Category: News (31-40 of 376)

Feb 5 2013 11:29 AM ET

Bridget Jones will return in book form for the first time in 14 years

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Image Credit: Laurie Sparham

“How’s your love life?”

Bridget Jones, heroine of the page and screen, might be fending that question off again in her next chapter. We’ve already heard buzz about a new Bridget Jones novel, but Knopf officially announced this morning that it will be releasing Helen Fielding’s book in November. It will receive an initial printing of 250,000 copies.

Bridget Jones’ Diary was first published in 1996 and is widely credited for invigorating the “chick lit” phenomenon. A sequel, Bridget Jones: The Edge of Reason, followed in 1999. The books have sold 15 million copies globally, and both were adapted into films starring Renee Zellweger, Hugh Grant, and Colin Firth.

While few details have been announced, we do know that time will have passed realistically for Bridget. She started the series in her 30s, but this story will be set in modern-day London with Bridget “at a later stage in her life,” according to a press release. “My life has moved on,” says Fielding, “and Bridget’s will move on, too. I hope people will have as much fun reading it, as I am writing it.”

There is a third Bridget Jones movie in the works also, but Fielding’s novel won’t follow the same plot, which involves Bridget having a baby.

Are you excited for the next installment?

Follow @EWStephanLee on Twitter.

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Feb 4 2013 01:42 PM ET

Khaled Hosseini's tour dates for 'And the Mountains Echoed' -- EXCLUSIVE

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Khaled Hosseini, the best-selling author of The Kite Runner and A Thousand Splendid Suns, is going on a massive five-week, 40-event book tour befitting a rock star to promote his upcoming novel And the Mountains Echoed (May 21). While we don’t know the exact plot of the new novel yet, we do know that it’s a family drama that takes place all around the world, from Kabul, to Paris, to San Francisco, to the Greek island of Tinos. Check out the exclusive tour schedule below to see if you’ll have an opportunity to meet Hosseini and get a signed copy of And the Mountains Echoed. Our hands cramp at the thought. READ FULL STORY »

Jan 30 2013 04:32 PM ET

Five things we learned about the Mariah Carey-Tommy Mottola marriage from record exec's new memoir

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Image Credit: Ron Galella/WireImage

The music biz memoir has become one of the hottest trends over the past couple of years — and the boys in the (record label) boardroom are not getting left behind. Today, Grand Central is publishing Tommy Mottola’s autobiography, Hitmaker: The Man and his Music, which he co-penned with Cal Fussman. Formerly the Chairman CEO of Sony Music, Mottola developed an amazing array of talent, including Celine Dion, Gloria Estefan, Shakira, and Mariah Carey. Mottola thought Carey was so amazing that in 1993 he married her, despite being both more than two decades older and the songbird’s technical boss.

READ FULL STORY »

Jan 30 2013 03:12 PM ET

Hillary Clinton plans post-State memoir: 'I don't know what I'll say in it yet'

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Image Credit: Jim Watson/AFP/Getty Images

Hillary Clinton may be stepping down as secretary of state, but she’s stepping up her writing.

In an online “townterview” held yesterday out of Washington, D.C., the former senator and first lady said that she “will” write a memoir, presumably after leaving the State Department this Friday.

“I don’t know what I’ll say in it yet,” Clinton said, but added that it would allow her the chance to “go into greater detail” about the last four years.

There’s plenty of possible material — which Clinton will be able to play up any way she wants. A lengthy exploration of interventionism vs. imperialism? A breakdown of the U.S.’s international image with regards to the evolving, increasingly electronic, global community? A whole chapter about her and Barack laughing on 60 Minutes? Oh, Hils.

No word yet if Simon & Schuster, which published Clinton’s previous two books (It Takes a Village and Living History), has any deal in place for the manuscript, which means at least two things: Clinton hasn’t done much manuscript making, and once she’s finished, it’ll be up for grabs! Get to bidding, world.

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Jan 29 2013 10:42 AM ET

Yes, finally! Amy Poehler has a book deal

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Image Credit: Jemal Countess/Getty Images

Amy Poehler continues in her quest to take over your life.

The comedian, actress and aces award show host will write her first book, slated for 2014, according to the Associated Press. The release will be handled by It Books, an imprint of Harper Collins, and is described as an “illustrated, non-linear diary.”

