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The Washington Post reports that Richard Ford won’t be returning to the fictional mindscape of the New Jersey hero who garnered him a Pulitzer Prize.

Ford has made it plain that a fourth book that would take his protagonist beyond his “Permanent Period” and into his sunset years isn’t in the cards.

“I’ve ruled it out as much as I’ve ruled anything else out. I won’t ever get married again. I’ll always be married to the same girl. And I don’t think I’ll ever write another Frank Bascombe book,” Ford said in an interview at his home overlooking Linekin Bay.

The NYTimes is reporting on an odd deal that the novelist Jonathan Lethem has going on his Web site. His new novel, You Don’t Love Me Yet, is to be published on March 13, and on his Web site he says he is willing to give away the option to make the novel into a film.

Check out the offer on his site here: http://jonathanlethem.com/freelove.html

Here is what he says:

Lately I’ve become fitful about some of the typical ways art is commodified. Despite making my living (mostly) by licensing my own copyrights, I found myself questioning some of the particular ways such rights are transacted, and even some of the premises underlying what’s called intellectual property. I read a lot of Lawrence Lessig and Siva Vaidhyanathan, who convinced me that technological progress – and globalization – made this a particularly contemporary issue. I also read Lewis Hyde’s The Gift, which persuaded me, paradoxically, that these issues are eternal ones, deeply embedded in the impulse to make any kind of art in the first place. I came away with the sense that artists ought to engage these questions directly, rather than leaving it entirely for corporations (on one side) and public advocates (on the other) to hash out. I also realized that sometimes giving things away – things that are usually seen to have an important and intrinsic ‘value’, like a film option – already felt like a meaningful part of what I do. I wanted to do more of it.

In the Feb/March issue of BookForum there’s a very interesting quote from William T. Vollman in regards to his new book, Poor People. His statements about the future of reading and of books is both bleak — that readers are losing their influence — and a bit overly optimistic — that people will read and write for the joy of it (as, opposed to, I guess political, imperialist or commercial interests). But he also seems to be describing a small group of people who are connected solely by their independent-mindedness; thus, they aren’t a pin-downable collective, but just a loose affiliation of people (perhaps in line with the “conspiracy of smart people”?).

Another thing he reminds me of is something a fellow grad student said to me about what happens to unspoken or unheard thoughts and ideas — do they just disappear? do they find ways of expressing themselves in unexpected ways?

The interview isn’t online, but here is the portion:

Bookforum: In Poor People, you write about being surrounded by people who can’t read your work. You’re a writer and also a publisher. What place do you think the book holds in our society?

Vollmann: I think that readers and writers are now simply an interest group. A relatively powerful interest group, but their influence is waning year by year. The good side of that, I think, is that it becomes increasingly likely that people will read and write only for the love of it. And that’s a very, very good thing. It’s likely that throughout history, most people have never been particularly well educated, and the world has gotten by somehow. Independent thinking is a category that almost by definition applies to a small number of people, because the great majority of people tends o think alike. So I can’t say I even find it that alarming that more and more of the people I know don’t read. It’s a little sad for me personally, but that’s only because that’s what I like to do. As I travel all over the world, and I meet people, let’s say in Yemen, for whom the only book that is at all important is the Koran, I think, well, they have very rich and interesting lives. Who am I to tell them that they should be any different? The average person is as smart as he or she needs to be. And that if we get in some terrible mess, then people are going to wake up and try to figure out what needs to be done.

I really love the novel World Light by Halldor Laxness. He is a great writer, and in that book he writes about a guy who is a true poet. He’s got this incredibly gifted sensibility; he really appreciates all the beauty around him. The only flaw happens to be that he writes terrible poems. So nobody can appreciate any of the stuff that goes on in his head. Maybe we’re all that way.

… on her blog that her new book is done. It is the latest in the series of Lizzie Stewart mysteries by the UAlbany professor in the school of criminal justice.

Sorry to have been away so long. I have been busy with the final copyediting of You Should Have Done on Monday. The manuscript is now on the way to press. (Imagine me jumping up and down).

Here’s what Publishers Weekly says:

Criminal justice professor Lizabeth Stuart investigates her paternity and her long-lost mother’s checkered past in Bailey’s fourth mystery (after 2003’s Old Murders), a story rich in history if not suspense. Raised by her grandparents in Drucilla, Ky., Lizzie never knew her mother, Becca Hayes, who abandoned her at birth. Now 39 years old and on the verge of engagement to her boyfriend, police officer John Quinn, Lizzie is especially determined to understand her past. With help from Quinn and PI Kyle Sheppard, she connects her mother to Chicago gangster Nick Mancini, who was stabbed to death in 1969. After 22-year-old Becca, who was Nick’s girlfriend and the chief suspect, disappeared without a trace, musician Robert Montgomery confessed to the crime. Decades later, Lizzie’s effort to track down the key players in this drama takes her from her home in Gallagher, Va., to Chicago; Wilmington, N.C.; and finally New Orleans. New readers might wish for more character development, but series fans should be pleased.

