Vincent Bugliosi is having a hard time trying to book interviews for his book. Well, if Bugliosi comes to New York and Vanguard goes to the trouble of sending me a copy of the book to read, Bugliosi is welcome on The Bat Segundo Show.
Of course, despite the purported “aggressive Internet campaign,” I haven’t received a single email or phone call on the book. Perhaps the problem here is that the publisher and the publicist on this book don’t seem to understand that this isn’t so much a question of mainstream and alternative. Or could it be that they assumed they would get on all the “big” shows and that they failed to contact the “small” ones? Did they put all their eggs in one basket? Was it hubris or ignorance on their part? Bugliosi’s inability to get on the air reflects the current journalistic shift from legitimate intellectual inquiry to frivolous celebrity gossip. In other words, this isn’t 1974 anymore. Unless, of course, you go online.
I’m firmly convinced that if Bugliosi wrote a book called The Prosecution of Paris Hilton for Carnality, he would have no problem getting on The Daily Show. (Conversely, a book with that title would have a difficult time getting on The Bat Segundo Show.)
The Call by Yannick Murphy: The always interesting author of Here They Come and Signed, Mata Hari returns with a novel that whips up a worldview from a rather quirky set of limitations: namely, the call logs that a veterinarian maintains as his son is unexpectedly put into a coma and an unforgiving economy denies him work. What emerges is a surprisingly optimistic, often funny, and very moving account on how one family uses acceptance and forgiveness as a way to atone for hard knocks. (
Birds of Paradise by Diana Abu-Jaber: Forget Franzen and Eugenides. If you're looking for a social novel that counts, Diana Abu-Jaber is the author you're looking for. Building from the free-form exploration of consciousness and identity in Crescent and the gripping procedural structure of Origin, Abu-Jaber's latest novel is her finest, equally fluent with gutterpunk culture and smarmy real estate men. It has been suggested by The Washington Post's Ron Charles that you will likely gain some pounds while reading this novel. This is certainly true. Abu-Jaber's description of food is so precise that it often made me want to do more cooking. But I very much admired the way in which Abu-Jaber presents all her characters as unwitting victims of rough capitalism, which permits them some dignity even as they perform terrible acts.
The Last of the Live Nude Girls by Sheila McClear: This memoir isn't so much about the decline of the Times Square peepshow, as it is about one young woman's efforts to pull herself up by by her bootstraps when presented with few economic options. Filled with self-introspective candor and a quiet dignity, McClear's story is one that might befall any of us in these volatile times. While McClear does get back on her feet, her book leads one contemplating the terrible fates of other young women now moving to New York and falling into deadlier vocations. (
Even if it contained pictures?