(View entire post here)

Thomas Pynchon's Gravity’s Rainbow is One of the Six Finalists for “The Best of the National Book Awards for Fiction” 

The National Book Foundation is asking readers to vote for their favorite National Book Award-winning fiction book as part of their “Best of the National Book Awards for Fiction” campaign and Penguin author Thomas Pynchon’s Gravity’s Rainbow is among the six titles selected by 140 NBA winners, finalists and judges. Voters can submit their pick by clicking here until October 21st and when you vote, your email address will be entered for a drawing to win two tickets to the 60th National Book Awards on November 18, 2009 and two nights in the Marriott Hotel Downtown. The winner will be announced at the National Book Awards on November 18th.

In addition, Harold Augenbram, the executive director of the National Book Awards will be leading a discussion of Gravity’s Rainbow at the Barnes & Noble on E. 86th Street on November 2nd.
 

(View entire post here)

James Wesley, Rawles is our guest blogger during the week of September 28. If you have any questions for James Wesley, Rawles, add a comment to any of his posts. Here is some more information about How to Survive the End of the World as We Know It - Tactics, Techniques, and Technologies for Uncertain Times: 

With the recent economic crisis, formerly unimaginable scenarios have become terrifyingly real possibilities-learn how to prepare for the worst

Global financial collapse, a terrorist attack, a natural catastrophe-all it takes is one event to disrupt our way of life. We could find ourselves facing myriad serious problems from massive unemployment to a food shortage to an infrastructure failure that cuts off our power or water supply. If something terrible happens, we won't be able to rely on the government or our communities. We'll have to take care of ourselves.

In How to Survive the End of the World as We Know It, James Rawles, founder of SurvivalBlog.com, clearly explains everything you need to know to protect yourself and your family in the event of a disaster-from radical currency devaluation to a nuclear threat to a hurricane. Rawles shares essential tactics and techniques for surviving completely on your own, including how much food is enough, how to filter rainwater, how to protect your money, which seeds to buy for your garden, why goats are a smart choice for livestock, and how to secure your home. It's the ultimate guide to total preparedness and self-reliance in a time of need.

About James Welsey, Rawles:

(View entire post here)

The survival battery is a key issue for any prepper, as one of the biggest short-term concerns in a SHTF scenario is security. Stored supplies and learned skills are all for naught if you can't protect the supplies from theft or survive to put those skills to use. While I would love for everyone to have a chance for a top of the line Main Battle Rifle (MBR), they do not run cheap, nor is the ammunition cheap these days. While modern rifles have undoubted advantages, there are also a large number of older weapons that remain capable, and which most citizens can buy online with a little paperwork.

To trade firearms in interstate commerce, one must have a Federal Firearms License - an FFL. Once upon a time one could acquire a Type 01 FFL (also known as a dealer FFL) as a "home FFL" at a reasonable price and without too much trouble, but since about the Clinton administration they've become much tighter - looking to allow only those selling firearms for a profit. One option still remaining to us mere citizens is the Curios and Relics (C&R) FFL or 03 FFL) is a "collectors" license which allows you to purchase firearms on the C&R list in interstate commerce. This means that you can buy C&R handguns out of state, or can buy online and have them shipped directly to you through a "common carrier". A purchase at a gun show or dealer on a C&R FFL can legally dispense with all the paperwork and checks normally required - a signed copy of your C&R and payment is all that is needed. The C&R list is comprised of all firearms over 50 years old as well as firearms determined by BATF to be of special collector value. Some short-barreled firearms and large caliber "destructive devices" have been released from NFA status on the C&R list. Others (including all machineguns to my knowledge) remain NFA items despite their C&R status.

(View entire post here)

Yesterday I explained some of the difficulties of becoming, or being, a professional writer and gave an example of how the initial germ of an idea for a book, by no means the hardest part of a project but definitely up there in the top three, can appear from anywhere and develop from a simple pub conversation. With Red Herrings and White Elephants and Shaggy Dogs and Black Sheep the hardest part, after the initial idea, was thinking of the expression or phrase, known as idioms, in the first place. There are possibly over two thousand that have become part of our accepted language (where the words we actually use mean nothing at all in the context of a conversation we are having and yet we instinctively know what they mean, i.e. Straight from the Horse's Mouth). Yet if we sit down and try to come up with a dozen, we will all be struggling after only a few. The best way to do that research was to listen out for them in action, so to speak, and so I spent the following two years with a notebook jotting down every single time I was "Barking up the Wrong Tree", visiting a "Bucket Shop" with a "Chip on my Shoulder" or had learned something "On the Grapevine." In the event I tracked down the source of over a thousand of them covered by those first two books, each one traceable to a single, or series, of real events in our rich history.

 #1 New York Times Bestselling Authors Charlaine Harris, Tomie dePaola and T. A. Barron Are Among the Stars of "From the Publisher's Office's" Fall Line-Up, Featuring New Content in Each of Nine Series, including "A Backstage Pass to the Worlds of Charlaine Harris" in Project Paranormal, Penguin Storytime with Liz Shanks, and "The Dark Side of American Business" in The Business Beat

(View entire post here)

New York, New York, September 30, 2009 ... Penguin Group (USA) has rolled out the second season of "From the Publisher's Office", its own online network, it was announced today by Penguin Group (USA) President Susan Petersen Kennedy.  The network features brand-new programming in all nine series across its three multimedia channels: "The Screening Room," "The Radio Room," and "The Reading Room." "From the Publisher's Office" was an online hit right out of the gate, with its inaugural season logging more than 100,000 page views in just three months, and drawing instant praise from readers (click here to read a sampling of the reader praise).

Mrs. Kennedy said: "It's very gratifying that ‘From the Publisher's Office' has been reaching so many readers, who are enjoying insights into our books and authors from across the house.  We're pleased to present a new season of programming."

New features added to "From the Publisher's Office" since its initial launch include: the ability to sign up for email newsletters or RSS feeds that allow users to receive notification when a new episode of their favorite show has been released, and syndication of the "Radio Room" and "Screening Room" series on YouTube and iTunes.