The book that tore publishing apart: ‘Harm has been done, and now everyone’s afraid’

Kate Clanchy’s memoir about teaching won the Orwell prize. Then, a year later, it became the centre of a storm that would engulf the lives of the author, her critics and dozens of people in the book trade. So what happened?At the end of March, a book that had been condemned to die came back to life. There was no star-studded launch, and no great fanfare, although this book is now somewhat famous. The new publisher of the poet Kate Clanchy’s memoir Some Kids I Taught and What They Taught Me felt it wrong to cash in on the controversy that has engulfed it. So the new editions – with some intriguing changes to the original text – were quietly resupplied to bookshops willing to stock them.What follows is a tale that reverberates well beyond publishing. It’s about whose voice is heard, which stories are told, and by whom. But it has broader implications for working life, too, particularly in industries where so-called culture wars raging through the outside world can no longer be left at the office door. Continue reading... Continue reading at 'The Guardian'

[ The Guardian | 2022-06-18 08:00:13 UTC ]

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'It's a mega year!': book trade braces for autumn onslaught of major new titles

After the lockdown, hundreds of delayed titles are expected this autumn including many household names vying for Christmas successFrom Richard Osman’s first crime novel to Caitlin Moran’s new memoir, almost 600 hardbacks are due to be published on 3 September in a “massive bun fight” of new... Continue reading at The Guardian

[ The Guardian | 2020-08-13 06:00:47 UTC ]
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The Delicate Balancing Act of Black Women’s Memoir

As Crown Publishing predicted, readers eagerly anticipated Michelle Obama’s Becoming. Autobiography and memoir are best selling categories because virtually everyone enjoys learning about the private life of public figures. In this case, many were curious about the woman who seemed to rise above... Continue reading at Electric Literature

[ Electric Literature | 2020-08-12 11:00:00 UTC ]
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OWN IT! partners with Grime record label on Adenuga memoir

OWN IT! is to partner with Grime music label Boy Better Know to co-publish the memoir of Ifeomagwu “Ify” Adenuga, the mother of the label's founders.  Continue reading at The Bookseller

[ The Bookseller | 2020-08-11 10:24:04 UTC ]
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Hodder acquires 'hopeful' memoir on choosing to parent alone

Hodder & Stoughton has acquired Liv's Alone by Liv Thorne, an "honest and hopeful memoir that captures the joy and the challenge that is parenting alone by choice". Continue reading at The Bookseller

[ The Bookseller | 2020-08-09 12:38:16 UTC ]
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Nigel Roby Sells the UK’s ‘The Bookseller’ to Stage Media Company

Calling his ownership and management of The Bookseller 'the greatest privilege of my working life,' Nigel Roby sells The Stage's Hugh Comerford. The post Nigel Roby Sells the UK’s ‘The Bookseller’ to Stage Media Company appeared first on Publishing Perspectives. Continue reading at Publishing Perspectives

[ Publishing Perspectives | 2020-08-07 09:05:55 UTC ]
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Better titles for ex-Trump staffers’ memoirs.

Another day, another announcement of a memoir from a former Trump collaborator. This time, it’s Fiona Hill, an ex-advisor who testified in Trump’s impeachment inquiry, whose “views about the future of a polarized America” will be published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt in 2021. I have nothing... Continue reading at Literrary Hub

[ Literrary Hub | 2020-08-06 19:59:16 UTC ]
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The Bookseller acquired by publisher of the Stage

The Bookseller has been acquired by the publisher of theatre magazine the Stage, in a move that will see the 162-year-old book trade newspaper join forces with the 140-year-old brand. Continue reading at The Bookseller

[ The Bookseller | 2020-08-06 12:20:48 UTC ]
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How a writer learned to open up about Dad's secret sex books

Sara Faith Alterman's "Let's Never Talk About This Again" is a memoir about strange family dynamics, love, grief and the benefits of finally opening up. Continue reading at Los Angeles Times

[ Los Angeles Times | 2020-08-05 18:00:51 UTC ]
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Dissecting Pain: An Interview with Alisson Wood

