waleslit.com blog

Cetology: FYI Amazon's "lending library"

2011-11-16T11:14:00.000-08:00

The Authors Guild's latest advocacy alert covers Amazon's controversial "lending library" policy.

From the article:

Amazon approached the six largest U.S. trade book publishers earlier this year to seek their participation in the program. By all accounts, each refused. Small wonder. Publishers aren’t eager to allow Amazon to undermine the economics of the e-book market, representing the lone bright spot for the industry, by permitting an estimated two to five million Amazon Prime customers to start downloading e-books for free. So books from the Big Six publishers – Random House, Simon & Schuster, Penguin, HarperCollins, Hachette, and Macmillan – are not in the Library Lending program.

Amazon’s attempts to enlist the next tier of U.S. trade book publishers, major publishers that are slightly smaller than the Big Six, appear to have fared no better. Many, perhaps all, also refused.

No matter. Amazon simply disregarded these publishers’ wishes, and enrolled many of their titles in the program anyway. Some of these publishers learned of Amazon’s unilateral decision as the first news stories about the program appeared.

You can read the full article on the Authors Guild website.

Whaleboats Under Sale

2011-10-24T12:27:00.001-07:00

Check out Shelf Awareness's great starred review of Katherine Malmo's debut book, Who In This Room (Calyx, Oct 2011). See clip below.

Juxtaposing the ordinary and the absurd, Malmo divines and articulates the relationships between chemotherapy and fly-fishing, fashion tips and a biopsy report, welding and marriage, casino demolition and adoption. The musical precision of her words is felt in the body, cutting straight to the core. You emerge from Who in This Room as if from a vigorous swim, refreshed and more alive. --Claire Fuqua Anderson, fiction writer

Who In This Room also received a great blurb from librarian rockstar Nancy Pearl, the author of Book Lust: “This moving, courageous, honest, and beautifully written account is not about the life of a cancer survivor, but rather of a life defined by living. It was a privilege to read it.”

The Grand Armada-- Agency Author News

2011-07-01T10:53:00.000-07:00

Dan Savage is "Dr. Ruth if she were interested in bondage and threesomes," according to Mark Oppenheimer in a fantastic profile ("Married, with Infidelities") from the latest New York Times Magazine. This is such an apt portrait it's hard to choose where to quote from, but this will be fun.

The Grand Armada-- Agency Author News

2011-06-29T10:04:00.000-07:00

The Wall Street Journal published pieces by Bill Streever and Robert Spector this month. Bill explores glacier moulins in this article and awe-inspiring photo gallery. Robert discusses the role-reversal of Amazon and Barnes & Noble. (You will need a subscription to access the full article.)

The Grand Armada-- Agency Author News

2011-06-27T11:29:00.000-07:00

Great write-up about Dan Savage's keynote speech to the ALA in this week's Publishers Weekly. The article's author, Andrew Richard Albanese, said the speech "entertained, moved, and captivated."

Here's a snippet:

[Dan Savage] praised librarians for offering the kinds of books that can help kids struggling with their sexuality, being bullied by classmates, rejected by their families and their churches, and portrayed libraries as a safe haven for many kids. As for why he turned his Internet-based effort into a book (published by Dutton in March) Savage drew applause, telling librarians "I'm a print guy, and books are magic."

Whaleboats Under Sail

2011-06-15T12:44:00.000-07:00

Crow Planet (Back Bay Books, 2011) is featured in a great summer reading list from the Cleveland Plain Dealer. You can view the blurb about Lyanda's book, and other summer reads, here.

Scrimshaw Pie Wheel-- Misc

2011-06-08T11:44:00.000-07:00

Using cloud computing to store your work-in-progress? In "Why You Should Keep Hard Copies of Your Writings," Jason Boog from Galleycat shares a government report about situations that could potentially spell doomsday for any digitally stored data.

The Grand Armada-- Agency Author News

2011-06-01T13:49:00.000-07:00

The National Cartoonists Society awarded Special Exits: A Graphic Memoir by Joyce Farmer (Fantagraphics, 2010) the 2011 Reuben Award for Graphic Novels.

This award is particularly meaningful because it is awarded by her peers.

Congratulations, Joyce!

The Grand Armada-- Agency Author News

2011-05-25T11:02:00.000-07:00

A very cool interview with agency author Lyanda Lynn Haupt just published on the American Society of Landscape Architects' website; great timing for the just-released paperback edition of Crow Planet.

A brief cut from the interview is below. You can view its thoughtful entirety on their website, or their blog:

Your new book, “Crow Planet: Essential Wisdom from the Urban Wilderness,” is all about the relationship between people and crows in urban areas. You say it’s a bit strained on both sides. How have the issues changed over the years? In urban places, crow populations tend to echo human populations. This means that the more concrete we make, and the more humans we make (these tend to go hand in hand), the more crows there will be among us. Just 50 years ago in Seattle, where I live, it was a big deal to see 20 crows in one place. Now, of course, there are autumn roosts in the thousands, and nearly all of us cross paths with numbers of crows every day. It’s funny to hear people say, “Where did all these crows come from?” as if their presence is some kind of sudden surprise, instead of the slow-growing outcome of years of urban planning (or lack of it) in which native habitat was chopped to bits, impervious surfaces reigned, and botanical structure was dramatically simplified. Very few native birds and creatures can survive in such places, but the adaptable, omnivorous, highly intelligent crow can.

Whaleboats Under Sail

2011-05-06T12:07:00.000-07:00

As part of its advertising campaign for Google Chrome, Google put together this ground-breaking LGBT-positive ad that celebrates the "It Gets Better Project" and its incredibly effective use of social media. The ad is so effective it has to be seen:

You can read more about the ad's initial airing on After Ellen.

Whaleboats Under Sail

2011-04-01T13:48:00.001-07:00

Check out the April 10, 2011 copy of The New York Times Book Review: It Gets Better, edited by Dan Savage and Terry Miller (Dutton/Penguin) will be #16 on the Print Hardcover Bestsellers list, #24 on the combined Print Hardcover and Paperback Bestsellers list, and #35 on the combined Print and E-Book Bestsellers list. Watching the reception to this book, as well as the continued success of the project, has been profoundly moving.

Whaleboats Under Sail

2011-03-23T10:01:00.000-07:00

NPR's Fresh Air host Terry Gross talks with Dan Savage and his husband, Terry Miller, today about the It Gets Better Project's inception, their marriage, and growing up.

You can tune into NPR at 8:00 PST (3/23/11) today to catch the interview, and in the meantime, read an excerpt from the book and more here on NPR's site.

