The rather delayed link roundup

Thanks to all who sent in well-wishes–feeling much better this morning, but still more on the tortoise side rather than hare-like in terms of speed. Anyway:

What the hell got Caryn James so angry? So the National Book Award finalists are all women from New York and wrote, I dunno, spare, short books. What’s the problem? Repeat after me: awards are a matter of taste, awards are a matter of taste….

Related, Ron Hogan’s on a quest to interview each NBA finalist, as he talks to Christine Schutt, then catches up with Joan Silber & Lily Tuck.

As reported all over the trade publishing world, HarperCollins is reorganizing into two distinct halves: the business side will be Collins, while the trade side will be called HarperMorrow, headed up by publisher Michael Morrison.

Meet the crime writing Ellises, Ron and Kate–both live in Merseyside and both write vastly different types of books.

The Los Angeles Daily News interviews Kirk Russell, whose series featuring a DEA agent and game warden has been updated with a second installment, NIGHT GAME.

Bob Walch is one of the few dissenters about Alexander McCall Smith’s new series, saying it wasn’t terrible, but it wasn’t very good either. Ouch. Granted, it is rather an acquired taste….

Speaking of McCall Smith, he’s decided to use the money included with the Dagger in the Library Prize to set up a literary prize for emerging writers in Botswana. That does sound awfully cool.

Lesley Lokko’s SUNDOWNERS is a “big doorstop of a book” and touted as the heir apparent to Jackie Collins. The Scotsman meets one of its own.

Who’d have thunk it? But the 20th edition of the Malta Book Fair has just begun, and it runs through the end of the weekend.

And finally, RIP Iris Chang, dead of a self-inflicted gunshot wound. She leaves behind a two-year-old son.