Peter Mayer on R.J. Ellory's A QUIET BELIEF IN ANGELS

A letter from Peter Mayer, publisher of The Overlook Press, to all the loyal readers of The Winged Elephant:

Dear Friends:

I’ve been in book publishing now for nearly 50 years, but finding a book like A Quiet Belief in Angels, or indeed an author like R. J. Ellory, is as exciting to me now as it ever was. It’s a wonderful book—a most unusual thriller set in Georgia— but the story of how this book came to be, and the story of the author himself, is every bit as good.

Ellory was orphaned at the age of seven, and at seventeen sent to prison for poaching. He found a new world in reading, immersed himself in literature, and began to write fiction. He composed twenty-two novels in longhand and submitted them to various publishers… and soon had a private collection of literally hundreds of rejection letters. The standard response from all the UK publishers was that they could not seriously consider the possibility of publishing novels based in the United States… written by an Englishman. He was advised to send his work to American publishers, which he duly did. He received from them equally polite rejection letters, most of which said it was not reasonable for American publishers to publish books set in the US… written by an Englishman. Events have not proved them right.

Ellory finally got an acceptance. His first book, Candlemoth, was published in 2003 and was instantly shortlisted for the Ian Fleming Steel Dagger Award. Five other novels followed, including the one you now hold in your hand. Each won him acclaim in Britain, as much for his prose as his plotting. With A Quiet Belief in Angels he won unparalleled praise and 300,000 readers. It has now been sold to 20 countries… and counting. It has been shortlisted for the Barry Award for Best British Crime Fiction, the Prix Du Polar Europeen Du Point, Le Nouvel Observateur Crime Writing Prize and the Quebec Booksellers' Prize. We think it’s strangely fitting that a publisher called “Overlook” should launch Ellory in America, where the entirety of the story takes place. Yes, we’re a little bit late to the game, but we have come to play.

I am extremely proud to publish R. J. Ellory, and I hope you’ll enjoy A Quiet Belief in Angels as much as all of us at Overlook have. We are going to knock ourselves silly in publishing and marketing this book, and I hope all of you will help us spread the word about this wonderful novel. And please visit our brand new website for A Quiet Belief in Angels.

With all best wishes,
Yours,

Peter Mayer
Publisher
The Overlook Press
pmayer@overlookny.com

Overlook Preview: A DANGEROUS LIASION Explores the DeBeauvoir-Sartre Relationship

Coming this Fall is the revealing new biography of Simone DeBeauvoir and Jean-Paul Sarte, A Dangerous Liasion, by Carole Seymour-Jones. Finally available in the U.S., this is a compelling and fascinating account of what lay behind the legend that this brilliant, tempestuous couple created.

Kirkus Reviews notes: "Appearing in what might be called a "sexography," Sartre, the Nobel-winning existentialist philosopher, and Beauvoir, existentialist and pioneering feminist, cavort with a dizzying panoply of partners. . . A spiraling double-helix of a relationship whose sordid beauty fascinates even as it repels."

Historian Peter de Bolla Reveals the Truth Behind THE FOURTH OF JULY

In a new paperback edition released this month, author and historian Peter de Bolla explores the ritual and mythology of American Independence Day. The Fourth of July and the Founding of America traces the the holiday's history, from 1776 through the Civil War, the Cold War and the present.

Book Editor Colette Bancroft of the St. Petersburg Times takes note: "With July 4 coming up, a new book looks at the nation's past. The Fourth of July and the Founding of America: The Shocking Truth Behind the Birth of Our Country (Overlook) by Peter de Bolla is a historian's take on what the holiday really represents. Think it commemorates the day the Declaration of Independence was signed? Think again!"

