Transcripts For CSPAN2 Tour Of The New York Times Book Review 20240621

Very similar or reset rehashing arguments or some sort of justification. It is not a summary process. Recently in the new york book review it was an iraq war veteran story. So many of those books have come out. How do you choose just one . It is perspective. Its a very subjective thing, very imperfect art. Its your looking for somebody who has some kind of unique twist, some kind of different argument something magical happening in the voice of the pros. How did you get this . I love criticism. The program in fiction writing. I love reviews, reading quick reading critics. I started working at publishers weekly, trade magazine that churns out. I went over to npr and worked on reviews. Do we ever see your byline . Yes. I write every now and then nonfiction. Working on a review about a photographer that is going in our issues. Yeah. How long have you been here . Three years. Thank you for your time. Thank you. One of those few sections of the paper that have our own dedicated coffee book. Integrated in to the book review as a whole. A fact check. Fact checking Fact Checking is a huge part of what we do at the book review. You can you can disagree with the book review but you shouldnt distrust it. Your job at the New York Times book review. What does that mean . Once the books arrive at our desk we are mainly in charge we are the last line of defense so to speak. We are reading for content. We are also Fact Checking. At the end of the day we write. We are sort of the last production sequence before the reviews . Once they have been written your job is to fact check them . Fact checking is sort of the unwritten part of the job. What the deadline nightly. Reading both for style and content. Something is an error the book review section. Georgia peach. It is. The book was written by one of our own New York Times Senior Editor but i was the copy editor on this review. Did you come up with the title . I did. You see some of the type, these headlines type, these headlines lamentably label heads, shorter, crunchier, there is no explanatory. So yes, these were actually quite fun to write. What grabs readers quickly. Georgia peach we come up with about five or six for this one. We had a meeting last week. Georgia peach all right. You are editing Senior Editor here the New York Times. Yes. Was that difficult . No. Hes a fantastic writer. I wish every review was this easy to edit. What kind of work did you do . Most of it because john is such a fantastic writer in this case i was really looking at the facts of the piece, ty cobbs history, a lot of information here about both his personality, on the field issues and off the field skirmishes. A lot of it was researching. And then at the end of the day i think i i think i suggested one or two minor tweaks, minor factual adjustments to the peace. For the most part this was a pleasure to edit. When you get a peace that is in such a pleasure to edit what do you do . You are sort of you take nothing for granted. You realize there is nothing that can be taken for granted. Checking every last line and usually put a lot more time. Wrestle a peace to the ground until you know what you have. Every fact, you double check you make sure that every claim can be corroborated, usually multiple sources. At that time you take nothing for granted. Very often you have to the reviewer because our viewers are very often experts in the fields. When youre going back and reviewing and saying i think this may be an accurate by this may be in need of revision yet you have to apply your own information back it up with your own facts to convince your writers and convince editors that your information is in fact righthanders is wrong. Again, most of the time most reviewers are thankful for the service. Grateful to be fact checked so closely as we do. And it is usually there always open and very cordial i would i would say. How did you get hear . Actually, i arrived about 15 years ago. I was an assistant. A generational copy boy for about 15 years. Many spent at the book review. 2,007 i sort of change track and became a copy editor. The editor of the sports Desk National desk, foreign desk. Finally in 2010 i came back to the book review and have been back since. A you a reader . Yes, voracious. For pleasure and for work. Yes. Yeah. I have been reading because of the work i read anything. It has broadened my horizons before coming here i didnt read much in the way of historical fiction. Now its one of my favorite genres. Politics my personal, of course, science fiction. I read that voraciously. But there is i i havent read a book and 15 years. Most of the things i read i basically recommendations. Are copy desk we have our editor we have an art director we have our production editor. We have a clerk. And we have because this is now an online publication as well, producer on the desk. Are you removed from the New York Times in general . You know, the era when the daily newspaper was a different operation from the weekend edition. That weekend edition. In that sense we are a little bit like our own private island. But we also integrated in the way that all sections are. The weekly sections, the sunday sections. For many readers of the New York Times these days they dont think about those oldfashioned kind of print cycle terms. They dont think of us as being they dont think of cooking, for example, as being a wednesday section. Style as simply being a sunday section and the thursday section. All the sections are online every moment of the day. In that sense we are integrated into the newspaper. People get their New York