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LATEST Feature Articles
Twenty Writerly Questions Series: Beth Powning
by - Monday, February 01, 2010
BookBuffet partners with Random House Canada to offer you a writerly glimpse into the lives of authors. First up, is Beth Powning. Check back for upcoming authors: Joy Fielding, Drew Hayden Taylor, and John Boyne.
Beth is the author of several books, including The Hatbox Letters, Edge Seasons: A Mid-life Year, Shadow Child, and The Sea Captain's Wife. She lives in an 1870s farmhouse with extensive gardens in Sussex, New Brunswick, with her husband, artist Peter Powning. For more information about Beth and her books, please visit her website The Sea Captain's Wife.ca, or read the first chapter of The Sea Captain’s Wife. <
1. How would you summarize your book in one sentence? The Sea Captain's Wife takes the reader around the world on a square-rigged sailing ship in the 1860's with a young woman and her captain husband; beneath the dramatic and fast-paced events of the adventure are the small, painful, and subtle moments that constitute a marriage.
2. How long did it take you to write this book? Three years.
3. Where is your favorite place to write? In my studio, which is a big room over the kitchen in our 1870's farmhouse. The room has tiny, low doors that even I have to duck to go through. There’s a skylight and narrow east-facing windows overlooking my vegetable gardens, forests and pastures. Questions 4-10... Continued below. ...More >>
LATEST Author Interviews
Author Podcast: Orhan Pamuk
by - Tuesday, January 12, 2010
I had the good fortune while on business in snowy London, to nab a ticket to the sold out event on January 12th featuring Turkish author and Nobel Prize Laureate, Orhan Pamuk at the Queen Elizabeth Theatre in the Southbank Centre. Pamuk of course is promoting his new novel, The Museum of Innocence (Published by Knopf, October 2009) which has been getting sensational critical reviews and popular acclaim. Pamuk has been working on Museum for many years and has alluded to it thus: “The story, which takes place in Istanbul between 1975 and today, is about obsessive passion and the great question: What is love, really?” Tonight, Pamuk is introduced by Hermione Lee who is herself a gifted writer and important critical reviewer. The following podcast begins with an introduction by Ms Lee, followed by a reading by Orhan Pamuk (with amusing antidotes), then a discussion period betwee Pamuk and Lee, and finally a selection of the questions from the audience. There is an interesting segment where Pamuk explains the derivation of the cover photo art: he found the picture in a Turkish photo archive, he photoshopped out the background and added the Bosphorous Sea, he added suspenders to the man in the back seat (which he then had to describe similarly in the book). After all the work, his publishers worried they'd be sued by anyone of the people depicted in the photo. A search to discover their identities and whereabouts found that the only surviving member is the woman seated in the front seat of the car wearing the kurchief. She was contacted and completely delighted by the story. Pamuk went to meet her and has a photograph taken of himself with her - she is now in her 90's.
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Feature Articles >>
The Gold Globe Winners 2010
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Monday, January 18, 2010
The Golden Globes are always a pre-curser to the Academy Awards (The Oscars) and this year awards went to some actors whose careers have well deserved recognition in the past and who receive it now, as well as the expected sweep of AVATAR. Kudos to James Cameron who once again breaks box office records by making over $1 Billion USD in the fastest time from opening date. (If you're interested in the animation, get this excellent book, The Art of Avatar: James Cameron's Epic Adventure) BookBuffet was particularly pleased to see Vieneese actor, Christopher Waltz win Best Supporting Actor for "Inglorious Bastards", and also Mo'Nique, Best Supporting Actor in "Precious". Check out the list of winners and nominated to see which films and their adapted books you want to start plowing through before Oscars March 7th, as you may have heard that the Academy of Motion Pictures announced back in June '09 that the Best Picture award will list 10 not 5 movies in the running. In the 30's and 40's The Academy used to feature 8-10 nominees, so this is not a completely new concept. One assumes it's a bid to increase theatre attendance across the spectrum of films before the award ceremony, and I have to agree, when an average of 400 films are released each year it seems reasonable to allow 10 to shine in the annual spotlight. Read on for the Golden Globe list of nominees and winners with links to books, trailers and trivia.
