EarlyWord

Following a feature on the Today show, Five Presidents: My Extraordinary Journey with Eisenhower, Kennedy, Johnson, Nixon, and Ford, Clint Hill with Lisa McCubbin (S&S/Gallery Books; S&S Audio; OverDrive Sample) has risen on Amazon sales rankings to #16.

The memoir, written by the former secret service agent who was assigned to Mrs. Kennedy and threw his body across the President’s on the day of the assassination, offers anecdotes and reflections on his time working with five Presidents and the historical and personal moments he witnessed.

People has been running anecdotes from the book online. One focuses on Elvis’s meeting with Nixon, another on the effect of the death of the Kennedys’ infant son on JFK, and a final feature on JFK’s efforts to protect Jackie’s public image.

Hill’s previous two books were NYT best sellers. Five Days in November spent two weeks on the Hardcover Nonfiction in 2013, debuting at #3. Mrs. Kennedy and Me, 2012, was on for six weeks, hitting a high of #2.

HBO’s adaptation of Rebecca Skloot’s The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks just gained some serious star power. It was just announced that Oprah Winfrey, who first signed the book in 2010, will also star in the film.

The book tells the sad but fascinating story of Henrietta Lacks,  a poor black woman from Baltimore who died in 1951. However, cancer cells removed from her body without her knowledge continue to be used in medical research. The book has been a fixture on best seller lists, spending a year on the NYT Hardcover Nonfiction list and another 2 years on the Paperback Nonfiction list, where it reappears regularly (most recently at #15 on the May 1, 2016 extended list).

People reports that Oprah will play Deborah Lacks, Henrietta’s daughter and the character through whom the story is told in the book. According to Variety, “with Winfrey attached to star [the project] has been put on the fast-track with filming beginning this summer.”

Skloot will serve as a co-executive producer and Henrietta Lacks’ sons, Zakariyya Rahman and David Lacks, Jr. and granddaughter Jeri Lacksare, will serve as consultants.

No news yet on when the film is likely to debut.

A front page feature in the NYT‘s Science section sent How to Bake Pi: An Edible Exploration of the Mathematics of Mathematics, Eugenia Cheng (Perseus/PGW/Legato/Basic Books) racing up the Amazon sales rankings.

Currently #136 (up from 4,803), the book mixes fundamental mathematical principles with recipes, offering Gluten-Free Chocolate Brownies to get things going. Don’t expect a cookbook however; Dr. Cheng is focused on the math, offering an accessible, quirky, and clever tour of how it works.

The NYT‘s feature highlights Dr. Cheng’s mission as a “math popularizer,” pointing out her rising fame – she has been a guest on Late Night With Stephen Colbert and hosts extraordinarily popular online math tutorials – and her conviction that “the pleasures of math can be conveyed to the legions of numbers-averse humanities majors still recovering from high school algebra.”

To get a sense of Dr. Cheng’s culinary chops, the article offers a recipe for Bach pie, a treat to honor the composer mathematicians adore, complete with “an Escher-like braid of four glazed pastry plaits that followed divergent trajectories, never quite crisscrossing where you expected them to.”

The paperback edition of How to Bake Pi goes on sale next week. Libraries we checked are seeing steady circ. on the hardback edition, which came out last year.

For all those going to BEA, Cheng is a participant in this year’s Day of Dialog, a featured author of the Art of Nonfiction panel.

Below, she frightens Colbert:

Today’s GalleyChat has now ended. Read the transcript, below.

Join us next month to find out which galleys fellow librarians are loving:

June 7, 4 to 5 p.m. EDT (3:30 for virtual cocktails)
#ewgc

Walter Mosley became the first African-American Grand Master in history during last week’s Edgar Awards ceremony.

The Grand Master is the highest honor the Mystery Writers of America bestows, one that recognizes a lifetime of achievement and an impressive quality of work. Agatha Christie, P.D. James, and Stephen King have won in past years but never an African-American author.

