items, various and sundry

I guess I should have mentioned on Monday that I mailed out all the contributor, review and subscriber copies (for those who didn't pick them up in Madison) of Say...why aren't we crying? (which should have a weblink to order soon, but you can always email me or the isthisacatAThotmail.com address to order or subscribe). So, keep an eye on the mail. If you'd like to get on our reviewer list and aren't currently, you can also follow the instructions in that parenthetical above. It's a beautiful issue chock full of excellent things and just to remind you of that, here's the TOC once again:

Short Stories
"Black Fish" by Janet Chui
"Til the Wildness Cried Aloud" by Jude-Marie Green
"Tempest in a Teacup" by Pam McNew
"This is a cute boy graveyard" by Jana Phipps
"The Better Life" by Ezra Pines
"Which Apes a Soul" by Mark Rich
"The Lethe Man" by David Schwartz
"Beholden" by Joe Sutliff Sanders (reprinted from Limestone)
"Featherweight" by Sonya Taaffe
"Laugh, Clown, Laugh" by Mikal Trimm

One Act Play
"Robert's Rules of Order" by Terry Bisson

Comic
"Why Aren't We Crying?" by E.L. Chen (Elaine also did the art and design for the cover of this issue)

Poems
"Casket of the Ages" by Bruce Boston
"Les Brown's Band of Renown" by Maureen McHugh
"Quirk" by Maurice Oliver
"Nets the Si'ze of Souls" by Michael Szewczyk (otherwise known as The Text Beak)

And did I mention we made all the contributors do their bios in first person this time? EEEvil. We are. So, buy the damn beautiful thing already and help us recoup our costs. We're not raking it in here, you know.

In other non-news, I am choosing to ignore certain book talk that could only be described as Stupid, Stupid, Stupid on Slate's book club this week concerning a certain New York Times' bestselling book Shaken & Stirred has professed its love for many times. I suggest you boycott as well, unless you want to be filled with rage and pity. (CUTESINESS?) Grrrrr.

I'll take two slices, whether it's regulation or not. Berlusconi sets law on what constitutes a true Napolitan pizza.

Eduardo Pagnani is the owner of Pizzeria Brandi, where, he said, the pizza Margherita was invented in 1889 and named after Queen Margherita of the House of Savoy. He said that pizza may be named for nobles, but that it has always been more about the people.

Indeed, here in famously passionate Naples, where garbage mounts in fetid mounds and moped drivers zoom the wrong way up one-way streets, there seems a certain pride in ignoring the new law — of course, only after it has been passed.

"We'll start a mini-federation," Mr. Pagnani said, laughing. "We'll be outlaws."

The NYTimes also has a nice piece rounding up viewings of the Transit of Venus from all over the place.

Not to mention the story on the Celebrity Assistants' Club.

A Madison paper wraps up nuttiness at BEA, and talks about nonnuttiness involving Sean Stewart, but tragically neglects to mention PERFECT CIRCLE.

But that's not to say that there weren't some real gems to be found on the convention's outer rings. Authors Sean Stewart and Jordan Weisman, who created the cult classic Internet game based on the movie "A.I." in 2001, were shopping around mock-ups of a fabulous-looking new project called "Cathy's Game." The book looks for all the world like a high school girl's diary, complete with talented doodles and drawings in the margins.

Packaged along with the book is a plastic bag full of authentic-looking goodies, including letters, postcards, a passport, even the box to a model airplane kit. By going back and forth between the diary and the artifacts, the reader can piece together the solution to a mystery. One hopes they found the right kind of publisher to do such a project justice.

And, finally, finally, finally, from today's Publisher's Lunch (also congratulations, Mary Anne!):

From Publisher's Lunch -- this actually sounds great to me: Bestselling YA author Francesca Lia Block's first adult novel NECKLACE OF KISSES, in which Weetzie Bat turns 40, and facing a mid-life crisis, escapes to a pink Beverly Hills hotel where magical creatures--a fawn bell-hop, a dress-knitting spider, a captured mermaid--help her regain the magic of her life, to Alison Callahan at Harper, by Lydia Wills at Writers and Artists Group International (world).

I'd heard that Block had sold an adult novel, but not that it was about Weetzie Bat's midlife crisis. I'm extremely excited about this, and think it sounds fabulous. I adored the Weetzie Bat books (still do), and have been not quite as dazzled with the last few things I read by Block, so this is hopefully a return to form. Or an expansion of form even. All to the good.

A day when you can foresee the return of childish things is a good one.

worm: "Portland, Oregon," Loretta Lynn with Jack White (how much do I love this? a pitcher's worth.)

check out: Whatever you want to.

namecheck: Ron "Link Maestro" Hogan