Wild at Heart
Filmmaker David Lynch (Eraserhead, Blue Velvet, Twin Peaks) is
planning to empty the contents of his mind into a coffee-table book,
an eclectic collection of his drawings, paintings, photographs, short
fiction, and essays. Harper & Row will publish in fall 1991.
Satellite Write
While explorer Will Steger was battling 60-day-long storms on his
trans-Antarctica expedition begun in the summer of 1989, his
coauthor, Jon Bowermaster, was toiling away in upstate New York on
the research and writing of their book, Saving the Earth: A Citizen's
Guide to Environmental Action. As Bowermaster finished each chapter,
he sent it to Steger via supply plane from a base in Chile. Steger
responded by satellite, typing GOODJOBJON or LAST2PAGESFINE on his
monitor. When Steger finally reached the Soviet base at Vostok, he
rushed to a phone to give Bowermaster line-by-line changes, just as
the book was about to go to press.
Mambo Jumbo
The Mambo Kings Play Songs of Love earned Oscar Hijuelos the 1990
Pulitzer Prize for fiction — and a $16 million lawsuit. ''Glorious
Gloria'' Parker, who leads an all-female band, charges that Hijuelos
defamed her in The Mambo Kings by portraying a fictional band
called ''Glorious Gloria Parker and Her All-Girl Rhumba Orchestra'' as
rife with promiscuity. Parker also insists that as a consequence she
and her band have been unable to earn a living.
Disc-o-Lit
Even though audio books — taped versions of classics and current hot
sellers — sell smartly, some audio publishers are aware that many
people are phasing out their cassette decks. So Rykodisc and Carol
Publishing have joined forces to release the first book on CD.
''We haven't decided exactly which book, but it will come from our
Citadel Underground series,'' says Carol publisher Steven Schragis,
referring to the company's line of books about the American
counterculture.
