Thanks to Bill Sherwonit for passing on this news item from the Associated Press:
“An independent bookseller in Sarah Palin’s home state is donating the proceeds he makes off her book to a group that is among the biggest critics of the former Republican vice presidential candidate.
Don Muller owns Old Harbor Books in Sitka. He’s selling Palin’s memoir, “Going Rogue,” for $28.99, and says he will donate profits to Defenders of Wildlife.”
Do I dare ask 49w readers: Are you planning to read the Sarah Palin book? Buy it? Ignore it?
If you’re interested in what other readers have to say, KSKA’s “Hometown Alaska” (featuring Ellen Lockyear, Kathleen McCoy and Charles Wohlforth) will be having a call-in book discussion at 2:00.
If the Palin question sets your teeth on edge, how about this one? We have another online book club coming up soon — late December or early January. I was thinking of picking a short story from David Vann’s Legend of a Suicide, but the author tells me it’s coming out in paperback in March and we might want to wait just a little longer… Since I’m spending the morning mulling it over, I thought I might as well let anyone reading this mull it along with me. Any ideas?
This morning I had an demitasse cup of egg nog. That's about a thimbleful but it packs a wallop to my pallet – especially with a sprinkling of nutmeg.
I had a similar luxurious experience while reading the first chapter of David Vann's Legend of a Suicide (on-line).
I know that anything else I read today will be like drinking water, after the richness of David Vann's stories.
Count me in for the book club discussion whenever David wants to do it.
I did read "Going Rogue" yesterday — but I had good reason. We needed to pick out selections for Andrew Halcro to read aloud for a video series at Alaska Dispatch. Here's part one.
Please god, do not say you are thinking of Palin for a book club discussion. I wish for radio silence on that one.
Is poetry an option for book club discussion? What about Joan Kane and Elizabeth Bradfield as a pair? Joan's book has gotten lots of recent press and Liz's book (Interpretive Work) was written while she lived in AK. She also has a new one out soon, Approaching Ice. I'd love to read two female AK poets bouncing off each other.
I like the poetry idea – a focus on works by Alaskan women of substance. Have not read David Vann, but look forward to it.
Previously, you talked about "Sometimes We're Always Real Same-Same" for the discussion, so I'd offer that as another suggestion.
I don't plan to read the Palin book but I am enjoying the outtakes…
Maia, thanks reading it, and for providing the link – I laughed before it even started to play!
Like Maia, I *have* to read Rogue for a project. Now I wish I'd ordered my copy from Sitka. And the Halcro readings – what a dang good (to quote our ex-gov) idea.
I like the poetry idea for the book club. We'll also be hearing from Juneau poet Emily Wall later this month, on her book Freshly Rooted.
I'd love to do poetry in January, but of all the genres, it's the farthest from my comfort zone. Is there a guest moderator out there who would commit to guiding the conversation, which often involves raising questions and making a fair share of comments to encourage others? An Alaska poet or devoted poetry lover would be ideal. (I'd be present for back-up, of course, just not leading the conversation.) Let me know here or at lax@alaska.net.
I'm reading Mudflats' detailed re-telling of Going Rogue–close as I'll get.
Slightly off-topic, but I was curious to hear from other authors at the consistent oversight that Palin arguably isn't really an "author" given that the book is in fact ghostwritten. Might seem a petty distinction (and it sure push buttons in the fan base pointing this out) but seeing that the "collaborator" is under legal orders to not discuss her part in writing the book is telling.
Traditional book industry practise aside, I personally think it's disingenuous at best if not ethically shallow to claim authorship on something you didn't do.
Jamie – Ghost writers and celebrities have a symbiotic thing going and it is the nature of the thing that ghostwriters are not credited.
In Palin's case most of us already know that she is "disingenuous at best if not ethically shallow…"
People who love her don't care.
Nobody is a reliable narrator anymore.
Sure, we're selling it. We have several copies pre-ordered, now just waiting for the planes to fly – they have been sitting in Juneau since yesterday morning!
Sarah Palin spent six years here, so she's part of our history, even though the town leaned Obama in the election. She's more famous than Soapy Smith ever was (oh there is a great new book about him too by the great grandson: Alias Soapy Smith). Scoundrels and scandals sell. We'll keep the profits to get us through the winter. – Jeff Brady