New out this month from Oxford University Press is Jeremy Butterfield's Damp Squid: The English Language Laid Bare, which provides a wealth of fascinating facts about the English language, such as: Where does our vocabulary come from? How do word meanings change? How is our language really being used? The book also includes Oxford researchers' top 10 most annoying phrases: 1. At the end of the day, 2. Fairly unique, 3. I personally, 4. At this moment in time, 5. With all due respect, 6. Absolutely, 7. It's a nightmare, 8. Shouldn't of, 9. 24/7, 10. It's not rocket science.
Memoirs about life with animals continue to be sure hits. Consider Marley & Me, Merle's Door, The Good Good Pig, and the latest, Dewey: The Small-town Library Cat Who Touched the World by Vicki Myron. So what could top that? A memoir by an animal. The 75-year-old chimpanzee who starred in several Tarzan movies and the 1967 version of Dr. Dolittle will release his autobiography in February, titled Me Cheeta: My Life in Hollywood.
Several awards were recently announced. The Dylan Thomas Prize, which recognizes the best young writer in the English-speaking world, went to Nam Le for his short story collection, The Boat. The Giller Prize, which is an award that goes to the author of a Canadian novel or short story fiction collection published in English, went to Joseph Boyden for his novel Through Black Spruce. The Whiting Writers’ Award is an American award presented annually to ten emerging writers in fiction, nonfiction, poetry and plays. The 2008 winners are: Mischa Berlinski (fiction),
Rick Hilles (poetry), Donovan Hohn (nonfiction), Douglas Kearney (poetry), Laleh Khadivi (fiction), Manuel Muñoz (fiction), Dael Orlandersmith (plays), Benjamin Percy (fiction), Julie Sheehan (poetry), and Lysley Tenorio (fiction). The longlist for the 2009 International IMPAC Dublin Literary Award was recently announced. You can check out the list of 147 contenders here.
The last time I checked, we still have a month and a half left of 2008, but Amazon has already released its list of the Best Books of 2008. I was surprised Toni Morrison's A Mercy, which was just released, didn't make the list.
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