Just wonderful. So watch it. You shall smile. And learn a bit.

The big news is no news at all. There’s no Pulitzer awarded for fiction this year. Weird. (The Los Angeles Times)

Here’s a rundown of who did win and what for. (The Huffington Post)

… while Jeffrey Gettleman won a journalism Pulitzer with the neat little twist of having nominated himself. (The Gawker)

David Foster Wallace was in the running for the fiction Pulitzer for THE PALE KING, and the book’s take on the IRS, being that it’s Tax Day, is particularly relevant. (The Daily Beast)

Moving right along to one of the next big literary prizes for the year, here’s The Orange Prize shortlist for 2012. (The Los Angeles Times)

The gorgeous, unusual cover for Haruki Murakami’s 1Q84 gets a special paperback treatment to preserve the effect of the image. (and on that note, be sure to tune in to Afternoon Viewing later today.) (The New York Times)

Jay Jordan steps down as president and CEO of the Online Computer Library Center. He shares his insights at (Library Journal)

Amazon builds a bridge to Japan for ebooks on Kindle. (The Asahi Shimbun)

First a Kindle hot-seller, then plucked up by a Big 6 house, and author Boyd Morrison is back to self-publishing. (The Huffington Post)

“On this day in 1981 the University of Pennsylvania Press issued their edition of Theodore Dreiser’s Sister Carrie, in which some 40,000 words are restored to the text and various changes to the original manuscript are reversed. Far from settling the issue, the Pennsylvania edition provided yet another chapter to one of the most famous and controversial stories in American book publishing…” (Today In Literature)

The Pulitzer Prizes will be announce later today. Here’s a preview at who’s who and what’s what. (Politico)

Ted Hughes’ brother is set to write his memoir. (The Telegraph)

Publishers seem to be making it rain in advance of The London Book Fair. (The Guardian)

Pottermore website is out of beta testing and ready for all those who aren’t yet ready to say goodbye to Harry Potter. (pottermore.com)

… and after THE HARRY POTTER LEXICON debacle and lawsuit, Ms. Rowling announces that the real Potter encyclopedia will donate its profits to charity. (The Guardian)

If you don’t think you pay for convenience and low pricing, David Carr has a closer look at Amazon’s Department of Justice-protected throne. (The New York Times)

… and Mashable.com lends its perspective as well. (mashable.com)

… and The Seattle Times thinks maybe Amazon goosed the government. (The Seattle Times)

Lightning Source opens three new facilities to accommodate print-on-demand orders. (The Commercial Appeal)

“On this day in 1962, Doris Lessing’s The Golden Notebook was published. It is the most highly-praised and still the best-selling of her two dozen books. Lessing has described it as an attempt ‘to break certain forms of consciousness and go beyond them’; she has also said that the novel became ‘an albatross’ hung around her neck by a feminist misreading. In this excerpt, Anna Wulf (the autobiographical heroine, writer of the notebooks) talks with her friend, Molly, about how others perceive the two of them superficially, and as almost interchangeable people…” (Today In Literature)

With big boats and cold, deep water on the brain, Erik Larson looks to tell the tale of the Lusitania. (The New York Times)

Friday the 13th is a prime marketing day if you’re R.L. Stine. (GalleyCat)

The Atlantic hails Emperor Bezos, crowned by the US Department of Justice. (The Atlantic)

Toni Morrison talk current affairs and weighty themes with (The Guardian)

Books n’ sales reps: a love story. (Idealog)

Keep score of your reading with book legders. (The New York Times)

Nobel laureate, Nadine Gordimer, sits down with Justin Cartwright at (The Telegraph)

“On this day in 1906 President Roosevelt made his famous speech labeling as ‘muckrakers’ the new breed of investigative writers — Ida Tarbell (Standard Oil), Lincoln Steffens (municipal politics), David Graham Phillips (Senate politics), Ray Stannard Baker (treatment of minorities), Samuel Hopkins Adams (patent medicines), Upton Sinclair (his novel The Jungle condemned the meat industry), and others. In his speech, Roosevelt gave full credit to his inspiration…” (Today In Literature)

Dave Sedaris talks about how and what he reads. (The New York Times)

Little, Brown previews JK Rowlings first novel for adults, THE CASUAL VACANCY. (Little, Brow Book Group)

… and Sameer Rahim curbs his enthusiasm  for the release of it. (The Telegraph)

Audiobooks ahoy! Audible sets $20 million for promotion. (Publishers Marketplace)

The New York Times profiles biographer, Robert Caro. (The New York Times)

Here’s a little more detail on the US DOJ’s lawsuit against Apple and the NY publishing houses. (Publishers Lunch)

