Tuesday, July 31, 2007
Celebrity biography

I've had to say no to a unique launch party for a celebrity biography on Thursday (out of the country). It's unique because the average age of the invitees is somewhere in the eighties and the main tipple will be tea. And it's unique because this celebrity biography is about a not very famous person who deserves to be more famous as opposed to the normal book about a famous person who has little to say and not much talent.

The biographee is Alice Herz Sommer (do listen to this Woman's Hour interview) and the book is A Garden of Eden in Hell.

A Garden of Eden in Hell

Alice was born in 1903 (work it out) and is still going strong. She suffered in a Nazi concentration camp but continued to play piano throughout the ordeal. She is still playing today and you can purchase a CD of her music from reinhard.piechocki@t.online.de .

I doubt that sales of this book will exceed those of Wayne Rooney, Jordan et al but somehow I feel it's a little more deserving.

Yesterday saw the annual Science v Nature cricket match which Nature duly won. If only the England cricket team were as reliable. Incidentally, Nature took the first three wickets with the first three balls of the Science innings. Is that one for next year's Wisden?

#    |  Comments [6]  | 
7/31/2007 10:43:26 AM (GMT Standard Time, UTC+00:00)
I heartily endorse your feelings for "A Garden of Eden in Hell", which is prominently displayed in my shop window.

Insiders waffle on about the internet, and marketing, yet titles like this one, and for instance "A Year in the Life of an English Meadow", are a handseller's dream and the reason why real bookshops will always outsell the virtual world for many special titles.
Clive Keeble
7/31/2007 1:23:12 PM (GMT Standard Time, UTC+00:00)
I should like to read this book but £19 is too expensive.

Clive Keeble's customers may hand over that kind of money without a second thought, but my generation of bookbuyers tend to be more parsimonious, even when not hard up.

Anne Weale
7/31/2007 2:27:07 PM (GMT Standard Time, UTC+00:00)
Anne

Many of my customers are your generation plus ; thankfully they don't expect 1960's book prices whilst often achieving 2007 prices for their houses.

Alice Herz Sommer showed tremendous strength of character to survive during the Holocaust : her story is as important and relative today as it was in 1945. £19 too expensive for such a biography ; Anne, we most certainly live in very different worlds.

My customers would go without any frivolous 21st century luxuries so as to be able to afford this book at full cover.
Clive Keeble
7/31/2007 4:19:36 PM (GMT Standard Time, UTC+00:00)
Clive

When I buy new books, they come from independent bookshops rather than online sources or from supermarkets. But all my life I've bought a lot of books from second hand shops, starting at Thomas Crowe's in Norwich as a schoolgirl with meagre pocket money.

As I don't go in for "frivolous 21st century luxuries", it's not a question of going without A to buy B.

A key factor in my resistance to high prices is that I have shelves crowded with re-readable old books, for example sculptor Sir Charles Wheeler's excellent autobiography which I blogged about on July 26.
Anne Weale
8/1/2007 5:58:20 PM (GMT Standard Time, UTC+00:00)
Your blog post is right on target. I hope she gets a lot of recognition and can educate and inspire people through her story. Is this book going to be published in the US? I would love to read it without having to order from the UK and pay outrageous shipping charges.
Ellen Gerstein
8/17/2007 11:29:55 AM (GMT Standard Time, UTC+00:00)
Ellen

I see that Amazon is offering the book in the USA - http://www.amazon.com/Garden-Eden-Hell-Melissa-Muller/dp/0230528023/ref=sr_1_1/103-0219117-3498223?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1187350167&sr=8-1
I hope this helps.

Richard
richard charkin