Times book review and the sunday paper. Yes. How long ago was that prepared . We published ten days ahead. There is a print edition. Today is tuesday. On thursday we will have a physical copy of that paper and people who subscribe to the New York Times book review will also potentially have their print edition that day depending on how fast the proof comes. We are the one section of the New York Times that you can subscribe to independently from the rest of the paper. You can be a New York Times book review subscriber and not get the rest of the newspaper. How many people subscribe to that . I dont know the current number. Lots and lots of people. More should do it. How long have you worked year at the New York Times . I have been here for four years. Doing what . I started off parttime as a Childrens Book editor. And then i pushed my way. I was here parttime. And then i started editing features which at that time at the back page of the book review which was an essay. Started by the book which is our weekly profile interview with an author and public figure about what they are reading. And i did that for another year and then became editor in 2013. In a recent edition you have David Mccullough. Yes. How do you choose the questions that you asked . Its a lot of fun. Originally i thought i would be strict about it and asked the same question. And i realize that that was an idiotic idea quickly with the help of my former boss because if you have david did there is for example your not going to ask him whats the funniest book you ever read or who were the greatest comic writers are what memoirs do you like. You have to tailor it to the author. I still personally edit that. I read the questions myself. One of the questions you asked David Mccullough was who were his favorite president ial biographers. Yes. How can you not ask that . Do you not going to ask that of david taveras. David mccullough puts on a book every couple years. Is it an automatic review in the New York Times . There are some authors were pretty automatic because even if we dont necessarily think for example that the latest thriller by x big name is necessarily is best but know that our readers will want to know. It is worthy of review not necessarily because of the quality. I think everything he writes is pretty terrific but we know it will be of interest. That review might not be positive but it is worthy of attention. Have you have her have you had an issue were all the reviews were negative for all the reviews were positive . Well, the reviews come in our regular ongoing basis and then we schedule in. We dont generally schedule them based on positive or negative. There are a lot of factors that go in. The most obvious is the date of publication. We are a newspaper. It should be a relatively new book, but then we think about the next in terms of fiction versus nonfiction all the genres. So within fiction you want to have, lets say you know, science fiction. You might want to have a british novel, something in translation, include poetry, and then nonfiction you want to have a mix of biographies, policy, science hard science mathematics. We are kind of balancing on so many in so many different ways that you dont really think about is positive or negative. I would say i would say thats one of the things that we dont pay a lot of attention to what were figuring out. You are an author as well have you had your books reviewed . I have. They have been reviewed in the New York Times. I got one of my nastiest reviews ever. Yes. Thank you for reminding me. Yes. I have been on the other side. How does that feel . It feels terrible. I remind myself that we are not a focus on. We love the Publishing Industry and support what they do but really we are here for readers. Readers are trying to make a decision about what they should spend their time and money reading and buying if they are buying a book. A book. Is important for us to tell us if it is worth her time. Negative reviews serve the function. To publishers want their books reviewed in the New York Times . Yes, but not if it is negative. Yes, very. Yes, very much so. Unfortunately we are the last remaining freestanding book review, newspaper book review in the country. The Washington Post book world was folded and outlook a number of years ago. Before that the San Francisco chronicle folded their freestanding section. That gives the section more importance, at least in the newspaper world but also in the online world as well. There are a huge number of places that are reviewing books from bloggers to people posting microreviews on twitter. But i think that there are very few places that are doing it in the way that we do it with the thoroughness and authority. What book reviews do you personally read . I read reviews all over the place. I read them i read them in the new yorker, the new york review of books, i read them in the atlantic and the number of weeklies and monthlies. I read a lot of it online. So its a might not necessarily read the print edition of all of those publications but i frequently read reviews here and there depending on the book and the reviewer. Is it easy to become new york centric . You know, now. I think its not. I think that i feel like at the New York Times we are all thinking so globally that if anything i think it ends up getting forgotten. All of the many regions of this country. There is there is a lot of regional literature that is really great. But internationally at this time s. We dont review books that are not out in the us but i really have a knife on books that were published in translation, authors that are huge in the uk and then come over