It Gets Better: Coming Out, Overcoming Bullying, and Creating a Life Worth Living (Dutton/Penguin, 2011) is edited by Dan Savage and Terry Miller, with contributions from Alison Bechdel, Urvashi Vaid, Michael Cunningham, David Sedaris, Ellen Degeneres, President Barack Obama, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, and Senator Al Franken, and many others. It's an amazing collection of people speaking out.

The Grand Armada-- Agency Author News

2011-01-26T12:11:00.000-08:00

Says Galleycat, "Columnist and author Dan Savage may end up with his own show on MTV. According to Entertainment Weekly, the writer will shoot a pilot for an advice show."

For more details (and a hilarious clip of Dan on The Colbert Show), check out Galleycat and Entertainment Weekly.

The Grand Armada-- Agency Author News

2010-12-13T14:41:00.000-08:00

"It Gets Better" Project mentioned in Frank Rich's New York Times opinion piece, "Gay Bashing at the Smithsonian." Not to be missed... the kicker's at the end!

It’s partly to counteract the hate speech of persistent bullies like Donohue and Perkins that the Seattle-based author and activist Dan Savage created his “It Gets Better” campaign in which gay adults (and some non-gay leaders, including President Obama) make videos urging at-risk teens to realize that they are not alone. But even this humanitarian effort is controversial and suspect in some Beltway quarters: G.O.P. politicians and conservative pundits have yet to participate even though most of the recent and well-publicized suicides by gay teens have occurred in Republican Congressional districts, including those of party leaders like Michele Bachmann, Mike Pence and Kevin McCarthy.

The Grand Armada-- Agency Author News

2010-12-13T12:30:00.000-08:00

Joyce Farmer's Special Exits (Fantagraphics, 2010) gets a great soundbite from librarian extraordinaire, Nancy Pearl, on her twitter:

In her powerful and moving graphic novel Special Exits, Joyce Farmer describes the last years in the lives of her parents. Left me in tears.

If you're on twitter, don't forget that you can follow the agency: http://twitter.com/waleslit. (We won't flood you with wardrobe choices and lunch habits, just literary bites).

Whaleboats Under Sail

2010-12-06T14:53:00.000-08:00

The New York Times Book Review (December 3), has a write-up by Douglas Wolk about Joyce Farmer's graphic novel, Special Exits: My Parents, a Memoir (Fantagraphics, 2010), which chronicles the story of her father's and step-mother's last years. Wolk calls it "forceful, unsparing and equally concerned, in its way, with saying the unsayable."

You can read the complete review of several recently released comics here. These are great words to summarize Joyce's work with.

Whaleboats Under Sail

2010-12-03T11:39:00.000-08:00

Joyce Farmer's Special Exits: My Parents, a memoir, a graphic novel, is out with Fantagraphics to fantastic reviews, including a starred PW review:

Underground feminist comic artist Farmer's account of how she looked after her aging parents is a quiet wonder... The story is stunning for its antisentimental realism, as well as for the glimpses of fantasy (Lars's hallucination of Hades' ferryman, Charon, rowing by in the hallway) that flicker by like ghosts. (view the full review here)

And here's a discussion about Joyce Farmer and the glowing advance praise she received from R. Crumb, in the LA Times' Hero Complex.

Nancy Lord's Early Warming: Crisis and Response in the Climate-Changed North will be published by Counterpoint in January 2011. Here's some warm words about it from Kirkus Reviews:

Although she deftly weaves pertinent scientific and political information throughout, her account's power stems from her on-site observations, lyrical descriptions of the land and sea and sensitive interviews of local officials and natives whose insight and experience humanize an otherwise vast and arcana subject. Lord reports from her home base, Alaska's Kenai Peninsula, where the wetlands are shrinking and large-scale modifications in both fresh water and marine conditions threaten the salmon-dependent economy; from Canada's Mackenzie River Valley and Fort Yukon, Alaska, where industrial development endangers the boreal forest, unlocking a massive carbon storehouse... an eloquent and important dispatch.

Nantucket Sleigh Ride!

2010-10-20T10:46:00.000-07:00

Hillary Clinton has added her own message to Dan Savage's "It Gets Better Project," a sure sign the project has gone viral. You can view her video here at The Stranger.

Dan Savage's "It Gets Better Project" has, as we said Monday, started discussions across the country and received attention from celebrities from Chris Colfer to Tim Gunn and all kinds of news media-- and now the Secretary of State. It's so cool to see the project resonating at a level that can (and hopefully will) save lives and affect policy.

Check the project out on YouTube if you haven't already-- it's awesome.

The Grand Armada-- Agency Author News

2010-10-18T12:42:00.000-07:00

The Sidney Hillman Foundation awarded Dan Savage the Sidney Award for Socially Conscious Journalism on Friday for his "It Gets Better Project," which he began on YouTube in September with now almost a million viewers and an amazing outpouring of responses,videos, and media.

The "It Gets Better Project" is a video archive created to start a dialogue between grown LGBT individuals and youth in reaction to recent suicides by bullied gay teens and young adults. The message: life gets much better once you're independent and school is behind you. It's an awesome project and hopefully the attention it receives will help change young people's lives.

Coming soon: a book based off the "It Gets Better Project" is being curated by Dan and his partner, Terry, and will be published in early 2011 with Dutton/Penguin as an adult book with YA crossover marketing, meant to raise awareness and give more teens opportunities to get the information they need from the "It Gets Better Project."

We would like to congratulate Dan on his work, on receiving a Sidney, and taking action to try to prevent the tragedy of teen suicide.

Nantucket Sleigh Ride!

2010-09-13T10:51:00.000-07:00

Carol Kaesuk Yoon's Naming Nature: The Clash Between Instinct and Science (Norton, 2009) grabbed the brass ring of the Washington State Book Award for general nonfiction.

Carol will be reading and speaking at the award ceremony, on October 8th.

From The Seattle Times,

Bellingham author Yoon explores the tension between evolutionary biology and taxonomy, the classification system first proposed by Swedish botanist Carl Linnaeus. This book won a "best book of 2009" designation by New Scientist and Library Journal, and was a finalist for the Los Angeles Times Book Prize.

That's awesome, Carol!

Whaleboats Under Sail

2010-08-18T11:59:00.000-07:00

Joyce Farmer's graphic novel, Special Exits, (Fantagraphics, September) is attracting spectacular reviews just as strong as R. Crumb's early blurb.