On learning the news Mosley said in a statement, “Receiving the Grand Master Award is the apex of my career as a crime writer; as a writer. It is, joyfully, one of the seminal events of my life.”

Literary Hub has posted his acceptance speech as well as a rundown of the award’s night.

Mosley is best known for his Easy Rawlins series, beginning with Devil in a Blue Dress (Norton, 1990).

His newest book, coming this June, is part of that series, Charcoal Joe: An Easy Rawlins Mystery (PRH/Doubleday, Random House Audio; BOT).

It was a banner week for Viet Thanh Nguyen’s The Sympathizer (Grove Press, April 2015).

On Thursday night, it took home the Edgar Award for Best First Novel and shortly after, debuted on the NYT Paperback Trade Fiction Best Seller list, landing in the #9 spot, the first time it’s appeared on a NYT list (in hardcover, it was on the ABA IndieBound best seller list for six weeks, hitting a high of #24, and the L.A. Times best seller list for 2 weeks, but did not crack any other list).

Both of these events come just weeks after it won the Pulitzer in Fiction.. At that time the Guardian‘s headline described it as having done “from overlooked to Pulitzer winner,“ a bit of an overstatement. Although it had not won many prizes until the Pulitzer, it was a critical success (see Ron Charles’s review from the Washington Post), appeared on many end-of-the year best books lists and won ALA’s 2016 Carnegie Medal for Excellence in Fiction.

What makes this Pulitzer Prize winner, described by Library Journal as “a meditation on war, political movements, America’s imperialist role, the CIA, torture, loyalty, and one’s personal identity,” an Edgar contender? The main character is a double agent, a communist sympathizer who is an aide to a South Vietnamese general, so, while it is literary, it counts as a literary thriller. As Kirkus commented, “Think Alan Furst meets Elmore Leonard, and you’ll capture Nguyen at his most surreal,” further saying that the result is “Both chilling and funny.”

UPDATE: New York magazine declares something librarians have observed for some times, that genres are converging, under the headline, “The Sympathizer Won a Pulitzer and an Edgar, and May Herald the Great Literary Convergence.” The article verifies that this is the first time a book has won both a major literary prize and a genre prize.

In other Edgar news, Let Me Die in His Footsteps, Lori Roy (PRH/Dutton, June 2015) took home the honors for Best Novel while The Long and Faraway Gone, Lou Berney (HC/William Morrow, Feb. 2015) won for Best Paperback Original.

Footer Davis Probably is Crazy, Susan Vaught (S&S/Paula Wiseman, March 2015) won for Best Juvenile and A Madness So Discreet by Mindy McGinnis (HC/Katherine Tegan, Oct. 2015) took the Young Adult prize.

A full listing of all winners and nominees is online, a great resource for both RA and creating displays.

Currently in the #12 spot on Amazon’s sales rankings, The More of Less: Finding the Life You Want Under Everything You Own by Joshua Becker (PRH/WaterBrook) appeals to fans of the surprise hit, now a trend-setter, The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up by Marie Kondo.

Becker has a ready audience. He runs a heavily trafficked website, Becoming Minimalist. His book appeals to two currently hot topics, decluttering and learning to live with less, but with a spiritual element. Becker describes his approach by saying, “There’s a better way to live life—one that recognizes the empty promises of consumerism and champions the pursuit of living simply, Scripturally, and Jesus-centered.”

Holds in several libraries we checked were running far over a 3:1 ratio on very light ordering while other systems have yet to buy.

As a result of a feature on NPR’s Weekend Edition Sunday. Angela Duckworth’s  Grit: Passion, Perseverance, and the Science of Success by Angela Duckworth, (S&S/Scribner; S&S Audio) is rising quickly Amazon sales ranking. At #34 the day before it goes on sale, it’s likely to hit bestseller lists next week. Holds across libraries we checked are strong, reflecting high interest in the subject.