That’s a nice phrase that also tells us basically nothing about what she’s working on. Here are three possibilities:

READ FULL STORY »

Jan 28 2013 05:46 PM ET

2013 Caldecott and Newbery Medal winners are announced

Awards season isn’t limited to those in film and television.

The American Library Association announced its own set of winners today for the best in children’s books.

The 2013 Caldecott Medal, which recognizes picture books, was awarded to Jon Klassen for This Is Not My Hat, a follow-up to his popular story, I Want My Hat Back. This Is Not My Hat is the tale of a small fish with a zealous attitude and what happens when he steals a hat from a larger creature.

The 2013 Newbery Medal for children’s literature was awarded to Katherine Applegate for The One and Only Ivan, which tells the story of an artistic gorilla that lives a caged life in a shopping center and hardly ever misses the jungle. But Ivan’s world is changed when he’s joined by a baby elephant that helps him to see things differently.

Even adults can appreciate the humor and creativity in these award-winning children’s books.

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Jan 25 2013 02:08 PM ET

Stephen King argues for gun control in strongly worded new Kindle essay

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Image Credit: Marc Andrew Deley/Getty Images

Stephen King has released a new Kindle single titled Guns, in which the horror author — who says he owns three handguns himself — passionately advocates for additional firearm regulation. “In the wake of the Sandy Hook shootings, gun advocates have to ask themselves if their zeal to protect even the outer limits of gun ownership have anything to do with preserving the Second Amendment as a whole, or if it’s just a stubborn desire to hold onto what they have, and to hell with the collateral damage,” King writes. “If that’s the case, let suggest that f— you, Jack, I’m okay is not a tenable position, morally speaking.”

In the essay, which is available on Amazon for 99 cents, King writes about the first novel he ever wrote, which he penned in high school and was later published as Rage under his Richard Bachman pseudonym. The book is about a kid who shows up at school with a gun, kills a teacher, and takes his class hostage, and after it was published, Rage apparently helped inspire several real-life school shooters. READ FULL STORY »

Jan 15 2013 01:35 PM ET

National Book Awards to add more nominees, maybe go 'a little more mainstream'

In order to infuse some excitement into the proceedings, the National Book Awards are going the way of the Oscars and Britain’s splashier Man Booker Prize by announcing a “long list” of ten nominees in the four competitive categories before whittling them down to the usual five finalists in each, according to the AP. More nominees will mean more books getting a boost from the attention, lesser potential for snubs, and perhaps more genre nominees in the fiction category. Another change: The judging panel will include critics, booksellers, and librarians in addition to writers.

National Book Foundation vice president and Grove/Atlantic CEO Morgan Entrekin told the AP that expanding the judging pool beyond writers will perhaps make the picks “a little more mainstream” and less likely to include “a collection of stories by a university press.”

Do you think “more mainstream” finalists make book awards more exciting, or will that defeat the purpose? A similar debate swirled around the Man Booker Prize when Julian Barnes won for A Sense of An Ending in 2011.

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Jan 15 2013 10:00 AM ET

Dan Brown's new novel 'Inferno' coming this spring

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Image Credit: Dan Courter

Antiquity meets modern-day mystery once again in Dan Brown’s upcoming novel Inferno. Doubleday announced this morning that the Da Vinci Code and Lost Symbol author’s next novel, coming May 14, will feature Harvard symbologist Robert Langdon’s return. The action will take place in Italy, and at the heart of the mystery will stand the literary classic Dante’s Inferno.

“Although I studied Dante’s Inferno as a student, it wasn’t until recently, while researching in Florence, that I came to appreciate the enduring influence of Dante’s work on the modern world,” said Brown in a press release. “With this new novel, I am excited to take readers on a journey deep into this mysterious realm… a landscape of codes, symbols, and more than a few secret passageways.”

Inferno will get a first printing of four million copies in the U.S. and Canada.

Follow @EWStephanLee on Twitter.

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Jan 14 2013 11:34 AM ET

National Book Critics Circle Award finalists are ...

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It may not be as famous as the Pulitzer or as remunerative as the Booker, but the National Book Critics Circle Award is high in prestige among writers and publishers. Among the 30 nominees in six categories are National Book Award winners Katherine Boo for her nonfiction work Behind the Beautiful Forevers and David Ferry for Belwilderment in poetry. Two of EW’s picks for best novels of 2012, The Orphan Master’s Son by Adam Johnson and Billy Lynn’s Long Halftime Walk by Ben Fountain, are in the running in the fiction category. See the full list of finalists below: READ FULL STORY »

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