… and John Sargent fills in the blanks on the proceedings. (Tor.com)

… and Michael Connelly and Sherman Alexie also weigh in. (The Los Angeles Times)

Spring cleaning vs. your book collection in (Salon)

Book-klepto gets prison sentence. (The New York Post)

“On this day in 1939 Seamus Heaney was born, eldest of nine children on a County Derry farm. His first collection of poems (Death of a Naturalist, 1966) earned four major awards and provoked Christopher Ricks to declare that those ‘who remain unstirred by Seamus Heaney’s poems will simply be announcing that they are unable to give up the habit of disillusionment with recent poetry.’…” (Today In Literature)

100 years ago, a very specific boatload of people were cruising the Atlantic. What books did they bring on board? (BookRiot)

How the ghost of H.L. Menken landed a six-figure deal for a modern day writer. (GalleyCat)

The Big 6 rumor mill says they all follow suit and snub Amazon at contract time. (paidcontent.org)

…but they’ll have to be cagey about it in the wake of Apple and five of the six being charges with ebook price fixing. (The Chicago Tribune)

… and a bit more on the allegations against the publishers is laid out at (GalleyCat)

Terry Deary doesn’t want kids to hate his books, so he’s asking teachers not to use HORRIBLE HISTORIES in class. (The Telegraph)

Publishers Weekly is counting down the top 10 characters from David Foster Wallace’s, INFINITE JEST. (Publishers Weekly)

“On this day in 1857, Gustave Flaubert’s Madame Bovary was published. The serialization of the novel in the Revue de Paris the previous winter generated one of the most famous literary trials in French history, and so much publicity that the book was an immediate hit. It was Flaubert’s first novel, and it made him little money — 800 francs for 5 years of writing, about what the stenographer he had hired for his trial earned in two weeks…” (Today In Literature)

Poet, Carol Ann Duffy, will commemorate the Pendle witches, eight women and two men, hanged four hundred years ago. (The Guardian)

The stories behind ten famous pen names. (Flavorwire)

Boutique bookshops inside department stores - I like it. Here’s Rizzoli’s in the belly of Saks Fifth Avenue. (Rizzoli USA)

Tech in fiction: it’s not just for spy-thrillers, ya know. Jessica Crispin talks with author, Ellen Ullman in (Kirkus)

Simon & Schuster’s Atria imprint puts four mystery/thriller writers on a bus and drives them all over God’s green acre. (January Magazine)

Have a look at the San Fransisco bookshop that inspired Alfred Hitchcock. (The San Fransisco Chronicle)

Kurt Vonnegut’s nastier side is profiled in a new biography. (The Telegraph)

“On this day in 1931, Dorothy Parker stepped down as drama critic for The New Yorker, so ending the “Reign of Terror” she endured while reviewing plays, and that others endured while being reviewed by her. This last stint was only a two-month stand-in for Robert Benchley, and altogether she reviewed plays for only a half-dozen years in a fifty-year career, but Parker’s Broadway days brought her first fame and occasioned some of her most memorable lines…” (Today In Literature)

Thomas Dunne books leaps into gleeful action and publishes an unauthorized biography of Mike Wallace eleven days early. 11 days? Really? (The Hollywood Reporter)

Two poems from David Morley get a National Poetry Month stage at (The Huffington Post)

… and NPR celebrates with its ‘Muses and Metaphor’ series. (NPR)

Encyclopedia Britannica’s last print run is destined to become a classic, but will it outshine the 1910/11 version? (The Guardian)

The Huntington Library is a feast for the senses - books, art, and botanical gardens. (The Spectrum)

Harvard English professor and veteran book critic, James Wood, named Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature. (The Harvard Crimson)

Jodi Picoult talks about her new book, LONE WOLF, and weighs in with an opinion on self-publishing. (The Huffington Post)

Writer, Michael Bourne, discovers his mother’s secret passion for writing and striving for publication. (The Millions)

Cheers and urgings-on from the readers, finger-wagging from the pundits, The Seattle Times takes Amazon to the woodshed. (JimRomensko.com)

Author, Tim Lott, has a writerly chat with (The Telegraph)

The Library of Congress issues ‘last call’ for founding documents exhibit, ‘Creating The United States’ closing May 5th. (Library of Congress)

“On this day in 1966 the English novelist Evelyn Waugh died at the age of sixty-three. Even those commentators who regarded Waugh’s views and behavior as those of a crackpot thought him the best stylist of his day — a writer, said Gore Vidal, of ‘prose so chaste that at times one longs for a violation of syntax to suggest that its creator is fallible, or at least part American.’…” (Today In Literature)

