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by Dan Gibson
When you hear that a forthcoming novel is an examination of one of the rich investment bankers who ruined our economy last year, I wouldn't blame you for grimacing a bit. First of all, while it's somewhat pleasing to consider a serious of awful things happening to a symbol for the declining value of your 401-k, it seems like it might be a little too soon to go back to that bad place. However, Adam Haslett's Union Atlantic might just end up being the lens we see this time through.
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 by Dan Gibson
Sure, Dan Brown's book is the bestselling book of the year, the newest Wimpy Kid volume was the must have book for kids, and the Twilight series kept flying off shelves. However, tell us a story of a best selling book by a first time author who put five years into writing her book and was rejected by 45 publishers, and that's the sort of thing that brings us joy. If that book was championed by indie bookstores before becoming the summer's must have purchase, you have our fiction title of the year, Kathryn Stockett's The Help.
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by Dan Gibson
In a year where the nonfiction charts were dominated by political titles (hello, Mark Levin, Glenn Beck, and Sarah Palin!) or self-help/weight loss/diet guides (you too can cook yourself thin and think like a man, while remaining a lady), possibly the most surprising book to top the bestseller charts was a 700 page book about the NBA written by a guy best known for writing on a website. The Book of Basketball is a somewhat juvenile, deranged masterpiece, and our nonfiction book of the year.
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 by Dan Gibson
Mary Kole isn't just an associate agent at Andrea Brown Literary Agency (a solid gig by itself), but an author, and a blogger who extensively covers the wide world of children's literature on her site, Kidlit.com. We appreciate her willingness to share some of her expertise and perspective on the young adult industry at the end of 2009.
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by Dan Gibson
 Joel Kneedler is relatively new to employment as a literary agent with the powerful Colorado Springs agency Alive Communications, but his experience in the Christian publishing business is astounding, from directing publicity for titles including as the mega-selling Prayer of Jabez and authors like Karen Kingsbury and Washington Redskins coaching legend Joe Gibbs.
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by Dan Gibson
While it is said that 92 percent of Americans own at least one Bible and twenty five million copies are sold every year, the business of how these Bibles move from store shelves to bookshelves in people's homes isn't probably something most people spend a lot of time thinking about. Think about this for a moment. If only 8 percent of Americans don't own a Bible already (and probably aren't in the market for one if they haven't picked one up at this point) and the average Bible owner already has four (up from three in 1993), how do you convince people to pick up a new one?
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by Dan Gibson
The jokes about Christian retail are almost too easy. Stacks of discs by Amy Grant and Michael W. Smith, a movie section full of Veggietales films and other morally constructive fare, and bookshelves full of Bibles. Mix in the array of Christian gifts including a wide selection of Precious Moments figurines and sanctified versions of everything from greeting cards to breath mints.
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With Kristi Jenkins
Alan Beatts is the owner of Borderlands, a San Francisco-based bookstore dedicated to science fiction and fantasy titles.
How do you feel generally about the state of science fiction and fantasy? Are you optimistic about the genre's future?
In general I think that SF and fantasy are doing as well now as they have at anytime in the past ten years.
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With Kristi Jenkins
Annalee Newitz is an editor at the popular Science Fiction-themed blog, io9. She has written for many periodicals including Popular Science, Salon.com and Wired and spent a year as a policy analyst for the Electronic Frontier Foundation.
How do you feel generally about the state of science fiction and fantasy (as far as book form goes)? Are you optimistic about the genre's future? What's next?
Like many people, I'm in mourning for the death of the midlist.
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by Kristi Jenkins
 Ask ten people if they read science fiction or fantasy and you're likely to receive ten different answers. Fans of the genres are generally strong in their loyalty to them, while people who dislike (or refuse to read) genre fiction are equally opinionated. |
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Dora Machado is the author of the Stonewiser fantasy series which premiered in 2008. The Heart of the Stone won the 2009 Benjamin Franklin Award for Best Debut Novel and was a finalist for the Foreword Magazine Book of the Year 2009 in the Science Fiction/Fantasy category. The second book, The Call of the Stone, was released in June, 2009. You can find Dora online at doramachado.com and FaceBook.
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