Every day Poets & Writers Magazine scans the headlines—from publishing reports to academic announcements to literary dispatches—for all the news that creative writers need to know. Here are today's stories:
As the Borders saga meanders to a close, Najafi Companies has pulled out of negotiations to rescue the bookstore chain and liquidators are circling. Meanwhile, there's hope pop-up bookstores may fill the newly empty spaces.
Books, Inc., an independently owned mini-chain with thirteen locations in Northern California, is celebrating a venerable birthday. Surviving war, earthquake, fire, and economic crises, the one-hundred-sixty-year-old store was founded in 1851 by Anton Roman, a successful player in the California Gold Rush, who traded his gold for books and opened a bookshop in Shasta City and later moved it to San Francisco. (Bookselling This Week.)
This week marked the seventy-fifth anniversary of the Belletrist Literary Club, which comprises a group of Utah women who meet monthly to discuss books and share a meal. Over six hundred books have been discussed during its lifespan. (Herald Journal via Shelf Awareness)
Pages from Jane Austen's unfinished manuscript, "The Watsons"—which had originally been expected to fetch over three hundred thousand dollars at auction—sold for $1.6 million. The buyer was anonymous, and despite the Los Angeles Times hope that it was actor Colin Firth, it was revealed today that the new owner is the Bodleian Library in Oxford.
The New York Times explores Amazon's decision-making process regarding the Android tablet that—once its finally released—will be positioned as a contender with the iPad.
Google's integrated answer to Facebook, Google+, has been building up its user base at a dizzying rate, and today, GalleyCat offers some help for writers and publishing professionals who'd like to take advantage of its functions.
A used-car dealer in Mohegan Lake, New York, is spicing up his classified ads using the tools of fiction. (Ad Week)
On the occasion of the U.S. release of the film adaptation of French-American author Tatiana de Rosnay's novel Sarah's Key—which focuses on the 1942 Vélodrome d'Hiver roundup of ten thousand Jews during the Holocaust—the Wall Street Journal takes a look at the book's long journey to finding a publisher. (Wall Street Journal)
Spoiler Alert: In case you find yourself with tickets to the latest (and supposedly last) Harry Potter adaptation, and have no clue what's happened in the series up to now, Time offers an abbreviated version of the first seven films.
