South African anti-apartheid poet and activist Dennis Brutus dead at 85. (Global Times)

Boyd Tonkin profiles yet another author to watch in 2010: Neel Mukherjee. (The Independent)

M.A. Orthofer sets up a new issue of African Writing. (The Literary Saloon)

A.S. Maulucci charts the writing lives of poets well into their autumn years. (Norwich Bulletin)

Kindle books outsell physical books at Amazon this Christmas. (SlipperyBrick.com)

Ian Rankin’s scheme to auction off a character slot in one of his detective book turns into a bit of a practical joke. (UKPA)

The decade of JK Rowling comes to a close. (The Guardian)

R.I.P. Elizabeth C. Laney, journalist. (The Columbus Dispatch)

On this day in 1904, Dublin’s Abbey Theatre opened, premiering W. B. Yeats’s “On Baile’s Strand” and Lady Gregory’s “Spreading the News.” (Today in Literature)

“Not only should you not accept a prize.  You should not try to deserve one either.”

-Jean Cocteau

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Belief as biology is on the line and Nicolas Wade dissects THE FAITH INSTINCT: HOW RELIGION EVOLVED AND WHY IT ENDURES.

It has nothing to do with biscuit-y, bread-y  things, but THE UNBEARABLE LIGHTNESS OF SCONES, by Alexander McCall Smith, gets the run down at The Washington Times.

January Magazine endorses ALPHABEASTIES and CREATURES for the learning-their-letters set.

The New York Times marks Javier Marías’ YOUR FACE TOMORROW: VOLUME THREE - POISON, SHADOW, AND FAREWELL as worth the effort.

Happy birthday, Shane MacGowan.

Happy Holidays from the AuthorScoop staff to all of our readers.
Thanks for another great year.

Chinese dissident author Lu Xiaobo expected to be sentenced on Christmas. (GalleyCat)
UPDATE: Lu Xiaobo jailed for 11 years for inciting subversion of state power. (Radio Netherlands)

Tired of all those 2009 book lists? How about a preview of 2010 then? (Telegraph)

PC World’s Tom Spring ponders if eBook piracy is “the publishing industry’s next epic saga.” (San Francisco Chronicle)

In possibly related news, the Amazon Kindle has been hacked. (AfterDawn)

Charles Stross shares a holiday tale. (Tor.com)

Author Patrick Smith injured in fall. (The Ledger)

Dan Brown takes the number one spot in the Christmas book charts. (Telegraph)

Oliver Marre says readers should take a cue from music fans to topple the trite. (Telegraph)

R.I.P. Ariffin Ngah, novelist. (TheStar.com)

On this day in 1914, the famous “Christmas Truce” spread along the Front. (Today in Literature)

To Want in Winter

(Jamie Mason)

How Human
To cull evergreen
Amid the barren boughs.
Brandish life
When all is wasted
And lay the feast and fire
As gauntlet down
To winds that gnaw and flay.

In vaulted nights
We plumb the basins
Of our breasts for ghosts
Like Marley’s,
Moaning vows
To clank our chains
Once we’ve gone quiet
Beyond our choice.

And you in your anguish.
And I in my doubt
Refuse to mark our breaths
Between the too faint
Tickings of the clock,
Demanding meaning of the void
And for angelsong to fill
A Silent Night.

(Read more of Jamie Mason’s poetry here.)

Editor’s note: ‘Midnight Poetry’ is a showcase for work by poets across the spectrum—from the pantheon of literary giants to contemporary, underground and new voices.

If you would like to submit your work for consideration, please see our Submission Guidelines.

“While thought exists, words are alive and literature becomes an escape, not from, but into living.”

-Cyril Connolly

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Steven V. Roberts profiles the immigrant experience in, FROM EVERY END OF THIS EARTH: 13 FAMILIES AND THE NEW LIVES THEY MADE IN AMERICA.

Author Katherine Paterson rakes in a good review at The Christian Science Monitor for, THE DAY OF THE PELICAN.

The Economist’s best-of list for 2009 covers a lot of literary ground.

Booklist endorses this YA translation from the French - WINTER’S END, by Jean-Claude Mourlevat.

Author magazine interviews Jane Smiley:

Ursula Le Guin resigns from the Authors Guild after nearly 40 years in protest over the Google Books settlement: “You decided to deal with the devil, as it were, and have presented your arguments for doing so. I wish I could accept them. I can’t.” (Publishers Weekly)

Joseph Sullivan shares his favorite book covers of 2009. (The Book Design Review)

Shanda Literature Limited buys out its competitor to become the “largest online literature publisher in China.” (Global Times)

Meanwhile, the government of China puts poet and writer Liu Xiaobo on trial. (LATimes)

Jonathan Kellerman shows off his guitar collection. (GalleyCat)

Bob Minzesheimer looks back at the decade in books. (USAToday)

Too little, too late: Julia Keller sounds off on “the problem with annual ‘best of’ lists.” (LATimes)

Borders to spare about 20 Waldenbooks locations. (DailyFinance)

Daniel Kalder tries to figure out what, if any, purpose is served by blurbs. (Guardian Books Blog)

Fiction wins the year over ghost-written celebrity bios. (The Independent)

Christmas in Los Angeles

(David W. Clary)

I am sitting at a window overlooking
the mouth cut into the earth
that opens up and reveals
Los Angeles.