Here is Publishers Weekly's starred review:

Underground feminist comic artist Farmer’s account of how she looked after her aging parents is a quiet wonder. Lars and Rachel are long retired and don’t venture out much from their South Los Angeles home except to go to the grocery store. Lars reads the paper, and both eagerly look forward to visits from their daughter (named Laura but presumably Farmer’s stand-in) as much as they don’t want to trouble her. Over the course of years that cascade through Farmer’s closely detailed story, Lars and Rachel slowly become needier, but do their best to hide their decrepitude from Laura. As the years pass (the 1992 Rodney King riots threaten to make their existence even more perilous), Laura teases out small facts about her parents that she’d never known--the bags of uranium ore that Lars, an engineer, keeps in the garage, Rachel’s desperately poor Missouri childhood. Farmer renders everything in busy, densely packed black-and-white frames whose cluttered look mimics the dusty house, its surfaces thick with cat hair and memories. The story is stunning for its antisentimental realism, as well as for the glimpses of fantasy (Lars’s hallucination of Hades’ ferryman, Charon, rowing by in the hallway) that flicker by like ghosts. (Sept.)

And an excerpt from Bill Baker's review due out in ForeWord Book Reviews:

...Ultimately, it’s these simple and true moments of mundane magic which marks Special Exits as more than just one of the best books released this year. It is, without a doubt, also one of the most significant contributions to the comics medium this side of the millennium, a modern masterpiece which celebrates the human condition.

Whaleboats Under Sail

2010-07-14T12:36:00.000-07:00

Something to look forward to in the hot days of August--

The New York Times Book Review will feature the paperback release of Bill Streever's Cold (Little, Brown) in Paperback Row on August 1st.

Loomings (Forthcoming Titles)

2010-06-11T14:14:00.000-07:00

Kirsten Grind's proposal for The Rise and Fall of WaMu has been sold to Zachary Shisgal at Touchstone (Simon & Schuster). Kirsten is a cited Pulitzer Prize finalist in explanatory journalism and this book will expand on her impressive research into the largest bank failure in US history. The publication date is in 2012. More about the sale and the series that inspired the book can be read in the June 8th edition of Publishers' Lunch and in the Puget Sound Business Journal.

Loomings (Forthcoming Titles)

2010-06-11T13:21:00.000-07:00

Trading Manny, Jim Gullo's true baseball story about teaching his son about the game during the steroids era, has been sold to DaCapo of Perseus Books, title scheduled to be out in 2012.

Whaleboats Under Sail

2010-05-12T11:37:00.000-07:00

The Off-Broadway play based off Dan Savage's The Kid was recommended and reviewed on the front page of the New York Times' art and theater section Tuesday. Here's a quote:

Vibrators, leather bars and good old-fashioned sodomy have never looked more wholesome than they do in “The Kid,” the easygoing, sentimental new musical about a gay couple trying to adopt a baby. The homosexual partners at the center of this surprisingly unsurprising production, which opened Monday night on Theater Row, feel like truly ordinary people, folks you’ve met many times before in depictions of American spouses in pursuit of parenthood.

You can read the full review, by Ben Brantley, here, and additional press at The New Group's website.

Whaleboats Under Sail

2010-04-19T13:23:00.000-07:00

Client Gordon Edgar will be in town May 16 to read at Elliott Bay Book Company (now at its cool new location on Capitol Hill) and to make an appearance at the Seattle Cheese Festival.

Cheesemonger (Chelsea Green, 2010), Gordon's punkrock food memoir, got a starred review from Booklist and is top of the chart for Kindle books in its category: cheese.

Gordon's schedule of appearances can be read here

Cetologists-- Agency Appearances

2010-04-19T12:46:00.000-07:00

May 21nd will be the launch date of the Hugo House's first ever writers' conference: Finding Your Readers in the 21st Century.

It's a three-day event running May 21-May 23. Elizabeth Wales, client Lyanda Lynn Haupt, and a good list of talented writers and people in publishing will be there. Check out the Hugo House website for the schedule and registration.

Nantucket Sleigh Ride!

2010-04-12T15:00:00.000-07:00

Kirsten Grind, Wales client, has just been cited as a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize for Explanatory Reporting for her coverage of banking giant Washington Mutual's collapse.

Here's the announcement. Congratulations, Kirsten!

Cetology-- About Writing and Publishing

2010-03-01T11:42:00.000-08:00

In the New York Times Monday Motoko Rich wrote about the breakdown of production costs for ebooks and hardcovers. You can view it at this link. The article is called "Math of Publishing Meets the E-Book" and provides a good introductory outline.

Nantucket Sleigh Ride!

2010-02-22T10:46:00.000-08:00

The LA Times Book Prize Finalists were announced today and we want you to know that two of the Finalists (in the Science and Technology category- which includes nature) are Wales Agency authors. Congratulations to Carol Kaesuk Yoon and Bill Streever.

Carol Kaesuk Yoon, author of Naming Nature: The Clash between Instinct and Science (WW Norton, 2009) lives in Bellingham, Washington and writes for the Science Times section of The New York Times. For more information about Carol Kaesuk Yoon go to her website. Naming Nature was picked as one of the ten best books of 2009 by New Scientist. Yoon’s editor at WW Norton is Maria Guarnaschelli.

Bill Streever, author of COLD: Adventures in the World’s Frozen Places (Little, Brown, 2009) lives in Anchorage, Alaska and works as a Biologist in the Arctic. For more information about Bill Streever go to his website. Cold was named a NY Times Notable Book for 2009. Bill Streever’s editor at Little, Brown is John Parsley.

For further information go to The LA Times Blog

The Grand Armada-- Agency Author News

2010-01-22T11:32:00.000-08:00

Playbill has listed Dan Savage's The Kid as the hottest Off-Broadway production this season. Chris Sieber is playing Dan and Jill Eikenberry is playing his mother-- a fantastic cast all around.

You can keep up to date on the musical's developments by reading the blog, and be sure to buy tickets before the show opens in April!

And take note: Lyanda Lynn Haupt's book Crow Planet (Little, Brown, 2009) is racing into its forth printing. It's an excellent story and a beautifully published one as well.

Whaleboats under Sail: Praise for Books Published

2009-12-30T13:28:00.000-08:00

David Mas Masumoto's book, Wisdom of the Last Farmer, (The Free Press) has been named among the "Best Environmental Journalism of 2009" in a list compiled by The Huffington Post. Here's the great quotation:

Behind every organic label you see in your grocery store or food co-op, there's a story. Many of them aren't very interesting. Catering to the likes of Wal-Mart, an increasing number of organic farms are large-scale, corporate-owned operations, not all that different from conventional farms in their soulless methods of mass-production. In Wisdom of the Last Farmer, David Mas Masumoto tells the most fascinating kind of story, reminding us that, at its best and most authentic, organic farming requires not only soul, but intimate knowledge of place, a deep grasp of subjects ranging from plant physiology to tractor repair, and unrelenting physical labor... -- Craig Canine, contributing editor

You can view the rest of this wonderful review and the other picks here

The Crew's Quarters-- Agency News

2009-12-30T12:06:00.000-08:00

We're switching P.O. Boxes, just a single-digit change (bolded below.)

