Back to Basics

Every once in a while I realize how far I've strayed from the original mission of this blog: To chronicle my shameless self-promotion.

Today I'm back on task, with a handful of media hits to report.  They came about thanks to two posts I put up on my Classics Rock! blog yesterday--one about J.D. Salinger, the other about Howard Zinn, both of whom passed away on Wednesday.

Ron Charles at The Washington Post, who haunts Twitter, generously devoted a tweet to the Salinger post, then devoted another to my piece about Zinn.

Today's edition of Shelf Awareness, the publishing industry newsletter, featured both posts in their lead news story, which was about Salinger.

CNBC.com's "Bullish on Books" blog included Classics Rock! in a roundup of Salinger coverage.

Just a short while ago, the New York Times "Paper Cuts" blog also posted both links.

And another widely read industry newsletter, GalleyCat, featured them as well.

I should also mention a near miss--a low brush with media coverage.  Earlier this week I had the chance to be considered for a segment on a national network morning show.  They were looking for parents of teens who could talk about the challenges of raising teens in today's world.  Since my daughters now spend most of their time away from home and my son is about to get his driver's license, I didn't think that my family was exactly the demographic they were looking for.  Plus I knew my wife would flat out refuse to do it and my kids would never speak to me again.  When I got back to the producer to say we probably weren't right for the segment, she said that was fine, because the concept had completely changed: Now they were looking for a family where a college grad had moved back home with the parents and "isn't budging."  She specified that they were looking for "exasperated parents," which strikes me as a redundancy.  I told her we weren't right for that one either.

Happy Bloomsday

Today is Bloomsday, a day to celebrate James Joyce's novel Ulysses and its protagonist, Leopold Bloom. The entire story takes place on June 16th, 1904. Bloomsday is typically celebrated with public readings of the novel and a tremendous amount of drinking.

I must have mash-ups on the mind, but I'd like to publish an edition of Ulysses that injects all the monsters and nymphs and sorceresses from The Odyssey into the novel--not metaphorically, but literally. It would be great to suddenly have a giant cyclops striding down O'Connell Street, gobbling up Dubliners by the handful. Ideally this would occur in Episode Four, just as Leopold Bloom is defecating in the outhouse, which would put our hero at a particular disadvantage. Wouldn't this be a great mash-up? Wouldn't this generate a terrific lawsuit?

Meanwhile, in honor of Bloomsday, I've posted a list of songs relating to Joyce and Ulysses over on Classics Rock! It's already been featured in the publishing industry newsletter Shelf Awareness, tweeted by Ron Charles of The Washington Post, and Facebooked by Deirdre Donahue of USA Today. Happy Bloomsday!

Catcher in the Rye Got Caught

I'm pleased to report that the list of Catcher in the Rye-related songs posted on my Classics Rock! site last Friday drew some attention. Gloria McDonough-Taub at CNBC featured it in the Bullish on Books blog on the network's web site, and gave it a shout-out on Twitter as well. Ron Charles at the Washington Post also tweeted about it. And Deirdre Donahue of USA Today posted it on Facebook.

I guess it pays to have two blogs. Perhaps I should start a third....