A red river flows from me to the south
and a white river flows back.
Each light a carful of hopes and dreams
and fears.
Memories of better times.
Prayers for better times.
Trapped here with me despite their desperate froth.

LA is grey and brown.
Grey sky over grey concrete.
Brown hills under brown clouds.
Like the life in my chest
the color has drained from my world.

When I was a child I sang
as children sing
of peace on earth
goodwill toward
man. Of Jolly Men who gave without limit.
Of Angels we heard on high.

I don’t sing much anymore
but when the children open their mouths again
I bask in their innocence
like Naaman in the river Jordan.

(David Clary’s first volume of poetry, A FEAST OF TEARS, can be purchased here.)

Editor’s note: ‘Midnight Poetry’ is a showcase for work by poets across the spectrum—from the pantheon of literary giants to contemporary, underground and new voices.

If you would like to submit your work for consideration, please see our Submission Guidelines.

“A writer’s problem does not change.  He himself changes and the world he lives in changes but his problem remains the same.  It is always how to write truly and having found what is true, to project it is such a way that it becomes a part of the experience of the person who reads it.”

-Ernest Hemingway

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Don’t be confused.  It’s a novel by Norberto Fuentes, even though it’s called, THEAUTOBIOGRAPHY OF FIDEL CASTRO.  And it’s good, really good; so says The Houston Chronicle.

Youngster reviewer, Trevor Delly, heartily endorses Brian Selznick’s HUGO CABRET.

Conscription contrasted with recruitment makes for interesting reading in Washington.  The Times reviews Beth Bailey’s AMERICA’S ARMY: MAKING THE ALL-VOLUNTEER FORCE.

And Monsters & Critics proclaims Craig Simpson’s DEATH RAY a surefire remedy for the boy who doesn’t want to read.

Author magazine interviews Richard Paul Evans:

Go behind the scenes of Larry McMurtry’s ‘Literary Life.’ (NPR)

Seattle named America’s most literate city for 2009. Find out how your city measures up here. (GalleyCat)

At what point does labeling a writer by race or ethnicity become too reductive? (Publishing Perspectives)

Philip Jones documents the death of Borders UK. (theBookseller.com)

Publishing terms creep into 2009 New York Times “Buzzwords.” (Publishers Weekly)

Nicholas Lezard exposes the folly of ‘literary fingerprinting.’ (Guardian Books Blog)

Matthew Shaer examines whether eBooks will fundamentally change the way we read. (The Christian Science Monitor)

M.A. Orthofer rounds up a bunch of new UK bestseller lists. (The Literary Saloon)

On this day in 1823 the Christmas classic, “A Visit From St. Nicholas” (commonly known as “‘Twas the Night Before Christmas”) was published anonymously in the Troy, New York Sentinel. (Today in Literature)

“Writing ought either to be the manufacture of stories for which there is a market demand—a business as safe and commendable as making soap or breakfast foods—or it should be an art, which is always a search for something for which there is no market demand, something new and untried, where the values are intrinsic and have nothing to do with standardized values.”

-Willa Cather

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THE LONDON EYE MYSTERY, by Siobhan Dowd, gets a thumbs up for kids who love a tantalizing story.

The Mormon Times endorses Orson Scott Card’s latest, this one with a more Christian axis, HIDDEN EMPIRE.

Dominick Dunne gets a posthumous good review in USA Today for TOO MUCH MONEY.

Yet another fine twist on Mary Shelley’s main guy shows that the nuances of this tale are still not wrung out of new ways to look at it.  THE CASEBOOK OF VICTOR FRANKENSTEIN, by Peter Ackroyd, is well-received in Boston.

Greil Marcus and Werner Sollers edit together a collection of essays to showcase A NEW LITERARY HISTORY OF AMERICA.

From the BookTrust YouTube description:

As part of our A Gift for Life campaign, we asked the shortlisted authors and judges of the BBC National Short Story Award to recommend a book for Christmas. Featured are Jane Rogers, Kate Clanchy, Sara Maitland, Helen Dunmore, Di Speirs and Lionel Shriver.

Jon Michael Varese reminds us that, despite numerous successful adaptations, “A Christmas Carol” did little for Dickens. (Guardian Books Blog)

Woman who attacked author Katherine Dunn in a purse snatching incident goes to the big house. (Oregon Live)

The Protagonize Winter Challenge is underway. (the protagonize blog)

Hey, look! A Christmas tree made of books. (The New Yorker)

German author Martin Walser takes China’s ’21st Century Annual Best Foreign Novel award’ for Ein liebender Mann (’A Man in Love’, or ‘A Loving Man’). (The Literary Saloon)

Jason Boog reports on Marvels’ plan to adapt a comic book version of Stephen King’s short story “N.” (GalleyCat)

Alison Flood reports on yet another sad and bizarre installment in the “when authors attack” phenomenon. (Guardian Books Blog)

R.I.P. Dan O’Bannon, screenwriter. (Examiner)

On this day in 1849, Fyodor Dostoevsky was granted a pardon from a mock-execution orchestrated by Czar Nicholas I. (Today in Literature)