HelenKay Dimon

I came across some interesting tidbits on the web over the last few days. Thought I’d share:

1. A guy named Scott Lynch wrote fantasy excerpts on his weblog. A publisher read the entries. Lynch got a book deal with Bantam Dell’s Spectra imprint. His hardcover release date for Lies of Locke Lamora is June 2006. He sold the movie rights. Did I mention he’s 27?

2. David Hasselhoff wrote a memoir. Someone bought it. It comes out in September. That’s probably enough said about that one.

3. There’s a new publisher in town. According to Publishers Lunch it goes like this:

Thomas Nelson announced recently the launch of a new trade imprint, Naked Ink, targeting 18 to 35-year-olds, meant to “inspire a generation of readers who seek imaginative, honest and relevant information through entertainment and pop-culture driven products.” Nelson’s Rebekah Whitlock, 26, is leading the line, which has slotted five titles for this year, starting with the April release, The Hot Mom’s Handbook: Blondes Moms Have More Fun! by Jessica Denay.

I honestly have no idea what any of that means or what these books are about. If someone has a clue, please fill me in.

4. In the last 3 days, 154 different google searches for author Kaavya Viswanathan have lead people to my site. Clearly I am not the only one excited about her debut (which was #28 on the NYT hardcover bestseller list last week) How Opal Mehta Got Kissed, Got Wild and Got A Life. I am very happy to see all of the interest in Viswanathan’s book, but I must admit the hits are freaking me out a bit. Any chance the same person has visited my site 154 times in 3 days looking for Viswanathan? I feel as if I should warn her or something.

I was flipping through the New York Times Book Review looking for the article on Sebastian Junger’s newest, A Death In Belmont (as I mentioned yesterday and, if you missed yesterday, this is the guy who wrote The Perfect Storm), and saw an ad for Indecision by Benjamin Kunkel. I blogged about this book when it first came out in hardcover. The hardcover has a head on it. For some reason, it always reminds me of Jonathan Safran Foer’s Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close, which has a hand on the cover. Why I think of one along with the other, I do not know.

But…I may not have been the only person who got stuck on Kunkel’s cover. The paperback version has a new look. It’s a bit freaky. I think it’s fingerprints with smiley faces on them. No, really.

Here they are. You decide:

I’ve been waiting for Sebastian Junger’s newest, The Belmont Strangler. In the wake of the memoir scandals visited on all of us by James Frey and others, Junger writes about a murder of an elderly woman (Bessie Goldberg) in his old neighborhood. Junger was about six years old at the time. A black man was arrested and convicted of killing a white woman in an affluent Boston neighborhood. Junger wonders if a man who worked for his family could have been the killer. The man turns out to be Albert DeSalvo. For those not up on their true crime facts, DeSalvo was the Boston Strangler (or so most believe).

There is a review of the book in Sunday’s New York Times Book Review. Since I already know I’m buying the book, one of the more interesting items for me came near the end of the review. It goes like this:

In an intriguing paragraph, Junger makes a disturbing claim about the genre of nonfiction that many have made about great fiction: “Maybe the truth isn’t even the most interesting thing about some stories, I thought; maybe the most interesting thing about some stories is all the things that could be true. And maybe it’s in the pursuit of those things that you understand the world in its deepest, most profound sense.”

The reviewer goes on to argue that Junger is wrong about nonfiction. The reviewer says, and I agree, that: “Nonfiction must be about actual truth, not about how coincidences could lead to a deeper understanding of truth.”

Junger’s book is getting great reviews, but all this pseudo-truth talk makes me nervous. If it’s Junger’s theory that DeSalvo killed this neighbor and not the guy convicted for the crimes, that’s fine. But say it’s “based on a true story” not that it is one. In the end, the reviewer calls the book a must read but warns to read it, like all nonfiction, with the idea that the author is looking for “a literary or dramatic payoff.”

Kind of sounds like fiction, but okay.

First, we have a second April contest winner: Phyllis Lamken of Victor, Idaho. Congrats!

Now, for those who haven’t purchased a copy (or 40) of my April release in the anthology When Good Things Happen To Bad Boys - it’s only been out a week but, really, why haven’t you? – I’m going to take the weekend and engage in a bit of shameless self-promotion. Actually, I’m going to engage in this exercise whether or not you’ve purchased my book. And, I’m serious, go buy the damn book. Don’t make me get nasty about this. Go…

Until you buy the anthology, you can read about what went through my mind as I started to write my novella Hardhats and Silk Stockings. Just head over to the Tell Tale feature at Access Romance. I’m the spotlight…kind of makes you wonder what the folks running Access Romance were thinking when they allowed that, doesn’t it?