It National Library Week and Brad Melzter salutes school librarians in (The Huffington Post)

Here’s an update from the American Library Association, including the current list of most-frequently challenged books on the library shelves. (ALA)

And here’s a hopeful look, courtesy of library champions in the UK. (The Guardian)

World Book Night is April 23rd. See where all the support came from in the US. (Publishers Weekly)

The third installment of William Manchester’s exhaustive biography of Winston Churchill is due out this Fall. (The Washington Post)

Israel closes its gates to poet, Guenter Grass. (The Huffington Post)

Katniss Everdeen Barbie makes me want to be nine years old again almost more than I can say. (Entertainment Weekly)

Publishers are working awfully hard to fertilize the idea that readers want more clickables in their ebooks. (wired.com)

Mike Wallace: journalist, interviewer, author, dead at 93. (CBS News)

“On this day in 1553 the French monk, physician, humanist scholar and writer, Francois Rabelais died. His influential and much-imitated satiric masterpiece, Gargantua and Pantagruel (five books, 1532-52) is in the mock-quest tradition, with the emphasis decidedly on the ‘mock.’ The author’s lampoon of religious orders, lawyers, Sorbonne pedants and just about every other power-group going brought condemnation…” (Today In Literature)

Columnist, John Derbyshire, is fired from The National Review for his article instructing white and Asian parent on how to counsel their children on the dangers of black people. (Politico)

BookRiot’s ‘Book Fetish’ feature has some pretty cool stuff on display. (BookRiot)

The Guardian asks an illustrious panel to name the books they read again and again. (The Guardian)

Author, Michael Morpurgo, talks about how WAR HORSE changed his life and his work. (The Telegraph)

If you’re stumped for Easter books, Kirkus can help. (Kirkus)

Levi Asher profiles Alain De Botton’s work over at (LitKicks)

Writer, Katherine Russell Rich, dies at 56. (The New York Times)

“On this day in 1950, J. D. Salinger’s ‘For Esme — With Love and Squalor’ was published in The New Yorker. Though still fifteen months away from the fame of The Catcher in the Rye, Salinger had many stories published in the high-circulation magazines at this point, and had drawn increasing attention from critics, fans and even Hollywood…” (Today In Literature)

the old man and the sea from Marcel Schindler on Vimeo.

Poet, Guenter Grass, explains the where the pointy end of his controversial poem is sunk. (The Denver Post)

The Indies Choice Book Award nominees are sampled for your review. (GalleyCat)

Jane Austen: she’s not just just for the girls. (The Christian Science Monitor)

Nabakov and Shakespeare, both born in April, compared and contrasted over at (Bookslut)

Tomorrow your pancreas may be overtaxed by chocolate bunnies and marshmallow chicks. Today, test your literary sweet smarts. (The Guardian)

Author, Anne Tyler, has a chat with (The Chicago Sun Times)

Nancy Goldstone diagrams the inspiration for her book, THE MAID AND THE QUEEN. (Salon)

District 12, the home of Katniss Everdeen, is up for sale in North Carolina. (The Baltimore Sun)

Chloe Schama makes the case that maybe women do in fact like girly books, and why it’s okay. (The New Republic)

“On this day in 1977, the pulp-noir writer Jim Thompson died. Thompson was one of the most durable and prolific of the mid-century pulp writers, a specialist in dark motives, twisted deeds and crime novels which, says biographer Robert Polito, ‘lanced a boil on the American Dream.’ Although success came late and left early, Thompson kept at it and kept hopeful…” (Today In Literature)

THREE CUPS OF TEA author, Greg Moretenson, ends up on the hook for $1 million for spending his charity’s money in ways that didn’t go over well. (NBC News)

Jonathan Lethem composes a wonderful ode to fandom in his latest essay in (The New York Times)

The mash-up wizard, Seth Grahame-Smith, also seems to be a Hollywood Midas. (The Wall Street Journal)

Booksellers weigh in with their disappointment over Google’s abandonment of indies. (Publishers Weekly)

Survey finds at least 1 in 5 Americans are reading electronically. (The Daily Beast)

… the bad new is that the survey also shows that at least 50 million Americans didn’t read a book at all last year.. (The Huffington Post)

The info is up on 2012’s National Book Fair. (The Library of Congress)

… and also for The Hay Festival. (The Telegraph)

In a reach to  scrape some foam off the tidal wave of press and money, De Capo Press spoofs the fanfiction-turned-erotic-megaseller with their parody, FIFTY SHAMES OF EARL GREY. (USA Today)