Elvis and Michael: Two Kings Who Died Too Young

Hillel Italie of the Associated Press writes insightfully about two Kings - Elvis Presley, King of Rock and Roll, and Michael Jackson, King of Pop, who died tragically yesterday in Los Angeles:

"Michael Jackson didn’t want to be just a superstar. Like the Beatles, he wanted to be the biggest, the king. He wanted to topple the reigning man with the crown, Elvis. In life and in death, there was Elvis. “It’s just so weird. He even married Elvis’ daughter,” said author-music critic Greil Marcus, who wrote at length about Presley in his acclaimed cultural history, Mystery Train. Elvis Presley overdosed — in his bathroom — on prescription drugs in 1977 at 42, his bloated, glazed middle age a cautionary tale to rock stars and other celebrities. Jackson died Thursday at 50, rushed from his Los Angeles home and pronounced dead at the UCLA Medical Center. The death shocked more than surprised. While endless fame seemed to inflate Elvis like helium, Jackson’s fame seemed to scrub the flesh and wear into his bones until you could almost see him shiver. Like Elvis, Jackson was once beautiful, outrageous, a revolutionary without politics who shook down the walls between black and white. He had the hits, the style, the ego, the talent. He was the King of Pop and he needed only to fill in the life: He married Elvis’ daughter. He bought the rights to some of Elvis’ songs. Elvis owned Graceland, its name a symbol for a deliverance the singer prayed for until the end of his life. Jackson had Neverland, a fantasy for a child-man for whom money meant the chance to live in a world of his own. He did, and did not, want to be like Elvis."

Read more about Elvis, Michael, and Lisa Marie in Adam Victor in The Elvis Encyclopedia.

M. Gigi Durham's THE LOLITA EFFECT Now Available in Paperback

Professor M. Gigi Durham's acclaimed study of the media sexualization of young girls will be available in a new paperback edition next week. The Lolita Effect includes a fascinating new introduction from the author in which he discusses the Miley Cyrus/Vanity Fair fiasco that occurred just as The Lolita Effect rolled off the presses and into bookstores.

M.Gigi Durham will discuss The Lolita Effect at the Capitola Book Cafe in Capitola, California on Thursday, July 30, at 7:30pm.

More Love for P.F. Kluge's GONE TOMORROW

Book blogger Terry Weyna has a lot of love for P.F. Kluge's acclaimed novel Gone Tomorrow: "I’ve always loved academic novels. Perhaps it’s because academia was a career choice I reluctantly abandoned in order to go to law school; perhaps it’s because I still would like to get that Ph.D. in English someday; perhaps it’s because my husband is a university professor. Or maybe it’s just because academic novels are set in such an interesting milieu that I just can’t resist, a place where (based upon the fiction I read, not contacts with my husband’s colleagues) backbiting, backstabbing and gossip battle it out with intellectual passions, eccentric personalities and interesting conversation. Most academic novels seem to be satires, but this one is different: it is a sort of rueful love letter to academe. . . I saw much of my own college in this book. I attended a small private college on the western edge of Illinois that I loved with all my heart while I was there, and still love today, though I haven’t been back in decades. This book awakened in me all the joy I took in that place, in its glorious fall colors, its stubbornly tardy springs, the many, many books I read while I was there, how I learned, more than anything, to ask questions (I seemed to graduate with few answers, but oh, I knew so well how to ask questions!). I remembered the professors like Canaris, who would casually mention a book that I should read, a book that would become one of my lifelong favorites; my creative writing teacher, Don Erickson, whose notes on my adolescent scribbling I still have today; drinking beer and eating cheese popcorn at a horrible little bar with the chairmen of the English and Speech Departments and the president of the college, solving all the world’s problems. Kluge perfectly captures the love and joy that my student experiences embody, though from the viewpoint of those for whom I was simply another soul passing through. And he captures a life, too – one different from what the man who came to the campus in 1970 thought he was going to live, but one that was precious in every moment nonetheless. . . .Gone Tomorrow is a marvelous book, a genuine pleasure to read. Few books have reached my heart so completely. Sharply observed, wryly told, with pellucid prose, Gone Tomorrow deserves a wide audience. Kluge is a new author to me, but I will certainly be reading more from his pen, as he toils away at the small Ohio college (Kenyon College, in Gambier, Ohio) where he is a writer in residence."

Alastair Campbell's ALL IN THE MIND: "A Brilliant Debut"

An unabashed RAVE review of Alastair Campbell's All in the Mind, recently posted on Curled Up with a Good Book:

“Martin Sturrock feels as though he’s losing his mind. Surely anyone who felt that way would seek psychiatric treatment. The problem lies in the fact that Martin Sturrock is the best psychiatrist in all of London. What happens when our mental health providers find themselves in the midst of a possible breakdown? Who does the best psychiatrist turn to when his own psyche is in danger? You will walk away from All in the Mind asking these questions and many more. Set in contemporary London, Alastair Campbell’s debut novel raises more questions than it answers in a devastating show of real emotion, perseverance, and a raw glimpse at the turmoil within the human mind.

