they are not addressing the bigger problems. The contest is notoriously bruising, and there have been many excellent poets who would not dream of putting themselves forward because they don't want to take part in the showbiz aspect of it all. These changes will probably increase the number of good candidates ruling themselves out."Palmer said the election was a flawed concept. "Would the medical school or mathematical institute be happy for their professors to be chosen by anybody?"The changes are still subject to approval by the university's parliament, the congregation. Seamus Perry, deputy chair of the English faculty board, said: "It is good news that the election will be so much more accessible to the large community of graduates of the university that have the chance to vote for Oxford's professor of poetry."In theory, the changes could give a better chance to more populist candidates as, in the past, the people who have voted are the ones who either live in Oxford or who have a deep, serious interest in who gets the job. So it could mean someone such as broadcaster Clive James would have a better chance of winning an election, although he has written that he would "rather throw himself off a cliff".But James, shortlisted along with Padel in this year's Costa book awards poetry category, has also written: "I do indeed find the Oxford poetry professorship just about the most attractive cup of its kind in existence."Whoever gets the job will join an impressive list of former professors of poetry such as WH Auden, Seamus Heaney, Matthew Arnold, Robert Graves, Cecil Day-Lewis and James Fenton.So far there are only a few declared candidates, one of whom is the Guardian's Stephen Moss, who has written poetry since he was 14. He said: "It's excellent news that the university has made an announcement on the post at last. The delay has been rather peculiar, and I assume reflected embarrassment at the Padel debacle."I can't say that electronic voting especially appeals to me: a modernist fad. I would much prefer the Victorian system of having to stand on a podium and declare your preference, depending largely on who had supplied you with the greatest quantity of beer."Oxford professor of poetryRuth PadelDerek WalcottPoetryUniversity of OxfordMark Brownguardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2009 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds feeds.guardian.co.uk |
McNally Robinson closing 2 stores Winnipeg-based McNally Robinson Booksellers is closing two of its four Canadian stores, citing factors such as the economic downturn, and internet and electronic text competition. cbc.ca |
Paperback Nonfiction Top 5 at a Glance1. THE BLIND SIDE, by Michael Lewis2. THREE CUPS OF TEA, by Greg Mortenson and David Oliver Relin3. EAT, PRAY, LOVE, by Elizabeth Gilbert4. ARE YOU THERE, VODKA? IT'S ME, CHELSEA, by Chelsea Handler5. I HOPE THEY SERVE BEER IN HELL, by Tucker Max feeds.nytimes.com |