Book Embargo

First, this is my 100th post!
Now, covers change all the time. That is something we are used to. When a book goes from hardcover to paperback, the cover sometimes changes. When a book is released in paperback but then subsequent books by that author are more popular, they often re-release the books with new covers (think Jodi Picoult and Kris Radish). Another change that we all know from Harry Potter is the differences between US covers and International covers. I wanted to highlight one title in particular because when it came out, it was a nothing book with the BEST COVER EVER and then when the authors newer books came out, they re-released this book with terrible covers.
That author is Dan Brown. Side note of some coolness, Dan Brown is a New Hampshire author, and we had him come to the store for Angels & Demons and he did a signing. Innisfree Bookshop ahead of the times AGAIN! Ha!
Anyways, Angels & Demons was one of his first books and the cover was amazing. Here it is.

Seriously. Look at it upside down. IT IS JUST AS COOL BECAUSE IT IS THE SAME. Yeah, super cool. Then we hear they are going to re-release it in hardcover. You can imagine our excitement. We got this…

Yeah. Not really anything to write home about… The international (Australian) edition is pretty cool though,

There was also the Special Illustrated Edition cover. Not as cool as the first, but interesting.

Then there is the regular mass market edition

and the larger mass market edition.

So you can see all the differences. Some were amazing, some were blah, but they were ALL for the same book. Imagine if you hadn’t remembered that you had read the book but you remembered the cover, you might buy it again because the cover was so different! And isn’t THAT annoying! Cover differences are pretty cool and with our world being so global, you can easily get copies of your favorite books with their international covers almost as easily as you can the US editions. (I know I do that all the time.)

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I am from the grand state of New Hampshire. Yay Granite!!! And we have quite a few wonderful authors who have gone on to quite high levels. Everyone knows Dan Brown of course, but also Barbara Delinsky, Jodi Picoult and Robin Cook all live in our state.

Another local talent is Joe Monninger. He taught at the college I went to. He is friends with my dad. Even his dogs go to the same vet as mine. (His memoir, Home Waters is about one of his past pooches.)

Casey over at Maisonbisson.com has reviewed Joe’s newest book, “Two Ton: One Night, One Fight — Tony Galento v. Joe Louis.,” a boxing biography. There is another post he did on the topic here.

Also, Here on New Hampshire Public Radio there is an interview with Joe. Check it out. It is from December of 2006.

Joe is a great writer, great teacher, and all around nice guy. If you have interest in boxing, dogs, or buiding a house in New England, then check out Joe’s stuff.

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At long last, a non-fantasy book! The Alexandria Link is Steve Berry’s newest book in his Cotton Malone series. This is my first book by Berry and it makes me sad I have not read his stuff in order. Side note, his first book is The Amber Room. That said, The Alexandria Link is fabulous. It does make references to his previous adventures, which, again, I have not read. In the first twenty minutes of reading his book, I whizzed through over thirty pages. It just sucks you in. It reads similar to Dan Brown’s stuff, in that you want to sit and read it and ignore everyone and every thing, but this book has the excitement of dealing with the lost library of Alexandria.

From the Kirkus reviews on the Barnes and Noble site.

European billionaires, Israelis, Saudis and Americans shoot it out in an international search for ancient manuscripts that could drastically alter the map of the Middle East. Having rested up from their great labors, the cast of The Templar Legacy (2006) faces new perils as they are thrown headlong into yet another there’s-been-a-huge-misunderstanding religious mystery. The ceaseless action begins with the kidnapping of the teenage son of former American secret-agent-turned-bookseller Cotton Malone, whose understandably panicked ex-wife has jetted to Copenhagen, where he now lives. There is the usual warning to keep the police out of it, but Malone has enough sense to enlist the help of his elderly but capable billionaire pal Henrik Thorvaldsen after shadowy evil-doers torch the bookstore as a warning. The kidnapper is Dominick Sabre, murderous right-hand man of elderly but malevolent billionaire Alfred Hermann, current big cheese in the Order of the Golden Fleece, a cabal of super-rich European moguls with a taste for world-scenario management. Thorvaldsen, a Jew, is also in the Order, giving him access to Hermann’s plotting, which has to do with the possibility that much of the great library at Alexandria was shifted offsite before its destruction. Amid the ancient papyri and scrolls may be some early Old Testaments that point to serious geographic misunderstandings over the millennia, mistakes that would undermine the claims of the world’s three monotheistic religions. Given a deadline-or the kid dies-to find his old pal George Haddad, who holds the clues to the location of the library, Malone jets to London, ex-wife in tow, in time to see Haddad assassinated, which forces him into anuneasy alliance with the treacherous Sabre. In the U.S., meanwhile, Malone’s former boss uncovers involvement at the Highest Level. The president’s life is in danger. Fast action and wild plotting largely mask lackluster prose in Berry’s latest what-if thriller.

Not really… the best of reviews, but still, it is a good time and I cannot wait to read further.

The point of this post is not the actual book itself however. It is the promotional tools used for it. I have taken a picture of my advance (which incidentally will not be the final cover I don’t think) and with the promo scroll.
It is a scroll that is on the softest fabric/paper and includes a tiny blurb on the book as well as the release date (which is wrong). It is just such an interesting idea, especially since “back in the day,” scrolls were used during the time of the Library of Alexandria.

If you like authors like Dan Brown, I think you will like Steve Berry. It really is fast paced, but still, has a factual base. Please keep in mind, it IS fiction however. The Library of Alexandria did burn down and there is not one man out there who holds the key to all of its information.
Release date is either February 6, 2007 OR January 30, 2007. Either way, start looking at the end of January!

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