A new survey out today lists the most popular owned yet unread books in Briton. The story is in The Guardian.
What’s interesting about this kind of survey is even though the article says these people are trying to put “intellectual credibility” on their shelves, what is really happening is something like marketing at work. The list includes recent prizewinners and best-sellers, like Vernon God Little (a Booker prize winner) or Captain Corelli’s violin (a best-seller) — perhaps people are just buying books because someone somewhere (whether in the media, in academia or word of mouth) told them they should. And that’s hardly intellectual at all.
Here’s a sample:

It’s the literary club no author wants to belong to, but boasts the likes of Salman Rushdie, Bill Clinton, Paulo Coelho and Fyodor Dostoyevsky. A survey out today of the books Britons own but do not finish shows a surprising lack of appetite for many of the nation’s most popular titles.

The bestselling book that topped the poll, DBC Pierre’s Vernon God Little, has been lauded the world over – ironically, for its explosive denouement. But 35% of respondents who bought or borrowed the Man Booker-winning satire about a Texan schoolboy in a death row reality TV show failed to get to the end.

For a take on this article closer to home, check out The Daily Prophet, a blog all about Harry Potter.

Eleanor from Flight of Fantasy in Loudonville has written in with a wonderful essay about the role of female authors in the realms of fantasy and sci-fi in the past, present and future.

Here is Eleanor’s essay (Note: many links to author pages appear after the essay):

From the days of Mary Shelley, the author of Frankenstein, women have been writing fantasy & science fiction.

In the early half of last century it was considered advisable to have a manly name, leading to the slightly altered names of Andre Norton and CJ Cherryh, although Marion Zimmer Bradley was just lucky, as I think that was her original name.

Nowadays we have plainly female bestsellers like Lois McMaster Bujold, queen of space opera; Laurell K Hamilton, successor to Anne Rice’s throne; and Diana Wynne Jones, one of Britain’s greatest SF/F (science fiction/fantasy) writers.

Writers like Patricia McKillip, Ellen Kushner, Pamela Dean, and newcomer Holly Phillips write well-styled literary fantasy. Elizabeth Moon and Mary Gentle write military sci fi & fantasy, Pat Cadigan is one of the best-remembered cyberpunk authors, and Patricia C Wrede is the leading author of Regency-era fantasy novels.

Women dominate the vampire & werewolf subfield, including such authors as Patricia Briggs, Charlaine Harris, Tanya Huff, and Barbara Hambly. Robin McKinley is beloved for her desert kingdom Damar, Mercedes Lackey is beloved for her (different yet similarly named) kingdom of Valdemar. Fruit’s Basket, the number 1 selling shoujo manga in America, is written by Natsuki Takaya. Diane Duane and Tamora Pierce (and, of course, J K Rowling) are famous for their young adult series.

There are individual stylists like eluki bes shahar (AKA Rosemary Edghill), Nina Kiriki Hoffman, Vera Nazarian, Nalo Hopkinson, and Tanith Lee. Among others, Ursula K Le Guin, Suzette Haden Elgin, Marion Zimmer Bradley, Anne Bishop, Octavia Butler, and Zenna Henderson have written about issues of women’s liberation, and of course the girl who disguises herself as a man to have adventures is a traditional fantasy trope, although she’s now more likely to simply run away as herself.

Women who write about gender issues such as homosexuality, intersexuals, and transsexuals include Laurie J Marks, Sarah Monette, Ursula K Le Guin, Ellen Kushner, and Marion Zimmer Bradley (again:), and to a lesser extent, Maria V Snyder and Lois McMaster Bujold.

Female authors with books coming out this month include Elizabeth Moon (Vatta’s War series), Anne Bishop (Ephemera series), Mercedes Lackey (Five Hundred Kingdoms series), Jane Lindskold (Wolf series), and talented newcomer Vicki Pettersson (The Scent of Shadows).

Eleanor’s 2007 Schedule of Recommended Releases by
Women Authors

APRIL
Claimed by Shadow – Karen Chance
New Orleans Noir anthology (Barbara Hambly short
story)
Fruit’s Basket 16 – Natsuki Takaya

MAY
All Together Dead – Charlaine Harris
Kushiel’s Scion (paperback) – Jacqueline Carey

JUNE
Water Logic – Laurie J Marks
The Harlequin – Laurell K Hamilton
Sharing Knife: Legacy – Lois McMaster Bujold
The Bone Key – Sarah Monette

JULY
Ilario: Lion’s Eye – Mary Gentle
Territory – Emma Bull
Harry Potter 7

AUGUST
The Mirador – Sarah Monette
Fruit’s Basket 17 – Natsuki Takaya
On the Prowl anthology (Patricia Briggs and Karen
Chance short stories)

SEPTEMBER
Powers – Ursula K Le Guin
Ilario: The Stone Golem – Mary Gentle
Dragonhaven – Robin McKinley

