Carrie Brownstein Coming Out with Memoir

I've seen Sleater-Kinney only once. Around 2001, the Olympia, WA-based rock trio performed at a record store in my city. Since it was free, I figured I'd go. Because it was free, the place was nearly packed to the rafters, the crowd surging forward as Corin Tucker, Carrie Bownstein, and Janet Weiss walked onstage. It was a great show, and from my vantage point, I hugely enjoyed watching a certain cluster of girls standing shoulder-to-shoulder and staring openly, hungrily at Brownstein.
 

Carrie Brownstein.
Image via nopoboho.blogspot.com

These days, Carrie Brownstein is more famous for costarring, along with Fred Armisen, in the hit sketch-comedy television show Portlandia. Just as Season 4 of Portlandia is set to air later this month on the cable channel IFC, Brownstein revealed that she is working on a memoir. Talking to the music news website Stereogum, she admitted the process of writing a memoir is both "fascinating and weird," as I suppose it would be if you're only thirty-nine years old. "I think it always maintains a slightly surreal quality, and even a strange level of disconnect, because I'm not looking back on my life from the vantage point of old age. I mean, hopefully, I'm not at the end of my life," Browstein said in the interview. "I think part of it is just trying to assess what to write about and what feels important."

Elaborating further on writing the as-yet-untitled memoir, Brownstein said, "Our memories are very multidimensional and they're very colorful. And then you start to write about them and they immediately become flattened out because you have to tell the story. And everything that's grandiose and colorful in your memory becomes these little shacks on the page and you have to build the scaffolding with every sentence and paragraph. It is very daunting. You assume that it's going to get onto the page in the same magnificent way that it exists in your brain, and that's just not true. So I just find it incredibly arduous. But I'm getting through it." According to the New York Times, Brownstein's memoir will be published by Riverhead Books, which is a division of Penguin Group USA.

This memoir is hardly Brownstein's first writing effort. Wikipedia states: "Brownstein began a career as a writer before Sleater-Kinney broke up. She interviewed Eddie Vedder, Mary Lynn Rajskub, Karen O, and Cheryl Hines for The Believer magazine. Brownstein has also written a couple of music-related video game reviews for Slate. From November 2007 to May 2010, Brownstein wrote a blog for NPR Music called 'Monitor Mix'; she returned for a final blog post in October, thanking her blog readers and declaring the blog 'officially concluded.' In March 2009, Brownstein contracted to write a book to 'describe the dramatically changing dynamic between music fan and performer, from both the birth of the iPod and the death of the record store to the emergence of the 'you be the star' culture of American Idol and the ensuing dilution of rock mystique. The book, called The Sound of Where You Are, is to be published by Ecco/HarperCollins."

To read the Stereogum interview, in which Brownstein talks about her memoir and much more, go to THIS LINK. For more on the Season 4 premiere of Portlandia, go HERE. And since I mentioned Portlandia, I'll use that as an excuse to post a video from Season 2, Episode 9 of the show, in which The Smiths' guitarist Johnny Marr guest-starred. Not only is Marr a legendary musician, singer, and songwriter (and sex incarnate), but he's also a good sport with excellent comedic timing.

Morrissey's Memoir Specially Edited for U.S. Audience

Many of my friends are huge fans of The Smiths, an English alternative-rock band that had a string of hits in the '80s. So when it was confirmed that the frontman of the band, Morrissey, was releasing an autobiography, they were beyond excited.
 

Morrissey as a young man.
Image via http://www.averageenthusiast.com

Adding to this excitement was that no one was even aware that he was writing a book. The music blog BrooklynVegan called it the "Morrissey autobiography that you didn't know was coming." But when it came, it immediately became a best seller. According to the Belfast Telegraph, it outsold the new Bridget Jones novel, Mad About the Boy, the first week it was released in the United Kingdom. (First-week sales figures for the book were 35,000 copies, compared to 32,000 copies of the Bridget Jones novel, reported the Belfast Telegraph.) Further fomenting my friends' hysteria was that the book only seemed to be available for purchase in the UK. Desperation led a few to buy it through Amazon's UK website.
 

A display of Autobiography, by Morrissey.
Image via http://www.spin.com

Finally, on December 3, the publisher of the book, Penguin Classics, allowed for it to be released in the United States through G.P. Putnam's Sons. Flipping through the U.S. edition of Autobiography, fans began to notice that something was missing from Morrissey's recollection of his childhood, adolescence, time with The Smiths, subsequent solo career, public court battles, and private life. There was little-to-no mention of his long-term relationship with photographer Jake Owen Walters. This significant relationship, homosexual in nature, was edited out for the U.S. audience. Meanwhile, details of another long-term relationship, this one with a woman, have remained in the book. 

