A memoir by someone who actually likes his family? As Carolyn See points out in The Washington Post, this is so rare that it’s “…close to miraculous. If a person wants to write about his youth and his parents, it’s usually because he has scores to settle.” which is just one of the reasons why she calls Growing Up Jung by Micah Toub “… a gem.” The book’s title refers to the fact that his parents, both Jungian therapists, applied their work to child rearing.

See gives it the ultimate compliment, “I hated to see this book end. I loved every person in it, from the wistful dad with his ‘fluffy-edged’ voice, to Toub’s kind and darling mom, his tolerant and loving ex-wife, even that volcanic teenaged sister…”

Give this to anyone in need of an Augusten Burroughs’ antidote.

By the way, Burroughs’ mother, Margaret Robison, will tell her own side of that story in The Long Journey Home, Spiegel & Grau (March 1, 2011).

Growing Up Jung: Coming of Age as the Son of Two Shrinks Micah Toub Retail Price: $23.95 Hardcover: 261 pages Publisher: W. W. Norton & Company – (2010-08-16) ISBN / EAN: 0393067556 / 9780393067552

According to holds, Mockingjay is the clear winner over Freedom with library users.

In four large library systems, Mockingjay is showing 3,114 holds on 630 hardcover copies (we’re not counting the large type or the audio editions), a full week after publication, while Freedom shows 1,550 on 383 copies on the day of publication.

For an author leery of publicity (he famously turned down an invitation from Oprah), Jonathan Franzen is already in the middle of a maelstrom for his book that is just releasing today. New reviews (yes, there are a few outlets that have held off until pub day) begin with an obligatory rundown of the Time cover, the NYT coverage and the backlash. NPR’s All Things Considered ran a story last night about the hasthtag #Franzenfreude which has been serving as Twitter outlet for those who believe all this coverage is representative of a prejudice towards male writers (as Jennifer Weiner put it in the Huffington Post, “…when a man writes about family and feelings, it’s literature with a capital L, but when a woman considers the same topics, it’s romance, or a beach book – in short, it’s something unworthy of a serious critic’s attention.”)

USA Today, reviewing the book on the day of pub, neatly avoids those accusations by comparing Franzen to a female writer,

What Franzen does so well here — and only Lionel Shriver, in this year’s brilliant health care satire So Much for That, is his equal — is marry rich, absorbing storytelling with incisive social commentary.

Ron Charles, who reviewed the book in print for the Washington Post last week, morphs into  “your totally hip video book reviewer” for a second look.

HBO’s biopic about Temple Grandin, which starred Clare Danes, won five Emmies last night, causing several news outlets to wonder, ‘Temple Grandin’ wins big at Emmys. But who is she? (Entertainment Weekly). Grandin made an impression at the event, according to the L.A. Times,

Attired in red and black rodeo gear, Grandin herself became a palpable presence at the ceremony, at one point, rising and excitedly swinging her hand lasso style from the audience. And while standing on stage after the movie had won its top award, she warmly embraced a sobbing executive producer Emily Gerson Saines, who said she found inspiration in Grandin’s life story as her own child had been diagnosed with autism.

Evidently she also made an impression on those who saw the event on TV; the tie-in book rose to #257 today, from #2175 yesterday.

Thinking in Pictures (Expanded, Tie-in Edition): My Life with Autism (Vintage) Temple Grandin Ph.D. Retail Price: $15.00 Paperback: 304 pages Publisher: Vintage – (2010-01-26) ISBN / EAN: 0307739589 / 9780307739582

No wonder it’s the number one title on Amazon in the College and University category, Debt-Free U ‘s subtitle is a sentence any parent would love to hear from their kid, “How I Paid for an Outstanding College Education Without Loans, Scholarships, or Mooching off My Parents.”

The author was on the Today Show this morning (did I hear correctly? I think Ann Curry said he studied Art History, not Finance). The book rose to #22 on Amazon sales rankings by the end of the day.

Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

…………………………

Debt-Free U: How I Paid for an Outstanding College Education Without Loans, Scholarships, orMooching off My Parents Zac Bissonnette Retail Price: $16.00 Paperback: 304 pages Publisher: Portfolio Trade – (2010-08-31) ISBN / EAN: 1591842980 / 9781591842989

How quickly one goes from literary darling to Jonathan Franzen, the Writer We Love to Hate (Newsweek, 8/26).

Knopf’s major nonfiction title of the season, The Tiger by John Vaillant received several stellar reviews over the weekend. About a rare man-eating tiger (the book claims that he was actually a premeditated killer) in a remote area of Siberia, the book is likely to receive more media attention in the upcoming week. Several libraries are showing holds.

Washington Post; “ to those of us who love the embattled cat, The Tiger offers the emotional satisfaction of Quentin Tarantino’s film Kill Bill — with the tiger in the role of Uma Thurman’s vengeful bride. But the characters in this book, both human and tigrine, are more nuanced.”

