Links and tidings

So who is Rex Pickett, and why does everyone love the movie based on his book SIDEWAYS? He speaks to the Guardian about his unexpected success and how cool it is that a publisher’s paying him real money for his next book.

The shortlist for the James Tait Black Memorial Prize is now available, and it’s quite an interesting list for fiction, with David Mitchell and David Peace (for his mammoth epic on the miner’s strike, GB84) among the notables.

So many book fairs, so little time. And now South Africa is getting in on it, as Capetown will host the very first South African Book Fair in 2006.

The Book Standard, a new hybrid site bringing together the resources of several big-hitting trade publications, has launched, and with it comes a new essay from the Bookseller’s Philip Jones about the polarization of UK publishing.

So I thought John Sutherland was supposed to be muzzled but instead, he just keeps writing, and writing some more. Now he’s on about the meaning — or lack thereof — of book prizes to authors’ careers.

Nancy Pearl, the librarian with her own action figure, was honored at the Library of Congress by the DC chapter of the Women’s National Book Association for her “extraordinary contributions to the world of books.” Her primer on passionate reading, BOOK LUST, is pretty good too.

I doubt I’ll actually read the Anna Wintour biography but so many weird details keep emerging from articles like this one, like the fact she…dated Eric Idle? Wha? I’m still getting over the whole “affair with Bob Marley” tidbit…

And finally, like everyone else, I implore you all to check out the spiffy new redesign over at Galleycat, part of Mediabistro’s big makeover with a bunch of new blogs that I’m trying not to get addicted to.