If you’ve ever passed someone walking into a psychiatrist’s office and wondered about their condition, this is the book for you. There is voyeurism in it, plain and true. We see inside the minds of not only Dr. Sturrock’s patients but Dr. Sturrock himself. All in the Mind is slow-moving at times, but every last word is important to the end. If reading it for no other reason, read it for the end. I literally gasped in surprise when I reached the apex of the storyline. For the last fifty pages alone, the novel is worth every second it takes to read it.

That said, if you’re the type of reader who needs to see every last conflict sorted, every storyline tied up in a neat little bow, maybe All in the Mind isn’t for you. It will indeed leave you with more questions than answers, more to think about than when you started. This is not a light read, not one that will leave you feeling all sparkly and new inside when it’s over. It’s the kind that will make you call up your loved ones and tell them how much they mean to you, maybe even look inside yourself to see if you have any of your own demons to face to avoid a plunge of your own.

Bottom line: All in the Mind is a brilliant debut. Campbell is an exceedingly talented author who knows how to weave a story, and his weave is tight; that kind of quality takes time to build up. The slow and easy pace is rewarded with a few moments of utter shock, moments that Campbell does amazingly well. Perhaps one of the best things about All in the Mind is that it doesn’t fit into any niche at all. It’s all on its own, and it stands out beautifully. Campbell’s storytelling is beyond reproach. It’s good to know there is still fiction that can make us all think."

Allan Tannenbaum's NEW YORK IN THE 70s on Display at Not Fade Away Gallery

Only one week left to see Allan Tannenbaum's spectacular photo exhibition New York in the 70s at Not Fade Away gallery in Manhattan. This amazing show features rare shots of musicians, artists, celebrities, politicians, athletes, and an amazing gallery of 24 hour party people. The companion book, New York in the 70s, is available at the gallery and in bookstores everywhere.

P.G. Wodehouse's Golf Classic THE HEART OF A GOOF in Newsday

In honor of today's opening round of the U.S. Open, Allen Barra rounds-up classic books on golf in Long Island's Newsday. Making the cut is P.G. Wodehouse's The Heart of a Goof, available in Overlook's beautiful Collector's Wodehouse series: "You don't necessarily have to be a lover of his Jeeves and Wooster novels to enjoy Wodehouse's golf stories. In fact, you don't even have to love golf. This collection of nine stories told by "The Oldest Member" from his comfy chair on the terrace of the ninth hole, includes such laugh-making characters as Evangeline (described as a "golfing giggler"), Rollo Podmarsh (who, even though he thinks he's been poisoned, still doggedly finishes his round) and Rodney Spelvin (who finds new inspiration for his verse when he discovers "the Scottish game"). Sample quote from the opening story: "It was a morning when all nature shouted 'Fore!' The breeze, as it blew gently up from the valley, seemed to bring hope and cheer, whispering of chip shots holed and brassies landing squarely on the meat."

Author Joe Bennett Discovers WHERE UNDERPANTS COME FROM

Shelf Awareness raves about Where Underpants Come From: From Cotton Fields to Checkout Counters--Travels Through the New China and Into the New Global Economy:

"Joe Bennett looks from a pair of underpants to their price tag and back again. He is puzzled that anything made in China and transported thousands of miles to New Zealand could sell for 87 cents and be so nice. In dogged determination to understand, he decides to "trace all the constituent parts of the underpants to their source," and covers a vast amount of territory in the process. He journeys to Urumqi (in Xinjiang province in China's far west), where long-staple cotton grows, is harvested, baled and turned into thread; he visits Quanzhou (in Fujian province, a two-hour flight south of Shanghai), where the fine cotton thread is knitted into fabric and made into underpants; he drops by the port of Shanghai to watch technicians pack goods into containers ready to ship, and more.

At every stage of the manufacturing and distribution process, Bennett finds rampant entrepreneurial mania. As if the instinct to do business was unleashed with a vengeance in China after 40 years of Mao, he writes, "While the corporate West salivates over the Chinese market with its billion potential customers, the corporate Chinese salivate over the Western market with its billion actual customers."

