Penny Marshall tells all, names names
Comedian and director Penny Marshall, 68, has been both in front of the camera and behind it. Now she’s sharing what the view was like in a memoir, “My Mother Was Nuts” (New Harvest, $26). She chats about her days on “Laverne & Shirley,” her …
Review: ‘No Easy Day: The Autobiography of a Navy SEAL’ by Mark Owen
Mark Owen’s memoir has attracted controversy and criticism for whether Owen revealed classified information about the 2011 raid that killed Osama bin Laden. But what’s missing is a reflection on the book’s strengths — a cast of characters artfully drawn, yet painfully human, passionate descriptions of a lifestyle that few are privy to, as well as its breathlessly paced, inexorable march toward an inevitable ending.
Best sellers 09.16.12
Publisher’s Weekly’s top 10s for the week of Sept. 16.
Literary listings
Local book signings and literary events, Sept. 14-29.
Korecki’s book: Jesse Jackson Jr. offered to arrange Blagojevich a pardon from Obama
Rod Blagojevich once promised to bring reform to Illinois politics. The former governor now lives in a federal prison in Colorado, serving out his sentence for political corruption. Chicago Sun-Times reporter Natasha Korecki followed every step of Blagojevich’s downfall. She details his demise in a …
Chicago Lit: Adam McOmber
Adam McOmber lives in the Lake View neighborhood, where everything is hip and happening. But for two years while writing his new novel, “The White Forest,” McOmber transported himself to another time and place that is about as far from Wrigleyville and Boystown as you can get.
Review: ‘This Is How You Lose Her’ by Junot Diaz
Nine stories, so many bouts with love. Junot Diaz brings readers a passionate collection of short stories with “This is How You Lose Her,” the follow-up to his Pulitzer Prize-winning novel, “The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao.”
Review: ‘NW’ by Zadie Smith
In her latest novel, Zadie Smith displays amazing inventivenes, as she did in her earlier work, this time exploring darker terrain. If she conjured E.M. Forster with “On Beauty,” the new book, “NW,” channels Virginia Woolf. The modernist influence is deliberate, as Smith unravels — in a rhythmic stream-of-consciousness style — the intertwined stories of a group of contemporary Londoners in their 30s.
Literary listings
Local book signings and literary events, Sept. 7-22.
Author Judy Blume diagnosed with breast cancer
NEW YORK (AP) — Children’s author Judy Blume says she was diagnosed with breast cancer over the summer but is “feeling stronger every day” after surgery.
The 74-year-old Blume wrote on her blog Wednesday that she learned in June that she had cancer and underwent …
Fall preview: Books
Erotica: That’s what’s hot this fall. The “Fifty Shades of Grey” phenomenon may only get hotter. Booksellers and publishers expect at least a dozen novels to benefit from E L James’ multimillion-selling erotic trilogy, a list-topper since early spring, and new ones continue to be acquired.
Literary listings
Local book signings and literary events, Aug. 31-Sept. 15.
Best sellers 09.02.12
Publisher’s Weekly’s top 10s for the week of Sept. 2.
Pippa Middleton publishing first book: a party book
LONDON (AP) — Pippa Middleton is publishing her first book: A guide to home entertaining.
The 28-year-old younger sister to the Duchess of Cambridge, formerly known as Kate Middleton, says that the book is based on her experience in her family’s party business and work …