Grit posits that stick-to-itiveness is a fundamental key to success, a topic which Duckworth, a professor of psychology at the University of Pennsylvania, has also detailed in a very popular TED Talk. On NPR, she describes grit as  “stamina. But it’s not just stamina in your effort. It’s also stamina in your direction, stamina in your interests … Grit is typically about an overarching, generally abstract goal that motivates everything that you do.”

Last month, on NPR’s Hidden Brain program, Duckworth gave a longer interview on the subject and her book was included on the “hot upcoming nonfiction” lists complied by The Washington Post, Forbes, and The Wall Street Journal [subscription may be required].

Curious as to your own grittiness? Duckworth has an online quiz.

Speculation is swirling over who will be the next 007, but we now know who will run the spy game on this side of the Atlantic.

John Krasinski is the next Jack Ryan.

The Office favorite will star as the famous fictional CIA agent, following in the footsteps of the film stars Chris Pine, Ben Affleck, Harrison Ford, and Alec Baldwin.

This time, however, Ryan is not headed to the big screen, but to an Amazon TV series.

While details are sketchy and no air date is known, Deadline Hollywood is reporting that “expectations are for the show to go straight-to-series” (translated: bypassing Amazon’s “try it out” pilot stage). It will not be a direct adaptation but “a new contemporary take on the character in his prime as a CIA analyst/operative using the novels as source material.”

Jack Ryan first appeared in 1984 in The Hunt for Red October (PRH/Berkley, 2013 is the most recent edition), which was also the first film adaptation (starring Baldwin).

Clancy went on to write a series of novels focused on Ryan’s rise from agent to the President of the United States before beginning a new series featuring his son, starting with The Teeth of the Tiger (PRH/Berkley, 2004).

Debut author, Cosmpolitan’s at-large books editor, and former librarian, Camille Perri appears on NPR’s Weekend Edition Sunday today to discuss her book The Assistants (PRH/GP Putnam’s; Penguin Audio; OverDrive Sample).

The story, a timely tale about resentment, student debt, the 1%, and a plot to get even, has a great pitch, says The Hollywood Reporter: “The Devil Wears Prada meets Office Space.”

Perri, a former assistant herself, says that being an assistant is very odd: “you are intimately close to power but you don’t have any; you see so much money, you’re just not making any.” She wrote the book as a treat for women in the same situation, she says, and hopes they get a kick out of it.

It is a favorite among GalleyChatters and is part of the Penguin First Flights program. Our LiveChat with Perri took place on Jan. 27, 2016. She recorded the following video for program.

Holds are strong on light ordering.

Surging up the Amazon ranks on the strength of a CBS Sunday Morning feature is Clinton Romesha’s  Red Platoon: A True Story of American Valor (PRH/Dutton; Penguin Audio; BOT; OverDrive Sample), which hits shelves tomorrow.  

The author, who earned the Medal of Honor for his actions in Afghanistan, writes about the battle for Outpost Keating in 2009, an against-the-odds fight in which eight American soldiers died trying to defend a combat post on the front lines of the war, a place Romesha calls “the most remote, precarious and tactically-screwed combat outpost in all of Afghanistan.”

In their starred review, PW said the account “ranks among the best combat narratives written in recent decades” and that Romesha’s “powerful, action-packed book is likely to stand as a classic of the genre.”

Variety reported in late January that Sony Pictures optioned film rights to the memoir.

Ordering is light across libraries we checked.

Filming has ceased indefinitely on the third Maze Runner movie, Maze Runner: The Death Cure, based on James Dashner’s #1 NYT bestselling YA series of the same name.

The film had been scheduled for release on 2/17/17 but Deadline Hollywood is reporting that star Dylan O’Brien, who was injured on set in late March, is suffering injuries “far more serious than initially reported.” No word is forthcoming on when filming will resume and the cast and crew have been sent home.

Both the first and second films, The Maze Runner and Maze Runner: The Scorch Trials, were commercial successes, taking the #1 spot at the box office during their opening weekends.

