Book News
Borders to sell e-books.
Borders Group Inc., the nation’s second-largest bookstore chain as measured by sales, has launched an e-bookstore powered by Kobo Inc., the Canadian e-book retailer in which Borders owns an investment stake.
Borders is late to the e-book business, which is the fastest growing segment of book publishing and book retailing. Major e-book retailers include Inc., Barnes & Noble Inc. and Apple Inc., with Google Inc. expected to enter the market later this year.
Borders said it hopes to control about 17 percent of the e-book market by July 2011. By contrast, Albert Greco, a book- industry researcher, estimates that in 2009 Borders had a 10 percent share of the retail book sales market.
“The digital book marketplace is still in the very early stages,” said Mike Edwards, CEO of Borders Inc. The new Borders e-book store has more than 1.5 million titles, including free books.
online.wsj/com
First Lines
Running Dark, by Jamie Freveletti
Emma Caldridge passed mile 36 of the 55-mile Comrades ultramarathon in South Africa when a roadside car bomb exploded. The force of the explosion blew her out of her shoes and catapulted her in the air 10 feet before hammering her into the dirt at the side of the road. The detonated car burned, flames leaping out of the shattered windows. She lay in the clay-colored dust with the hot sun beating down, blinding her. She moaned, turned her head away from the sun’s glare, closed her eyes and lay still, trying to gather her wits about her. A shadow fell over her face. She opened her eyes without moving her head and saw the blurry image of a man’s legs from the knees down. The limbs appeared to shimmer in the heat waves thrown by the burning vehicle. He wore running shoes, like everyone else that day. The shoes stopped next to her and rose to their toes as the person crouched down. A silver necklace in the shape of an antelope head swung into her line of vision. The amulet hung on a black rawhide cord. Emma tried to ask for help, but her dry mouth wouldn’t form the words.
The man’s dark hand came into view, holding a white plastic injector, similar to an EpiPen carried by people with allergies. In the next instant, the hand jammed the tip into Emma’s forearm, right above the wrist. She felt the prick of a needle and the rush of medication pulsing into her skin. Before she even had a chance to make a sound, he jerked the point out of her arm. The shoes flattened onto the dust and walked away with a crunching noise.
Children’s Fiction Best Sellers
1. The Red Pyramid, by Rick Riordan
2. The Hunger Games, by Suzanne Collins
3. Theodore Boone: Kid Lawyer, by John Grisham
4. Catching Fire, by Suzanne Collins
5. The Book Thief, by Markus Zusak
6. The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian, by Sherman Alexie
7. Dork Diaries: Tales From a Not-So- Fabulous Life, by Rachel Renee Russell
8. Shiver, by Maggie Stiefvater
9. Infinity: Chronicles of Nick, by Lincoln Pierce
10. Big Nate: In a Class by Himself, by Lincoln Peirce
Publishers Weekly