Much more than an intrepid investigator reporting how his underpants found their way to his body, Bennett is a delightful guide on an off-the-beaten-track-tour of the New China. Other visitors to Shanghai would hightail it to Pudong (in 1990 the site of vegetable gardens and pig farms) to gawk at the array of flashy high-rises rivaling Manhattan; Bennett treks out to Tangshan Free Trade Area, Shanghai's new container ship port, the biggest in the world. In Bangkok, while Western tourists troll through the sex emporia, he searches for the elusive tree that produced rubber for the elasticized waistband of his underpants.

Because of his wildly idiosyncratic itinerary, the restaurants he patronizes and the people he meets are far from run-of-the-mill: enjoy his every bite of a freshly killed millipede; make the acquaintance of a whole slew of previously uncelebrated factory workers, engineers and entrepreneurs. The good time he has on his adventures from one end of China to the other is infectious. Of all that he sees, though, nothing captures his imagination like Chinese driving habits. "China doesn't have motorbike gangs. China is a motorbike gang," he says with veiled admiration of those who drive like paramedics and regard rear-view mirrors as purely decorative."--John McFarland

Shelf Talker: A delightful and informative tour of the New China through the lens of the fancy underpants of a very funny New Zealander.

Alan Furst Calls THE MIERNIK DOSSIER as a "Spy Tale Unsurpassed"

Charles McCarry's The Miernik Dossier is chosen by novelist Alan Furst as one of the Five Best spy tales ever written in The Wall Street Journal: "With The Miernik Dossier, Charles McCarry introduced us to Paul Christopher, the brilliant and sensitive CIA officer who would appear in a series of perhaps more widely known novels, such as The Secret Lovers and Second Sight. The book itself is the “dossier” in question: the reports and memoranda filed by a quintet of mutually mistrustful espionage agents, including a seductive Hungarian princess and a seemingly hapless Polish scientist, who undertake to drive from Switzerland to the Sudan in a Cadillac. It is a travelogue that bristles with suspicion and deception—but don’t listen to me, listen to a certain highly acclaimed spy novelist who reviewed McCarry’s literary debut: “The level of reality it achieves is high indeed; it is superbly constructed, wholly convincing, and displays insights that are distinctly refreshing. A new and very welcome talent.” Good call, Eric Ambler."

More Praise for A.D. 381 by Charles Freeman

George M. Eberhart, senior editor of American Libraries, offers a critique of Charles Freeman's A.D. 381: Heretics, Pagans, and the Dawn of a Monotheistic State: "A.D. 381 explores the crucial year of 381, when the Council of Constantinople ratified the edict of Roman Emperor Theodosius I, who decreed in 380 that the Nicene version of the Christian Trinity would become state religion in the east. . . Freeman points out that the Council's decision was far from democratic and in fact was a politically expedient move by the Nicene bishops to extend their power as Theodosius attempted to patch the cracks in the empire. This seemingly obscure decision had the effect of stifling free discussion of a spiritual matters and scientific knowledge for centuries to come and ushered in an orthodoz partnership of church and state that lasted until the Renaissance." - College and Research Library News, June 2009.

IN THE FOOTSTEPS OF ABRAHAM: The Holy Land in Different Hues

Robert Leiter of the Jewish Exponent takes a look at In the Footsteps of Abraham, by Richard Hardiman and Helen Speelman, recently published by Overlook: "At the turn of the last century, travel to what was then called the Holy Land began to become a distinct growth industry (as promotional types like to put it these days). This was the period, of course, when Mark Twain was one of many Innocents Abroad, and his descriptions of the terrain and the people he saw there have been quoted ad infinitum ever since. The significant swell in visitors -- and at least one of its consequences -- is what Richard Hardiman and Helen Speelman's In the Footsteps of Abraham, a thick, well-produced coffee-table book published by the Overlook Press, takes as its starting point.