Seattle Times, ‘The Tiger’: John Vaillant’s mesmerizing tale of a man-eating tiger, vengeance …; “For readers who enjoy literary nonfiction, think of Vaillant as a younger version of John McPhee, but on steroids.”

San Francisco Chronicle; “…offers readers a shiver-inducing portrait of a predator that has been revered – and feared – like no other animal.”

It was also a fall pick by librarians at BEA’s Shout & Share and by independent booksellers as for the September Indie Next list.

The book is also in development as a film by Random House Films, with a projected release date some time in 2011.

The Tiger: A True Story of Vengeance and Survival John Vaillant Retail Price: $26.95 Hardcover: 352 pages Publisher: Knopf – (2010-08-24) ISBN / EAN: 0307268934 / 9780307268938

Random House Audio; 9780307715074; $40.00

A librarian’s BEA Shout & Share pick and also a September Indie Next selection, the intriguingly titled, The Sound of a Wild Snail Eating was featured on NPR’s Weekend Edition Saturday. Author Elisabeth Tova Bailey spoke to Scott Simon about how the unlikely gift of a snail in a pot of flowers helped her deal with a year of being bedridden by a neurological disease. She described how calming it was to watch a creature that moved only slightly faster than she could.

Indie Next says the book is “…one sweet story of the importance of taking time to notice our connection to nature.”

Some libraries are showing heavy holds on light ordering.

The Sound of a Wild Snail Eating Elisabeth Tova Bailey Retail Price: $18.95 Hardcover: 208 pages Publisher: Algonquin Books – (2010-08-24) ISBN / EAN: 1565126068 / 9781565126060

Last week, a whopping two weeks ahead of next Tuesday’s release of Jonathan Franzen’s Freedom, reviewers broke ranks to be among the first to deliver their verdicts on his tale of an upper-middle class Midwestern family. (Michiko Kakutani at the New York Times was first out of the gate, calling it “an indelible portrait of our times,” followed by the NYTBR cover review dubbing it “a masterpiece,” while Franzen himself appeared on the cover of Time.)

This week, it was a People pick, but Entertainment Weekly gives it a somewhat less stellar “A-“:

Freedom isn’t flawless: [the wife’s] journal reads more like Franzen than his character, and he gets sidetracked by quirky tangents. But this is a deep dive into a fascinating family that feels very real, and fully grounded in our time.

A backlash also began this week, with novelists Jodi Picoult and Jennifer Weiner charging in an interview in the Huffington Post that.

…it’s a very old and deep-seated double standard that holds that when a man writes about family and feelings, it’s literature with a capital L, but when a woman considers the same topics, it’s romance, or a beach book – in short, it’s something unworthy of a serious critic’s attention.

Next week will bring the book itself, at last. Unsurprisingly, holds are  growing (though they’re not nearly as high as those for a certain YA dystopian novel).

Freedom: A Novel Jonathan Franzen Retail Price: $28.00 Hardcover: 576 pages Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux – (2010-08-31) ISBN / EAN: 0374158460 / 9780374158460

Franzen’s isn’t the only novel to be aware of next week:

Fiction Watch List

The Gendarme by Mark Mustain (Putnam) is a first novel about a 92-year-old Turkish American who suddenly comes face-to-face with his part in the Armenian genocide. It comes from the Amy Einhorn imprint at Putnam/Penguin – and as one bookseller put it, “Our staff has come to expect at least one blockbuster every season from Amy Einhorn Books.” Her first list, Winter 2009 included The Help, followed by The Postmistress this year.

This one may be the breakout for Putnam’s Fall list. Einhorn presented it at BEA during LJ‘s Day of Dialog and said it’s a Penguin sale rep’s pick. Prepub reviews, however, are mixed.

Skippy Dies by Paul Murray (Farrar Straus & Giroux), a novel set in a Catholic boy’s boarding school in Dublin that made the Booker long list and is being made into a movie directed by Neil Jordan, gets a flat-out “A” from Entertainment Weekly: Murray’s humor and inventiveness never flag. And despite a serious theme — what happens to boys and men when they realize the world isn’t the sparkly planetarium they had hoped for — Skippy Dies leaves you feeling hopeful and hungry for life.”

Holy Thief by William Ryan (Minotaur) is a debut mystery set in Stalinist 1936 Moscow. This one got starred reviews in Library Journal and PW, and several mentions in a recent EarlyWord Galley Chat. Talia Sherer, of Macmillan LibraryMarketing, calls it a “book to read in one sitting without taking a single breath.”  LJ said, “In his solitude and resolve, Ryan’s Korolev evokes Martin Cruz Smith’s fierce Arkady Renko, while the period detail and gore call to mind Tom Rob Smith. Ryan’s first novel will be released with a tsunami of marketing, so readers in public libraries will be lengthening the reserve lists for this remarkable thriller.” However, Kirkus says “the pacing is at times a bit slow, and the mystery holds few surprises.” Orders and reserves are light at this point in the libraries we checked.

Sure Bets

Body Work by Sara Paretsky (Putnam) is the 14th mystery starring private investigator V.I. Warshawski, and is set in Chicago’s avant garde scene. PW calls it “superb” and declares: “This strong outing shows why the tough, fiercely independent, dog-loving private detective continues to survive.”