Wales Literary Agency, Inc.
P.O. Box 9426
Seattle, WA 98109-0426

Whaleboats under Sail: Praise for Books Published

2009-12-14T14:07:00.000-08:00

New Scientist has named Carol Kaesuk Yoon's book, Naming Nature: The Clash Between Instinct and Science (2009, W.W. Norton) one of their best books of this year! You can view the release on their CultureLab blog.

What they say about Carol's book:

A smart, thoughtful, incredibly engaging look at the science of taxonomy - all but forgotten in our rush to molecular biology and yet completely essential in trying to impose a sense of order on the craziness of life. Yoon has a gift for making nature beautiful and the scientists who study it both passionate and occasionally hilarious. A great read.

Whaleboats under Sail: Praise for Books Published

2009-12-04T12:25:00.000-08:00

Lyanda Lynn Haupt's book Crow Planet (Little, Brown, 2009) is one of the LA Times' choices for the best nonfiction of 2009! You can go to the LA Times' book section to see reviews and blurbs about each book.

Whaleboats under Sail: Praise for Books Published

2009-11-25T11:59:00.000-08:00

Dwight Garner of the New York Times says that Cold, by Bill Streever, is:

A flinty and tough-minded look at a vanishing world, with just enough humor glowing around the edges to keep you toasty and dry.

You can view the rest of his Top 10 Books of 2009 list, and a link to a July review of Bill's book, here. The rest of the New York Times' Holiday Gift Guide can be found here

The Grand Armada-- Agency Author News

2009-10-26T12:30:00.000-07:00

Into the Forest by Jean Hegland (Random House, 1998) is going to be part of Target's Breakout Books promotion beginning in December this year. The publisher has come up with a lovely new cover for the occasion.

Also, Martha Stewart selected David Mas Masumoto's most recent book, Wisdom of the Last Farmer, (Free Press, August 2009) as a "Martha's Find" celebrating sustainable agriculture and food on her October 23rd show.

You can watch the clip here.

Congratulations to both Jean and Mas for the well-deserved attention their books are receiving.

You can also read a fascinating excerpt from Lyanda Lynn Haupt's book, Crow Planet in The Utne Reader.

Nantucket Sleigh Ride!

2009-09-25T10:58:00.000-07:00

Bruce Barcott's The Last Flight of the Scarlet Macaw (Random House, 2008) won the bi-annual Gene E. and Adele R. Malott Prize for Recording Community Activism. Here's the scoop from GalleyCat. Congratulations, Bruce! Also, Robert Spector's The Mom & Pop Store is an ABA Booksellers' pick for November's Indie Next List Notables. The full list will be published in the October 1st edition of Bookselling This Week.

The Grand Armada-- Agency Author News

2009-09-21T11:46:00.000-07:00

Carol Kaesuk Yoon went on NPR's Living on Earth Friday, September 11, to talk about the science of taxonomy (the subject of her book, Naming Nature). View the other parts of the show and listen to Carol's segment here.

And Robert Spector, author of The Mom and Pop Store, has been promoting his book in small businesses across America-- and during the week of the 14th he was in Washington DC and NYC, both cities that declared an official Mom & Pop Store Day in honor of local small businesses.

Whaleboats under Sail: Praise for Books Published

2009-08-24T14:11:00.000-07:00

Crow Planet: Essential Wisdom from the Urban Wilderness, Lyanda Lynn Haupt's new book out with Little, Brown, will be reviewed by Liesl Schillinger in the August 30th edition of the The New York Times Book Review. Here's a sneak peek:

In a lyrical narrative that blends science and conscience, Haupt mourns the encroachments of urbanization, but cherishes the wildness that survives. She has learned to appreciate, "but not quite love," the crow.

Crow Planet is also on the PNW Indie Bestseller list.

Bill Streever, author of Cold, will be on All Things Considered this week to talk about all things chilly.

Whaleboats Under Sail: Praise for Books Published

2009-07-27T11:10:00.000-07:00

Bill Streever's just-released Cold (Little, Brown) has received outstanding reviews from readers. According to the New York Times Sunday Book Review:

The subtitle of “Cold” suggests a march into the well-scoured terrain of polar exploration. Despair and blackening digits. Man’s best friend for dinner again. But that’s not where we’re going. Bill Streever does include a few tales from the era, but he has high standards. Losing a frostbitten limb won’t earn you a place in this book. You must be found dead with a spoon lashed to the stump. The adventures here take place in colder and stranger lands than the Arctic... “Cold” is a love song to science and scientists, to Earth and everything that lives on and flies over and tunnels under it. It’s impossible to read the book and not fully realize that our planet must be protected.-Mary Roach

And the New York Times' Books of the Times, July 24 edition:

“Cold” is a striding tour through a disappearing world. Mr. Streever’s prose does what E. L. Doctorow said good writing is supposed to do, which is to evoke sensation in the reader — “not the fact that it is raining, but the feeling of being rained upon.” This book is chilling in too many ways to count.-Dwight Garner

Bill Streever also makes a quick appearance in Papercuts, the New York Time's book blog.
Congratulations to Bill for such a stunning reception of Cold.

Loomings (Forthcoming Works)

2009-06-03T12:04:00.000-07:00

Two of our clients have received starred reviews in Kirkus Reviews this week.

Here's an excerpt from what Kirkus said about Naming Nature: The Clash Between Instinct and Science, by Carol Kaesuk Yoon (Norton, August 2009):

The umwelt, writes the author, accounts for the fact that different cultures give similar names, such as fish, to wildlife—and has long served as humanity’s most intimate connection to the natural world. By bowing to the rationality of a scientific view of the natural order, we have undermined our understanding of the world. Yoon’s accounts of brain-damaged individuals who cannot recognize and name living things—and of young children’s unquenchable interest, even before they can walk or talk, in the natural world—bring to life the marvel of our intuitive umwelt abilities. We must cling to these abilities if we are to preserve nature, the author argues. Brightly blending scientific expertise with personal experience, Yoon is an outstanding science writer who takes a seemingly dull topic and rivets unsuspecting readers to the page.

And here's a few lines from the review for Bill Streever's Cold: Adventures in the World’s Frozen Places (Little, Brown, July 2009).

Alaska-based biologist Streever spent a year documenting the nature and science of cold. “Cold is a part of day-to-day life,” he writes, “but we often isolate ourselves from it, hiding in overheated houses and retreating to overheated climates, all without understanding what we so eagerly avoid.” .... With aplomb, Streever charts a meandering course of the land around him, providing an enthralling tour through haunting arctic tundra, permafrost tunnels of 40,000-year-old ice and the winter dens of hibernating beasts.