here. I would say no. What about self published books . Have you reviewed self published books . Do you get them . We get them, and we dont review them. We review about 1 percent of the books that come out in print from our publisher every year. So 99 percent of those books are being discarded. At sometime at sometime you have to say okay we will just look at these books. Otherwise we would be here. One of the things that we find is the publishing world is often liberal white male dominated. Have you found that in your business . I mean, it i mean it is not here at the unit at the New York Times book review. When it comes to the books themselves i dont think so actually. The Publishing Industry is dominated by women if anything in terms of the number of editors who were there and the people who are promoting them and selling them. Publishing is really female dominated. In terms of the book i would say no. No. In terms of the attention given to books sometimes just to be as we try not to do that here. We tried to bear in mind that the books that are of interest to our readers are multifaceted. I dont think of that in terms of you know, there are so many distinctions you could choose. Some people think of it very much in terms of gender. I would say ethnicity and country of origin is something we pay a lot of attention to. Terms of to. Terms of the political spectrum we try to get people across the spectrum. On trying to think of recent examples. But just off the top of my head last week we had worked for example. And we do try to get a number of different political perspectives. Bill oreilly, dana perino, american sniper come all bestsellers on the New York Times bestseller list. When it comes to political bookss or maybe. Of view books what do you do . We like to review them when we think they are worthys. We dont like too many easy ways to do a book review that is political in nature. You get someone you get someone going to agree 100 percent, and that is boring in terms of the reviews. Yes, this person is right especially if the book is a polemic in nature or you could get someone on the opposite side of the political spectrum, and then they just make fun of the book and author and take it down. Neither of those is interesting. Both very predictables. We try to do get someone who we think will honestly and in an interesting way to gauge the subject matters do a takedown or iraniraq. In your time as editors what changes have you meant . Well, changes on the page that are made in terms of introducing the features in the book review by the book. Something down. Which is the back page. It has changed the number of times. But directly before i came on board it was an essay. We changed it to something, something called book and where we have a rotating group of 15 colonists. They are matched. Each week they answer some questions in the literary world, the world of books and publishings command they dont know who they are matched with before they take it on. The idea was thats i think that in the internet age we dont want to just get that opinion. Thats where i think forms are so popular. People want to get different perspective. This this is a way to get two very different strong voices distinctive writers. Even if they had the same answer and broadly speaking this week we asked them if the daily news price for women helps or hinders women writers. Even if this is a terrible thing. They say for different reasons. The columns themselves are distinct enough. We will go to the front called open book. Before we had something that was a letter from the editor about the contributors to this section, and i wanted to introduce a feature in the book review that is more news oriented or faster moving. That is what open book is. A critical essay. Talking about what its like to be between books when your novelist. Who came up with that idea . I was her idea. She picks that. She had a book about the spring. It it seems like a fun topic. Sometimes we commissioned the exit. Sometimes we will approach a novelist or a critic we like and asked them if there is something they would be interested in writing about generally, writing about a topic of planning an issue something that we approached a number of writers about. Any of the New York Times book review outside the firewall . I dont think we have a firewalls. There are you know i dont think so actually. I think there are ways to get around it. But the book review operates in the same way. Do you hear from readers . All the time. Are you kidding . Happy, angry, disappointed critical, upset, annoyed. Of you ever review the book because reader said you have to look at this book . Nos. It would mean that the book is out. Last weeks may. Were really looking right now. It takes now. It takes us a while to assess the book figure out if it should be reviewed. Contact reviewers, figure out who would want to write about something have them agree to do so take it to the editorial process. Again we closed ten days before the book review comes out. Thats quite a leadtime. We have to be far ahead of things. You ever see a book and say im going to review this one . I have not yet. I think that you know my predecessors reviewed books while there in they were in this job. I havent done it yet. One of the things i try to do is really gets in idea. I feel like my. Of view is infused. What makes a good book review . I mean, good book review is a good piece of writing. It should be interesting in and of itself. Im not going to delude myself into thinking that everyone who reads the book reviews are actually going to go out and read the book. For many people the book review assess that they dont have to read the book. Its easier to its easier to talk about what makes a bad review them what makes a good review. There are there are a lot of things that are bad review does it does not do. I will say that one of my personal pet peeves is to get to the end of the book review and say do they like it . If i cant tell that something is wrong with that review. I cant stand to read a book review that is a book report. I think that i dont like a disinterested sort of what some reviewers might imagine a timely review being very auspicious and stately about it. Someone should tangle with material and you should be able to tell that there is an interest there. Get engaged with it. The bestseller list. Yes. We have moved from fiction and nonfiction bestsellers to all sorts of bestsellers. Yes. Y . Because people read in different ways. There are so many books published. If you just did fiction or nonfiction you would miss out on so much of the other books that are out there. A lot of books sell in the real world are cookbooks, how to books inspirational books Childrens Books probably outsell all of them all the other categories. And within Childrens Book you want to distinguish between y 8, young adult books which it turns out lots of grownups are reading and middle grade books. If you have an eight yearold child you dont want to look at a book to cover bestseller list of childrens novels and not know that a lot of them are actually for 14 yearolds. So we introduced a lot of specialized bestseller lists in the book review over the last couple years to account for a number of changes that were made. Look at format, ebook audiobooks you know books that sell across platforms. How is ebook phenomenon affecting your world . Not a lot of honestly. I think that there was of view or an excitement depending on your perspective that they would overtaken supplant traditional carbon based books as they are called but i dont think that that has happened. Their growth took off and then they kind of started to taper and stabilize. Stabilize. A lot of people who read ebooks will we call hybrid readers. They might take the camera on an airplane with them or use the tablet reader for romance novels or erotica. Offer books that huge amounts really quickly. A book that is just too heavy to carry. Other books that they want to have a print edition of. But on this plan there coffee table. Have it on the bookshelf. I think that what he has done is expanding opportunities. I read in print. Constantly building new bookshelves. I cherish them. I love the weather printed. The uk edition. And then in print. I am print all the way. Onscreen all they. For me the book has a special place. Did you have an essay at one point . Yes. A tech reporter. He is a columnist. He wrote about inheriting his mothers library and what the importance of that was for him. That resonated that resonated with me because i have books that have been handed down to me. I chose which books i wanted to keep. I no that they are my dads books. Who is bob what is bob . Bob is my book of books. He is i do think of them as having a personality. Very clean grade journal. I have written down every book that i have read since i was 17. And where does it live . In a diary, several diaries . No, its one book. People people are often disappointed by talk about it. I write small. I record the author and the title. Its on my desk at home. Its like the one cherished object if my house were to go up in flames i would want at 1st. I have to say i was going to say i dont have a copy of it. The 2015. I do have a pdf of it now. 2015. How many books are on that list. Is not about the numbers. Its about the content. I dont know the number actually. I did keep track of numbers why started. I think its a can of people asking me that question for me to say, wait i should know how many. It has its downside because i can do things like quantify how many books i have read each year in the notice if i start to fall off from my batting average. You not going to tell us a number. Am not going to give it away. Its my diary. [laughter] i will write about that. I have written about it. Another book coming out. I do. Im writing about my life with bob. How did you get started . I have the most roundabout way. I dont take notes. Anyone trying to get into book reviewing. You know, i think the easiest way to answer that is to say was always reader. That is the primary qualification to be a reader, to be interested in books. In that way. Take us on that roundabout. Its a very long so after college i found that i wanted to go and academia. I was discouraged from doing so by one of my professors who assured me that i would never get a job that because i would be qualified because there were no jobs. So this was in the early 90s. I want to do something that would be very different from what i find wanted to do. If it wasnt going to do academia with the would be publishing and see if there was Something Else out there that might interest me. I decided to buy a oneway ticket. I lived their for a year. I read a lot when i was there. When i came home was actually not to live in new york but to get prepared to move to hong kong to contact in hong kong in doublethink amen from scholastic childrens publisher. Thats what i would want to do. Ended up taking a job. I worked in publishing. And what is childrens publishing, then i worked briefly at Time Incorporated london. When i was in london i started writing books and art for the economy. I came back to new york worked in television actually. In news. Then i left that job to read my 1st book. When i left that job i was writing fulltime for