Jennifer Weiner Is The New Candace Bushnell

Jennifer Weiner, one of the leader’s of the chick lit genre (though she takes issues with that term), recently signed a seven-figure TV deal with ABC Studios. Weiner will create and executive produce series projects for the studio.
Weiner has authored such bestsellers as Good In Bed, Goodnight Nobody, Little Earthquakes, The Guy Not Taken and In Her Shoes, [...]

Walter Mosley To Release New Book With Black Publisher

AOL Black Voices reports about Walter Mosley’s new release, The Tempest Tales. Mosley’s book will be released in May by Black Classics Press. Here’s the summary of the book:
Tempest Landry, an everyman African American, is “accidentally” killed by a cop. Denied access to heaven because of what he considers a few minor transgressions, Tempest refuses [...]

Star Jones & Al Reynolds Are Divorcing

Photo: Jeff Gentner/Getty
Don’t ya’ll dare accuse me of gossiping. Star Jones is an author, so this counts as a topic of interest to the African-American gossip literary community.  
Star and Al are divorcing. And it was reported by People, so you know it’s official.
I’m never one to gloat over celeb break-ups (though someone please save Katie Holmes), [...]

The Moments, The Minutes, The Hours . . .

No, we’re not talking about the time left until the end of the Democratic primary.
Jill Scott, one of my favorite artists, recently released “The Moment, The Minutes, The Hours: The Poetry of Jill Scott.” I’m sure this book is as wonderful as her music, so she’s definitely added to the list of must-reads.
Side note: I’m nearly [...]

I Know Why The Caged Bird Sings

 
 Photo Source: Maya Angelou’s Official Website
The phenomenal Maya Angelou recently celebrated her 80th birthday. Dr. Angelou is immensely talented on several fronts, and she is a personal favorite of mine.
I remember reading I Know Why The Caged Bird Sings as a child on my own, thank you, and being swept into her body of literary works. From documenting [...]

Site of The Day: Mahogany Books

We received a nice email from Derrick A. Young over at Mahogany Books, an Internet bookstore specializing in African-American books. Derrick (like we’re on a first name basis), has a nice blog (The Lit Lounge) dedicated to African-American books, and he was kind enough to give us a shout-out.
We’re definitely adding The Lit Lounge to the blogroll. [...]

Anger Management Express: The Real McCain?

The Huffington Post covered the release of Cliff Schecter’s new book “The Real McCain,” which chronicles the presidential hopeful’s “legendary anger streak.”
HuffPo, which obtained an advance copy of Schecter’s book, cited an altercation between McCain and Arizona Republican Rick Renzi. HuffPo also reports that ” the website Raw Story obtained a separate anecdote from Schecter’s book, in [...]

President Bush Signs The Second Chance Act

Since I don’t have any political writers yet, here’s some news you can use…
As a criminal defense attorney (day job), I often deal with defendants who share similar histories of early, childhood entry into drugs and criminal activity. Although President Bush has given us lots to criticize him for during his administration, kudos to the President and [...]

MLK’s Call To Conscience

Sorry for the infrequent posting. I’ve been away, though with today’s technology, that excuse goes out the window (especially since I have two cell phones, a Blackberry and my trusty broadband card). Ok, let’s try that again.
I’ve been really busy, juggling the day job, reading submissions, researching a few projects, jumping on a political campaign, and [...]

National Book Club Conference: August 1-3, 2008

Billed as “THE glamour literary retreat of the year,” the 2008 National Book Club Conference will take place on August 1-3, 2008 in Atlanta, Georgia.
Here’s the schedule, which features many of today’s African-American authors:
Friday, August 1st
8 a.m. – 9:30 a.m.: Bebe Moore Campbell Memorial Breakfast featuring honoree Terry McMillan. Ballroom (TENTATIVE)
9:45 a.m. – 10:45 a.m.: Tina [...]