Odd bits of publishing news this week

What about Oprah and her Book of the Month Pick? With Love in the Time of Cholera Oprah has picked (IMHO) a rather bad chick lit title. It is supposed to be literature when in fact it is a rather boring tale full of high drama and unrequited love.

OK, I confess -- I couldn’t make myself finish it. My analysis: a big bunch of romantic claptrap! And boring to boot. Really, any one of us could come up with at least a dozen more deserving books.

Author Jennifer Weiner, however, has the best has the best quote on the Oprah's pick:

An author who's won the Nobel Prize? Who's got a movie coming out next month? Who's already been an Oprah pick?. . . Seriously, what's the Girlfriend Of Us All going to choose next? The Bible?"

Speaking of Bibles Here is an interesting press release from the Green Press Initiative. They are announcing that Publisher Thomas Nelson will be shipping out a new Bible next week.

The hook? This is purportedly the first to be published entirely on on paper that has been recycled and certified by the Forest Stewardship Council as coming from trees harvested according to environmentally sound practices.

Nice – but it makes me wonder if the Green Press Initiative has ever heard of eBooks.

The Most Creative Book Teaser Ever Author Kelly DiNardo has a new biography in the works: Gilded Lili, the story of striptease artist Lili St. Cyr. She invited her blog readers to create an ad for her. Here is the winning entry: