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Viewing: Blog Posts Tagged with: Galleycat, Most Recent at Top [Help]
Results 1 - 9 of 9
1. Bad Kitty for President

A candidate from the Right Side of the Street who:

Wants to throw those without homes into a volcano
Tries to buy votes (with a dead fish)
Goes ballistic on the opposing candidate
Uses a 527 Group to run attack ads
Refuses to debate on the issues

No, faithful readers, the candidate is not Newt Gingrich. It's Bad Kitty. Nick Bruel's feisty feline is back and this time she's running for office. After years of faithful service, Old Kitty is giving up his position as the President of the Neighborhood Cat Club. Bad Kitty is motivated to run for his position when stray cats from another area wander into her domain. Instead of erecting a giant fence to keep them out, Bad Kitty wants to toss the freeloaders into an active volcano.

The book's seven chapters are broken down into the steps of the electoral process, from the primaries to the results. Along the way, Bad Kitty does her best to upend the proceedings as she seeks endorsements, goes on the campaign trail, takes on the media, and debates her opponent, Big Kitty. When election day rolls around, the results are surprising, but satisfying. As Bruel tells Bad Kitty, "Democracy makes sure that EVERYONE has a chance to participate, that EVERYONE has a chance to win, and that EVERYONE has a chance to someday become the leader of his or her community." Let's hope he's right.

Once again, Bruel delivers a laugh-aloud chapter book that kids are sure to love. Besides telling a good story, the book provides a lot of factual information that goes down easy. For the most part, kids won't realize that they're learning a lot about the electoral process. The exceptions are the two Fun Facts spreads. Although Uncle Murray (Bad Kitty's backer) attempts to enliven things up, the presentation is a little heavy handed, especially for kids in the primary grades. Still, the story itself does an excellent job of showing how the system works. Bad Kitty for President gets my vote!

Here's GalleyCat's interview with Nick Bruel, along with a trailer for Bad Kitty for President.

Bad Kitty for President
by Nick Bruel
Roaring Brook Press, 144 pages
Published: January 2012

0 Comments on Bad Kitty for President as of 1/1/1900
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2. Can You Feel the Drop Rocking?

Love from Galleycat!


And more authors, readers, bloggers and library ninjas joining the drop... we can't keep up!

3. Linked Up: Kevin Bacon, Jay Pharoah, Justin Bieber

I always enjoy doing Linked Up because it gives me a chance to reflect on how I spend my free time on the internet. Apparently this week, I was a bit celebrity-obsessed.

Kevin Bacon is his own biggest fan. [Urlesque]

A subway car that’s 97.5% RECYCLABLE! [Good]

So you want to write a novel? Maybe you should watch this first. [DWKazzie]

And in related news…NaNoWriMo is over! (2,799,449,947 words later…) [GalleyCat]

If only I could actually type this into my browser… [Next Web]

Jay Pharoah, a new cast member of Saturday Night Live, is my favorite impersonator of the moment. (Magic starts at 2:50.) [David Letterman Show]

Can you pass the Kanye West quiz? [New Yorker]

Apparently, pirating music is so last year. [Wired]

1200 Hot Wheels all at once? Yes please! [Kottke]

Justin Bieber is talented in ways you never even imagined. [GawkerTV]

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4. Who needs an agent? You do.

Do you ever feel like you want to take everyone involved in the publishing business--writers, agents, publishers, and the interns who open the mail--and shake them until their teeth rattle? Probably not, right? Well, I usually don’t either. But then I read a piece like this one in Galleycat and, well, you know....

At the risk of sounding self-serving, every serious author needs an agent. Not just any agent, of course. You need a good agent. One who is an advocate, who is willing to fight for you and who is able to tell you when you’re being unreasonable and doing your career more harm than good. You need someone who’ll tell you they believe in you when you think you’re the biggest literary fraud since James Frey (who is actually a very good writer despite his questionable morals). You need someone who asks about your ailing grandmother and vets your contracts. You need someone who will look at your royalty statements and make sure that the publisher isn’t holding a 75% reserve for returns. You need someone who is willing to try to place foreign rights to a book that is so hopelessly American that no one outside of the 50 states would want to read it. You need someone who will do battle with your publishing team and make sure they still like you despite the fact that you aren’t always discreet about them in your Facebook posts. You need someone who’ll see you through the process from idea to publication to the inevitable disappointment when the publicity for your book is done with before you noticed it had started. And, you need an agent because in these trying times, we’re sometimes the only people who offer continuity and stability in what everyone hopes is a long career.

So, how does the digital revolution change the fact that you need an agent? Not at all. Sure, you can upload your manuscript on the internet yourself and you can do all your own accounting when you start selling the downloads. But, if you’re serious about writing books, you’re still better served having someone else handle the business side of being published.

