Some Bookish News from the last month:
- Turns out that America's most recession-proof business is .... bookstores. Yep. This is based on data from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics and Google Trends. This shouldn't be a surprise, they keep telling us that business at independent bookstores is booming.
- Amy Tan, Ann Patchett and Colson Whitehead are National Humanities Award recipients. “The National Humanities Medal recipients have enriched our world through writing that moves and inspires us; scholarship that enlarges our understanding of the past; and through their dedication to educating, informing, and giving voice to communities and histories often overlooked,” said NEH Chair Shelly C. Lowe (Navajo). Check out the other awardees, there are 12 total.
- Oprah Winfrey selected her 100th pick for her book club: Ann Napolitano’s “Hello Beautiful” which is apparently a modern day homage to "Little Women".
- On a related note - The BookGang Podcast (Amy Ellen Clark) recently did a deep dive into celebrity book clubs that was interesting.
- Attention: Fans of the Sebastien St. Cyr series by C.S. Harris - the next installment is released in the US on April 18. Mark your calendars.
- The Backlisted Podcast (which is technically on hiatus) had an episode this week where Becky Brown and Norah Perkins, joint custodians of the Curtis Brown Heritage list of literary estates, selected seven backlisted books that they felt should be better known. One of them was "Merry Hall" by Beverly Nichols. I concur on this! This is the first book in a trilogy of memoirs in which Nichols, after WWII, decided to buy a large country house (in England) with gardens in need of extensive renovation. I am not a gardener but I loved this trilogy mainly because it is very dry, tongue in cheek, funny. I gave the books to my best friend, who is a master gardener, and she ADORED them. They ended up getting passed around our bookclub to the great joy of everyone.
