Alvah's Books

Go Ahead. Spoil My Appetite.

From the Sunday, New York Times, April 26, 2009. The list includes the five top sellers in each category:

HARDCOVER FICTION
1. JUST TAKE MY HEART, by Mary Higgins Clark
2. LOOK AGAIN, by Lisa Scottoline
3. TURN COAT, by Jim Butcher
4. LONG LOST, by Harlan Coben
5. THE HOST, by Stephenie Meyer

HARDCOVER NONFICTION
1. LIBERTY AND TYRANNY, by Mark R. Levin
2. ALWAYS LOOKING UP, by Michael J. Fox
3. OUTLIERS, by Malcolm Gladwell
4. MOMMYWOOD, by Tori Spelling with Hilary Liftin
5. COLUMBINE, by Dave Cullen

PAPERBACK TRADE FICTION
1. THE SHACK, by William P. Young
2. 7TH HEAVEN, by James Patterson and Maxine Paetro
3. CITY OF THIEVES, by David Benioff
4. UNACCUSTOMED EARTH, by Jhumpa Lahiri
5. FIREFLY LANE, by Kristin Hannah

PAPERBACK MASS-MARKET FICTION
1. TRIBUTE, by Nora Roberts
2. WHERE ARE YOU NOW?, by Mary Higgins Clark
3. ANGELS AND DEMONS, by Dan Brown
4. FROM DEAD TO WORSE, by Charlaine Harris
5. NOTHING TO LOSE, by Lee Child

PAPERBACK NONFICTION
1. THREE CUPS OF TEA, by Greg Mortenson and David Oliver Relin
2. THE MIDDLE PLACE, by Kelly Corrigan
3. I HOPE THEY SERVE BEER IN HELL, by Tucker Max
4. LONE SURVIVOR, by Marcus Luttrell with Patrick Robinson
5. THE TIPPING POINT, by Malcolm Gladwell

HARDCOVER ADVICE
1. ACT LIKE A LADY, THINK LIKE A MAN, by Steve Harvey with Denene Millner
2. MASTER YOUR METABOLISM, by Jillian Michaels with Mariska van Aalst
3. THE CARROT PRINCIPLE, by Adrian Gostick and Chester Elton
4. THE ULTIMATE DEPRESSION SURVIVAL GUIDE, by Martin D. Weiss
5. EIGHT LITTLE FACES, by Kate Gosselin

PAPERBACK ADVICE
1. HUNGRY GIRL 200 UNDER 200, by Lisa Lillien
2. THE LOVE DARE, by Stephen and Alex Kendrick with Lawrence Kimbrough
3. NATURALLY THIN, by Bethenny Frankel with Eve Adamson
4. WHAT TO EXPECT WHEN YOU’RE EXPECTING, by Heidi Murkoff and Sharon Mazel
5. THE FIVE LOVE LANGUAGES, by Gary Chapman

CHILDREN’S BOOKS
1. LISTEN TO THE WIND, by Greg Mortenson and Susan L. Roth
2. GALLOP!, written and illustrated by Rufus Butler Seder
3. THE VERY HUNGRY CATERPILLAR, written and illustrated by Eric Carle
4. THE COMPOSER IS DEAD, by Lemony Snicket
5. CAT, by Matthew Van Fleet

For some time now I’ve been obsessed to getting down to my svelte 125 pounds, and I figured that maybe I was missing something in the calories in/calories out equation. Reading positive reviews about Skinny Bitch  by Rory Freedman and Kim Barnouin, I went ahead and downloaded it from Audible.com to my iPod and listened to it when I took my dogs out for their walk.

Did I find that secret to slimming down? No. In fact, I think I got about halfway through the book and gave up out of boredom. There’s not much I can recall except that the tone is snarky and the authors enjoy cussin’ like sailors.

Did I miss the point? No. I know it was a gimmick. But from someone who used to be very thin (and battled for most of her life to gain weight) and who wanted to lose the extra pounds, I really didn’t want to have these very unfunny women beat me up about my eating or exercise habits. I already do that to myself. I know I eat crap, I know that I sit in front of the computer too much and don’t move my ass as much as I should. I wanted some fun motivation to get me back on track and laugh my way back to slimming down.