There is no question that agents, as well as publishers, need to get with the program when it comes to e-books and all things digital. There is a woeful amount of ignorance about this revolution and lots of needless resistance and hand wringing. In the end, however books get into a reader’s hands is irrelevant. The process by which they get there, who sifts through the good, the bad, and the absolutely unreadable, and who takes care of the administrative side of things while you hone your craft, should not change. I would argue that with so much content out there for the taking (or downloading), now more than ever we need agents and publishers to be better gatekeepers and advocates. Otherwise, I will begin to fear for the future of books, and not just because they don’t come in paper packages any more.


-Miriam

39 Comments on Who needs an agent? You do., last added: 11/15/2009
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5.

Class of 2k9 Promoting Debut Novel by Albert Borris, Their Class Member Who Cannot...

I've been an infrequent blogger as of late (busy busy busy) but had to take the time to mention this story I spotted on GalleyCat. Debut novelist Albert Borris, a member of the Class of 2k9, had a stroke last December prior to the release of his book Crash Into Me. Now he's unable to promote the book on his own, so the Class is pulling together to get the word out about Crash Into Me.

I've always admired the Class collectives--it's a terrific idea that debut mid-grade and YA authors pool their resources and band together to promote their collective works. And how wonderful that they're there to help Borris, who is thus far unable to communicate correctly. (More proof that authors of books for young readers are awesome.)

Check out Crash Into Me.

4 Comments on , last added: 7/23/2009
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6.

Self-Published Books on the Rise...

It's another busy busy week so light on the blogging, but I wanted to get a link up to this GalleyCat post especially for the writers who came to see me speak on Saturday at the Carnegie Center in Lexington.

We talked a lot about self publishing (there were many questions about it), so here's an interesting stat from Bowker via GalleyCat:

According to the bibliographic company Bowker, 285,394 new books were published by print-on-demand companies last year--a 132 percent increase compared to 2007. In contrast, U.S. publishers put out 275,232 new books and editions in 2008--a 3.2 percent drop compared to the year before.

In case you don't have your calculator handy, that's a total of 560,626 books published in 2008.

This was also reported on in Publishers Lunch with the headline "On Demand Books Overtake Traditional Titles for the First Time."

6 Comments on , last added: 6/1/2009
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7.

GalleyCat's Publishing in 2008 Rundown...

Happy New Year everyone. I'm back at work and almost through my email. (I've read them all but haven't answered them all.)

Today, for my first post of 2009, I offer links to GalleyCat's year in publishing 2008 rundown, offered in month-by-month capsules featuring phony memoirs, fake controversy, Glenn Beck, publisher jumping by big names authors, editors hopping houses, layoffs, salary freezes, restructuring, signs of the publishing apocalypse, Sarah Palin, and Madonna's brother (not necessarily in that order). It's fun to read them chronologically from January to December, so here you go:

You also might find this interesting--here's a piece in the New York Times about the new austerity in the publishing world where "fancy lunches, sparkling parties, sophisticated banter" and sales meetings in the Caribbean are being replaced by pizza in the cafeteria and video conferencing. (Oh the horror.)

2 Comments on , last added: 1/6/2009
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8. Is P.G. WODEHOUSE the Funniest English Novelist Ever?

On Monday, Paper Cuts, the blog of the New York Times Book Review, attempted to determine the funniest novel ever. At the top of their list were not one, but two Wodehouse classics: THE CODE OF THE WOOSTERS and LEAVE IT TO PSMITH.

Galleycat, however, disagreed:

"For example, where P.G. Wodehouse is concerned, The Code of the Woosters and Leave it to Psmith may be funny, but they are not UNCLE FRED IN THE SPRINGTIMEwhich is, in fact, the funniest English-language novel ever published, no matter what any of you care to say different. (Even the ones who point out that the Times left out the works of Kyril Bonfiglioli!)"

So, while there may be some debate as to the exact novel, Paper Cuts and Galleycat agree: If you want to laugh, Wodehouse is the man for the job.

What's your favorite Wodehouse novel? Post your defense below for a chance to win the next two books in our Collector's Wodehouse series: PSMITH, JOURNALIST and NOTHING SERIOUS. The answer that makes us laugh the hardest wins!

0 Comments on Is P.G. WODEHOUSE the Funniest English Novelist Ever? as of 9/17/2008 2:21:00 PM
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9.

Random House 'Morality Clause' Only in UK ...

I just found a post that sheds some light on the Random House morality clause issue which I mentioned recently. According to GalleyCat, the purported morality clause is present only in UK Random House contracts. According to an agent questioned about the issue,"there's a lot of strange language that goes into UK contracts that has little bearing on the American market."

So US Random House authors...have a good time.

1 Comments on , last added: 8/26/2008
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