There are four books currently in the series with a fifth due on Sept. 27, 2016, The Fever Code (Maze Runner, Book Five; Prequel), James Dashner (PRH/Delacorte). As the subtitle says, this one is actually a prequel, which, according to the publisher, will reveal “the story of how Thomas and WICKED built the Maze.”

A trade paperback edition of Maze Runner: The Death Cure, with a sticker announcing “Soon to Be A Major Motion Picture,” was released in 2013 (PRH/Delacorte).

The streaming service Hulu has announced it is adapting Margaret Atwood’s The Handmaid’s Tale (Houghton Mifflin, 1986) into a 10-episiode drama. The news sent the novel rising on Amazon’s sales charts.

Elisabeth Moss, who made her name on Mad Men, will star. Atwood will serve as a consulting producer.

In a hulu press release Atwood says:

“The Handmaid’s Tale is more relevant now than when it was written, and I am sure the series will be watched with great interest. I have read the first two scripts and they are excellent; I can hardly wait to see the finished episodes.”

The series is set to debut in 2017 and will be the second screen adaptation of Atwood’s dystopian novel. A 1990 film starring Natasha Richardson, Faye Dunaway and Robert Duvall told the story of a religious totalitarian state that controls women and their fertility. The scathing and grim novel has also been adapted into a graphic novel, an opera, and a ballet.

The novel won the inaugural Arthur C. Clarke award and was nominated for the Booker Prize and Nebula Award. In 2012, Atwood wrote an essay for The Guardian on the novel’s genesis and legacy.

Publishing’s summer season begins next week and marquee authors are appearing in every category. Librarians and booksellers also have a slew of recommendations.

Marquee Names

Adult Fiction, Holds Leaders

James Patterson (with Maxine Paetro), 15th Affair (Hachette/Little, Brown; Hachette Audio; Hachette Large Type; OverDrive Sample). At 464 pages, it is NOT one of the new shorter Patterson’s announced earlier this year.

Danielle Steel, The Apartment (PRH/Delacorte; Random House Large Print).

Middle Grade and YA

The Trials of Apollo Book One The Hidden Oracle, Rick Riordan (Hachette/ Disney-Hyperion; Listening Library; OverDrive Sample) — kicks off a new five-book series.

A Court of Mist and Fury, Sara Maas, (Macmillan/Bloomsbury; Recorded Books) — the sequel to A Court of Thorns and Roses.

The Crown, Kiera Cass, (HarperTeen) — The finale to The Selection series in which dystopia meets The Bachelor. An effort to launch it as a TV series on the CW didn’t get past the pilot stage, but there are still hopes for a Warner Bros. movie.

Literary

Zero K, Don DeLillo, (S&S/Scribner; S&S Audio) — All the country’s critics want to have their say on this book. Michiko Kakutani jumped ahead in the daily NYT this week, calling it the author’s “most persuasive since his astonishing 1997 masterpiece, Underworld.”

Hollywood also gave its review this week, in the form of it being optioned for a film by Scott Rudin.

DeLillo is scheduled to appear on NPR’s Weekend Edition tomorrow.

The titles covered here, and several other notable titles arriving next week, are listed with ordering information and alternate formats, on our downloadable spreadsheet, EarlyWord New Title Radar, Week of May 2, 2016

Revised Edition

 Get What’s Yours, Revised & Updated, Laurence J. Kotlikoff,  (S&S)

It’s such a big week that there’s even a hot title in the usually quiet category of revised editions. The best seller on getting the most from Social Security has been updated to reflect new regulations that took effect on April 29, 2016. Ironically, as reported by Bloomberg, those changes in Social Security rules  were brought about by the book itself, which revealed some loopholes. Time to weed those first editions (if you can get them out of readers’ hands).

Media Magnets

Ruthless: Scientology, My Son David Miscavige, and Me, Ron Miscavige (Macmillan/St. Martin’s; Macmillan Audio; OverDrive Sample).

As we wrote earlier this week, the Church of Scientology has tried to prevent this book’s publication, only adding to the interest. Miscavige will appear on ABC’s “20/20” today.