Now the Skinny Bitch authors have written a book geared for men, Skinny Bastard. According to the New York Times the same “tough-love message of the original book will translate to men who want to lose weight and “get ripped.” and, “follows roughly the same outline as “Skinny Bitch,” with the language retooled to appeal to male psychology. Whereas the introduction to “Skinny Bitch” reads, “If you can’t take one more day of self-loathing, you’re ready to get skinny,” the men’s version does not assume low self-esteem: “Chances are, you haven’t done so badly, despite the few extra lbs you’re carting around. … But don’t kid yourself, pal: A hot-bodied man is a head-turner.”

I can’t predict how well this book will sit with men (or sell) but I went ahead and asked my husband for his opinion and he said, “If your choice is a lot of skinny bitches and bastards or pleasant fat people, I’ll take the latter.”

The first time I expressed interest in writing, my father presented me with his copy of Strunk and White’s The Elements of Style. I still have that original 1959 first edition and it’s in remarkably good shape considering it has traveled from Europe to New York, California, and back to New York.

This little book has been invaluable and I always keep it near me. When I don’t want a long-drawn out explantion about style or grammar, I refer to it often.

For a little history about the book, Sam Roberts wrote a nice article in the New York Times.  Below are the first three paragraphs:

Photo from the New York Times

The New York Times
‘The Elements of Style’ Turns 50
By Sam Roberts

How does a professional writer discuss “The Elements of Style” without nervously looking over his shoulder and seeing Will Strunk and E. B. White (or thousands of readers of their book) second-guessing him? (Is “second-guessing” hyphenated or not? Is posing a question the same as using the passive voice?)

William Strunk Jr. wrote and self-published the famous “Little Book” as a professor of English. White, his student at Cornell in 1919 and later an author and essayist, first revised the text four decades later after returning it to prominence with an essay in The New Yorker.

In 1959 a New York Times book reviewer pronounced it “a splendid trophy for all who are interested in reading and writing.”

To read the rest of the article click on headline.

Public Provides Giggles; Bloggers Get the Book Deal

By Jenna Wortham

After Duncan Birmingham, a comedy screenwriter in Los Angeles, got one too many holiday cards featuring miserable-looking pets wearing fake reindeer antlers, he realized the photos were great material for a blog.

Mr. Birmingham started Pets Who Want to Kill Themselves in early January, uploaded the first entry and asked readers to contribute. Within days, visitors were supplying him with snapshots of bulldogs in bunny costumes and cats wearing wigs. The blogosphere noticed – and so did the publishing world. Within a week, he was contacted by editors and literary agents. By the second month, he said, he had sold a book based on the photos to Three Rivers Press, an imprint at Crown Publishing Group, for “enough money to buy a Lincoln Town Car” – with change left over.

To read the rest of the article, click the headline.

Recession Fuels Readers’ Escapist Urges

By MOTOKO RICH

In a recession, what people want is a happy ending. 

At a time when booksellers are struggling to lure readers, sales of romance novels are outstripping most other categories of books and giving some buoyancy to an otherwise sluggish market.

Harlequin Enterprises, the queen of the romance world, reported that fourth-quarter earnings were up 32 percent over the same period a year earlier, and Donna Hayes, Harlequin’s chief executive, said that sales in the first quarter of this year remained very strong. While sales of adult fiction overall were basically flat last year, according to Nielsen Bookscan, which tracks about 70 percent of retail sales, the romance category was up 7 percent after holding fairly steady for the previous four years.

To read the rest of the article go to The New York Times  book section.

For a Brooklyn Tale, and Its Author, a Second Chance at a First Impression

By Eric Konigsberg

So woefully forgotten are L. J. Davis’s novels of Brooklyn that not even he has copies on hand in his apartment. Boxes of the unsold books, along with the rest of his collection 5,000 or so volumes by other authors, were relegated to storage two years ago, when Mr. Davis sold the Boerum Hill town house that had been his home since 1965 and moved into a postwar condominium around the corner.

To read the rest of the article go to The New York Times Book section.