Booked

The big book news this week is former Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice’s appearance at The Bookworm at 87th and Pacific in Countryside Village Tuesday, Oct. 26. She’ll be there to sign her new book, Extraordinary, Ordinary People: A Memoir of Family before speaking at the Ambassador of Hope gala that evening. The book is light on her time in the Bush administration; focusing on her upbringing in the segregated south. Her father, John Wesley Rice Jr., came from a family of well-educated itinerant preachers in Louisiana. Her mother, Angelena Ray’s family, were Birmingham, Ala., landowners. Ironically, it was folks in those same areas that she so carelessly blew off to go shoe shopping and catch Spamalot in New York City during the height of 2005’s Hurricane Katrina. The free event is open to the public and runs 2-2:45 p.m.   If you’re a comic book fan, you probably have Saturday, Oct. (bollywoodhungama.com) 23, circled on your calendar. If not, plan to swing by the Omaha Executive Inn & Suites (AKA the old Howard Johnson’s) at 3650 S. 72nd St. for the Omaha Comic Book Convention. The free event is open to the public and runs from 10 a.m-4 p.m. You’ll see local vendors and those from other states, and be able to check out action figures and other collectibles and comics. For more information call 309.657.1599 or visit epguides.com/comics.   As the market for e-readers becomes more crowded (not to mention cheaper), Amazon recently announced a new eBook format, Kindle Singles. The program will offer short books or long articles, categorized as between 10,000 and 30,000 words, or 30-90 pages, which will have their own section in Amazon’s Kindle store. The online bookseller said these will be cheaper than full novels, but they have yet to name a price.   As if horror mash-ups weren’t enough (Pride and Prejudice and Zombies, Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter, et al), it has come to this: tabloid fiction. Ben Greenman, editor of the New Yorker, of all things, just published Celebrity Chekhov, a literary mash-up that incorporates celebrities like Lindsay Lohan and Jesse James into the Russian writer’s works. “Aren’t celebrities fictional characters anyway?” Greenman asked the New York Daily News. — Kyle Tonniges Comments? Questions? Want more? Check out our Booked blog online at thereader.com. Or email us at booked@thereader.com.