The Grand Armada (Agency Author News)

2009-05-15T12:47:00.000-07:00

It's been a great week for agency clients.

David Mas Masumoto's forthcoming new book, Wisdom of the Last Farmer: Harvesting Legacies from the Land, scored a terrific review from Kirkus Reviews.:

Long before Michael Pollan and Barbara Kingsolver turned to writing about food, Masumoto (Heirlooms: Letters from a Peach Farmer, 2007, etc.) was chronicling his work on an 80-acre farm of peaches, nectarines and grapes, as well as vineyards and gardens, in the Central Valley of California... A peach of a book, and with a recipe for raisins in the bargain—worthy of placement alongside the best of Wendell Berry, Liberty Hyde Bailey and other literary farmers.

Client Bruce Barcott's review of Horse Soldiers: The Extraordinary Story of a Band of US Soldiers Who Rode to Victory in Afghanistan, by Doug Stanton (Scribner) took the front page of The New York Times Book Review.

Later on in the same issue of the Book Review, you'll find a review of Flotsametrics and the Floating World, by Curtis Ebbesmeyer and Eric Scigliano. Here's a glimpse:

Ebbesmeyer’s goal is noble and fresh: to show how the flow of ocean debris around the world reveals the “music” of the world’s oceans. Ebbesmeyer does this through a series of studies of floating matter that are mostly pretty weird. Hockey gloves, plastic turtles, Nike sneakers — these are Ebbesmeyer’s lodestars, since they are often dumped en masse into the sea and distribute themselves around the world like so many data points on a vast liquid graph. Messages in bottles are also good, since it turns out they too are often put out to sea in great numbers. In the 1950s, the Guinness brewing company released some 200,000 messages in beer bottles. Even today, a few people write in each year to claim their reward.

You can view the full review here.

And it looks like Dan Savage's The Kid will be transformed into a musical this autumn (according to the NYtimes, Saturday, May 16).

Loomings (Forthcoming Works)

2009-05-13T12:04:00.000-07:00

Kirkus Reviews just put out a great review of Lyanda Lynn Haupt's forthcoming book, Crow Planet: Essential Wisdom from the Urban Wildness (Little, Brown, July 2009):

A self-described posthippie ecofeminist offers a quiet, genial book of “hopeful possibility” amid the current ecological crisis.

Wildlife researcher and rehabilitator Haupt (Pilgrim on the Great Bird Continent: The Importance of Everything and Other Lessons from Darwin’s Lost Notebooks, 2006, etc.) writes gracefully about the interactions between crows and humans in the urban landscape and what those interactions portend for the future of the zoöpolis (where human and animal geographies overlap). For most people, notes the author, crows are the most commonly encountered native wild animal. Her fascination with the unusually intelligent birds began after a long depressive funk. One day she looked out her study window, saw an injured fledgling perched on an electrical wire and took the bird in. While nursing it back to health, she began to feel better. Haupt then spent two years studying the shiny black songbirds in her backyard and neighborhood. Found in growing numbers—there are more than 30 million in the United States—in densely populated towns and suburbs, the omnivorous American Crow thrives on the detritus of modern urban life, consuming everything from road kill to bread crumbs, bagels and McDonald’s fries. The author discovered that watching the creatures mate, nest, forage and help one another encouraged a necessary awareness of the continuity between human lives and that of other species. Like her beloved Thoreau—who wrote, “There is no wildness distant from ourselves”—Haupt celebrates the interconnectedness of all life and urges readers to pay close attention to their home places. The chapter on the habits of amateur urban naturalists is a neat how-to guide for anyone interested in learning how the wild, nonhuman animals around us live. Even though we are unable to view our entire planet, she writes, we can take positive action by cultivating a sense of wonder at the wildlife at our door: “We practice wonder by resisting the temptation to hurry past things worth seeing.”

A fresh take on conscious living in the everyday world.

Loomings (Forthcoming Works)

2009-05-06T11:47:00.000-07:00

Bill Streever's forthcoming book, Cold: Adventures in the World's Frozen Places (Little, Brown; July 2009), received a couple cool reviews this week.

From Publisher's Weekly:

Cold weather systems the earth needs to thrive is the subject of Streever's well-documented book, using all of the author's expertise from his field trips to the world's most frigid environments. Streever, who chairs the North Slope Science Initiative's Science Technical Advisory Panel, writes of the frostiest experience: “We fail to see cold for what it is: the absence of heat, the slowing of molecular motion, a sensation, a perception, a driving force.” Rather than giving the reader a dry, academic lecture on snow, glaciers, wind-chill factors and icebergs, he delivers a poetic, anecdotal narrative complete with polar expeditions, Ice Age mysteries, igloos, permafrost and hailstorms. Two of the most fascinating segments are the arduous task of scientific reconstruction of past climates and the magical navigation of migratory birds to warmer lands. This is a wonderful collection of one man's first-rate observations and commentary about the history and importance of cold to the earth and its occupants.

And Library Journal:

“Open this book to any page and be treated to a tidbit about the cold, its effects on animals, on history, on the world. Do frogs and caterpillars actually freeze solid and then revive in spring? Have you ever heard of the School Children's Blizzard that froze cattle standing in place? What is the difference between hypothermia and frostbite? Biologist Streever explores benign cold, threatening cold, and monstrous/scary cold not only through history and science books but also in person, in Alaska and other frozen spots around the world. The author knows what he is talking about. He has worked in Arctic Alaska and chairs the Science Technical Advisory Panel of the North Slope Science Initiative. This reviewer found Streever's book more consistently enticing than Mariana Gosnell's Ice: The Nature, the History, and the Uses of an Astonishing Substance. Written in a popular, accessible style, Streever's book also includes 34 pages of notes. Recommended for public libraries.”

Loomings (Forthcoming Works)

2009-04-15T10:12:00.000-07:00

Carol Kaesuk Yoon's forthcoming book, Naming Nature: The Clash Between Instinct and Science (W. W. Norton, August 2009), just received a starred review in Publishers' Weekly. You can view it on their site or below:

In this entertaining and insightful book, New York Times science writer Yoon sets out to document the progression of the scientific “quest to order and name the entire living world—the whole squawking, scuttling, blooming, twining, leafy, furry, green and wondrous mess of it” from Linnaeus to present-day taxonomists. But her initial assumption of science as the ultimate authority is sideswiped by her growing interest in umwelt, how animals perceive the world in a way “idiosyncratic to each species, fueled by its particular sensory and cognitive powers and limited by its deficits.” According to Yoon, Linnaeus was an umwelt prodigy, but as taxonomists began to abandon the senses and use microscopic evidence and DNA to trace evolutionary relations, nonscientists' gave up their brain-given right (and tendency) to order the living world, with the devastating result of becoming indifferent to the current mass extinctions. Yoon's invitation for laypeople to reclaim their umwelt, to “take one step closer to the living world” and accept as valid the “wondrous variety in the ordering of life,” is optimistic, exhilarating and revolutionary.