To satisfy a need among the upscale individuals flooding the region, photos displaying its natural beauty were taken in great quantity -- the most popular being those locales with a connection to the Bible. The major producer of such images was the Matson Photo Agency, made up of members of the American Colony, a group, we're told, of Christian expatriates. All of the scenes reproduced in the book are hand-tinted versions of a collection of glass lantern slides, which now reside at the Joods Historisch Museum in Amsterdam. According to Joël J. Cahen of the museum, it is one of the "few fully hand-colored sets in existence, and certainly one of the largest." Helen Speelman's grandfather, Arie Speelman, a devout Christian, commissioned the hand coloring of 1,200 photos on glass plates, a labor-intensive undertaking. The elder Speelman then traveled around Holland using his extensive collection plates to give lantern slide lectures about these foreign and still exotic locales.

What is most wonderful about the images reproduced in the book is that, for those who have been to Israel often, the sites captured have both an exactitude -- in terms of attention to detail (even in the broad landscapes) -- while the soft pastel colors that appear to have been so effortlessly superimposed add a dreamy haze to the unmistakable reality. It's just the right touch -- the perfect nostalgic overlay that makes you long to get back to Israel as soon as possible."

Meet Rachel DeWoskin, author of REPEAT AFTER ME, at Upcoming Readings

Meet Rachel DeWoskin, reading and signing from her new novel Repeat After Me, at Barnes & Noble at Boston University, 660 Beacon Street, Tuesday, June 9, 2009, at 7pm. (617-267-8484).

Rachel will also be in Washington, D.C. on Thursday, June 16, at Books-A-Million, 11 Dupont Circle N.W. (2pm), and on Wednesday, June 24, at Barnes and Noble, 82nd & Broadway, NYC (7pm).

Rachel DeWoskin spent her twenties in China as a consultant, writer, and the unlikely star of a nighttime soap opera called “Foreign Babes in Beijing.” Her memoir of those years, Foreign Babes in Beijing, has been published in six countries and is being developed as a feature film by Paramount Pictures. Her new novel Repeat After Me, is about a young American ESL teacher, a troubled Chinese radical, and their unexpected New York romance. Rachel has a BA in English from Columbia and an MFA in poetry from Boston University. Her first collection of poems, called The Caretaker’s Daughter, is about girls (including her) in the Missouri Ozarks. Rachel lives in NYC and Beijing.

Today is Best Friends Day!

From Irene S. Levine, author of Overlook's forthcoming Best Friends Forever: Surviving a Breakup with Your Best Friend, comes this this hopeful blog post: "Set your cell phone alarm, mark your calendar, and write it across the top of your hand in red ink. Get ready for Best Friends Day (BFD), sponsored by DoSomething.org and BFF Entertainment. The two groups have declared June 8th, 2009 a national day of celebration for best friends to do something together to change the world. What can two best friends do on that day to have fun, show affection for each other, and do something that has a larger impact by helping others?" Check it out on Irene's FracturedFriendship blog.

Daniel Kalder, author of STRANGE TELESCOPES, Profiled in Austin American-Statesman

Daniel Kalder, author of Strange Telescopes, is profiled by Jeff Salamon in the Austin American-Statesman. Here's a brief excerpt:

"In 1996, Kalder left for Russia to work as an English tutor. He figured he'd stay a year or so, but he wound up falling in love with Moscow and lived there for a decade. "You just see this entire society where nothing's fixed; everything is broken down," he says. "Something is being born and no one knows what it is." The two books Kalder has written about the former Soviet Union, Lost Cosmonaut and Strange Telescopes, have vaguely science-fictional titles, and he speaks of the fallen empire in distinctly fantastical terms, calling it a "parallel reality" and a "shadow universe." So when Kalder decided to turn himself into a journalist, he didn't much resemble the traditional model of the foreign correspondent who spends a few years filing dispatches and then writes a sober-minded tome about his host country.

"I lived there for almost 10 years, and I don't recognize Russia in that writing," he says. "It tends to be very, very kind of ponderous, very tragic, very chin-stroking, almost pious."
By contrast, what Kalder saw in the wreckage of post-Soviet Russia was something at once funny, tragic and perverse: a wild variety of realities auditioning for the 21st century.

Strange Telescopes, which was released last month in the U.S., tells the story of four of Russia's fervent believers: Vadim Mikhailov, the self-declared leader of a supposed army of "Diggers" who live in a subterranean kingdom that lies beneath Moscow's streets; Edward, a young man who wants to revive the culture of exorcism that was once central to the Russian Orthodox Church; Nikolai Sutyagin, who tried to build the world's tallest wooden skyscraper; and the book's most compelling character, Vissarion Christ, a self-proclaimed messiah who has established a base for his religious movement in remote Siberia. Unlike the other three, Vissarion isn't a failure; he has 4,000 followers. "For me, he was the greatest dreamer of all, because I entered his dream," Kalder says of the weeks he spent among Vissarion's cult.

