News & Notes — 7/20/13

July 20, 2013 News & Notes 6

News & Notes is a weekly Saturday post featuring book- and publishing-related news, links to interesting articles and opinion pieces, giveaways on this and other blogs, and other cool stuff.

Books & Ebooks in the News:

 

Ben Pruchnie/Getty Images

 Worth Reading: 

    Literary Losses:

    • Marc Simont, children’s book illustrator, died last week at the age of 97. Simont won the Caldecott, along with author Janice May Udray, for A Tree is Nice in 1957.  He’s perhaps best-known as the illustrator of the Nate the Great books. (Margalit Fox, The New York Times)

    Book Announcements:

    • “Patrick Rothfuss’ Kingkiller Chronicles books are getting a TV show!”  Yes, you read that right.  20th Century Fox has optioned the entire trilogy for television.  I’m torn between dancing around in excitement and worrying about how badly they could mess it up.  (Not to mention wondering how I’m going to watch them without cable TV.)  I’m not the only one; the fan posts on Rothfuss’ Facebook page (and there are a lot) are pretty evenly split between “Congratulations” and “OMG I hope they don’t ruin it”.
    • A Calvin and Hobbes documentary is coming out in November.  See the trailer and read about the film at GalleyCat.

    Free & Bargain books:

    Awesome lists: 

    Just for fun:  

    That’s it for this week!

    I’m always on the lookout for interesting articles, lists, and links for News & Notes, so please let me know if you see (or write!) anything that might be good for this feature.  You can leave me a comment or send me an email — my address is on the About/Review Policy/Contact page.

    6 Responses to “News & Notes — 7/20/13”

    1. Bea

      I can imagine that Rowling is furious; that lawyer screwed up client confidentiality big time. It’s too bad that the book wasn’t a better seller before the news broke.

      • Lark @ The Bookwyrm's Hoard

        I agree. But at least she did get a chance to read some positive critical reviews before the secret got out, so she knows that the book was well-received even without her name on it.

      • Lark @ The Bookwyrm's Hoard

        Me too! On the other hand, I do hope to read it now, and I probably wouldn’t have otherwise, mainly because I hadn’t heard of it and it’s not the sort of mystery I normally pick up without a recommendation.

      • Lark @ The Bookwyrm's Hoard

        I squeed too — at the same time I was going “oh please don’t let them ruin it.” And I think Rowlings was perfectly justified in publishing pseudonymously and with such secrecy, after what happened with The Casual Vacancy. I’m sorry her trust was betrayed in that way. I’m sure the secret would have leaked eventually, but to have it get out so soon must have really been a blow.