Wednesday, August 25, 2010

Obama gets 'Freedom'


Obama given copy of Franzen’s Freedom, booksellers panic

When I read this headline today, the first thing that came to my mind was, why would the booksellers panic if Obama gets a copy of Franzen's Freedom? Does it contain some shocking secrets that were meant to be hidden from him? Is Franzen asking for freedom from the Obama administration in his book? 

To those of you who are wondering, what's going on in here - this was a headline on nationalpost.com today.
'Freedom' is Jonathen Franzen's much awaited new novel, coming out a decade after his last, the much acclaimed, ''The Corrections''. It has created a lot of buzz already and is expected to go on sale on August 31 in U.S bookstores.

But, as I read the article further, I realized Oh no! Nothing as exciting as that! It's just that the booksellers thought that a store had sold a copy to Obama and hence was foregoing the embargoed shelf date of August 31. In actuality, they had offered the president an Advanced Reading Copy. So they were just threatening to put the book on sale early to beat competition.

The publisher isn't complaining with the publicity he got. Neither am I, for the question it has raised in my mind. I am still left wondering, was the headline writer just playing with words there? It'd be interesting to know her opinion on Democrats. But I wouldn't really have an answer till I read the book. Would I? 

Keeping a close watch on that book in this blog. Stay tuned ;)

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