OCTOBER
1634: The Bavarian Crisis – Virginia De Marce & Eric
Flint
An Ice Cold Grave – Charlaine Harris
Many Bloody Returns (Charlaine Harris short story)

websites:
bookstore! http://www.fof.net
CJ Cherryh http://www.cherryh.com
Lois McMaster Bujold http://www.dendarii.com
Laurell K Hamilton http://www.eridine.com/blog
Diana Wynne Jones http://www.dianawynnejones.com
Patricia A McKillip http://www.patriciamckillip.com
Ellen Kushner
http://www.sff.net/people/KushnerSherman/Kushner/index.html
Pamela Dean http://www.dd-b.net/pddb
Holly Phillips http://www.hollyphillips.com
Elizabeth Moon http://www.elizabethmoon.com
Pat Cadigan
http://users.wmin.ac.uk/~fowlerc/patcadigan.html
Patricia Briggs http://www.hurog.com
Charlaine Harris http://www.charlaineharris.com
Barbara Hambly http://www.barbarahambly.com
Robin McKinley http://www.robinmckinley.com
Mercedes Lackey http://www.mercedeslackey.com
Diane Duane http://www.dianeduane.com
Tamora Pierce http://www.tamora-pierce.com
eluki bes shahar http://sss.sff.net/people/eluki
Vera Nazarian http://www.veranazarian.com
Nalo Hopkinson http://www.sff.net/people/nalo
Tanith Lee http://www.tanithlee.com
Ursula K Le Guin
http://www.ursulakleguin.com/ukl_info.html
Anne Bishop http://www.annebishop.com
Octavia E. Butler
http://sfwa.org/members/Butler/index.html
Sarah Monette http://www.sarahmonette.com
Maria V Snyder http://www.mariavsnyder.com
Jane Lindskold http://www.janelindskold.com

Thanks for all the great recommendations, Eleanor!

In addition to the books above, I would also mention a couple of others:

Julie Philip’s “James Tiptree, Jr.: The Double Life Alice B. Sheldon.” This book just won (on Thursday) the 2006 NBCC Award for Biography. Here’s a write-up from NBCC’s Jennifer Reese:

SHE IS REMEMBERED, when she is remembered at all, as the eccentric woman who published marvelous, edgy science fiction stories in the 1960s and ’70s under the name James Tiptree, Jr. — a name she took off of a jam jar. And for this short, dazzling run alone, Alice B. Sheldon would merit a biography. But she was much more than just a fleeting sci-fi world sensation, as Julie Phillips makes clear in her splendid reconstruction of this brilliant and multifaceted woman’s troubled life. Sheldon played many roles in her seven decades: the dutiful daugher of a glamorous, globe-trotting mother; flirtatious socialite; army officer; CIA agent; journalist; painter; devoted wife. But it was only in middle age, after she began writing in the guise of reclusive avuncular James Tiptree, Jr., that she found, all too briefly, an outlet for her prodigious talents and energies. The sexual, artisitc and intellectual contradictions Sheldon mostly failed to accommodate in her own stormy life, Phillips captures and contains — in all their complexity — in this deeply intelligent and generous biography.

Also of note is Delmar-resident Pamela Sargent’s new release “Farseed.” The young adult novel is a sequel to 1983’s (yes, that is correct) “Earthseed,” and is the second part of a trilogy.

Booklist writes:

Sargent, Pamela. Farseed. Mar. 2007. 288p. Tor/Tom Doherty, $17.95 (9780765314277). Gr. 7–10.

In Earthseed (1983), genetically created teenagers were taught survival skills to fulfill a desperate plan to settle other worlds. Centuries pass; settlements are started on an earthlike planet, Home; and children are born. Then a small group breaks away and sets up its own society, which degenerates into a primitive existence. Meanwhile, those who stay at the original settlement are fearful, never straying far from their homes and pastures. In Farseed, Sargent explores the resurgence of the conflict between the groups that begins after 16-year-old Nuy, the daughter of the leader of the breakaway contingent, encounters strangers who are looking for her people. The interpersonal dynamics, plus the challenges of adapting to another world, give this long-awaited second book of the Seed Trilogy strong appeal. —Sally Estes

In today’s Times Union was my review of the book “Religious Literacy.” You can read the review here: http://blogs.timesunion.com/books/?p=423.

Here’s an excerpt:

Although chairman of the religious studies department at Boston University, Prothero’s argument isn’t about faith, but about how knowledge of religion is vital to the functioning of a democracy that requires a well-informed citizenry. This, of course, is a key rationale for journalism, so Prothero’s book is likely to get a lot of positive press for his mission, if not always for his writing.

He is careful to stress the difference between indoctrination, or making people believe a particular religion, and religious literacy, or getting people to understand “the religious terms, symbols, images, beliefs, practices, scriptures, heroes, themes, and stories that are employed in American

public life.”

Not understanding this distinction, Prothero argues, is part of the problem. Although the Supreme Court has ruled against “Sunday-school-style religious instruction,” he writes, the high court also ruled that “the Bible may constitutionally be used in an appropriate study of history, civilization, ethics, comparative religions and the like.”

For high schools, Prothero describes two required courses: one that views the Bible in terms of its literary and religious importance, another that introduces students to “the seven great religious traditions of the world: Hinduism, Buddhism, Confucianism, Daoism, Judaism, Christianity and Islam.”

For colleges, he calls for all students to be required to take one course in religious studies, so graduates can have at least “minimal religious literacy.”

The question is: Is this a good idea? What do you think?