“On this day in 1839 Stendhal’s last novel, a product of 52 consecutive days of dictation, appeared in French bookshops. The aging author had begun employing a copyist in 1835, when wearing glasses became a necessity. Stendhal complained that the process of dictation proved annoyingly boring, but he couldn’t seem to write while wearing spectacles…” (Today In Literature)

It’s baseball season again. And baseball book season as well. (BarnesandNoble.com)

Chip Kidd talks books covers at TED and it’s all featured at (The Huffington Post)

Ted Genoways leaves The Virginia Quarterly review to pursue his own writing. (The New York Times)

The vibrant habit of reading allowed is lauded at (The Guardian)

David Rieff is painfully honest about his mother, Susan Sontag. (The Telegraph)

In an unusual brand of jacket-note, Vintage Books states a disclaimer on 50 SHADES OF GREY’s fanfiction incarnation, MASTER OF THE UNIVERSE. (GalleyCat)

Now you can access the OPAC library catalogs with an app! (The Digital Shift)

The Walrus launches a book imprint with Margaret Atwood’s short, I DREAM OF ZENIA WITH THE BRIGHT RED RED TEETH. (Quill & Quire)

Amazon opens a Spanish ebook store. (Publishers Weekly)

Short stories pinned to pedestrians. Hmmm. That’s different. (The LA Times)

Google dials down its ebook access to Google Play only. (GalleyCat)

“On this day in 1926, H. L. Mencken was arrested by the Boston vice squad, charged with the possession and sale of indecent literature. The literature in question was the April, 1926 issue of Mencken’s American Mercury magazine, found offensive for a short story entitled ‘Hatrack,’ by Herbert Asbury…” (Today In Literature)

At fifty-something, debut novelist Charlotte Rogan looks poised to take over a few bestseller lists with THE LIFEBOAT. (The New York Times)

Mark Twain’s obsession with Joan of Arc, pondered at (The Awl)

‘My Mother, My Translator’ is a wonderful look at story, language, and the bonds of culture and blood. (Granta Magazine)

Goodreads has a nice monthly newsletter with bookish news and a preview of new releases. Check it out! (goodreads)

Frank Langella’s book launch party fairly glittered with stars. Apparently, there’s no grudge for the amount of dirt he dished on the dead. (The Chicago Tribune)

Here’s a fun list of songs inspired by books and authors. (BookRiot)

Did you know that Amazon lets authors see who’s highlighted in their Kindle books and Tweeted from the Kindle Fire? (wildfiremarketing)

Pulitzer-winner, Gene Weingarten, gives his insights to the writers and readers at (Writer’s Digest)

The National Magazine Awards earn a scowl for being more than a bit lopsided. There’s not a single woman nominated in the major categories. (The New York Daily News)

And here’s a quick check to see if your online site(s) have malware burrs. (GalleyCat)

“On this day in 1928 Maya Angelou was born in St. Louis, as Marguerite Johnson. As a child she got the nickname ‘maya’ (’mine’) from her brother; she chose the ‘Angelou’ later, an adaptation of her first husband’s name, taken at the beginning of her stage career. The title of the first and most famous volume of her autobiography, I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings, she took from a Paul Laurence Dunbar poem…” (Today In Literature)

GalleyCat presents possibly the world’s first book trailer:

Fifty years before the book trailer even existed, the great Ernest Hemingway experimented by tape recording a rambling and possibly intoxicated introduction to Across the River and into the Trees.

Lee Child seems full of awesome - just an excellent guy all around. (thebigthrill.org)

National Poetry Month is cancelled, but maybe there’s a positive spin on it in there? Somewhere? (poetryfoundation.org)

The case for writing fiction in lieu of reclining on the therapist’s couch. (The New York Times)

Friend to AuthorScoop, Jamie Ford, answers 20 Questions to illustrate a day in the life… (20somethingreads.com)

Anthony Horowitz checks in with (The Telegraph)

BookRiot finds 16 things that have never been said better than they were by Calvin & Hobbes. (BookRiot)

The Guardian posts an interview with Ian McEwan. (The Guardian)

597 Fifth Avenue used to be Scribner’s showcase. Sadly, now it’s a fancy makeup shop. (The New York Times)

A call to reevaluate the works of William Somerset Maugham at (The Scotsman)

New book says it was OJ Simpson’s son, Jason, who committed the famous murders. (FoxNews)

Macmillan packs up and moves out of Africa. (The Daily Monitor)

“On this day in 1957, Samuel Beckett’s Endgame was first performed in London, in French. Waiting for Godot had premiered in 1953 and become an international sensation, but Beckett could find no one in France willing to risk their theater on a new play which featured one character who could not stand, one who could not sit, and two others unable to come out of their garbage cans…” (Today In Literature)

From this morning’s Flavorwire link: