“Having imagination, it takes you an hour to write a paragraph that, if you were unimaginative, would take you only a minute.  Or you might not write the paragraph at all.”

-Franklin P. Adams

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If you can make it to Nashville, Tennessee for the weekend of August 14th through 16th, you won’t be sorry.

Killer Nashville hosts its annual writers conference and once you’re there, workshop after lecture after the last cool thing you just saw will keep you busy and leave you smarter than when you came.  You might even make a friend or two.

I’ll be there, presenting a workshop on writers and research called, WRITE WHAT YOU KNOW, LEARN WHAT YOU DON’T and the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation will offer lectures on police procedure, forensic processing, and criminal psychology, not to mention staging their now-traditional crime-scene-reading contest.

There will be a fresh crop of panel discussions on word-craft, the publishing industry, and technology for writers.  And this year, best-selling author J.A. Jance headlines the brain trust of agents, editors, and authors for the gathering.

With just 72 hours to take it all in, you’ll be wishing for more daylight.

Hope to see you there.

As biographies go, WILL YOU TAKE ME AS I AM: JONI MITCHELL’S BLUE PERIOD, is sincere, if hazy, and author Michelle Mercer will have to make do with a lukewarm endorsement in Chicago.

Novelist Patrick Somerville earns high praise from The Chicago Sun-Times for his debut, THE CRADLE.

The Boston Globe keep us current with three new bits of fiction that might scratch your itches.

China’s Communist tug-of-war gets turned inside out from a smuggled cache of translated secret recordings.  The Economist features PRISONER OF THE STATE: THE SECRET JOURNAL OF PREMIER ZHAO ZIYANG, translated and edited by Bao Pu and Renee Chiang and Adi Ignatius

Found this interesting little piece on GalleyCat. Laura Furman, editor of the O. Henry prize anthology, explains why rumors of the death of the short story are greatly exaggerated:

Sexism, smears and scandal: less than one week after becoming the first female Oxford professor of poetry, Ruth Padel resigns over her role in the smear campaign against rival Derek Walcott…

…Padel’s Hay Festival statement (video)…

…Now what?

Apple relents and allows Eucalyptus e-book app, despite dangers that someone might read the Kama Sutra and some other filth from Project Gutenberg.

LitKicks explores three new works interpreting Vonnegut, Dickens and McClure.

Israeli soldiers swarm Palestinian literary festival.

Karla Morton named 2010 Texas Poet Laureate.

Sam Witt asks, “Who cares about poetry, anyway?”

GalleyCat reports that Illinois has passed a bill to effectivelty block scumbag ex-governor Rod Blagojevich from profiting from his book deal if he’s convicted.

A Polish court has convicted a man who published Hitler’s Mein Kampf for copyright infringement after he was sued by the German state of Bavaria, who holds the rights and works to suppress its publication.

R.I.P. Amos Elon

Today in Literature: On this day in 1891, Scribners Magazine accepted “Mrs. Manstey’s View”, which would become Edith Wharton’s first published story.

“Most writers regard the truth as their most valuable possession, and therefore are most economical in its use.”

-Mark Twain

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Think you know fresh?  Maybe you do, maybe you don’t.  Susanne Friedberg sets it spinning as it relates to food with FRESH: A PERISHABLE HISTORY.

Two new volumes of shorts and poems from John Updike catch the eye of The New York Times.

Medium, Concetta Bertoldi, opines on the other side in DO DEAD PEOPLE WALK THEIR DOGS?

Library Journal hosts a page of short reviews of some new mystery novels.

The fifties got Carl Sandburg on “What’s My Line”; today we get Clay Aiken on “Are You Smarter than a 5th Grader”…

Decca Aitkenhead chats it up with Clive James (who has some strong feelings about the Oxford poetry professor mess).

Short Story Library features three new pieces this week: a literary short story by Rachel Morrison-Dayan, an offbeat piece by Mike Shusterman on his days as a firefighter and a review of Todd Moore’s The Riddle of the Wooden Gun.

Flannery O’Connor’s Georgia farm becomes a literary tourist attraction.

A Jewish poet wins an Arab poetry contest using a pseudonym.

The Guardian posts its third “Haycast” with Joan Blackwell discussing writing her first novel at 75, Clive James reading some poetry and a discussion of the ongoing Oxford poetry professorship sandal.

Beacon Press and the notoriously protective estate of Martin Luther King, Jr. announce a publishing pact called The King Legacy.

Today in Literature: On this day in 1938, Raymond Carver was born in Clatskanie, Oregon.

“Follow the path of your aroused thought, and you will soon meet this infernal inscription: There is nothing so beautiful as that which does not exist.”