This is a splendid review and we think revolutionary is the perfect word for Carol's work.

Nantucket Sleigh Ride!

2009-04-10T13:21:00.000-07:00

Bruce Barcott, has been selected as a 2009 Fellow by the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation. He is the author of Last Flight of the Scarlet Macaw (Random House, 2008) and Measure of a Mountain (Sasquatch, 1997/Ballantine Books, 1999). This is a wonderful recognition of Bruce's talent. You can find the notice listing all of this year's recipients in the April 9th New York Times. Congratulations, Bruce!

Loomings (Forthcoming Works)

2009-01-21T13:01:00.000-08:00

Starred review in Kirkus Reviews for Flotsametrics and the Floating World: How One Man's Obsession with Runaway Sneakers and Rubber Ducks Revolutionized Ocean Science, by Curtis Ebbesmeyer and Eric Scigliano (Smithsonian/HarperCollins). Here's a quote:

Lively as-told-to autobiography of a scientist who studied flotsam—floating trash—and revolutionized the study of the world’s oceans. Ebbesmeyer graduated college as a mechanical engineer in the mid-1960s and went to work for Mobil/Standard Oil, which financed the doctorate studies that made him the company’s first oceanographer. Years of traveling the world gave him an intimate knowledge of how ocean movements affect oil rigs, but he grew increasingly fascinated by sea currents and eddies and began to focus on beaches, more specifically on debris deposited there. An epiphany came in May 1990 when a Pacific storm knocked five containers filled with thousands of athletic shoes off a cargo vessel. Nearly a year later, the shoes began washing up along the West coast of North America. With the help of a surprisingly large and cooperative fraternity of beachcombers, Ebbesmeyer tracked the progress of the shoes up and down the coast and as far as Hawaii, producing a groundbreaking study of ocean currents. With the help of maritime and environmental journalist Scigliano (Michelangelo’s Mountain: The Quest for Perfection in the Marble Quarries of Carrara, 2005, etc.), Ebbesmeyer spins a fascinating tale. Even readers with little interest in ocean science will be riveted by the author’s chronicle of the epic travels of oceanic trash; the entertaining explanations of how floating debris guided Christopher Columbus and the Vikings to safe harbors; the horrific stories of men adrift at sea; how flotsam may have triggered the origin of life; and frighteningly, the warnings of the threat that an increasing avalanche of plastic waste poses to the oceans. A captivating account of the man who turned beachcombing into a science.

This is a fantastic, well-deserved perk for an awesome book. Keep an eye out for it in April.

The Grand Armada (Agency Author News)

2008-11-26T11:36:00.000-08:00

Dan Savage has been speaking about the passing of Proposition 8, the legislation that has backtracked on and banned legal gay marriage in California. He’s been spotted on the Colbert Report, Anderson Cooper 360, and in the opinion pages of the New York Times.

The agency is proud of his advocacy for equal rights for all, and we recommend the Colbert Report segment as the most fun.

In other agency news, Library Journal named Bruce Barcott's Last Flight of the Scarlet Macaw (Random House) to their Best Books of 2008. You can find that list in their December issue.

Whaleboats Under Sail: Praise for Books Published

2008-10-24T12:55:00.000-07:00

Bruce Barcott's The Last Flight of the Scarlet Macaw: One Woman's Fight to Save the World's Most Beautiful Bird (Random House, 2008) has a spot in the New York Review of Books, in a group review on birding by Robert Paxton. You can find it on page 28 of the Nov. 6 issue. Well deserved and nice work, Bruce!

The Grand Armada (Agency Author News)

2008-10-10T13:52:00.001-07:00

We’re breaking out of our blogging silence –blogging is fun, but we’ve had a lot of work on our hands- to share an article Dan Savage has written in light of the upcoming vote in Washington State about Death with Dignity. It is poignant and well-reasoned and deserves your attention. In Defense of Dignity, by Dan Savage

The Chase-- New Title Sales

2008-07-02T12:17:00.000-07:00

We just placed Gordon Edgar's Cheesemonger: a memoir with MacAdam Cage. It was a completed manuscript and is already scheduled for 2009! A perfect match for Gordon's winning narrative, progressive politics, and (we must say it) cheesy memoir. Congratulations, Gordon, on the sale of your first book!

Loomings (forthcoming works)

2008-06-06T13:27:00.000-07:00

The covers for Lisa Dale Norton's Shimmering Images: A Handy Little Guide to Writing Memoir (St. Martin's Griffen, 2008) just came in this week. It looks great and we can hardly wait for the book to be out. In the meantime, here's Lisa's blog on the Huffington Post, where she writes about politics and the craft of storytelling.

The Grand Armada-- NEW Agency Author News

2008-05-28T13:19:00.000-07:00

We have signed on some exciting new projects by a list of talented new writers:

Gordon Edgar, a cheesemonger at Rainbow Grocery in San Francisco, is the author of "Cheesemonger," a delicious and delightful memoir on food and politics. His book is just about ready to be sent out; in the meanwhile, get at taste at his website, Gordonzola.

George Hageman is the author and strategist behind the much-followed podcast Military History. He is now working on a book about the same subject. He is also Harvard-bound this fall and just graduated from Lakeside High School-- which we guess makes him our list's prodigy. His final proposal is forthcoming.

Jane Sandor is currently an instructor in English at Mount St. Mary's College. She has an MFA in Creative Writing and English Literature from the University of Alabama, and has had two essays in succession (2006 and 2007) designated notable by the Best American Essays. We're very proud to be representing her first novel, "Alta California," a noir literary truth-hunt a la A.S. Byatt's Possession, set in LA. Her book is about to go out.

Christopher Sanford, MD, wrote the recently released The Adventurous Traveler's Guide to Health (University of Washington Press, 2008). He is a family practice physician who specializes in tropical medicine. We are overjoyed to be working with him on his second novel, "Yellow Jack," the final draft to come. His first novel, Sutures, came out from Soho Press in 1993.

Joe Upton is the author of Alaska Blues (in print continuously since 1977). His new project, "Into the Ice: A Crab Fisherman's Story of One Year on the Bering Sea," is a gripping true story from the frozen Bering Sea and an insight into the industry made famous by the show "Deadliest Catch." His project is ready to be shown.

