Daily book biz round-up: Franzen makes Time; Jezebel hits back; and more

Today’s book news:

• Jonathan Franzen to become first living author in a decade to be featured on cover of Time
• What the heck is goin’ on at Dorchester Publishing?
• Jezebel hits back at Huffington Post‘s “Most Overrated Authors” list
• Former Microsoft CTO publishes six-volume, 2,400 page cookbook. Retail price: $625
• Eye Weekly talks to Bryan Lee O’Malley about Scott Pilgrim vs. the World

Daily book biz round-up: Crown restructured; Nancy Drew turns 80; and more

A spot of book news to close out the week:

• Maya Mavjee announces Crown restructuring
• Penguin comes out on top in iBookstore stats
• A look at Robert J. Sawyer’s Mississauga office
• Nancy Drew: 80 years young
• Malcolm Gladwell “most highlighted” on Kindle
• World will soon get to share in Philip K. Dick’s sodium pentothal-induced fever dreams
• Sales of “freshly ground black people” cookbook quadruple

Bookmarks: Coolio cooks, Anne of Green Gables tweets, and more

A few sundry links from across the Web:

• “Living in a Gourmet’s Paradise?” Rapper Coolio now has his own cookbook, Cookin’ with Coolio
• A new audio-book version of the Bible is available, featuring Richard Dreyfuss as Moses, Luke Perry as Judas Iscariot, and — who else? — James Caviezel reprising his role as Jesus Christ. The L.A. Times Jacket Copy reports the audio-book is described as a “verbal cinema” complete with a musical score and sound effects
• You can now be a follower, or “kindred spirit,” of Canada’s favourite redhead. Anne of Green Gables is using Twitter
• We’re well aware how prevalent bad sex is in fiction … so how about awards for good sex? 
• You are officially invited to attend Hogwart’s School of Witchcraft and Wizardry … with a new iPhone Spells app 
• Sad but true: Finn Reeder, Flu Fighter is a book for middle-school aged children about the ubiquitous H1N1 virus

An anti-Canadian cookbook?

Author and Q&Q contibutor Shaun Smith points out what he’s calling a “very Canadian problem” with a new cookbook coming from Phaidon Press this fall. Called COCO, the book will feature recipes from 100 emerging culinary stars chosen by 10 of the world’s leading chefs, including Gordon Ramsay and Mario Batali. The problem is that not one is from Canada. From Smith’s blog:

I have tremendous respect for all of these curators. The reason for this gap is not entirely clear. They managed to find five deserving Australians, so surely they could have found at least one Canuck.

I am told by Phaidon that there may still be one opening left. That is, they’ve confirmed only 99 chefs and there is space for one more chef.

I’ve been floating names at Phaidon – Jonathan Gushue, Jérémie Bastien, Theo Yeaman, Patrice Demers, Mark Cutrara, Michael Steh (to name just a few) – with the hopes that they will clue into the fact that their book, as it stands, has a big hole in it and may not be particularly well received in Canada.

Smith is encouraging other Canadian foodies to help push Phaidon into choosing a Canadian chef for the remaining open spot.

Bookmarks: Shakespeare, Waugh, Sedaris, Seinfeld, Bush

Some book-related links:

• Stolen Shakespeare folio recovered in U.S. (Dallas Morning News)
• The battle over Brideshead Revisited (Times Online)
• David Sedaris in Ottawa (The Ottawa Citizen)
• Latest round in the Seinfeld cookbook fight (The New York Times)
• Corruption alleged over donations to Bush presidential library (Think Progress)
• Baghdad bookseller holds out hope for Iraq (Financial Times)
• Who needs bookstores when you’ve got libraries? (Scrimisms)

Bookmarks: Ishmael Beah’s “poetic licence,” sci-fi’s exhaustion, and the Bard goes manga

Some book-related links:

• The flaws in Ishmael Beah’s memoir called “poetic licence” (The Australian)
• Is sci-fi out of ideas? (Entertainment Weekly)
• The Bard goes manga (The Star – Malaysia)
• Tales of romance, in Polish (The Observer)
• Oolichan publisher publishes himself (Vancouver Sun)
• You stole my cookbook title! (The New York Times)
• Book scavengers (Seattle Post-Intelligencer)
• Area eccentric reads entire book (The Onion)