Peter Mayer Talks to Marketplace About Fiction and the Economic Crisis

Overlook Publisher Peter Mayer spoke to Ashley Milne-Tyte on Marketplace about the impact the current economic crisis may - or may not - have on contemporary fiction. From Steinbeck's Grapes of Wrath to Tom Wolfe's Bonfire of the Vanities to Little Dorritt, the classic Charles Dickens novel - the panelists discuss "financial fiction" in this fascinating report. Listen to the interview on the Marketplace/American Public Media website.

Overlook Preview: OPERATION KRONSTADT

Coming soon to bookstores everywhere is the riveting Operation Kronstadt, the true story of honor, espionage, and the thrilling rescue of Britain's greatest spy - The Man with a Hundred Faces.

Written by Harry Ferguson, former MI6 officer and undercover agent, Operation Kronstadt uncovers a truly dramatic story from the Russian Revolution involving a daring rescue attempt and a “mission impossible” against the best defended naval target in Russia. Set in Spring of 1919, when the power struggle between former Tsarists and Bolsheviks hung in the balance, the only British agent in Russia is trapped and in mortal danger. Mansfield Cumming (alias “the first C”) dreams up an audacious—probably suicidal—plan to rescue him, and a young naval officer is sent with a specially selected team into the jaws of the Soviet fleet. This is the remarkable true story of the spy Paul Dukes (the only MI6 officer to be knighted for work in the field) and Gus Agar, whose extraordinary escapade won him the Victoria Cross.

Peter Quinn's classic novel of Civil War New York, BANISHED CHILDREN OF EVE, Read at the Irish Repertory Theater in NYC

Tomorrow, June 5, the Irish Repertory Theater in New York will stage a reading of playwright Kelly Younger's adaptation of Peter Quinn's Banished Children of Eve, available in paperback from Overlook.

Directed by Ciaran O'Reilly, the reading of Banished Children of Eve will be presented as the culmination of a two-day developmental workshop. The play will be read by Fred Applegate (Happiness, Young Frankenstein), David Wilson Barnes (Becky Shaw, The Lieutenant of Inishmore), Muiris Crowley (The Yeats Project), Mark Hartman* (Avenue Q, Finian's Rainbow), Michelle Hurst ("SherryBaby," The Story), Nicola Murphy (The Yeats Project), Aaron Shaw ("In Treatment") and Tracie Thoms* (10 Things To Do Before I Die, Rent).

Set in New York City during the Civil War years, Banished Children of Eve echoes with Stephen Foster songs and the disparate voices of immigrants, minstrel actors, hucksters, and domestic servants whose lives all intersect. As tensions surrounding emigration, war, and racial strife reach a flashpoint and rush toward the fatal Draft Riots, the characters are drawn together in a net of violence and fear, longing and hope.

The reading is open to public. Friday, June 5, 3pm, Irish Repertory Theater, 132 West 22nd Street, New York.

More Praise for Allan Tannenbaum's Look Back at NEW YORK IN THE 70s

Allan Tannenbaum's New York in the 70s exhibition and book is the talk of the town - featured in The New York Times Book Review Summer Reading issue, and also in Women's Wear Daily:

"PICTURE THIS: Nostalgia was in the air at the Not Fade Away Gallery on Thursday night, where New Yorkers of a certain age (and some of a younger one) gathered to celebrate former SoHo Weekly News photographer Allan Tannenbaum’s new exhibit “New York in the 70s,” a genre-spanning selection of pictures culled from the lensman’s recently re-released book of the same name, on view through June 25. “The Seventies in New York was a time where basically anything went,” explained Tannenbaum, taking a pause from signing books and greeting guests including music writer Danny Fields, photographer Bob Gruen, James Wolcott and Patti Smith Group guitarist Lenny Kaye. “It was a very hedonistic period, which I’m not sure exists in this day and age anymore.”

