Jhumpa Lahiri Archives - Book Business

September 12, 2013The Rising Value of Land in Book Titles

On Sept. 24, Jhumpa Lahiri's new Booker Prize-nominated novel, "The Lowland," will be released on this side of the Atlantic by Knopf in what promises to be a highlight of this most literary season. And yet surveying recent offerings in the bookstores, one can't help but notice a strange echo reverberating behind the esteemed author. Even the world of publishing, it seems, is not immune to the whims of fashion.

"No one wants to be derivative in book-titling," said Ms. Sohn, an occasional Times contributor whose novel was released in paperback this past summer.

September 10, 2013Shortlist for Man Booker Prize for Fiction Announced

The shortlist for the Man Booker Prize for Fiction, the most prestigious literary award in Britain, was announced on Tuesday morning. The six finalists are: "We Need New Names," by NoViolet Bulawayo (Little, Brown/Chatto); "The Luminaries," by Eleanor Catton (Little, Brown/Granta); "Harvest," by Jim Crace (Nan A. Talese/Picador); "The Lowland," by Jhumpa Lahiri (Knopf/Bloomsbury); "A Tale for the Time Being," by Ruth Ozeki (Viking/Canongate); "The Testament of Mary," by Colm Toibin (Scribner/Penguin)

January 21, 2013Random House's new Facebook app: If you liked Evelyn Waugh, you'll love the Berenstain Bears

Online book discovery doesn’t work very well. Random House is attempting to address that problem with a new Facebook app, BookScout, that gives users book recommendations from multiple publishers, not just Random House. Based on my extremely preliminary testing, the app’s recommendations leave something to be desired.

December 15, 2011World Book Night U.S. 2012 Announces Anna Quindlen as National Chair, Giveaway of 1 Million Free Books

World Book Night U.S. has announced the selection of its honorary national chairperson, Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist and bestselling author Anna Quindlen, and revealed the WBN 2012 U.S. book picks. In addition, World Book Night U.S. has opened the registration process for those wishing to become volunteer book givers.

World Book Night is an ambitious campaign to give away a million free books across America all on one day — April 23, 2012 — by enlisting 50,000 volunteer book lovers to help promote reading by going into their communities and distributing free copies of a book they especially enjoy. World Book Night was successfully launched in the UK earlier this year, and now the U.S. is joining the effort, which is supported by American publishers, bookstores and libraries nationwide.