BookTV is building a network of local content. Birmingham’s part start airing this past weekend and some of the videos are already online. Very cool! Click through and scroll down the left column to see videos filmed in the Alabama Booksmith and around town, all focused on Birmingham’s “literary scene”. The column on the right is from CSPAN’s History TV with even more videos and interviews from a Birmingham perspective.
Category Archives: Authors
Local Author Expo – Birmingham
Mark your calendars for December 3rd, 10:00am-3:00pm. That’s when the sixth annual Local Authors Expo is slated to take place. As always, the event will take place downtown at the Central Library. The expo is always an interesting mix of authors and books. Most of the tables are stacked with books by self-published authors. So authors have a publisher, but most are braving the wilds of literature on their own. Prices and subjects run the gamut, so you’ll want to leave yourself enough time to make the rounds. More than 90 authors have already signed on.
In keeping with the self-published push, they have also invited Liz Reed, of the Birmingham Arts Journal, to lead a 90-minute discussion/orientation for people wanting to get published. The event is called “Every Writer Needs an Editor“. It is free, but they’re asking that you click through that link to reserve a spot, so they can make sure they have enough seats.
Harper Lee Letters up for Auction
There are 11 of Harper Lee’s letters set to be sold by November 8th. You can get the full details and keep up with the results over on the auction site. I was surprised how unique many of the letters are. There seems to be a personal tone to each of them. Most correspondence we see from author’s these days is a little more formal, a little more template-driven and even a little less polite.
These letters run from the 1960s-1990s. Harper Lee seems to be one of the most curious and sweetest of famous Southern authors. But then I know a lot of our senior ladies down South would probably fit this bill as well. They should all just put pen to paper.
Even if you never get the chance to bid on one of Lee’s letters, it’s worth a couple of clicks and some time to read through the text of each.
I don’t understand Seth Godin
I admit – I don’t really follow Seth Godin, but it’s hard not to bump into someone re-tweeting, re-posting or waving the Godin flag online. I can understand why so many latch onto an author that speaks with such clarity.
But I honestly am beginning to think that he has amassed such a following simply because he supports both sides of any idea. Granted, Godin always presents a clearly defined side each time… but here’s the latest that I saw, just the other day:
February 9, 2011 Godin posted Autarky is dead. A very concise post that states:
All our productivity, leverage and insight comes from being part of a community, not apart from it. The goal, I think, is to figure out how to become more dependent, not less.
Just two months earlier on December 8, 2010 he posted about his Domino Project, where very logically he outlines eight reasons why he’s going solo in publishing his next book, cutting out publishers, bookstores, “middle men”, etc. It seems all that community was getting in his way.
Isn’t that hundreds-of-years-old ecosystem the kind of community he’s plugging this month? Or to Godin is a community simply a streamlined process between his customers and himself?
I fail to see the communal in one man cranking out a series of books to his flock of followers. That seems to be more of an echo chamber than a community. It seems that if the goal is to build a better product, then you need the expertise every step of the way.
Now, having said all of that, I totally get what he’s doing with the Domino Project. If you’ve read this blog before, you know that I have no problems with new platforms, leveraging new technology and adding effiencies to the publishing system.
This is really just about Godin’s ping-pong of a message and how it often leaves me confused. Am I being unfair?