Top Five Bestsellers

From the USA Today Snapshots, I saw the following on their top five best sellers list:

No Place Like Home by Mary Higgins Clark

Marley & Me by John Grogan (Marley is a dog; this is not about Bob Marley the reggae singer.)

American Theocracy by Kevin Phillips

Game of Shadows by Mark Fainaru-Wada, Lance Williams, investigative reporters of San Francisco Chronicle

The Mermaid Chair by Sue Monk Kidd

This was interesting

This link to Beliefnet.com was sent to me today. The Most Segregated Hour: three new books examine the racial divide in our worship by Michael Fuquay

Did you know that...

If you don't have time to read a whole book about political matters, did you know that you can pay a subscription fee of $99.95/year and get highlights of dozens of books? I found this out in the March 25-26 issue of the Wall Street Journal. Eight to twelve page summaries of political books can be emailed to you by web based reader services such as Capitol Reader.

They call it the perfect storm

Five million copies of The Da Vinci Code in paperback, plus other Code type books, will be available for purchase on Tuesday just weeks before the release of the Da Vinci movie in May. That is what the publishers refer to as the perfect storm.

Also, available on Tuesday are 150,000 copies of The Jesus Papers: Exposing the Greatest Cover-Up in History . In the meantime the writers of both books, Brown and Baigent respectively, carry on their battle in court. READ ON

Did you watch last night's episode of Lost?

Did you see Sawyer reading a book that targets primarily teen girls in last night's episode? As plain as anything you could see Sawyer was reading Judy Blume's Are You There God? It's Me, Margaret What clue about the show could that book possibly be giving us?

Later on Henry, the alleged "Other", quoted something about martyrs and prophets apparently from the book he has been reading by Russian writer, Dostoyevsky. The quote was, "Men reject their prophets and slay them, but they love their martyrs and honor those whom they have slain"

What are our neighbors reading?

So glad you asked. This is what I found out in the Georgia Times Union:

The Bookfellows met on Monday at Valdosta-Lowndes Library to discuss Evening Star by Larry Mc Murtry.

The Hahira Book Club will meet this afternoon to discuss one of my favorite books, Angela's Ashes by Frank McCourt. Also, meeting later on today is a group at the Brunswick-Glynn County Library. Their book discussion will be one of the "All Georgia Reads" selections called Trouble No More by Anthony Grooms.

The Book Discussion Group will meet this Friday morning in Brunswick to discuss The Other Boleyn Girl by Phillippa Gregory.

Books for April and May

We already chose our book for April 21, Blind Obedience: A True Story of Family Loyalty and Murder in South Georgia by Bill Boyd. Take a look at the reviews on Amazon.com.

We are going to read something light and funny and discuss it at our meeting on May 19: The Thing about Jane Spring by Sharon Krum. If you read articles on personal branding like this one titled, Brand Your Brilliance by Robin Good and also this one The Brand called You, then you will understand the protagonist Jane Spring.

Jane Spring is an uncouth lawyer; too brutally honest, too scathing and too ambitious. She decides to use the movie version of Doris Day as a model to create her new personal brand; more pleasant, more feminine, more considerate of others.

What is Jodie Picoult reading?

I saw an article in the Christian Science Monitor about the writer, Jodie Picoult. According to the article, the book that she has been reading is Maybe a Miracle by Brian Strause. READ MORE.

We discussed one of Jodie Picoult's book some time ago, My Sister's Keeper. Remember that one? I have read three of Jodie's books and that one by far is my favorite. Jodie has a new book out that we need to check out The Tenth Circle.

What's your verdict?

Blythe Brown, wife of Dan Brown, is an art historian and painter. She is being described, not simply as the support system for her writer/husband, but as the real brain or the creative energy behind the success of the Da Vinci Code. She apparently did most of the research for the book. Who knew?

Read more in USA Today. Pay attention to the break down of the plot points that Michael Baigent and Richard Leigh, authors of Holy Blood, Holy Grail, are questioning. These are the key points for the lawsuit against Random House and Dan Brown. I don't know if this case is being tried before a jury or if the Judge makes the final verdict. However, just suppose you were a member of the jury, what would be your judgement?

Friday March 17

We meet again this Friday to discuss Zorro by Isabel Allende. Read the Reviews before the meeting. Read an excerpt of the novel.

Bestsellers in the news

The Templar Legacy by Steve Berry is number 4 on the N.Y. Times Bestsellers list.

Remember Carmen Bin Ladin? She was the writer of the 2004 bestselling book we discussed some time ago, Inside the Kingdom: My life in Saudi Arabia. Here is news on one of her daughters: She has dropped the 'Bin Ladin' name and goes by Wafah Dufour. She has been promoting herself as a musician and will be featured on reality TV soon. READ MORE.

Knights Templar

In my January 6th post, titled Book Buzz, I mentioned two new books about the Knights Templar to look out for this year: The Last Templar by Raymond Khoury and The Templar Legacy by Steve Berry.

Well according to Jennifer Fish Decamp of the Times Union, Berry's book is the better thriller. She says this is the best of his four books. See page C-1 of the Georgia Times Union dated March 8,2006.

Remember Steve Berry is to visit the public library in Waycross on April 4. Tonight he will be at Books A Million at 7:00PM in Jacksonville.

Today is your day Ladies

Happy International Women's Day! Here is how our neighbors in Jacksonville will celebrate Women's History Month: READ MORE.

Notice you can bring your lunch to the Women’s Center of Jacksonville for their monthly FAB (Females and Books) Talk. On March 10 they will be discussing Cokie Roberts’ book, Founding Mothers:
The Women Who Raised Our Nation from noon till 1:00PM.

"Lost" trivia

Once again there was a literary reference on the television show Lost last night. Henry Gale, the captured man, the one that some of the survivors suspect is an "Other", started a conversation with Locke about the writers Ernest Hemmingway and Fyodor Dostoyevsk.

The name Henry Gale is also the name of a physicist who worked in the fields of astrophysics and magnetism. Also, Dorothy in The Wizard of Oz had an uncle named Henry Gale. Henry Gale is supposed to have been from Nebraska and he ended up in Oz in his balloon. The Henry Gale in Lost claimed he and his wife landed on the island in a balloon. Hmmm. MORE TRIVIA