the 1st time ever. I had written for the economist. I realize this is what i want to do. I never want to go back. I worked briefly at a magazine called american demographic. After that i stayed home and wrote books. Pamela paul, was your 1st book . How did you choose the topic . My 1st book came out in 2002. The topic was kind of chosen for me. And after i got divorced i noticed that many other people did. A trend alert went off. I started doing research about it. My day job was Trend Analysis at the time for broadcasting for cnn and applied it. My own marriage ending the road about it happening to people my age around the country. How did you get from their . Obviously at the time. I was a contributor. I was not on staff. By the time i got to choose my topic everything was chosen. Someone was already doing something on s m infidelity it turns out what i wrote the story most of it could not be printed in Time Magazine surprise surprise. There is a lot more to be said. So did it so well . I dont know if it sold well. It was a very maybe it did. But they got a lot of attention not all of the positive. I mentioned my nasty review earlier. To to my own horn for a little bit to my think it was ahead of its time. That book came out in 2005. Especially the internet and pornography had change the way the people consumed. It has changed access commander change the way in which people using it. To do the research men who use pornography. To talk about what they use was like, if it affected their attitude their sex lives. And the reaction to it was interesting. You know i thought the people were going to come to it as a finally someone approach this journalistically, not coming to it with a political agenda. They just kind of laying out this research. Who knew. They got its moment in the spotlight. Instead to my chagrin people reacted very much alive political lines. A lines. A lot of people on the left to it that would say finally is the smart, interesting nonideological approach to pornography. Instead many of them said it was an attack on free speech for a woman taking away pornography. And the reception. Many conservatives were open from a critical perspective. Was it from a moral perspective . Some of it was. To i heard from a lot of conservatives, ended up coming to congress and testifying on the effects command they were interested in the way that it had affected mens sex lives. Frankly i dont see it as an issue. I would have to say at least conservatives were more open to hearing at. Well, just to continue your book journey. Again, not so obvious but knew what was going on in my life when i wrote the book. I had two children. And what i observed in my real life was the parenting had kind of become industrialized. Have become a thing. It used to be in the New York Times that we never used parenting. You would use childrearing. Its a very parent centric way of looking at this thing we do. I wanted to write about that and to investigate some of the ways in which companies were taking advantage of parental anxiety. Basically as a sham. As. As a parent i found that there were so many ways i was told the family spent spend money on next, why command z and doing all this other stuff that i would be able to raise the perfect child. And, of course, i did. Where were you born, raised . I was born in new york. I was born on an island. My parents were divorced at a young age. I spend my weekends in the citys. Really they look at me and say that the new yorker. I must say im from long island reluctantly. My mother worked in advertising. She actually enter the world of advertising is a copywriter that peggy dig amendment. She was writing model for me to be my father worked in construction. Do you review New York Times reporters books . We do. We dont review all of them. We also as you know the New York Times has a a sunday book review and we have our daily reviews. And they cant obviously review the New York Times reporters, but the daily section will get an outside review. Have you ever been pressured to review somebody . No. I can tell you that people will be annoyed if we dont. It looks from other staffers you know, we review those books we think there were the. In general the New York Times filled with great writers. You know, our readers, our New York Times readers command they know when our big reporters have books come out, our colonists. Out, our colonists. They are generally interested command in that way we try to respond. Have you ever lost a friendship over book review . No, i havent unless somebody is just so angry with me that they are even revealing it. Maybe i havent just dont know. In case there writing a book they dont let me know. What is the thing you dont like about your job . Nothing. Is the weirdest job. With the possible exception of lying down and reading all day with nothing else to do this is the next best thing. Are your children readers . Yeah. I have piles back there a books they have to bring home. They consider and i got this job for it to be a promotion. The pinnacle of achievement. Is your husband a reader . Yes. What kind of work to see do . He works in finance. Im letters of these numbers pamela paul, the podcast is that something you started as well . No, that was begun under santana house. You can listen to writers on the website. All of those. How many times a week do you do that . Once a week. It is available outside . Youre asking me all these good technical questions to which i do not know the answer. I think that it is. You can download from itunes. There is a way around it. All right. Lets go to buy the book. What are some of the books on your nightstand . No, i can