-Paul Valery

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The hot literary trend of American Presidential fascination branches out to include ABIGAIL & JOHN: PORTRAIT OF A MARRIAGE, a biography by Edith B. Gelles, based on the letters of Abigail Adams.

One Washington D.C. Examiner was so impressed by Dr. Sharon Moalem’s book, SURVIVAL OF THE SICKEST: A MEDICAL MAVERICK DISCOVERS WHY WE NEED DISEASE, she reviewed it even though the book is a couple of years old.  I’m glad she did.  Sounds so fascinating, I may have to have it.

It might be bathroom reading in its layout, but I think Jeff Wilser’s THE MAXIMS OF MANHOOD: 100 RULES EVERY REAL MAN MUST LIVE BY, is probably hilarious and culturally informative.

THE LITTLE STRANGER, by Sarah Water, is a novel that mesmerizes.  Nice praise, if you can get it.

The KLF co-founder & artist Bill Drummond on why he ripped up a Ted Hughes poetry book:

After denying she had played a role in the smear campaign against Derek Walcott, it turns out that newly-elected Oxford poetry professor Ruth Padel sent emails to journalists in April tipping them off to allegations about Walcott (previous coverage here, here and here).

Motoko Rich explores the pricing model for literature in the age of e-books…

…but can you do this with an e-book?

A Japanese company has released a horror story printed on toilet paper.

Google has renegotiated its book digitization accord with the University of Michigan…

…Ottawa-area writers still have a lot of reservations about the whole thing.

Joe Queenan digs into his fascination with “piano” novels.

Times Online presents Ben Machell’s interview with “a new voice in modern macabre” Helen Oyeyemi.

The Guardian has a podcast from The Hay Festival featuring Nicholas Stern on climate change over the coming century, Giles Foden discussing his new novel, Turbulence, and a culinary tour of the festival by Jay Rayner.

Today in Literature: On this day in 1951, Cason McCuller’s The Ballad of the Sad Cafe and Other Works was published.

“Don’t worry about people stealing your ideas. If your ideas are any good, you’ll have to ram them down people’s throats.”

-Howard Aiken

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More praise heaped on Reif Laresen’s debut novel, THE SELECTED WORKS OF T.S. SPIVET.  It’s making me think I need to make my stack one book higher.

Teen soap opera series, Carter House Girls, gets a new installment in, STEALING BRADFORD, by Melody Carlson.  The kids in Seatle make the case why parents should by it for their girls. What-evar.

Foreward Magazine has selected Clive Limpkin’s, INDIA EXPOSED: THE SUBCONTINENT A-Z, as their showcase feature for May.

Wednesday Martin looks at one of the most pre-vilified posts a woman came assume, in STEPMONSTER: A NEW LOOK AT WHY REAL STEPMOTHERS THINK, FEEL, AND ACT THE WAY WE DO.

The award-winning author of the short story collection Church Booty discusses her work and writing process:

The Examiner’s Bob Riel cooks up a road trip through literary New England.

Hide the kids… Dick Cheney’s shopping for a book deal.

Apple rejects e-reader app because classic literature is too dirty.

How will Facebook and other social networks affect the vital “leave the past behind” themes in literature?

Random House to publish memoir of JFK’s version of Monica Lewinsky.

CSI writer sued by a couple who claims he named shady characters after them “in revenge for a real estate deal gone bad.”

The Huntington Library, Art Collections and Botanical Gardens marks the 300th anniversary of Samuel Johnson’s birth with a new exhibition opening today.

Banned Welsh poet Patrick Jones ties poetry and music together with “Tongues for a Stammering Time.”

The Telegraph’s Nicolette Jones profiles children’s writer and illustrator John Burningham.

Today in Literature: On this day in 1910, Margaret Wise Brown—author of Goodnight Moon and more than a hundred other children’s books—was born.

“If you have other things in your life - family, friends, good productive day work - these can interact with your writing and the sum will be all the richer.”

-David Brin

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The Baltimore Sun finds three new novels to crow about.

Three more books for the serious brand of consideration from The Boston Globe: TALL MAN, DEATH OF DOOMADGEE, by Chloe Hooper; EVERYTHING HURTS, by Bill Scheft; and REASON, FAITH, AND REVOLUTION: REFLECTIONS ON THE GOD DEBATE, by Terry Eagleton.

Students of poetry will recognize the wealth of analysis in Helen Vendler’s, OUR SECRET DISCIPLINE: YEATS AND LYRIC FORM.

William F. Buckley, Jr. and his wife, Patricia, are sent up lovingly, though not as they may have wished, by their son, Christopher Buckly, in LOSING MUM AND PUP.

Actor Michelle Ryan discusses her love of Rudyard Kipling: