Sunday, January 30, 2005

Saturday saga continues

There's a bit of spat going on between Random House and the Evening Standard. It seems an interview with Ian McEwan published on 17 January was breaking a strict embargo ahead of the book's publication which was originally supposed to be tomorrow. Random House then moved publication ahead by a week, their carefully planned publicity strategy unravelling in the process and incurring 'extra costs'. Read the story on Reuters.

Fantastic interview with McEwan on Open Book this afternoon (I'm a Radio4phile -- have it on constantly apart from 'Sailing By' which I can't stand because it sounds to me like someone drowning). Saturday is to be 'Book at Bedtime' on R4 from 21 March. As far as I can discern, Amazon's price of £10.79 is unbeaten on this book so far. I'm spending the extra 9 quid that will get me free delivery on The Writer's Voice by Al Alvarez.

1 comment:

Alice said...

On McEwan, can I recomend "Child in Time" - one of my favourite science literature books (although more physics than medical) and probably my fave McEwan (although I think I'll wait for paperback of Saturday, if only becuase I don't have time to read it at the moment!)

According to Waterstones Books Quarterly McEwan references "Child in Time" in "Saturday". And I've had customers complaining about the Standard. But apparently they break these things all the time (wasn't it the Standard Nature were blocking at one point too...)