We have two last-minute additions to July’s batch of Early Reviewer books, and some scandalous book news to report.

The new books
The new additions are American Wife by Curtis Sittenfeld, and Hurry Down Sunshine by Michael Greenberg. So go run and request them!

The buzz
American Wife has been generating a lot of buzz lately (see Wonkette, Radar). It’s a work of fiction, loosely based on Laura Bush’s life. This morning, Maureen Dowd wrote about it in The New York Times, saying

“It’s the sort of novel Laura Bush might curl up with in the White House solarium if it were not about Laura Bush. It would be interesting to hear how that lover of fiction feels about being the subject of fiction.”

Another July Early Reviewer book, The Winds of Tara is also buzz-worthy. The Winds of Tara is the unauthorized sequel to Gone with the Wind—so unauthorized that (according to Wikipedia) copyright holders blocked US distribution of the book and bookstores had to pull it from the shelves. You’ll note that it’s being offered to Early Reviewers only to Australians, by an Australian publisher, Fontaine Press.

Labels: early reviewers, LTER