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Book Reviews >>
Why Women Have Sex
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Monday, December 14, 2009
Sex holds a universal fascination. From our basic limbic drive of "preservation of self and species" to the furthest extremes of sexual practice, everyone wants to know how it works and where they fit into the spectrum. Starting from our first sexual stirring and tracking behavior to the oldest fornicators, researchers are gathering information to determine what stimulates our sex drive, the mind-body connection and social-cultural differences for normal and abnormal behavior. In 1998 when Viagara came on the market for men, the push was on to discover the pink pill equivalent for women. Female sexuality, these studies show, is even more complex and nuanced than male sexuality. Researchers Cindy M. Meston and David M. Buss, both psychology professors at the University of Texas at Austin discovered some fascinating new information, which is contained in Why Women Have Sex: Understanding Sexual Motivations from Adventure to Revenge (and Everything in Between). I am particularly interested to read the section talking about the sex practices of young women today. What are these third generation feminists up to? You'd be surprised to see the frank level of experimentation and use of sex, almost as a tool in their armanentarium to get what they want. Seems like a good book to purchase for anyone who wants to understand the sexuality of women better. (Uh... who doesn't that include?)
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Publisher News >>
GRANTA Turns 30
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Tuesday, September 08, 2009
Granta magazine is a literary quarterly from the UK that is turning 30 this year, and they’re asking you to help them celebrate by purchasing a subscription to GRANTA. Digital subscriptions fees have been wound back to 1979 for an annual cost of £3.50 – so there’s no excuse no matter where in the world you live. What’s inside?
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Whistler Reads >>
Whistler Reads: Feb 7th Discussion of THE GOLDEN MEAN
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Tuesday, December 15, 2009
The first book event kicking off the 2010 season in Whistler is going to be a doozy. Don't miss the 28th Whistler Reads book group discussion on Febuary 7th 2010 (apres ski) 4:00-5:30pm at 3313 Peak Drive on Blueberry Hill, Whistler - the home of Chris and Angela. (Tickets: $20 at door or online below) We are thrilled to bring you BC author Annabel Lyon, whose third book The Golden Mean (Random House Canada) was shortlisted for not one, not two, but for three of Canada's literary prizes: both the 2009 Governor General the Giller Prize winning her the the Rogers Writers' Trust Prize. (The Golden Mean is currently #3 on amazon.ca) This is the fictionalized story of Greek philosopher Aristotle's unique relationship to the boy who would become Alexander the Great. The title of the book, the golden mean, is a term used to describe the desirable middle between two extremes, one of excess and the other of deficiency. For example courage, a virtue, if taken to excess would manifest as recklessness and if deficient as cowardice. Socrates teaches that a man "must know how to choose the mean and avoid the extremes on either side, as far as possible". Buddha taught "the Middle Way" in 6th century B.C., sharing the supremely important notion that the main purpose of our existence is to lead a good life. Hence, in heralding the New Year with this book and this author, we are bringing together philosophies from many corners of the earth and from a fascinating point in history. Sound like a great way align your 2010? Purchase a copy of this book for yourself and for those bibliophiles in your world. Join us for Whistler Reads' first event of 2010. RSVP required. (OR your ticket purchase will put you on the guest list.)
WGBH Boston >>
Masterpiece Classic: January Brings Gaskell, Austen and Buchan
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Sunday, January 03, 2010
We're back into Classic Season at Masterpiece hosted by Laura Linney. BookBuffet partners once again with WGBH Boston to give our members free books (5 copies of the current book) from which the new series is adapted. As a television viewer you can luxuriate in the stunning performances of the actors playing the parts: Dame Judy Dench and Dame Eileen Atkins are just two of an ensemble cast of 50 playing opposite each other in the first 3-part drama titled, Cranford adapted by Heidi Thomas from 3 separate books by the Victorian author, Elizabeth Gaskell. Praised by both Dickens and Carlyle in her time, Gaskell was inspired by the changing social and economic times of the late 1800's as the classes met the challenges and opportunities of the Industrial Revolution. Raised by her Unitarian Minister father and later married to a Unitarian husband, Gaskell covers the topics of the day as diverse as: revenge of a trade unionist through murder, individual travails after the Napoleonic Wars, and the interlocking fortunes between 3 country families. (Wives and Daughters, 1864-66) adapted and aired previously by BBC-Masterpiece is considered to be her best work. Gaskell was a close friend of Charlotte Bronte and became her biographer, (The Life of Charlotte Brontë, (1857). Of the series, Director Simon Curtis says, "Treat classics like contemporary material and contemporary material like classics." Get the insider scoop on the making of the series and take advantage of the BBC production team's reverence for classic literature through the many resources available on the Masterpiece website. Limited online viewing of the series is available in the US (not Canada) and you can of course tune-in to the series on television, as well as read the book. Win copies of Elizabeth Gaskell's novels for your book group by participating in our online discussion group. Details below.