Some List news about When Good Things Happen To Bad Boys (notice how I’m linking a second time in my subtle attempt to guilt you into going to B&N and investing in a copy…or 40):

*Top Ten Romance Bestseller List at Borders/Waldenbooks for the last three weeks – two of them pre-release.

*Bookscan’s Top 100 romances for the last 3 weeks and, even better, in the Top 25 for the last two weeks.

*Amazon Daily Top Ten Romance Anthologies consistently for weeks. Yesterday (Friday) it was #1. It was #2 at the time of posting this morning.

Reviews are good. Numbers are good. Fellow anthology authors Lori and Erin are my heroes. Considering begging my editor to let me be in 12 anthologies a year just so I can be associated with the amazing and talented ladies of Brava as much as possible.

Thank you to everyone who purchased a copy. Thank you to all those giving good reports about it and sending me those wonderful emails. Thank you, thank you, thank you.

This one is really more of a book spotlight than an author spotlight. It’s Deadly Housewives, an April 2006 anthology release from Avon Trade.

The publisher describes it like this:

In the expert hands of fourteen unsurpassed storytellers, being a housewife takes on a whole new meaning. Get ready for a lethal mix of meddling mothers-in-law, creepy neighbors, cheating husbands, fickle female friends, careers left behind, out-of-control kids, steamy sex, and much, much more in this thrilling collection of never-before-published stories! Go behind the lace curtains and PTA smiles to explore the often mind-numbing reality of being a housewife. You’ll laugh, you’ll scream, you’ll recognize yourself or your best friend in each of these deadly situations.

Join Nevada Barr, Barbara Collins, Carole Nelson Douglas, Eileen Dreyer, Vicki Hendricks, Suzann Ledbetter, Elizabeth Massie, Christine Matthews, Denise Mina, Marcia Muller, Sara Paretsky, Nancy Pickard, S. J. Rozan, and Julie Smith on a riotous ride through the dark but often hilarious corners of the housewife psyche. In Deadly Housewives, the murders and mysteries on Wisteria Lane will look like an elementary-school bake sale compared to the thrills and suspense that these masters cook up!

Why this one:

1. The cover jumped out at me when I saw it on Chick Lit Books and when I saw it at B&N. The fact it’s not actually posted on the B&N website sale page is not good, in my view. This cover catches the eye in person.
2. There are some great authors in here and some I haven’t read and want to explore.
3. There is a “caution” on the back cover that made me laugh:

Caution: This book is meant to be read alone while sipping a glass of wine. Do not operate a motor vehicle or handle any kind of weapon for one hour after reading. Guaranteed to raise your blood pressure and your craving for revenge. Batteries not included.

4. Murder, mayhem, mysteries…It’s as if Avon published this one just for my enjoyment.

I’m a fan of Jamie Sobrato’s blog. Actually, I’m a fan of Jamie Sobrato. My only complaint is that she does not blog often enough. Kids, husband, full-time writing career – yeah, whatever. A girl could get carpel tunnel syndrome clicking on Jamie’s website link 40 or 50 times a day to see what she has to say.

In case you haven’t been reading – and, shame on you – she’s been talking about her publication road. She was a Golden Heart finalist (twice, I think). Got The Call. Is a Blaze author. Was nominated for the RITA first time out. And she’s cute…all very annoying if she weren’t so charming.

This sounded a bit too familiar for comfort:

My point with all this is that I’ve never met an author who feels completely satisfied with his or her literary lot in life. There is always the drive to achieve more (if we weren’t so driven we would never get published in the first place–it takes both delusions of grandure AND a huge drive to succeed to make it past all that rejection), and with each success comes additional pressure.

Also had to laugh at her thoughts on her new cover. Looks as if Alison doesn’t love it either.

Patricia Cornwell. Everyone has a theory about her. Seems as if everyone has something to say about her:

-She was the subject of a 1996 scandal involving an alleged lesbian affair and FBI officials, which all lead to a kidnapping, death and a court case.

-A copycat killer used her book Postmortem as a guide. Some people blamed her for that, ‘tho it’s not clear how that one was her fault.

-A strange site that tracks famous people’s DWI charges lists her. And, ummm, why do we need a site like this??

