Book News You Can Use 4/17/15

Relax in Paradise Gunter Grass and Edwardo Galeno.

Congratulations to all of the Hurston/Wright Legacy Award nominees, the Pen Award nominees and the International IMPAC Dublin Literary Awards!

Haruki Murakami and Chimamanda Ngozi Adiche made this year's Time 100 Most Influential People list.

The American Library Association named the most challenged/banned books of 2014. It also shows that authors of color are the most affected by book banning attempts.

Tavis Smiley has been winning lately.  His latest book, My Journey with Maya (which he talks about here), will become a Broadway play.  Now Death of a King will be adapted for TV.

This looks like an ordinary press release about TVOne's future projects.  But if you scroll down to the end of the movie section of the article, you will find that TWO of ReShonda Tate Billingsley's books will be movies next year. Can someone ask BET what happened to the Let the Church Say Amen movie?  And can we PLEASE turn What's Done In the Dark a movie?

It looks like The Alienist will finally become a TV series.

Watch this documentary about the Henrietta Lacks story.

Reese Witherspoon will be producing the movie adaptation of Luckiest Girl Alive, which was picked up by Lionsgate.

R.L. Stine talks about his new Fear Street book (among other things) in this BuzzFeed article.

James Patterson calls it collaborative writing. I call it a money grab.

The latest VIDA Count shows that books written by minorities are still not being reviewed by major publications. Sigh.

Here are some African-American female writers to follow on social media.

Here is a review about Nigerian author Chigozie Obioma and his book, The Fisherman.

The late chief of Charlie Hebdo slammed Islamophobia in a book he finished two days before he died.

In a new book, a former NFL player said that his mother asked him for $1 million after he was drafted.

Yay to North Carolina Girl Scouts who installed some Little Free Libraries!

Parodies of Uptown Funk and Shake It Off were done in honor of National Library Week.