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Wine & Book Club >>
Wine & Book Group Pick for Dec-Jan
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Tuesday, December 01, 2009
Who can resist the delicious red cover of The Winter Vault by Canadian powerhouse, Anne Michaels (McClelland and Stewart, 2009) $15.88. Her last book Fugitive Pieces launched her literary career and garnered her several literary awards including the UK's prestigious Orange Prize and Guardian Fiction Prize. Readers say they "have been aching for her next novel" ever since. Now over a decade later, it has arrived. Judging by the reviews, Michaels has not disappointed her readership. Publisher's Weekly says Winter Vault is "a tender love story set against an intriguing bit of history is handled with uncommon skill." (starred review) and the New York Times writes, "Literature is all the better for it." What could be a better read over the holidays? The story is about a couple who travel to Egypt to live on a houseboat on the Nile River just below Abu Simbel during the '60's, the period of the building of the Aswan Dam.
"Avery Escher is one of the engineers responsible for the dismantling and reconstruction of a sacred temple... Jean is a botanist by avocation, passionately interested in everything that grows. They met on the banks of the St. Lawrence River, witnessing the construction of the Seaway as it swallowed towns, homes, and lives. Now, at the edge of another world about to be inundated in the name of progress, much of what they most believe in is tested.
When a tragic event occurs, nearing the end of Avery’s time in Egypt, he and Jean return to separate lives in Toronto; Avery to school to study architecture and Jean into the orbit of Lucjan, a Polish émigré artist..." - McClelland and Stewart What could be a better Wine & Book Group read over the holidays? To celebrate we've paired this book with a spicy delicious red, evocative of exotic locations from a stunning winemaker ....More >>
Author Interviews >>
Author Podcast: Amos Oz
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Saturday, November 21, 2009
BookBuffet attended the American Jewish University, LosAngeles where Israeli author, journalist and peace advocate Amos Oz was invited to speak about his life and his books with Rob Eshman, the Editor in Chief of The Jewish Journal of Greater Los Angeles. It is all part the Third Annual Celebration of Jewish Books held this November in the city of angels.
Amos Oz, as many of you will recall, was this year’s favourite in to win the Nobel Prize for literature, according to the UK betting site Ladbrokes who rated Oz at 4-1 odds. While he lost to a reasonably obscure Romanian author, the publicity still serves to bring attention to his writing and his political advocacy for a two state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Turning 70 this past May, Amos Oz said “Being a 70-year-old Israeli is probably like being a 200-year-old Swede.” [He uses 300 year-old American in this talk.] He is being celebrated in his homeland with a three-day festival in his honour that includes literary, musical and cultural events with President Shimon Peres taking part.
Oz has written 18 books and 450 articles and essays. His works have been translated into 32 languages. He famously writes with two pens, one colour for his fiction and another colour for his politics. Half of his books are set within a 30-minute radius of his home in Arad where he lives with his wife Nily. His last book is a slim 117 page memoir titled, Rhyming Life and Death, published in the USA by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt and translated by Nicholas de Lange, Professor at University Cambridge. The author prefers to call it one of his “tales”. He says he just tells tales. Tales are what people told each other in caves and it is what we do today. The New Yorker says Rhyming is, “A prose poem… at once melancholic and sensual.” And that is how I find Amos Oz tonight. A warm, soft but firm-speaking man who exudes the depth of experience of his life – a life spent in war and peace, with family, soldiers, politicians, artists; loving, hating, and remembering. ....More >>
Technology Corner >>
Apple Announces The iPAD
by
Monday, February 01, 2010
Events >>
eBook Summit: Media Bistro Presents Innovations in Digital Publishing
by
Friday, November 06, 2009
I just signed up for Mediabistro.com's two-day eBook Summit in NYC December 15-16th. If you register before November 18th it's only $345 for both days. Take a look at the heavy-hitting list of key note speakers: Brandon Badger, Product Manager, Google Books; Steve Haber, President, Digital Reading Business Division, Sony; Katty Kay, Washington Correspondent, BBC World News America Author, Womenomics; Jane Friedman, CEO & Co-Founder, Open Road Integrated Media and former CEO, HarperCollins. The program promises to "take a closer look at the changing digital publishing industry, from the perspectives of content creators and of publishers. Leaders in the field will uncover business development opportunities, and highlight the latest technological innovations currently driving the future of digital publishing." If you are a publishing professional, content creator, marketer, advertising and PR professional, business development and e-commerce leader, gather round. Get the Twitter feed with: #ebooksummit. In case you need a completely frivolous reason, take in some holiday shopping and window displays-there is no place on Earth like NYC in December. Details, details, details... here is the skinny on what's up for discussion:
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MASH UP >>
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Some Member Book Selections
 
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