Grit: The Power of Passion and Perseverance, Angela Duckworth, (S&S/Scribner; S&S Audio).

Earlier this month, the NYT profiled the author, whose TED talk has been viewed nearly eight million times. She is scheduled to appear on NPR’s Weekend Edition, this Saturday, followed by CBS Sunday Morning, and the week after by PBS NewsHour.”

Peer Picks

It is a banner week for books librarians love with seven LibraryReads selections hitting shelves, including the #1 pick for May:

Britt-Marie Was Here, Fredrik Backman (S&S/Atria Books; S&S Audio; OverDrive Sample).

“Britt-Marie is a woman who is used to her life being organized. But when she leaves her cheating spouse and takes a temporary job as caretaker of the recreation center in the tiny town of Borg, her life changes in unpredictable ways. With its wonderful cast of oddball characters and sly sense of humor, this novel is sure to capture readers’ hearts. Highly recommended.” — Vicki Nesting, St. Charles Parish Library, Destrehan, LA

It is also a May Indie Next pick.

Our latest Penguin Debut Authors Chat title comes out as well, Clare Mackintosh’s I Let You Go (PRH/Penguin/Berkley; Penguin Audio; BOT; OverDrive Sample).

“Five-year-old Jacob is killed in a hit and run, an event that sends the police in search of the driver. Jenna Gray flees to Wales to mourn the loss of her son and recover from her past. As the anniversary of Jacob’s still unsolved death approaches, a tip to police results in an arrest and a very different picture emerges. This self-assured debut combines jaw-dropping moments with complex, believable characters and an ending that is hard to see coming.” — Jennifer Winberry, Hunterdon County Library, Flemington, NJ

Everyone Brave is Forgiven, Chris Cleave (S&S; S&S Audio; OverDrive Sample).

“Set during World War II and loosely based on the author’s own grandparents, this was a strikingly honest look at the changes that war creates on a country’s landscape and its people. These changes were so strongly shown by the progressive style of this novel. Bit by bit, we are privy to each character’s transformation. What a great tribute to what they endured. War gives birth to many endings, also to many beginnings. Bittersweet.” — Lori Elliott, Kershaw County Library, SC

Cleave’s novel is also People magazine’s “Book of the Week,” an Indie Next selection, and a favorite on GalleyChat.

Wilde Lake, Laura Lippman (HC/William Morrow; Harper Audio).

“As Lu, the newly elected state’s attorney in Howard County, prepares for a trial of a woman found murdered in her apartment, she begins to uncover secrets from her past. Bringing her back to the night her brother saved a life at the cost of another, Lu begins to question everything she’s known about the events and her childhood. Lippman’s newest standalone is sure to be another hit, perfect for mystery fans.” — Annice Sevett, New Hanover County Library, Wilmington, NC

Sweet Lamb of Heaven, Lydia Millet (Norton; Dreamscape).

“An arresting story about a wife manipulated and what she goes through to escape her husband’s desperate means to keep her. When her daughter is born, Anna starts hearing a voice in her head that may suggest the supernatural or the divine. She and her daughter hole up in a motel where all the guests seem to hear a similar voice in their heads. The author jolts the reader into reading something unexpected and the effect is eerie and memorable. Highly recommended for a book discussions.” — Andrienne Cruz, Azusa City Library, Azusa, CA

City of the Lost, Kelley Armstrong (Macmillan/Minotaur Books).

“When Casey Duncan and her friend are invited to Rockton, a town for people who need to disappear, she’s skeptical. Could it really be the haven it promises? She soon finds that Rockton has its own particular set of problems, including a designer drug and a murderer. As the town’s new detective, Casey is soon plunged into the hunting of a killer in a town built on secrets. Armstrong introduces a fascinating setting and an intriguing cast of characters. Readers will find themselves hooked.” — Elena Gleason, Coos Bay Public Library, Coos Bay, OR

Redemption Road, John Hart (Macmillan/Thomas Dunne Books; Macmillan Audio; OverDrive Sample).