see with that question because i have this great news bed. A japanese platform bed, and the best thing about it is that it has a border going all around it. I can pile books around the entire bed. I think it by answering the question. Im surrounded by books to read right now surrounded by books that are in large part about reading about riding through your book because i am writing a book on the subject. Writers who will writers who will avoid the subject in the writing a book and others who are drawn to it. I think i fall into the latter category. I look to writers his voice i admire. It ranges. Right now reading Shirley Jackson. Wrote a terrific essay a few weeks ago about Shirley Jackson recently reissued domestic writing. She wrote about living with her kids in the house in vermont. Two books called among the savages and raising demons. The titles give a sense of her sensibility and wit. Im enjoying those at the moment. Who are some of your favorite nonfiction authors . That is such a broad question. They can take notes. They can look at the bookshelves and she read so many favorites. Thats a hard question to ask. I wish i had my i think its a good category. Biographer. I mean, David Mccullough is an amazing biographer. Im going look over to the side of my bookshelf. Embrace people to him. Sells well. Well, lets broaden it. I will add bob carroll to the mix. Im actually a big find a big fan of president ial biographies of political memoirs. It is the storytelling. I mean, if you read and this is one of his president ial biographies but if you read his book on the Brooklyn Bridge that book is not just about the Brooklyn Bridge, its about Mechanical Engineering at the time, its about you know, what they learned about whats it called . You have the suspension . No. I am thinking about when you go scuba diving you get the bends. How they discovered the ben stein the construction of the bridge. Brooklyn politics at the time all of these incredible figures that played into the building. So so what he does is he kind of leaves this incredible tapestry. And so its the storytelling, its the vividness of the writing. Is there any trend in nonFiction Books or in Fiction Books that you have noticed over the years . The blurring of those definitions. We have seen a lot of people writing fictionalized memoirs for taking what might have been considered a memoir and turning it in the fiction or taking nonfiction and writing about it in a much more personal way. I mean, when i started writing nonfiction and even in journalism you rarely saw the 1st person. You are always avoid i. With the internet in particular that personal voices being infusing the nonfiction more. And then infection i would say also a blurring of genres where you have, you know, traditional socalled literary writers infusing genre fiction whether its crime, thriller into there writing. With a book like poison about its just this little snippet of history any books like that surprise you . Am always surprised by the bestseller list. Every week we do a podcast segment. There is always something unexpected. I think that a book like boys a book like seabiscuit, unbroken those kinds of books that kind of narrative nonfiction, what it does so well is take the very particulars of a small story within a much broader canvas and succeeds in conveying all the ups and downs of particulars and the name that people. Three people i would fight. Just in terms of the attention thats gotten. To me what i found most powerful and moving about the attention that has gotten is it really showed the impact that early reading had a people. Most people read to kill a mockingbird in school. Most of them read it because it was a sign of a school. Much as people complained about assigned reading and how boring those novels that your forced to read in english class in junior high are, those but have a tremendous impact. Many people read decades ago the us so much attention and generated such excitement. Shows the power the book had another inspirational effect on a persons life. So many peoples lives. Coming out july 2015. Do you have an early copy of it . Have you assigned a reviewer to it . We are going to review it we do have a reviewer, but but we dont have the book. Thats my next mission. Keeping that pretty tight come a simon schuster. Harpercollins. The keeping it pretty tight. They are. Who is the reviewer . I cant tell you that. Thats the most exciting part of our job. Its the books themselves. In its finding that match the most interesting person his voice we havent heard from on the subject who would provide a different perspective than you might read elsewhere in the book review want. On the staff meets what is your Editorial Staff mack we meet as a whole rather rarely. This is a very informal place. So we have micro meetings and informal meetings all the time. And you know, i would say that its fun. Theres a reason why this job is good. Everyone here no matter what role you play your huge reader and an opinionated reader and someone who enjoys and relishes you know, having opinions about books. There is a bit of debate sometimes disagreement but there is also a lot of humor we take what we do seriously but we have a lot of fun. What is the purpose of an editorial meeting . We have editorial meetings with each of the preview worse. We will meet with them as a small group usually once every week or two to discuss the book. That preview editor thinks it should be reviewed. Reviewed. And sometimes you talk about the ones that he or she thinks should not be reviewed if there is some reason to debate it to let you know what to make sure that we are okay. And