Harlequin has responded to criticism over recently-announced plans to set up a vanity-press publishing arm for authors it turns down by changing the name of the venture from Harlequin Horizons to DellArte Press. No word yet on whether that will be enough to appease the Mystery Writers of America, Romance Writers of America, and Science Fiction Writers of America so they continue to consider books by Harlequin for awards and Harlequin authors for organization membership.
- Variety has news that Tommy Lee Jones has left the pending movie based on Michael Connelly's novel The Lincoln Lawyer due to "creative differences over the script."
- Mystery Books News has a report on FOX TV's Spring schedule which was revealed this week. The lineup includes a new thriller, Past Life, based on the novel The Resurrectionist by M.J. Rose; the action drama Human Target, featuring a private detective and bodyguard who will stop at nothing to protect his clients; and an additional 9 episodes of the crime drama Lie to Me.
- Busted Flush Press's December reissue of Crossword Blues by author Ace Atkins featuring Nick Travers (an ex-New Orleans Saint turned blues historian at Tulane University) will include an original never-before-published Travers short story and a new foreward by music journalist
Greil Marcus.
- If you want to earn a little extra money for the holidays, check the books in your bathroom. A first edition of Charles Darwin's Origin of the Species just sold at auction for $171,000. It had been kept on a toilet bookshelf for years until a family member realized what it was. Or just be friends with a professional football player who is also a book collector and decides to sell the copy of Alice in Wonderland once belonging to the original "Alice."
- Speaking of the holidays, Janet Rudolph prepared a listing of mystery novels themed around the holidays and Oline Cogdill has a nice posting about authors who use their books to help various charities.
- And for your Moment of Zen or Whimsy, or whatever you want to call it, here are the winners of Unshelved's annual Pimp My Bookcart.
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