-She’s viewed as obsessed and a bit nutty by some. As an example, Dr. Les Sachs clearly does not care for her.

-She took on Scotland Yard and British criminal history when she figured out the true identity of Jack The Ripper – or so her book argues. She expended countless hours and a huge amount of her personal fortune on her book research then got massacred by the British press for her findings (and hubris). Apparently, the Brits didn’t appreciate Cornwell announcing that she had cracked the case.

-Now, she’s out to “solve” another real-life mystery. This time the issue is the sinking of the Hunley - the Confederate submarine that sank in 1864 just after it torpedoed a Union ship. Cornwell contributed $500,000 to the research and forensics project.

Not sure what to say about all this, but Cornwell sure is an interesting lady. Will say that if I had $500,000 and was looking for a way to get rid of it – short of burning it, of course – I probably wouldn’t use it to research a book. Unless my publisher felt like reimbursing my expenses…

Have a bit of a mini-rant over at AR’s All A-Blog today. I’m too exhausted to write something else. Go over there.

A few months ago I drafted an entry and linked to an article by Dayo at Yale. The article was one which, in my view, gave the standard chick-lit-ruins-women argument based on what appeared to be the reading of a few chick lit offerings and the reviewing of back cover blurbs. The argument struck me as dated and uninformed.

Dayo found the entry. Dayo is not happy.

Dayo alleged that I had excerpted the article and not provided full text. This is wrong. The link was in the entry. Still is – click on the words “this article” in my first sentence of the previous entry. Dayo says the “self-important blogosphere” misunderstood the chick lit argument proposed. I am reprinting Dayo’s comment – in full – right here. You can decide if Dayo is informed, correct and well-reasoned. You may also want to keep that phrase “self-important” in mind as you read:

Interesting. I’m glad to see the self-important blogosphere rear its head once more. I am the female author of the above article, which–poorly excerpted–the lot of you have decided to rip apart for a number of reasons. A bit late in the game, I’ll offer this as a reply: Firstly, the intentional delusion of “escapist” meaning in literature presupposes an apolitical slant to the printed word. Reading geared toward females, and in the cutthroat world of publishing, “reserved” for female writers, takes on the burden of REPRESENTATION for women to BOTH sexes. Men dismiss it; women are only hurt by the presumptions inherent in the most “known” tropes of chick lit. Why must she shop, and pout, and hover by the scale, and be dependent on males? That the stereotypical, privileged, gum-chewing female bimbo “speaks” for women as the only ambassador in print ignores the stratified and unbelievably diverse nature of female reality in the world today. What image, other than that of a spoiled brat, might the prototypical lovelorn London press agent offer to a woman anywhere in the so-called “third world”? Or in the first world? Women struggling to live through childbirth, abuse, and facing a host of other socio-political oppressions are fully uninitiated into the cult of material personality so prevalent in these texts.
Further, the excerpt failed to mention my critique of the system of generating “good” literature, which is related to both publication and habits of interpretation. These “airy” novels are not considered alongside those of (what I call) “the cult of the young, male author”. This system of valorization for young, snarky 20-etc male writers is utterly underused for females. The female author is taking a gamble on her gender with each word; and I agree with some posters that the cloisters of ” high” art are closed to many women on principle.
My point is the reductionist perspectives such literature promotes about the modern “woman” are both structural and contextual. If a woman writer (of whom so many are so talented) chooses to stake out territory for equal representation in print, she is walking a thin wire, sacrificing sales for the sake of political truth. Pointless dating chronicles not only make for ho-hum reading, they engender prejudices against marginalized women, not to mention a pretty talented half of civilization. This is a shame, that’s all. Enough already.

the FULL text can be found here:

http://www.yaledailynews.com/article.asp?AID=31698

Looks as if I’m not the only one who loves free books… Here I thought I’d get a few entries and, well, let’s just say you guys sent in more than a few. Wow – who knew?

Using advanced scientific analysis, I have chosen a winner for the first week of the April contest. Yes, this advanced scientific analysis amounted to: figure out how many entries there were in the first week, pick a random number, then figure out which entry matched that chosen number. Uh-huh, I’m a genius.

Congrats to Brenda Townsend of Spring, Texas. You are the winner!

The contest continues. If you’ve already entered, you’re in the running. No need to email again. In fact, please don’t. One entry per month only. See, I can only count so high before I get confused and have to reach for a calculator.

I’ll randomly select another winner next week. Good luck!