ICYMI: After Hachette writers banded together behind their publisher (piles of tweets, an author petition (pdf), a perplexing Malcolm Gladwell YouTube clip, and of course our own Edan Lepucki in Stephen Colbert’s pre-order campaign), Amazon proposed giving authors “100% of proceeds” from ebooks — that’s including Hachette’s share — while they hashed things out. You gotta admire that gumption. Halfway around the world, a French court order just banned free delivery for discounted book orders–so Amazon now charges one cent. Also: they’ve got drones. The Times concludes that if you can’t beat ’em, join ’em.
Amazon or perish?
Kristof on the Value of Teachers
At the New York Times, Nicholas Kristof highlights a study finding that a classroom of students of a strong fourth-grade teacher will collectively earn $700,000 more over their lifetimes than those taught by a weak teacher.
Neil Gaiman’s Video Game
Neil Gaiman announced the launch of his first video game, Wayward Manor. The horror-fantasy author (whose latest book was recently reviewed by our own Tess Malone) told Mashable that the game follows “the misadventures of a ghost who wants nothing more than a peaceful afterlife.”
Catstarter
“The most interesting writers we know, all asking and answering the same question: why can’t we stop watching cat videos?” Coffee House Press one-ups all boring Kickstarter campaigns with Catstarter, a campaign to fund a book on cat videos and “how we decide what is good or bad art, or art at all.”
Am I Special?
“Perhaps I will just go underground and live a quiet life of desperation. I’ve heard mumblings about a place called ‘Social Media Manager.’ It seems like a nice place where all people my age go for a while. Just until things start to make sense again.” Nobody knows the throes of existential angst quite like a twenty-something. Here’s a plea for help from one such twenty-something over at McSweeney’s.
A New Generation of Historical Epics
Which Author Spells The Best?
The Council of Literary Magazines and Presses is hosting their annual Spelling Bee Fundraiser on October 30th. New Yorker editor Ben Greenman will host the event, which will pit Jonathan Ames, Amor Towles and Laura Lamont’s Life in Pictures author Emma Straub against one another (and more) in a battle of lexicographic perspicacity. (Can you state the language of origin, please?) The event will be judged by none other than Jesse Sheidlower, editor of the inimitable Oxford English Dictionary.
From the Mixed-Up Files of E. L. Konigsburg
Rest in peace E. L. Konigsburg, author of one of the greatest children’s books of all time. (Hyperbole? Oh, go get lost in the Met’s fountain.)