To be sure, you’d be hard-pressed today to find a rock star willing to strip down to Skivvies for an impromptu shoot in an inflate-a-pool (see Tannenbaum’s “Patti Smith Soho Rooftop, NYC, 1974,”) or a world-famous couple allowing a newspaper photographer in on the most banal, private moments (as John Lennon and Yoko Ono did over several months in 1980). “These were one-on-one things,” Tannenbaum said of shooting famous faces, the results of which hung alongside his photos of seminal protests, parades, happenings and late nights at Studio 54 and Plato’s Retreat. All of which begged the question, Is there a trick to being at the right place at the right time? “I think the word is the ‘moment’ — you’re looking for a moment to happen. You have to pay attention. A lot of it is just understanding the scene, knowing where you are and being ready [for] when the moment happens,” Tannenbaum said, a moment before Patrick McMullan tapped him on the shoulder. “I hate to interrupt,” said McMullan, an old friend, “but I have the famous photographer Lynn Goldsmith, [Allan’s] contemporary, to bring over.” After smiling with Tannenbaum for a few McMullan shots, Goldsmith, who’s known for her portraits of musicians like Sting and Bruce Springsteen, offered her take on the show: “The interesting thing about Allan’s work, why it’s so good, is because it covers not just music or entertainment, but it’s like the title of his book — it’s the times. It’s very exciting to see [his work] all together in one place in that it’s really what life was like in the Seventies.” — Nick Axelrod

Milton Glaser Featured in Chronogram Magazine

The life and work of Milton Glaser is the subject of a lengthy profile in Chronogram. Reporter Lynn Woods talked to the "graphic guru/design god" last month in New York. Milton's latest book is the highly provocative Drawing is Thinking, and the documentary "To Inform and Delight" is currently in theaters across the country. Make no mistake about it: We ♥ Milton Glaser!

Max Frei's THE STRANGER Reviewed in Bookslut

Our friend Colleen Mondor at Bookslut has posted a fantastic review of Max Frei's The Stranger: Max Frei’s The Stranger is an international bestseller that took Russia by storm. Mad curiosity over what literary sensation the Russians love was enough to make me want to read this book. Apparently the Russians like fantasy -- really well written fantasy -- and The Stranger is a great blend of that genre and hardboiled mystery with some thrills and It’s a Mad Mad Mad World fish out of water comedy thrown in. It’s an utterly original title that any fan of the surreal (adult or teen) will enjoy.

Max Frei, the same as the author, is a “twenty-something loser” who is drifting through life with nothing exceptional to share other than odd sleeping patters. At night he is a chronic insomniac while during the day sleep comes with ease. He remembers his dreams with deep clarity and many times finds himself in a world with an old world European sensibility where he enjoys wonderful meals at a certain sidewalk café and chats with a man named Sir Juffin. As the book opens Max discovers that he can travel to this parallel world, and live in the “City of Echo.” Sir Juffin makes him a member of the Department of Absolute Order, a group of secret agents tasked with solving magical crimes. It is here that Max’s nocturnal habits are much needed and he finds himself battling all manner of demonic creatures and wizards gone bad along with the rest of the department. Max makes friends, proves capable of great bravery and even become Death after a mix-up with some major magic. While all of the mysteries are serious (even the one with magically animated evil dolls ala Chucky), Frei’s humor comes through with every word. Readers will find themselves enjoying Max’s adventures without ever fearing for him or the denizens of Echo. There are fatalities but also romance (secret agent style) and the surprising domestication of cats and swimming in multiple bathtubs. Frei excels at his world building and brings Echo alive in the best combination of 19th century Austria and futuristic steampunk delights. Frei has a series of books set in Echo and hopefully there will be more of Max’s adventures to come for English readers. This is irresistible reading. He’s smart, savvy and funny; an everyman hero we can all believe in."

Overlook Celebrates NEW YORK IN THE 70s with Photographer Allan Tannenbaum at the Not Fade Away Gallery

Over six hundred of our closest friends packed the Not Fade Away gallery last Thursday to celebrate Allan Tannenbaum's new exhibition and book launch for New York in the 70s. Media Bistro's GalleyCat and George Whipple of New York One reported on the scene, and Patrick McMullan snapped some great party photos. In the photo here, Details writer Ian Daly, Village People cowboy Randy Jones, our own Vida Engstrand, and GalleyCat's Ron Hogan attempt to spell "YMCA."