Reading at Rikers

Jamie Niehof, an intern with the Correctional Services Program, wrote a post for the New York Public Library about running the library at Rikers. My favorite part was:

Each prisoner is allowed one book and one magazine. The most popular books are by far James Patterson's novels, so popular in fact that we have to lock them up after book service because they tend to disappear. I wonder if James Patterson has any idea. National Geographic is the magazine of choice, and there is an entire box of them to choose from, some as far back as the early 80's. Urban magazines and books were in high demand, with almost no supply.

God, James Patterson is popular literally everywhere.

Plus sized must mean any size on the plus side of zero

We all know that fashion does not realistically depict women, in that most women weigh over 80 pounds. It's a good thing that books do not fall prey to this slimmed down version of reality. Oh, wait, never mind.

I think where Jezebel is particularly on the money is that the covers highlighted (at the link above) are not supposed to represent just any women; they're meant to represent large ladies as protagonists. Like the Bloomsbury cover whitewashing debacle(s), this shows that publishers think that no one will pick up a title with a big girl on the front (even if the title is "Big Boned").

One day soon, reader types, we will not be treated like idiots. At least, that's what I keep telling myself.

Goodness gracious, Cornel West

Cornel West, Cornel West, what is up with your world? He details his Sunday routine, and says he is:

Funky Baptist, which means you focus on the blood at the cross where you find the love and freedom to bear witness to truth and justice. And funky as in George Clinton-and-James Brown funky, as opposed to deodorized.

Love. Him.

He also says, "Downtime is reading; I’m always reading on the plane, whatever the reading is for course work the next week. I’m also always rereading the classics, Plato, St. Augustine."

Aspire to West-dom, people. I don't quite know why he's famous (besides his hoe-down with Larry Summers), but he is a walking soundbite. Chomp chomp.

Stealing books for fun and pleasure

Margo Rabb wrote a great essay on a recent rash of bookstore shoplifters, trying to have their unemployment and reading too. The most frequently stolen book? The Bible. In the shoplifters' defense, the only people Jesus straight up promised entrance to Paradise were thieves so...logical connection to stealing his Word?

This I liked:

Fiction is the most commonly poached genre at St. Mark’s Bookshop in the East Village of Manhattan; the titles that continually disappear are moved to the X-Case, safely ensconced behind the counter. This library of temptation includes books by Martin Amis, Charles Bukowski, William S. Burroughs, Raymond Carver, Don DeLillo and Jack Kerouac, among others. Sometimes the staff isn’t sure whether an author is still popular to swipe until they return their books to the main floor. “Amis went out and came right back,” Michael Russo, the manager, told me.

Maybe they should put the Bible back in the X-Case.

Tolerance is a skill we should cultivate

Hello, fellow pessimists. I read a lot of the interwebs this weekend, and saw the huge number of comments attached to Nathan Bransford's post about how much publishing houses make off a book relative to the author. And, after reading 200 plus comments, I can safely say (not to any of my readers, because you are all perfect, but to the larger world):

Author folk: you need to chill out.

First, the conspiracy theories have to go. Publishers are not trying to lose money (even when it appears otherwise). And although some of you might be able to do a good job "saving the industry," you are not working in publishing, doing that good job.

Second, while writers make very little money, people in publishing also make very little money. I know people who have worked for travel stipends and for no benefits (those ones are me). I know people who have been working in publishing for years and are technically interns, making an hourly wage (or working for friggin free, people. For free).

The moral here is that yea, mid-list writers make almost no money. But most people who work in publishing make almost nothing. Ten years of publishing experience pays slightly less than a 21 year old college graduate working in finance (did your stomach just curdle? Mine did). And almost everyone in publishing has to stretch that salary in New York City, the most expensive city in the country.

So chill out, drop the conspiracy theories, and don't take it out on the people trying to make a living in publishing. No one goes into book publishing for profit. They do it for free books and the chance to read for work.

Handwritten Bible worth more than my life

The handwritten Bible I mentioned last week was auctioned off on Ebay and closed with a bid of $15,407.53, making it about $15,406 out of my price range.

So, instead, I'm investing in a Wii and the new video game Mass We Pray (which, since it's on a Wii, I think should be Mass Wii Pray, but, you know, whatever):



If this isn't real I think my heart will drop out of my body in sadness.

I have heard the word of the Lord

And it is spoken by Richard Dreyfuss. A new audiobook of the Bible is coming out with an all-star cast. For $125 you can hear Luke "Judas" Perry betray James "Jesus" Caviezel.

Question: would you follow Richard Dreyfuss into the desert? And would you rather listen to stars preach, read the Bible on your Xbox, or see how other people recopy the Word?