Anyone who is a fan of Morrissey and thus would purchase the book is well aware of his sexuality. So why not leave the details concerning Morrissey's male partner in the book? Was Penguin Classics - and by extension, G.P. Putnam's Sons - afraid that the mere mention of homosexuality would offend U.S. readers of the book? Would prevent it from being stocked in chain stores across the United States? Would adversely affect U.S. sales? If that's the case, like typical corporate suits, they haven't a clue. And they definitely don't know the fans of Morrissey and of The Smiths. Even those who aren't fans still love a juicy story: it's human nature to flip through a book to get to "the good part." The publisher would have done well to leave Morrissey's story alone.

Random House Says Libraries Own Its E-Books

Of all the "Big Six" book publishers, Random House is the only one that has held fast to its stance on libraries' ownership of its e-books. Last year, Ruth Liebmann, director of account marketing at Random House, told attendees at a library panel, "A library book does not compete with a sale. A library book is a sale." And just last month, Skip Dye, RH's vice president of library and academic marketing and sales, reiterated to Library Journal, "Random House's often repeated, and always consistent, position is this: when libraries buy their RH, Inc., e-books from authorized library wholesalers, it is our position that they own them."

        Book publisher Random House has not waivered in its long-held assertion that libraries own its electronic titles. (Image via http://www.applebitch.com)

Random House's belief that libraries own its e-books is in stark contrast to the viewpoint held by the other big book publishers, especially Penguin, which feel "the ready download-ability of library e-books could have an adverse effect on sales," according to Molly Raphael, president of the American Library Association (ALA). As a result, they've developed an increasingly adversarial relationship with libraries, finding more ways to limit libraries' access to popular electronic titles, or even going as far as refusing to offer any of their e-books to libraries for fear of lost sales. That Random House has confidently allowed libraries continuous access to its electronic titles is commendable. 

Yet, this action doesn't completely absolve Random House of accusations of greed. Earlier this year, it drastically raised the prices of its e-books - in some cases, as much as 300 percent - eliciting both exasperation and consternation from librarians across the country and the world. The South Shore Public Libraries system in Bridgewater, Nova Scotia, Canada, actually  boycotted Random House e-books in the wake of the steep price increase. "I don't want to pick a fight with them," said Troy Myers, chief librarian of South Shore Public Libraries, "but their pricing's unfair and I think they need to change it." Despite calls from the ALA to reconsider the price increase, Random House has, as of yet, not done so. I doubt it will. After all, once prices go up, they're not very likely to come down.

Penguin Pecks Away at Libraries' Access to E-Books

Last November, Penguin Group ceased to make its frontlist e-book titles available for library lending. Then, earlier this month, it decided to no longer offer any of its e-book titles to libraries. The big book publisher's big decision came after a dispute with OverDrive, the library digital vendor.

Penguin flips out over the lending of its

e-book titles to libraries.

image source: no_typographic_man/flickr

Officially, the dispute centers on the way in which OverDrive distributes Penguin's e-book titles. (See the PCWorld article below for the technical details.) But the real issue here is corporate greed. Like record companies during the rise of the MP3, book publishers are desperately clutching at their products in an effort to not let one cent escape their coffers. Such actions on the part of corporations always backfire. Judging by what's being said in library circles, there is already a backlash to Penguin's latest effort.

PCWorld * February 13, 2012

Ebook Publishers Want Library Borrowing to Be Difficult

By Jared Newman

In an effort to make library ebook borrowing less convenient, Penguin Group has discontinued over-the-air library book downloads for Kindle users.

Users will instead have to download books onto a computer, then transfer them to the device with a USB cable. In addition, Penguin has terminated its agreement with Overdrive, a library ebook distributor, which for now means Penguin won't supply any new ebooks or audiobooks to libraries.

Penguin's reason for splitting with Overdrive is somewhat technical: Overdrive was apparently relying on Amazon to distribute the books to Kindle users, but Penguin's contract allowed Overdrive only to store and serve books on its own servers, according to Infodocket.

But the bigger issue is that book publishers are worried about libraries. Random House is the only major publisher that gives libraries unrestricted access to purchase and loan ebooks. Other publishers place restrictions on how many times a book can be downloaded or when new books become available. Simon & Schuster and Macmillan don't lend ebooks at all.

Skittish Publishers

And as we're seeing now with Penguin, even when publishers do participate, they want the lending process to be difficult. A recent meeting between book publishers and the American Library Association made this fact painfully clear, as ALA President Molly Raphael points out:

“Borrowing a print book from a library involves a nontrivial amount of personal work that often involves two trips--one to pick up the book and one to return it,” Raphael wrote. “The online availability of ebooks alters this friction calculation, and publishers are concerned that the ready download-ability of library ebooks could have an adverse effect on sales.”

In other words, being able to download library ebooks is too easy. Penguin's USB download requirement could be a way to introduce friction. If you've ever actually tried to borrow a library ebook, however, you know that most of the friction comes from books being all checked out, not from the actual download process.

Furthermore, by making users put a file on their computers, publishers are increasing the risk of ebook piracy. DRM-cracking software for library ebooks is not hard to find, and users may be tempted to lift lending restrictions as long as those files are passing through PCs. In trying to increase friction, publishers may end up reducing it for unscrupulous readers.