Sponsored by Algonquin / Workman Publishing
Maddy Donaldo, homeless at twenty, has made a family of sorts in Golden Gate Park. When she witnesses the murder of a young homeless boy and is seen by the perpetrator, her life is upended. Everyone from the police to the dead boy’s parents want to talk to her. As adults pressure Maddy to give up her secrets and reunite with her own family, she must decide whether she wants to stay lost or be found. Set against the backdrop of a radically changing San Francisco, this debut follows the lives of those who depend on makeshift homes and communities.
Welcome to Check Your Shelf. To share a little bit of good news (for once), my colleagues and I successfully hosted a live virtual Halloween-themed trivia program! It took multiple platforms and three people working behind the scenes to make it run smoothly, but it was a lot of fun!
Let’s jump into some news.
Libraries & Librarians
News Updates
Investigators are searching for a person who intentionally tossed a burning newspaper inside an official ballot box, which was located in front of the Baldwin Park (CA) Library. *ALL THE RAGE EMOJIS*
Worth Reading
How Little Free Libraries fight racism.
Librarianship in the time of COVID.
COVID took away our family’s second home: the library.
Book Adaptations in the News
Emma Roberts is producing a teen series based on V.E. Schwab’s short story, First Kill.
Sadly, HBO Max is no longer moving ahead with their adaptation of Americanah.
Apple TV+ has halted production on Sarah Perry’s The Essex Serpent.
Showtime is no longer moving forward with James Patterson’s and Bill Clinton’s The President is Missing.
Hulu is adapting Charles Yu’s novel Interior Chinatown for television.
Gabrielle Union’s production company has optioned the rights to The Care and Feeding of Ravenously Hungry Girls.
Ava DuVernay is directing the Netflix adaptation of Caste: The Origins of Our Discontent.
Showtime revives Dexter as a limited series, AND Michael C. Hall is coming back to play everyone’s favorite serial killer!
A24 has snagged TV rights to Bryan Washington’s novel Memorial.
Angelina Jolie is in talks to star in the film adaptation of Lisa Genova’s Every Note Played, alongside Christoph Waltz.
Dean Koontz’s Devoted is being adapted for TV.
I Know What You Did Last Summer is headed to Amazon, but let’s be real: nothing will ever beat the mid-90’s star power and overall horror movie cheese of the original.
Reba McEntire is starring in NBC’s new series adaptation of Fannie Flagg’s Fried Green Tomatoes at the Whistle Stop Cafe.
Here’s a first look at the upcoming Bridgerton series, based on the romance novels by Julia Quinn.
Trailers for Hillbilly Elegy, Firefly Lane, The Flight Attendant, and The Underground Railroad.
Books & Authors in the News
The Bolton/DoJ drama continues as John Bolton insists on a jury trial, claiming he didn’t break any laws with the publication of The Room Where It Happened.
Author Jeffrey Toobin has been suspended from the New Yorker and will take time off from CNN after a “Zoom call incident.” (Content warning for unexpected/unwanted public exposure)
Bill Bryson says that he’s retiring from the writing life.
Ian Rankin talks about how he became a suspect in a real-life case while researching his first novel.
This five-year-old from Georgia wrote a book about getting through the pandemic for other kids. I’m such a sucker for tiny children writing their own books!
Numbers & Trends
August bookstore sales dropped 30.7% from last year, although overall sales for the first 9 months of the year were up 6.4%.
Award News
The winners of the Inaugural Ignyte Awards have been announced!
The winners of the 2020 Anthony Awards have been announced as well.
Here are the shortlists for the Baillie Gifford Prize and the TS Eliot Prize.
Voting for the 2020 Not the Booker Prize is officially up and running.
The Ford and Mellon Foundations have teamed up to award $1 million in grant money to 20 Disability Futures Fellows across a wide variety of creative fields.
Bookish Curiosities & Miscellaneous
A first collection of Shakespeare’s plays sells for almost $10 million.
On the Riot
This reader pens an ode to the libraries they’ll miss when they move.
If you don’t already have too many tote bags, take a look at these library-themed totes! (And you’re all a bunch of liars if you say you don’t have too many tote bags!)
What’s the science behind reading?
Celebrate good news this weekend, however you can. I’ll catch you all next week!
—Katie McLain Horner, @kt_librarylady on Twitter.