Update Announcements by Craig Stark #67, 1 May 2006

Happily, BookThink's positions for copy editor and forum moderator have been filled. Karin Bergsagel will be making our heretofore near deathless prose now, we confidently presume, absolutely deathless, and Gen Kazdin, who already has too much to do, logically seized the opportunity to do even more and will now be manning - or should we say womanning? - the forum rudder. Sincere thanks to all who wrote to offer their services. By now, each of you should have received a reply inquiring if you'd like to help in another way. There are lots of opportunities.

Historical fiction, as many of you know, has been one of the more productive genres for booksellers in recent years, and this is especially true of children's books. Children's Books Editor Guusje Moore takes you back in time today to dig for bookselling gold.

Also, some interesting items appear in Pamela Palmer's Top Ten on eBay, and for the first time since we've been doing this the Yankees beat the Brits - barely - 11 books to 9. Nice to have some of that money staying on this side of the pond! One important reason for this is renowned artist/photographer/filmmaker Ed Ruscha, who landed three times in the non-fiction top ten. Ruscha is a wry, irreverent antidote to the Pop Art movement spearheaded by Andy Warhol. In recent years, fame has finally caught up with him, and in my opinion his photographs of western, often Southern-Californian cityscapes are especially noteworthy. I'm spending some time with this because this is precisely the kind of power flashpoint that gets special treatment in our premium newsletters - in fact, Ruscha is scheduled to appear in a 50/50 later this year. Non-subscribers should spend a few minutes researching Ruscha books. They're amazingly strong across the board - and just think, you could get more of the same every month. Subscribe here.