The year in books: controversial titles kept pages, heads turning

How do you characterize a literary year that includes a nationally televised smackdown of a disgraced memoirist, the almost-publication of a sort-of "confessional" from a fallen football superstar, and a book of recommendations from a presidential advisory committee hitting the best-seller charts? Weird.

Before closing the books on 2006, let's consider a few cultural bookmarks.

OPRAH WINFREY VS. JAMES FREY: In January, after the Smoking Gun Web site revealed that Frey's best-selling memoir "A Million Little Pieces" contained about that many little lies, Winfrey first stood by her book club pick, but then changed her mind and berated him on her TV show. Eight months later, publisher Random House reached an unprecedented legal settlement with disgruntled readers who claimed they had been defrauded by Frey's book. The book, for the record, remained on the best-seller lists, along with Frey's follow-up --- also falsified --- "My Friend Leonard."

O.J. SIMPSON VS. EVERYBODY: Just when it seemed there were no limits to the depths to which American publishers would sink for a buck, reason reared its head. In November, notorious (and hugely successful) publisher Judith Regan announced the publication of a book called "If I Did It," purported to be Simpson's hypothetical version of how he would have killed his ex-wife, Nicole Brown Simpson, and Ron Goldman. When everybody on the planet recoiled in horror at the mere concept, Regan's boss, Rupert Murdoch, scuttled publication and ordered all 400,000 copies mulched. Within days, naturally, copies popped up on several online markets. And within weeks, Regan was unceremoniously fired.

THE WORD ON WAR: An unrelenting wave of books about the war in Iraq, from conception to quagmire, dominated the nonfiction best-seller lists all year and helped turn the tide of public opinion. Among the best: Bob Woodward's "State of Denial," Thomas Ricks' "Fiasco" and Lawrence Wright's "The Looming Tower: Al-Qaeda and the Road to 9/11." In a fitting footnote to the year, Vintage Books published the bipartisan Iraq Study Group's report to the president, and it became an instant best-seller.

MISSION ACCOMPLISHED: Former President Jimmy Carter's 21st book, "Palestine: Peace Not Apartheid," is a best-seller, like almost all the others, but this one has proved to be unusually controversial. At every stop of his book tour, the recipient of the 2002 Nobel Peace Prize has faced crowds of protesters --- along with the hundreds of readers who always show up for his signings. Much of the outrage seems to stem from Carter's use of the word "apartheid," drawing a comparison between today's Palestinians and the victims of government-mandated racial separation in South Africa. "I wanted to provoke debate," says Carter, 82. "I wanted to provoke discussion."

ARGUABLY THE BEST: In May, The New York Times published its list of the best fiction of the past 25 years. Toni Morrison's "Beloved" was anointed the best, followed by the fairly predictable contingent of Don DeLillo ("Underworld"), John Updike (all four "Rabbit" novels), Cormac McCarthy ("Blood Meridian") and Philip Roth ("American Pastoral"). The Times list, like every best-of list ever created, will be the subject of passionate debate until the end of time.

THE AWARDS GO TO ... Geraldine Brooks' lyrical novel "March" won the Pulitzer Prize for fiction; Richard Powers won the National Book Award for his novel "The Echo Maker"; and Timothy Egan's history of the Dust Bowl, "The Worst Hard Time," took NBA nonfiction honors. (Former Atlantan Taylor Branch's book "At Canaan's Edge," the final installment in his definitive history of the American civil rights movement, was a nonfiction finalist.) And Orhan Pamuk, author of "Snow," "My Name Is Red" and other books, became the first Turkish writer to become a Nobel laureate.

... AND THE MONEY GOES TO: Mitch Albom's treacly novel "For One More Day" was the best-selling hardback fiction of 2006, according to Nielsen BookScan, selling more than half a million copies since it was published in September. The top-selling nonfiction title of the year was the charming "Marley & Me," Philadelphia Inquirer columnist John Grogan's memoir of an exceptional dog, which has sold 1.2 million copies.

ONE CITY, ONE BOOK: In April, Mayor Shirley Franklin launched the first citywide summer reading program, Atlanta Reads: One Book, One Community. For the inaugural effort, the mayor's advisory panel (with a little help from a public vote) picked the 1982 novel "Run With the Horsemen" by Ferrol Sams. Sams, an 83-year-old Fayetteville physician, was a dapper, enthusiastic ambassador for social reading.

FIT FOR A FESTIVAL: Is metro Atlanta ready to support an annual book festival? At long last, after a number of valiant efforts that fell short in years past, the answer appears to be yes. More than 50,000 people attended the first AJC Decatur Book Festival on Labor Day weekend. Michael Connelly, Diana Gabaldon, Edward P. Jones and about 100 other authors spoke to SRO crowds at virtually every venue. Another important event in metro Atlanta's literary community --- the 10-day Jewish Book Festival --- marked its 15th anniversary in November.

A LITERARY COUP: British-Indian author Salman Rushdie, Booker Prize-winning author of "Midnight's Children" and survivor of an Ayatollah Khomeini death sentence, joined the faculty of Atlanta's Emory University in October. Rushdie will be a writer in residence, teaching four weeks a year for the next five years, as well as advising students and participating in symposiums and lectures. Of more long-range importance, Emory also acquired all Rushdie's archival papers, giving a million-dollar boost to the university's already world-class literary collection.

AUTHORS AT WORK: The enigmatic Thomas Pynchon published "Against the Day," his first novel since 1997; John Updike abandoned suburban angst for homegrown fanaticism in "Terrorist"; Charles Frazier emerged from the shadow of 1997's "Cold Mountain" by the light of "Thirteen Moons," another sprawling novel set in 19th-century Appalachia. Also, Richard Ford resuscitated his greatest fictional character, Frank Bascombe ("The Sportswriter" and "Independence Day"), in "The Lay of the Land"; and Cormac McCarthy went post-apocalyptic in his bleakest novel yet, "The Road."

AUTHORS AT REST: Among writers who died in 2006 were novelist Bebe Moore Campbell, 56; William Styron, author of "The Confessions of Nat Turner" and "Sophie's Choice," 81; Naguib Mahfouz, the only Arabic-language writer to win the Nobel Prize for Literature, 94; crime noir novelist Mickey Spillane, 88; former U.S. poet laureate Stanley Kunitz, 100; Scottish novelist Dame Muriel Spark, 88; Peter Benchley, author of "Jaws," 65; Octavia E. Butler, America's most acclaimed black female science fiction writer, 58; Betty Friedan, feminist leader who wrote the hugely influential book "The Feminine Mystique," 85; and Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright Wendy Wasserstein, 55.

Copyright 2006 The Atlanta Journal-Constitution