I’m at the Blue State, the liberally named cafe in the heart of Yale Country. Every kid in here is behind a computer.  I wonder if they’re doing school work, or on-line shopping, or having  e-sex with an assistant professor, which I suspect is the case with the girl on my right who is wearing the equivalent of pajamas (comfy!), Uggs (why?),  and knows how to use a tube of cherry lip gloss.  I am working on a proposal that hopes  someday to grow up and become a book. The yellow stick in my hand is a pencil.

Just a side note, I am usually a superb parallel parker, but for some reason today I got all tense parking in front of Blue State where three guys were standing. And I fucked it all up. One guy even said, “Do you want me to park that for you?” Was that necessary? Then I stayed in the car and did email on my Blackberry until they left. I know, one minute a power agent, the next a major pussy.

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5:40 Metronorth to New York. The sky still darkened by clouds, pale blue off in the distance. I sit in the last seat of the last car every day. I nurse a medium decaf with skim milk from St. Dunkin’s. And I think about the exciting day I have ahead of me in publishing.

Every day, in the  aisle in front of me sits a man with a gray-haired crew cut, his knees pressed up against the seat in front of him. In his lap, a pile of newspapers. With hawk-like concentration, he circles and underlines with a blue Bic. Then he tears, folds, and inserts the articles into a deep pocket in his trenchcoat. On the platform at Grand Central, he will hover over the recycling bin snatching newspapers from commuters as they leave the station.

Now, I have to read Les’ memoir.

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Last night at the Mid-Manhattan Library, 100 or so people were gathered to hear a panel discuss paranormal mysteries. My client Stacy Horn was among the panelists and, frankly, she kicked ass. Am I partial? Besides the fact that everyone there seemed to have descended from the Starship Enterprise or the Good Ship Lollipop (okay, I know, shouldn’t sterotype the kids in the Paranormal Club), but how could you not love a woman who wrote a book called Waiting for My Cats to Die.? Who followed that up with a wrenching investigation into some of New York’s grisliest unsolved cold cases in The Restless Sleep. And who then spent a year in the basement at Duke University, home to  the oldest parapsychology lab in the country, where she combed through every dusty box to tell the story of the men and women who devoted their lives to proving the existence of life after death in her latest, Unbelievable.

Here are some of my favorite outtakes from the Q&A:

“What says Christmas more than werewolves?”

“A lot of people hear voices and not just mentally ill people.”

“Sensitives are like that.”

“You know, the run of the mill Dracula tropes.”

“I do therapeutic harp.”

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I thought I was done with the Phil Spector story, the guns, the road littered with dead women, the Jewfro. But now this tidbit of book news from Media Bistro:

Spector Son’s Tell-All Surprisingly Not Titled “To Know Him Is To Love Him”

From Sharlene Martin of Martin Literary Management comes word of a memoir from Louis Spector, who was adopted (along with his twin brother) by legendary record producer Phil Spector when he was five; Spector then presented the siblings to his then-wife, Ronettes singer Veronica Bennett, as a Christmas present. The proposal, entitled The Gingerbread House on La Collina Drive.

I know, life is good.

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Dave Cullen’s book COLUMBINE hit the New York Times Bestseller List at #7. Did I ever say how much I love the number 7?

This was a book  ten years in the making, which is a nice way of saying more blood, sweat, and tears were spilled than I can ever recall. I hope the people whose lives were affected feel that they were well served.

Mostly I want to congratulate Dave; his persistence and compassion were the guiding lights of this project. I want to thank everyone at Twelve, who took on this challenging book in the 11th hour and published the hell out of it.

I guess I want to say, too, that in a Twittery world, this kind of book is starting to look like an endangered species. Even in the olden days, few writers could or would devote ten years to a project outside of the academy. Believe me, there were many junctures when I wanted to tear my hair out:  missed deadlines, long silences, outsized drafts etc. etc., but I am so proud that I got to be a part of it. When people ask what makes working in publishing worth it — this.

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Heather B. Armstrong’s memoir jumped on to the NYT bestseller list its first week on sale. Man, am I happy. Even our dog noticed what a good mood I was in and roped me into something like 4,000 throws of the aqua blue sheep toy. Heather’s on the road doing readings, huge crowds, due in large part to the enormous popularity of her blog, Dooce.com which is about marriage and motherhood, or poop and boobs. I understand some women at the readings have asked to have their pregnant stomachs autographed (reminds me of my high school neighbor who got her fifteen year old butt signed by Bob Weir), many are bearing gifts, taking pictures with Heather. It’s really amazing how you can develop a loyal readership through blogging. Ahem. Anyway, her book is called, IT SUCKED AND THEN I CRIED. It’s hilarious and then you cry. Highly recommended.

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Big, huge, exciting news: As of tomorrow or the next day, I will have a new blog site. I know you will miss the jejune photograph of me circa kindergarten. And the blocky hard to read type. I will, too. But this young woman named Hilary who lives in Detroit helped me create a better blog and it’s just way better. (That was a plug for Hilary if you need website help — I’ll give you her email.) Look out for the new site, let me know what you think. And thanks for reading.

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