Friday Round-Up

The number of comments on the last post is staggering. I'll have the top genres for you next week, I promise; in the meantime, Laura's back with another link-heavy round-up. Enjoy! — E

Last week I challenged you to write the greatest love story every told. Who knew that Hitler was such a closet romantic? You all did, it seems. I read your entries, laughed, cried, and groaned at some truly terrible puns (you know who you are), and selected a winner.

Brittany Hansen opened her Hitler romance novel with the following lines:

Holding his copy of Mein Kampf, Maurer opened the cover to read the inscription, "Herrn Johann Georg Maurer. In memory of our time together in prison in Landsberg. Cordially dedicated by Adolf Hitler. Christmas 1925." The message was subtle; Maurer closed his eyes, hugged the book to his chest and whispered, "Mein pookie."

This is destined to be a classic. I feel it in my bones. Hitler, I’m sure, would feel it in at least one bone. And now that our disturbing image of the week quota is filled, on to the round up—there’s also a new contest down the line (or just click here to go straight there and ignore my brilliant witticisms. Know that I’m silently judging you).

The Times put out a list of the best 60 books of the past 60 years. Although Ursula Le Guin says there’s no way to choose “bests,” the list covers some serious heavyweights that deserve the adjective “best,” including Nineteen Eighty-Four, To Kill a Mockingbird, Catch 22, The Bell Jar...Twilight? For serious? I'm sorry if there are sudden typos, I think I just burst a blood vessel in my eye.

This list prompted the following G-chat conversation with Eric (note: all vulgarity has been removed and punctuation added, for readability and out of regard for your tender sentiments):

Laura: WHY IS TWILIGHT ON THE SAME LIST AS LOVE IN THE TIME OF CHOLERA?
THE CORRECTIONS AND TWILIGHT: ON PAR.
Kill me.
I don't want to live anymore.
Eric: I feel barfy now.
Laura: Please put me out of my misery.
Eric: But you have to put ME out of MY misery!
Are you ****ing kidding me
The Time Traveler's Wife
Are you ****ing kidding me
This planet is totally ****ed.
Kurt was right about everything.

Listen. I read The Time Traveler’s Wife, and I really enjoyed it. But top 60 from the past 60 years? Yikes. If you love time travel, check out this list of the top ten time travel novels (from which The Time Traveler’s Wife is suspiciously absent…).

As to Twilight, that book is the cut inside my mouth I can’t stop poking—I just can’t leave it alone. This is just a preface to say: next post, I swear, will be Twilight free. But not this one!

There's a new Twilight video game coming out, that will be World of Warcraft meets virgin vampires. In the words of the Geekologie writer, "Wow, can you say a bunch of creepy old guys trolling for teen girls in a video game? Because I can. It's pronounced Twilight: The MMORPG."

Luckily, vampires are going back to their catacombs soon, because Neil Gaiman said so, and as a rule I don't argue with Neil. I also don't argue with wizards. (If, as I suspect, Neil is a wizard, I could winnow it down to just one rule.) There has been a big debate about who wizards better (“to wizard” is a verb now): Gandalf or Dumbledore. Answer: false. Merlin. Although I have to say, Gandalf has been doing a wonderful job on Top Chef Masters.

Fabio from last season’s non-masters Top Chef has self-published a cook book (as did the Obama family). Last season’s Top Chef was rough for me, and I'm still pretty bitter about Stefan losing (to Hosea, with that stupid goatee and face, ugh). That painful memory makes me want to drown my sorrows alcoholically with Harry Potter, who is apparently a lush. Those books should really be printed on edible paper, to soak up some of that booze.

Another thing that makes me want to drink: handsome, charming, successful 25 year old novelists whose books are turned into movies. Unless he wants to be my boyfriend, in which case I would go out for drinks in a less binge-y way. Either or.

One more thing driving me to the bottle (what? It's Friday!): Green Apple Books’ videos comparing the Kindle with print books. I was thinking about embedding the best one here, but it turns out they’re all terrible, and I'm sorry, if I wanted to watch terrible acting I could stop by my local middle school musical. Green Apple Books: proving once again that hippies can’t do anything right.

A non-hippie started a company that comes up with titles for books, and I have to be honest here—I think this might just be the greatest racket ever. People. We can DO this. So this week’s contest: prove your title writing chops by renaming a classic (or just something popular) in the comments, without including the original title. The rest of us will try to guess what you renamed. The author of the funniest and most sales worthy title gets a hearty pat on the back, and can be my first employee at Titillating Titles, LLC (plus the feature in next week’s post). The person who guesses the most fake titles correctly earns a permanent spot on my bar trivia team. And I take bar trivia very seriously. Your deadline is next Thursday night—don’t miss it, or your publisher will drop you like you’re hot. Even if you’re famous and important.

If you like the contest, you’ll certainly like these fictional character pick-up lines, some of the best of which came through Twitter. Don’t be Twitter shy, guys—it can be great for book publicity! And Margaret Atwood is doing it. Only sheer laziness keeps PMN from Twitter (also, we tend to run on—140 characters isn’t a lot). But you guys go have fun. (NB: Twitter upsets my stomach. Sad, but true. But don't let it stop you from promoting yourselves—there's nothing better than free publicity. — E)

Speaking of technology helping book sales, there was an interesting post this week about why writers should consider e-publishing as a form of self-publishing, and then a post that will crush all your hopes of being successful after self-publishing. Wait, no, don’t be sad—look, a shiny new pink e-reader! With an old school iPod click wheel! Yea, you feel better. As always, Borders remains on the cutting edge of e-books, this week adding a toy section to their stores. Next: a ball pit and Happy Meals. And then they’ll get rid of those pesky “books.”

Also leaving books behind, Gotham dropped Screech’s tell-all about Saved by the Bell, because it was scandalous and unverifiable. And now he’s not invited to the reunion (neither is Mr. Belding—so clearly they’re just cutting out the cast from SbtB: The New Class). Bookstores are censoring scandalous readings, the British Library is seething with sexual tension, and people are hiding cocaine in the spines of books. All we need are some explosions and this could be a Nicholas Cage movie.

Well, tigers, that’s all for this week. Remember: submit contest entries in the comments to win eternal fame and fortune (minus the “eternal” part. And the “fortune” part. And maybe change the “fame” part to “some recognition on a blog”). Until next week!