The Chase-- New Title Sales

2008-05-12T14:26:00.000-07:00

Planted in a new publishing house, Masumoto: In a pre-empt, David Mas Masumoto's Wisdom of the Last Farmer has been bought by The Free Press/Simon and Schuster. Mas Masumoto is best known for Epitaph for a Peach and as an organic farming advocate and spokesman extraordinaire. The opening chapter of his forthcoming title appeared in the NY Times Magazine in August of 2007. In from the cold, with a warm and speedy sale: Bill Streever's book, Cold: An Untold Story in a Warming World just went to John Parsley of Little, Brown, due out in 2009. From Publisher's Marketplace

NON-FICTION: SCIENCE Bill Streever, Ph.D's COLD, in which the author travels through four seasons and to all four corners of the globe seeking out supercooling, snowflakes, blizzards, bears, hypothermia, hibernation, and the Year Without Summer, to John Parsley at Little, Brown, by Elizabeth Wales at Wales Literary Agency (World)

And on a more serious note: Nancy Lord's Early Warming: Alarms and Responses from the Climate-Changed North went to (newly-replanted on our very own West Coast) Jack Shoemaker of Counterpoint, now in Berkley, California. Nancy just headed to Washington, DC as a Knight fellow. Congratulations to David Mas Masumoto, Bill Streever, and Nancy Lord!

Nantucket Sleigh Ride!

2008-04-18T12:51:00.000-07:00

Nancy Lord, author of the work-in-progress on contract with Counterpoint Press, Early Warming: Alarms and Responses from the Climate-Changed North, has just been awarded a fellowship to a seminar on climate change by the Knight Center for Specialized Journalism. This is a big deal and out of the 30 journalists awarded the fellowship, she's the only one from Alaska. Congratulations, Nancy!

Cetologists-- agency author appearances

2008-04-11T13:12:00.000-07:00

Ellie Mathews' (author of The Ungarnished Truth (Berkley, 2008)) interview on NPR is now up on their website. You can listen to it in its entirety here: Cooking Contest Winner Offers Ungarnished Truth.

Cetologists-- agency author appearances

2008-04-08T11:32:00.000-07:00

Ellie Mathews, author of The Ungarnished Truth (Berkley, 2008), a memoir about the Pillsbury Bake-Off, is going to be on NPR's Morning Edition coast-to-coast Friday, April 11. To keep abreast of other appearances by Ellie, check out her website here.

Cetologists-- agency author appearances

2008-03-18T11:00:00.000-07:00

Agency author Michelle Tea will be in Seattle on March 28th. Her most recent book is Rose of No Man's Land (Harcourt, 2005), now available in paperback. The Hugo House has a blurb about the event:

"Answered Prayers and Other Tragedies" Sherman Alexie, Michelle Tea, David Schmader and musician Seann Nelson all produce new work that asks "Is the only real tragedy getting what you want?" Also featuring Ben Blum, winner of the New Works Competition. $15-25. Town Hall. Friday, March 28, 2008, 7:30 PM.

The Chase-- New Title Sales

2008-03-12T11:52:00.001-07:00

Agency author and artist Leela Corman's graphic novel Unterzakhn has been sold to Schocken/Pantheon. Its release is in 2010, but it's already receiving chatter from the blogosphere. Forward Magazine started running installations from it at the end of February, and you can read an interview with Leela here:

ER: Well, then it seems in your creative process, images of the world surface. If you could say if there is an overarching story you think “Unterzakhn” tells, what is it?

LC: I’d say that I’ve always been fascinated with what’s happening behind the scenes, in seemingly mundane domestic life and in larger matters. I’m very interested in stories that talk about real people living in mythologized situations. Much of the way we ingest history is via official versions of stories — wars, rulers, treaties. But I don’t want to know about the decisions of generals, I want to know about the lives of civilians. That’s where it gets interesting.

Publisher's Weekly had something to say about it, too:

Unterzakhn in The Forward Leela Corman's Unterzakhn is being serialized in The Forward, a Jewish newspaper based in New York City. The comic began serialization on February 29. Unterzakhn revolves around immigrants in NYC's Lower East Side at the turn of the 20th Century. More information can be found at The Forward's website. Unterzakhn will be published in its entirety by Schocken/ Pantheon in 2010. -Comics Briefly, PW Comics Week, March 3, 2008

The Grand Armada- Agency Author News

2008-03-04T14:33:00.000-08:00

Agency author, retired Oceanographer Curtis Ebbesmeyer, Ph.D., has been quoted by William Yardley in his article "In an Answerless Canadian Inquiry, 3 Bodyless Feet," in the New York Times today (March 4, 2008). The article investigates a series of right-foot size 12 running shoes that have washed up (with the feet still in them) on an island off British Columbia.

"Running shoes are quite buoyant," said Mr. Ebbesmeyer, who is completing a book, "The Floating World," to be published by HarperCollins. "They would tend to encase a foot and keep it floating. A body comes apart naturally; it's called disarticulation. The head usually comes off first. The parts of the body that are protected will last the longest. The shoe usually floats soles up, so that might prevent the sea-birds from pecking at it."

You can view more about the macabre article here

Nantucket Sleigh Ride!... cont'd

2008-02-19T12:59:00.000-08:00

From the front cover of the The New York Times Review of Books, February 17:

"(Bruce) Barcott deftly unsnarls his story’s many strands and keeps them taut. He explains complicated deals clearly, dramatizes legal proceedings and leads readers on delightful (to this reviewer, at least) excursions into how one makes, stores and moves energy from water; the environmental downside of dams; and how and why animals go extinct. With a deep understanding of so many environmental issues and their larger context, Barcott presents evidence and then states strongly — but never shrilly — what other writers might hedge on."- Elizabeth Royte, New York Times Review of Books

We really can't add much to that. You can read the entire article here.

Nantucket Sleigh Ride!

2008-02-11T14:01:00.000-08:00

Late last week the Seattle Times ran a glowing review of agency author Bruce Barcott's just-published book, The Last Flight of the Scarlet Macaw. Here's a quote from the full article:

"Through tough reporting, colorful travel writing and a touch of natural history, Barcott has elevated an obscure environmental struggle to epic status. In doing so, he dramatizes the signal issue of species diversity in a rapidly globalizing world. And he celebrates the heroic and unsung efforts of those "rare and strange and sometimes aggravating" people who work tirelessly to preserve it." -Tim McNulty, Feb. 8, 2008

The Last Flight... has received a lot of wonderful reviews recently. We just heard from RandomHouse that it will be featured on the front page of the New York Times' Review of Books this coming Sunday, Feb. 17. Keep an eye out for it, and three cheers for Bruce!