the purpose of those meetings as the editor will tell my deputy and i about i about the book, what its about, why is worthy of a review command and coming usually with an adjusted list. Sometimes with this is my 1st choice is my 2nd choice and why those people would be good. If its an author who has been reviewed a lot they will come in with a list of everyone who has review that person before in the New York Times book review. And and the reason for that as we have some unusual rules are. And one of them is if you have reviewed stephen king before you cannot review him for us again. Y . We want to get some new voice on it. We want to get someone new. Our daily critics like garner janet these people they will review, you know, the next even king even if they would usa have reviewed his books before. Thats part of there role. But we do here is get someone with a fresh perspective on it. It becomes challenging. But we want to look at everyone that has review them before. Okay, who are the kinds of people that we want. How would you recommend to viewers to readers how they should read . Is it accessible . You know, i still like to read and print. I think it reads a lot like a magazine. We really think hard about our cover. Maybe those three books that were going to have on the cover that we can whos going to review it. That has a place and should be kind of thought about. I am the production editor here at the book review command i am in charge of getting all the various elements of the section headlines captions photos tax, all of that on an electronic page and off to the printer so you can read in the sunday paper. How do you get them together . Actually, we are all electronic. Publications probably about ten or 15 years ago. We use a system called adobe and design. All the elements are checked into that system so that i can look to see if its caption ready headline ready, look in the page file. In this sort of gives you a helicopter view of all the parts. I can zero in on things that having cleared for copywriting and production status. All right. Lets look at our recent book review cover. Here is your Summer Reading cover. Who designed it and what was your role . The art director came up with the overall concept. I gave i gave him the blank electronic page any sort of looked at it. All of our cover several logo gauge. The New York Times banner. He takes the blank canvas looks at it. He talked to the editor and figures out what kind of damage they want to have. A lot of times we have it on the cover. A happy summer cover. They figure out what they want and then he finds an illustrator who will agree to do something along those lines. They give they give some are back. He gives me a rough version of the layout. I pull it and. The artist artist gets credit for his work. Ill put that on. This scan the art. I get that High Resolution copy of it and pull that into the page and that is what goes to press. Since were going to desktop publishing we do all digital. Transmitted out of the 11th for. Then we close the issue. Its all adobe acrobat. You dont you dont really see the old metal and film negative and things started happening when i was doing the. Once you send off what you set off how quickly can this be printed . We can close this at five in and transmit the page between five and six. Will have copies back in the morning or overnight. Probably havent done for three hours. Its very speedy. Our 1st one is the main press for the times in the metro area. You have your computer open. What are you working on hear . This is one of our electronic pages done in adobe and design. Im making sure that highresolution artisan place. You can see some of the stuff is a little fuzzy. You put that in. Art director sort of left this out. Ill go through and make sure all the real artisan. I just come in. If its in here and announcing this one yet. Once i get this done it will be pretty much ready for press. Have to guess we dont have a headline here. Its still a work in progress. This normally would be two days before we close. Were going to go to press. When into the system and we use a big database system to track of pages. An image of all the pages in this particular issue. Dont know what the ads will look like it. I can see the editorial page he can look at it to. Across the middle of the page. Too many pages in a row. And its just a really good overview of the section. If i see green on top i know i have a highrise art in place. If its right of get a nag. Can you pull the cover . The cover, this is a smaller one. This this is like Everything Else in the issue, work in progress. And this is over here. So as you can see, its not quite fitting yet. I dont have the real artisan but eventually it will look Something Like this. This is a mockup of the illustration. This is a book called loving dad. That will be our cover for seven june. The 7th of june. In my ideal world i think of someone reading cover to cover. Online it does not appear that way. And i think you know readers probably read it in conjunction with all the books coverage at the time whether from the daily with a publishing reporter something that ran in the magazines. You know again ideally they would read it all. What do you think about books that splash New York Times bestseller on their covers. I think its great. In this interview and tour you will see the original handwritten manuscript of Maya Angelous i know what the caged bird sings as well as Richard Wrights native son. This is booktv in new york city. Host dr. Khalil mohammed where we . Guest we are at that world famous Schomberg Center for research on blacks called her. Host why is it