Truitt's Fix by Rex Evans Wood

The producer of Hear It Now and Dakota Datebook (a show I write for) at Prairie Public Radio has a new science fiction book out. Rex Evans Wood's new book, Truitt's Fix, is about Dan Truitt, a man "caught between warring nations, on the run, and pursued by a relentless villain."

I haven't read the book yet, but I'm passing along this news: Wood will be doing a reading at Zandbroz in Fargo this Saturday, November 12^th, at 6:30pm.

JD Salinger: Unmasked!

J.D. Salinger wrote Catcher in the Rye over fifty years ago, but while his book has been in the public eye for the better part of a century, the author has been famously reclusive. Salinger has been in the news lately, however, trying to block a book from using his copyrighted characters without his permission, but he still hasn't made any public appearances. AbeBooks has a Salinger retrospective, for people following the story but only familiar with Salinger through Catcher, and they include this "back of a milk carton" look at how Salinger might appear today:

The artist's rendition looks a bit younger than eighty-something; for a more recent look, which purports to be an actual photo of the author, check out his biography's cover:

I'll bet literary historians are hoping this goes to court: it may all be an elaborate scheme to get Salinger to appear as a witness, on the stand, for all to bask in his visage after so many years. Won't everybody be surprised when he shows up looking like Thomas Pynchon on The Simpsons?

Library Patrons In Need

A librarian in Ludington, MI, penned a book about various strange and pitiful library patrons she had encountered while behind the desk, but her literary aspirations have gotten her fired. Painting readers in a bad light is a serious issue to her library, but readers are rarely a problem -- it's the homeless and mentally ill who have nowhere else to go, and end up at the library with its comfy chairs, quiet bathrooms, and unlikeliness of getting arrested. It's serious enough that the ALA addresses the issue, but the problem is mostly homelessness, not the libraries themselves...unless a librarian starts documenting them for her novel. I haven't read the book (or even any excerpts) -- if it's written well, good for her; if it's written humorously, treating people in need as clowns, then I'll have a problem with the book.