Happy New Year ~ 2009

This blog has attracted over 4,500 readers in its first year. Thank you all for your interest. We're all happy to bid goodbye to a year full of sour news, bad weather and a sinking economy. Here's to a new President, a renewed hope in America, and good times in 2009 with friends, family, great books and movies to enrich our spirit.

Wherever you are, please remember to support your local economy. The merchants and stores support you with tax dollars, employ your neighbors, and invest in your community. Show your appreciation by supporting their business. And remember to support your fellow artists & authors in their endeavors. The entrepreneurial spirit thrives in America and around the world.

Read globally ~ Shop locally

Google Book Search

As you may be aware, Google created a book database, including generous excerpts of most author's works. On October 28, 2008 the Authors Guild, the Association of American Publishers and Google announced the landmark settlement of Authors Guild v. Google.

If your books are available at google.com/books, you might want to go to the lawsuit settlement page, and fill in your contact information. That's how you'll be notified and compensated for any copyright infringement.


Read more about how the settlement works here.

Good excuse of the week...

This from Poynter.org:

The "best" of 2008's media errors and corrections


It's Regret the Error's annual round-up, with this year's "correction of the year" award going to Dave Barry for this explanation:

In yesterday's column about badminton, I misspelled the name of Guatemalan player Kevin Cordon. I apologize. In my defense, I want to note that in the same column I correctly spelled Prapawadee Jaroenrattanatarak, Poompat Sapkulchananart and Porntip Buranapraseatsuk. So by the time I got to Kevin Cordon, my fingers were exhausted.

Ann Patchett essay in The Atlantic

EXCERPT:

"And then there’s this: if my house were burning down, the one thing I’d rush in to save would be my copy of The Collected Stories of Eudora Welty, which I had signed at the first author reading I ever attended, the year that I was 16 and the author was 70. I could discourse endlessly on why my books are in no way improved by my signature, and my words are just the same on the page whether or not I’ve read them aloud. And while I know better than anyone that I am no Eudora Welty, I know how profoundly I was shaken to see her, how I felt that my book had been transformed by the touch of her hands."

--- Ann Patchett

The December 2008 Atlantic has an excellent essay by Ann Patchett on book tours.