“In Hart’s new suspense novel, we meet veteran detective Elizabeth Black, who is facing possible suspension for a suspicious shooting. At the same time, former police officer Adrian Wall is released from prison after serving time for the murder of Julia Stange. Stange’s son wants Adrian dead. Adrian has always claimed his innocence, but after his release, a couple of new bodies turn up at the church. This is a thrilling page-turner that starts at a rapid-fire pace and doesn’t let up. Great book for literary and thriller lovers alike.” — Kelly Currie, Delphi Public Library, Delphi, IN

It is also a May Indie Next title and a GalleyChat hit.

Seven other Indie Next picks hit shelves this week.

The Atomic Weight of Love, Elizabeth J. Church (Workman/Algonquin; OverDrive Sample) is the #1 pick for May.

“Church deftly traces the life of Meridian Wallace, an intelligent young woman who is searching for who she is and what she wants to become. As America braces for entrance into WWII, Meri falls for the ambitious Alden Whetstone, a much older but brilliant scientist. Aspiring to be a ‘good wife,’ Meri abandons her own academic pursuits in ornithology to follow Alden to Los Alamos, but the years that follow are filled with dashed hopes and compromises. Over the decades of her marriage, Meri attempts to fill the void of unrealized dreams by making a home and reclaiming her sense of self. Filled with sharp, poignant prose, the novel mimics the birds Meri studies, following her as she struggles to find her wings, let go, and take flight. Church gives readers a thoughtful and thought-provoking examination of the sacrifices women make in life and the courage needed for them to soar on their own.” —Anderson McKean, Page & Palette, Fairhope, AL

Heat and Light, Jennifer Haigh (HC/Ecco; HarperAudio; OverDrive Sample).

“Haigh has been building a body of work around Bakerton, Pennsylvania, for more than a decade. In this new Bakerton novel, Haigh once again unleashes the sweep of historical forces as out-of-state companies look to drill for natural gas deposits. There is hope among the residents that the future will be brighter, but there is also the risk that they will just be victims of greed and further environmental ruin. This is a big, issue-oriented book, but its success is found in the brilliance with which Haigh crafts her characters and makes their lives a vehicle for looking at the moral, political, environmental, and economic questions about fracking. A timely book and perhaps one even worthy of the title ‘Great American Novel.’” —Anmiryam Budner, Main Point Books, Bryn Mawr, PA

Also reviewed by Janet Maslin in the New York Times today. Galley chatters are also fans.

Everybody’s Fool, Richard Russo (PRH/RH/Knopf; Random House Audio; BOT; OverDrive Sample).

“While any new book from Richard Russo is a cause for celebration, to have one that revisits the characters from a beloved classic feels like a gift from the literary gods. Everybody’s Fool returns to North Bath, New York, the setting for Russo’s breakout novel from 1993, Nobody’s Fool. No one writes better about the quirks, petty jealousies, hard times, humor, and heartbreak of small town America. Everybody’s Fool is good old fashioned storytelling at its finest!” —Shawn Donley, Powell’s Books, Portland, OR

Imagine Me Gone, Adam Haslett (Hachette/Little, Brown; OverDrive Sample).

“Imagine Me Gone is a deeply moving portrayal of a family’s complex love for one another as they manage and respond to the shape-shifting undercurrent of mental illness experienced by both father and son. A compelling read on every level, this novel is crafted with impressive emotional sensitivity, providing a direct feed into the inner lives and secrets of each character. Writing of this caliber is a rare thing. Haslett has created a gem of a novel that I will recommend over and over again.” —Nancy Scheemaker, Northshire Bookstore, Saratoga Springs, NY

Entertainment Weekly lists it as one of their Hottest Fiction picks: “Haslett’s latest — one of spring’s biggest books — is a heartbreaking, hilarious chronicle of one family struggling to love one another amid anxiety and depression.”