Loomings-- Forthcoming Titles

2008-01-22T13:03:00.000-08:00

We've been dealing with an amazing phenomenon at the agency over the past several months. Two of our authors, oceanographer Curtis Ebbesmeyer and writer and journalist Eric Scigliano are working on a book titled The Floating World: An Oceanographer's Quest to Unravel the Mysteries of the Oceans' Currents (Smithsonian Books, 2008). It's the story of Curtis's years of work with a worldwide community of beachcombers to track the movement of flotsam through the great ocean currents and gyres. Because of this exciting project, we've found ourselves receiving daily e-mails about the rubber duckies thought to have been floating for a decade and a half on a course from the Pacific, over the Arctic, and into the Atlantic Ocean. These e-mails have come from every continent; from tv shows and major newspapers and magazines, authors and independent journalists, ocean aficionados and average citizens. Most of the inquiries we've received have been about the whimsy of the rubber duck, but many inquiries have also expressed interest in the meaning behind it all: how the ocean moves and what impact the amount of garbage lost at sea means to us and to the world. An article by Curtis was printed in the Wall Street Journal last August. It clarifies some facts surrounding the ducky mystique and is well worth quoting from again:

"I'm sorry to have to give the good people of Britain and Ireland the disappointing news: There is no yellow rubber ducky flotilla approaching your shores... The 29,000 celebrated bathtub toys that fell into the Pacific in January 1992 aren't made of rubber, they're plastic. And they aren't all ducks. They came in four shapes: green frogs, true-blue turtles, red beavers, and yellow crouching ducks -- the latter two have by now been bleached white. Perhaps a hundred of them have made it to the North Atlantic and are now scattered across its vast expanse."-- Curtis Ebbesmeyer, Opinion, Wall Street Journal August 8, 2007 You can read the entirety of Curtis's article here. Though there is no full invasion of bath tub toys approaching the shores of the UK, it's nevertheless stirring to realize how the image of tiny plastic ducks surviving years at sea has captured the public imagination.

The Grand Armada-- Agency Author News

2008-01-08T10:51:00.000-08:00

Agency author Scott McCredie and his book (Balance: In Search of the Lost Sense (Little, Brown, 2007)) and his research on balance are the focus of an article by Jane E. Brody today in the New York Times. Here's the start of the article to whet your interest, and a link to the rest that includes some interesting exercises meant to improve your balance:

Scott McCredie is a Seattle-based health and science writer who says he "discovered" what he calls "the lost sense" of balance after he watched in horror as his 67-year-old father tumbled off a boulder and disappeared from sight during a hike in the Cascades. Though his father hurt little more than his pride, Mr. McCredie became intrigued by what might have caused this experienced hiker, an athletic and graceful man, to lose his balance suddenly. His resulting science-and-history-based exploration led... (read on)

Whaleboats Under Sail-- praise for books published

2007-12-11T12:19:00.000-08:00

Kenny Fries' new book, A History of My Shoes and the Evolution of Darwin's Theory (Da Capo Press, 2007) is a recipient of the Gustavus Myers Center's Outstanding Book Awards of 2007. These annual awards recognize titles that advance human rights, and Kenny's book falls into that category with keen insight. Here's a blurb about Kenny's title from the Myers Center's website:

"This is a gem of a story on biological research by Albert Wallacce and Charles Darwin on adaptation,and itnerspersed with this is the author's ways of adapting to fibulae missing in both of his legs. Essayist, poet, and Goddard faculty member, Mr. Fries has written a truly distinctive philosophical and autobiographical examination of the social and political context of ability/disability. He draws the reader's attention via his relationship with his partner to how a society's culture defines the limit of the body as much as a particular individual's bodily condition. Read this dazzling book!"

The Grand Armada-- Agency Author News

2007-12-07T13:53:00.001-08:00

Take a look at the December 2nd edition of the New York Times Magazine. Former Washington State Governor Booth Gardner, a client of ours, is the focus of an article written by Daniel Bergner on assisted suicide. Booth is campaigning for assisted suicide; Daniel opposes it. Then, open up to page 46 and read the article by Bruce Barcott, author of Last Flight of the Scarlet Macaw (forthcoming in March 2008). In "Kill the Cat that Kills the Bird?" Bruce writes about environmental ethics and a current conflict between two different sorts of animal lovers. Here's a quote from the article to pique your interest: "Serious birders compile a list of every species they have seen in their lifetimes. I hadn't come to Galveston to load my wagon,* though. I had come to find out why Jim Stevenson had become the most notorious cat killer in America." *"load my wagon," as Bruce translates elsewhere, means being able to mark off several species of birds as "seen." Next up: Curtis Ebbesmeyer (still), and some exciting news about Kenny Fries

Loomings-- Forthcoming Titles

2007-12-07T10:16:00.001-08:00

It's a busy season, but we're taking a moment to share some of the fantastic books our clients have written that will be out and available soon:

The Last Flight of the Scarlet Macaw: One Woman's Fight to Save the World's Most Beautiful Bird, by Bruce Barcott (Random House, March 2008)

"Barcott (The Measure of a Mountain) relates the dramatic and heart-rending story of one woman's struggle to save the scarlet macaw in the tiny country of Belize... Barcott's compelling narrative is suspenseful right up to the last moment." -Publisher's Weekly

The early reviews have been enthusiastic. Bruce's book was also a runner-up for the J. Anthony Lukas Work-in-Progress award.

The Ungarnished Truth: A Cooking Contest Memoir, by Ellie Mathews (Berkley, March 2008)

Ellie's third book, this memoir-in-food describes her experience of entering -and winning- the quintessentially American Pillsbury Bake-Off. If you love ungarnished chicken dishes, click here for her winning recipe: the million dollar chicken.

Shimmering Images: A Handy Little Guide to Writing Memoir, by Lisa Dale Norton (St Martin's Griffin, August 2008)

Shimmering Images is mandatory reading for anyone who wants to start writing down their memories for an audience; Lisa guides the reader through how to find the heart of a memory and capture it in writing. As Carol Franco (co-author of the Legacy Guide) says, it's "a must for anyone contemplating writing a memoir."

Up next: Curtis Ebbesmeyer, as promised, and Bruce Barcott in the NYTimes Magazine

Nantucket Sleigh Ride!*

2007-11-20T11:10:00.000-08:00

Ellen Forney, graphic artist, cartoonist, and Wales client, has caught a big one. She's the awesome illustrator of The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian, by Sherman Alexie (Little, Brown, 2007)-- which won the National Book Award for YA Fiction. Ellen debuted her next work in progress at the Richard Hugo House in Seattle this past Saturday (11/17). Three cheers for Ellen Forney! *A "Nantucket sleigh ride" refers to the wild ride that sometimes occurred after a whaleboat crew successfully harpooned a whale. Our sympathy is with the whale, but it's an apt description for when a client's work takes off. Next up in "Loomings," Oceanographer Curtis Ebbesmeyer will reveal all... about the rubber duckies!