It would be easy to summarize Being Lolita as a memoir about a toxic, exploitative relationship between a high school English teacher and his student, and it is about that—but it’s about that in the way Walden is about a pond. Continue reading at The Paris Review

[ The Paris Review | 2020-08-04 16:08:33 UTC ]
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Personal Space: Morgan Jerkins on Making Unexpected Family Discoveries

On this episode of Personal Space: The Memoir Show, Sari Botton interviews Morgan Jerkins, author of Wandering in Strange Lands: A Daughter of the Great Migration Reclaims Her Roots, published by Harper. In this fascinating historical memoir, Jerkins explores her identity and heritage by tracing... Continue reading at Literrary Hub

[ Literrary Hub | 2020-08-03 19:36:31 UTC ]
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How Poetry Helps Us Through Grief

A former U.S. poet laureate’s new memoir reflects on the power of storytelling to reconcile past traumas—and offers lessons for surviving the cataclysms of the present. Continue reading at The Atlantic

[ The Atlantic | 2020-08-01 12:00:00 UTC ]
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In ‘Memorial Drive,’ Natasha Trethewey reclaims her mother’s life from the man who took it

Trethewey’s memoir is a tribute to a life snuffed out by a brutal man, a fractured judicial system and a patriarchy as old as Methuselah. Continue reading at The Washington Post

[ The Washington Post | 2020-07-31 12:00:00 UTC ]
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Green Tree acquires Liz Fraser memoir

Bloomsbury's Green Tree is to publish Liz Fraser's memoir Coming Clean: A True Story of Love, Addiction and Recovery next year.  Continue reading at The Bookseller

[ The Bookseller | 2020-07-31 11:02:40 UTC ]
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A Queer Memoir About Navigating Toxic Masculinity

I met David Adjmi at a fancy writing residency. The kind of place where you work all day alone and then eat dinner together, have a drink in the parlor afterwards. I remember a night when someone suggested watching a movie. As people were perusing the house copy of the criterion collection... Continue reading at Electric Literature

[ Electric Literature | 2020-07-31 11:00:00 UTC ]
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Book Deals: Week of August 3, 2020

Scribner buy a book about American’s first female astronauts, Matthew McConaughey sells a memoir to Crown, and more. Continue reading at Publishers Weekly

[ Publishers Weekly | 2020-07-31 04:00:00 UTC ]
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Personal Space: Laura Lippman Dares to Focus on Herself

On this episode of Personal Space: The Memoir Show, Sari Botton interviews Laura Lippman, author of My Life as a Villainess, published by William Morrow. In this wry essay collection she writes movingly about becoming a mom in her fifties, choices she made in her career as a journalist and a... Continue reading at Literrary Hub

[ Literrary Hub | 2020-07-30 18:00:43 UTC ]
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In ‘Memorial Drive’ a Poet Evokes Her Childhood and Confronts Her Mother’s Murder

The new memoir by the Pulitzer Prize-winning poet Natasha Trethewey is an aching investigation of trauma and art. Continue reading at The New York Times

[ The New York Times | 2020-07-30 10:06:53 UTC ]
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French book trade recovering from Covid-19 lockdown

The French book trade is picking up from its two months of Covid-19 lockdown much better than expected. Continue reading at The Bookseller

[ The Bookseller | 2020-07-29 11:42:21 UTC ]
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How “Memorial Drive” Tries to Make Sense of a Mother’s Murder

Katy Waldman writes about “Memorial Drive,” a new memoir by the Pulitzer Prize-winning poet Natasha Trethewey, who pieces together memories of her mother, who was murdered by Trethewey’s stepfather. Continue reading at New Yorker

[ New Yorker | 2020-07-29 10:00:00 UTC ]
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The best audiobooks of July provide an escape

Let your summer getaway include a new Sherlock Holmes adventure, a memoir about reinvention, and two novels that offer insights on racial identity. Continue reading at The Christian Science Monitor

[ The Christian Science Monitor | 2020-07-28 21:20:01 UTC ]
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