Lost Empire by Clive Cussler and Grant Blackwood (Putnam) is the second adventure with married treasure hunters Sam and Remi Fargo. PW isn’t impressed, calling it “a standard chase thriller” with “uninspired dialogue.”

Maybe This Time by Jennifer Crusie (St. Martin’s) is a romantic comedy about a woman trying to fix the problems of a family in a haunted house. PW says, “Crusie’s created a sharp cast of lonely souls, wacky weirdos, ghosts both good and bad, and unlikely heroes who are brave enough to give life and love one more try. You don’t have to believe in the afterlife to relish this fun, bright romp.”

Dark Peril by Christine Feehan (Berkley) is a new entry in the Carpathian fantasy series.

The Way of Kings by Brandon Sanderson (Tor) is the first volume of a planned 10-part fantasy series by the author best known for his efforts to complete the late Robert Jordan’s Wheel of Time series.  PW is optimistic: “Sanderson’s fondness for misleading the reader and his talent for feeding out revelations and action scenes at just the right pace will keep epic fantasy fans intrigued and hoping for redemptive future installments.”

Former British Prime Minister Tony Blair‘s memoir, A Journey: My Political Life, goes on sale next week. Excitement is high in the UK, as expressed by The Independent yesterday,

The mere prospect of Blair’s memoirs is already generating a response that borders on the hysterical. Labour’s leadership candidates speculate nervously in private about what might be in it. The BBC will broadcast an hour-long interview. Newspapers plan extensive coverage. The financial arrangements for the narrative are a source of raging controversy [After much criticism, Blair announced that he will donate his £4.6m advance and royalties to a sports center for badly injured soldiers].

But will Americans care? Holds are negligible in the libraries we checked.

A Journey: My Political Life Tony Blair Retail Price: $35.00 Hardcover: 720 pages Publisher: Knopf – (2010-09-02) ISBN / EAN: 0307269833 / 9780307269836

Cover of Time magazine, the cover of the upcoming NYT BR, and now…Franzen’s Freedom wins top honors in the new issue of People (9/6/10). Of his first book in ten years ago, People says, “In its humanity, depth, dry comic observations and World According to Garp-like evoking of unspeakable sorrows and indelible bonds, it proves well worth the wait.”

It gets four of a possible four stars, as does another quite different book, a “hilarious love story,” The Tower, the Zoo and the Tortoise by Juliet Stewart. It has also been receiving strong reviews elsewhere and has been called the next Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society. Holds in libraries, although not nearly as high as those for the Franzen title, are growing.

Thorndike is releasing the book in large type in January (details below).

The Tower, The Zoo, and The Tortoise: A Novel Julia Stuart Retail Price: $24.95 Hardcover: 320 pages Publisher: Doubleday – (2010-08-10) ISBN / EAN: 0385533284 / 9780385533287

Large Type; Thorndike; 1/5/2011; 9781410432827; $34.99

Agh! The President got ahold of an ARC of Jonathan Franzen’s Freedom, which is not supposed to go on sale until next Tuesday, supposedly unleashing “a small panic in the publishing world.” (NYT Arts Beat Blog).

It seems that news sources made it sound like he bought a finished copy while vacationing on Martha’s Vineyard, causing booksellers around the country to be beseiged with requests for copies. Apparently, they are sticking to the strict on-sale date (is there some irony in the fact that the book is titled Freedom?).

Some libraries are showing the book as being “in process,” with holds ranging from 4:1 to 10:1 in systems we checked.

Already a critical success here, reviews are beginning to break in the UK, with the Telegraph saying Franzen is “almost alone in his willingness to tackle America’s big issues.” The Guardian calls it the “novel of…the century.”

At left, the UK cover.

New York magazine lists 20+ most anticipated books of the fall.

For an in-depth look at the upcoming season, crafted particularly for librarians, check out HarperCollins’ Fall Buzz presentation on our site.

Looking further ahead, publishers that have three seasons are beginning to release their Winter/Spring ’11 catalogs.

The new Penguin, Harper and Random House catalogs have recently been added to Edelweiss (make sure to take advantage of their nifty “GeoSearch” feature  that lets you identify books about your area or by local authors). Other publishers, such as Macmillan and Simon & Schuster offer e-catalogs on their own sites (links are available at the right, under “Publishers Catalogs”).

We thought Scholastic had mastered the art of the embargo, but the LA Times got their hands on a copy and have posted a review, “…a series conclusion that is nearly as shocking, and certainly every bit as original and thought provoking, as The Hunger Games.”

Meanwhile, on Twitter, so many people have claimed to be reading copies that one person complained, “I feel like I’m the only one who hasn’t read it.”

Mockingjay (The Final Book of The Hunger Games) Suzanne Collins Retail Price: $17.99 Hardcover: 400 pages Publisher: Scholastic Press – (2010-08-24) ISBN / EAN: 0439023513 / 9780439023511