The Sport of Kings, C. E. Morgan (Macmillan/Farrar, Straus and Giroux; Macmillan Audio; OverDrive Sample).

“Horse racing and breeding, evolution, race, love, family dynamics and America’s historical past are a few of the subjects and issues that Morgan bravely, confidently, and intelligently explores with a poetic and lyrical sensibility. The result is a gorgeous and engaging novel that is sobering, important, and unforgettable. In addition to her singular vision and style, Morgan combines some of the intense power of the landscape as mindscape of Thomas Wolfe, the dramaturgy and myth-mining of Eugene O’Neill, the deep focus and rigor of Richard Powers, the transcendent beauty of Vollmann’s best prose, and the strong spiritual commitment of Marilynne Robinson. The Sport of Kings unfolds dramatically into an exquisite work of classic American literature.” —Ed Conklin, Chaucer’s Books, Santa Barbara, CA

The Versions of Us, Laura Barnett (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt; OverDrive Sample).

“A lovely debut that swept me along with the story of two people destined to be together. One chance meeting in college then takes three different roads and readers see the next decades played out through the couple’s eyes. Each story is different, yet with the same players, and each does not turn out as expected. This is a thoughtful and touching novel about love, expectations, and forgiveness.” —Kelly Estes, Carmichael’s Bookstore, Louisville, KY

The Curious Charms of Arthur Pepper, Phaedra Patrick (Harlequin/MIRA; Harlequin Audio; OverDrive Sample) makes the newly announced June Indie Next list.

“Arthur Pepper has finally gotten around to cleaning out his deceased wife’s clothes when he comes across her charm bracelet. He doesn’t remember seeing it before, and the charms pique his curiosity about the life his wife led before they met. Thus begins an adventure that will have Arthur learning to embrace life more fully and becoming more present in the lives of those he cares about. Grab a seat and get lost in this charming read with characters you will cheer on, laugh with, and perhaps shed a tear for.” —Lisa Fabiano, An Unlikely Story, Plainville, MA

Tie-ins

Several titles coming out this week tie in to the upcoming Disney movie Finding Dory, set to open June 17.

Finding Dory: The Junior Novelization (RH Disney (PRH/Disney) is aimed at kids aged 7 to 10. Also available in paperback, the hardcover edition is called the “Deluxe” version.

There’s also a picture book, Finding Dory (Picture Book): Three Little Words, Amy Novesky (Hachette/Disney Press) and the image-rich Disney Pixar Finding Dory: The Essential Guide, DK (PRH/Penguin/DK Children).

The two leveled readers are Ocean of Color (Disney/Pixar Finding Dory), Bill Scollon (RH/Disney) and Dory’s Story (Disney/Pixar Finding Dory), RH Disney (RH/Disney).

The film, which recounts the continued adventures of the fish Dory following Finding Nemo, features the voices of Ellen DeGeneres, Albert Brooks, and Idris Elba.

As we have previously posted, a remake of Roots is on the way, scheduled to air on the History Chanel, and simulcast on A&E and Lifetime, over four consecutive nights beginning May 30.

A tie-in edition is now available, Roots [miniseries tie-in]: The Saga of an American Family, Alex Haley, (Perseus/Da Capo Press).

The new version seeks to make the seminal TV event, based on the Pulitzer Prize winning novel by Alex Haley, relevant to a new generation of viewers, many of whom were not alive when the first adaptation aired.

Set to premiere on June 10th is Warcraft, a fantasy film adaptation of the video game of the same name. It stars Travis Fimmel, Paula Patton, and Ben Foster.

The tie-in Warcraft: Durotan: The Official Movie Prequel, Christie Golden (PRH/Titan Books) comes out this week.

The game has been adapted into novels for over a decade, the most recent is Illidan: World of Warcraft, William King (PRH/Del Rey). There are also comics based on the game. The film opens June 10.

For our full list of upcoming adaptations, download our Books to Movies and TV and link to our listing of tie-ins.