Poet & Punk Rocker Jim Carroll Dead

Poet and rocker Jim Carroll died Friday. He is best known for his book The Basketball Diaries, an autobiographical tale of his life as a star athlete at Trinity, an elite private high school in Manhattan. Carroll, the son of a bar owner, attended Trinity on a scholarship. The Basketball Diaries, which began life as a journal, was first published in 1978. A 1995 movie version starred Leonardo DiCaprio. Carroll also published several poetry collections, including The Book of Nods(1986),Fear of Dreaming(1993) and Poems 1994-1997(1998). The singer Patti Smith encouraged him to break into music, and he formed the Jim Carroll Band. His 1980 album, Catholic Boy, is described as a landmark punk record. One of its songs, People Who Died. is Carroll's best known musical work. Among his other albums were the less successful Dry Dreams (1982) and I Write Your Name(1984).

Oprah's New Pick

Today Oprah Winfrey announced her new pick: Say You're One of Them by Uwem Akpan. The book is a collection of short stories originally published in the New Yorker. The book won the Commonwealth Writers' Prize for Best First Book 2009 and PEN/Beyond Margins Award 2009. Nigerian born Akpan studied philosophy and English at Creighton and Gonzaga universities. He studied theology at the Catholic University of Eastern Africa. He was ordained a Jesuit priest in 2003 and received a Masters in Fine Arts in creative writing from the University of Michigan in 2006. He now is assigned at Christ the King Church, Ilasamaja-Lagos, Nigeria.

Mystery Writer Lyn Hamilton Dead of Cancer

Lyn Hamilton, the author of the Lara McClintcoch archaeological mysteries, has died of cancer. Hamilton started this series when she was 50. Lara McClintoch is a Toronto antiques dealer who solves murders while traveling the world. Hamilton was twice nominated for an Arthus Ellis Award, for her debut mystery The Xibalba Murders and for the eighth book in her series, The Magyar Venus. The fourth book in the series, The Celtic Riddle, was the basis for a 2003 Murder, She Wrote movie starring Angela Lansbury as Jessica Fletcher.
In 2008, Hamilton wrote on her website that The Chinese Alchemist would be the final book in her archaeological series. She added that "my plans are to retire from the mystery business, although I reserve the right to change my mind. Last fall, I had the pleasure of teaching mystery and suspense writing at the University of Toronto's School for Continuing Studies' Creative Writing Program. Lara, I believe, is renovating a casita in a little town north of Puerto Vallarta, Mexico. So far not a single body has been uncovered."

Film Disgrace Opens Friday, September 18

Disgrace, based on the book by Nobel Prize Winner J. M. Coetzee, opens this Friday, September 18. Disgrace is the first novel to explore post apartheid South Africa. The novel won the Booker Prize in 1999 and the Commonwealth Writers Prize in 2000. Many consider it a contemporary classic. The film is directed by Steve Jacobs and stars John Malkovich as a South African professor who is fired after seducing a student. Daniel Davies in The Lancet acclaimed the book "Disgrace offers an apocalyptic vision of contemporary South Africa....What transforms Disgrace from a good compelling book into a work of brilliance is its allegorical reach." The screenplay was subject to Coetzee's approval, and he has praised the film for "integrating the story into the grand landscape of South Africa."

Film based on Rucka's Graphic Novel opens Friday

WhiteOut, an action thriller based on the graphic novel by Greg Rucka and Steve Lieber, opens this Friday, September 11, 2009. The film stars Kate Beckinsale, Gabriel Macht, Columbus Short, and Tom Skerritt. From publicity: "Antarctica … The most isolated landmass on Earth. 90° S. latitude, 0° E. longitude. Six million square miles of ice. Six months of darkness. Temperatures at -120°. Winds at 100 miles per hour. Nature never intended you to survive here. For U.S. Marshal Carrie Stetko, things are about to get even more dangerous. The only law enforcement in this unforgiving territory, she has just been sent to investigate a body on the ice. Antarctica’s first homicide. A shocking discovery in itself, it will plunge her into an even more bizarre mystery and the revelation of secrets long-buried under the endless ice … secrets that someone believes are still worth killing for."

2009 Great Lakes Book Awards

Winners of the 2009 Great Lakes Book Awards are:

Fiction: The Great Perhaps by Joe Meno
General: The Foie Gras Wars by Mark Caro
Children's Chapter Book: The Blind Faith Hotel by Pamela Todd
Children's Picture Book: Thatt Book Woman by Heather Henson, illustrated by David Small
The association is also giving the Voice of the Heartland Award, recognizing "a person or company in the book industry for a lifetime contribution to regional books," to Becky Anderson, Anderson's Bookshops, Naperville and Downers Grove, Ill.