Update on Bourdain’s Next Book

By Karen

Unfortunately, I don’t have one. Anthony Bourdain has committed to 3 new books with The Ecco Press, an imprint of HarperCollins, but none seem to be in the pipeline for the near future.

You can read descriptions of the upcoming books here.

I browsed through all the HC titles being published through May 5 and Bourdain’s nowhere on the list, although he’s hanging with an eclectic group of writers these days, including Miguel de Cervantes, Mark Twain, and C.S. Lewis. Among the living authors, a few weirdo titles caught my eye that you might want to check out in the meantime, like…

I’m Hosting as Fast as I Can! Zen and the Art of Staying Sane in Hollywood by Tom Bergeron, host of Dancing with the Stars, due out April 7.

In Praise of the Stay-at-Home Mom by Dr. Laura Schlessinger — if you have the stomach for her — also due April 7.

Me Cheeta by Cheeta, — yes, that Cheeta, who’s 76 years old — March 3.

And if you want to be first to know when Tony’s next book is ready to go, you can sign up here.

When Did Bourdain Lose Touch with Commas?

By Karen

Anthony Bourdain is my favorite writer these days, bar none, but what’s up with his punctuation?

I’m thrilled he’s regularly blogging about his new season of No Reservations, giving us his behind-the-scenes perspective on things. Those posts read like rough first drafts, pounded out on the fly, never to be reread, edited, or even proofed. I’m OK with that. They sound like he’s talking directly to you. Even on his worst days – with perhaps a raging hangover – his innate wit enables him to express himself more vividly than most people.

But in Envy, his latest post about his visit to Spain, I couldn’t help noticing some commas deliberately, glaringly, in inappropriate places. I quote:

An interesting visual, phenomonen occurred during the editing of the Spain show.

Understand: Albert, along with his brother, Ferran, is a chef/owner of the three Michelin starred El Bulli, the hardest to reserve, restaurant table in the world.

A jarring, flood of endorphins, then brain overload, and for a second, a blinding light.

And if I wanted to get nitpicky, I could rag on his peculiar misuse of semicolons:

Suffice to say that just about anywhere in the world of fine dining, from Shanghai to San Francisco; when Albert walks in the door, the whole place goes on Red Alert.

But let’s not go there.

These aren’t bold stylistic quirks, but rookie boo-boos that typically make writers wince with embarrassment if they get published.

It’s got me wondering if we’ve ever seen Bourdain’s true technical competence as a writer in his books, or if some devoted editor with a stake in boosting his literary career has been making his work look much more polished than it ever really was.

Anthony Bourdain & Ottavia: A Portrait

By Karen

Someone got this great photo of Anthony Bourdain with Ottavia at his David Letterman taping on March 24.

I wondered why Tony seemed so subdued during that interview. I guessed either he was really sick of being asked about the cobra heart and the warthog again, or that Ottavia was in the wings, watching his every move.

He was also unusually circumspect as a judge a few weeks ago on the new season of Top Chef. Almost a nonentity.

With the extended book tour with nonstop personal appearances and interviews, the latest season of No Reservations, and his new family, it wouldn’t surprise me if Tony’s feeling yanked in a lot of directions and exhausted. I’m beginning to think that for his own sanity and career longevity, he needs to go on a long vacation to an undisclosed location so he can “refill the well,” as we writers call it when we get in a rut and run out of ideas.

Anyone who follows him must be noticing that he’s begun to repeat himself a lot. That’s partially due to lazy interviewers asking him the same easy questions over and over, but it also may be because the man’s been picked clean of fresh ideas.

As much as I’ll miss him, I’m willing to see him go away for a while to have some time to relax, unwind, and let his crazy thought processes have free rein to generate some new material. Maybe even write another novel, just for fun.

The last thing I want to see is Anthony Bourdain become a victim of his own success and start screwing things up.

Take a break, Tony! You deserve it!

What Cats Know About Job Stress

By Karen

There’s a reason the words “cat” and “job stress” never appear in the same sentence. It’s because cats never suffer from it. Performance anxiety is a foreign concept to them.

But that’s not to say cats never work. Many have rewarding careers in retail as greeters. Others are in the hospitality industry as bed-hopping companions for guests at trendy B&Bs. Certain laid-back cats work in healthcare as therapy felines. And in farming, they’ve been “rodent proliferation control engineers” for centuries. However, you’ll never find cats in risky occupations like sniffing out corpses at crime scenes or nosing for bombs and drugs in airports. Dirty work – that’s for dogs.

No matter how they make a living, cats don’t fret: “Am I making people happy enough?” “Have I nabbed my quota of vermin today?”

They just do what they do and let bean-counting schmucks worry about the bottom line.

I try to write like a cat: Just sit down and start without endlessly questioning if my ideas are brilliant enough. Don’t let blank pages intimidate me. Have no fear I’ll run out of inspiration before the end.

When cats work, they find something they enjoy doing enough to let it become part of their persona. That way, they never dread or over-analyze it. As a writer, I’ve got an enjoyable job. Now I’ve just got to work at perfecting my joie de vivre.

Cats finally have a voice

Once upon a time, there was a writer named Karen who lived with three cats named Fred, Yul, and Adele. Fred inspired Karen to write a magazine column about working with cats. Karen expanded the column into a book  called How to Work Like a CAT, published in October 2006 by Willow Creek Press.

Karen never realized she had been working a like a cat (clumsily) almost her whole life – and getting laid off and fired a lot - until she fled Corporate America and began working full-time at home as a freelance writer with these cats as her only co-workers.

 They have graciously shown her the error of her ways so she could write a useful book and help others avoid making her mistakes.

Karen and her cats are voracious readers (actually, the cats prefer to sit on books and magazines) and decided that all their fascinating insights are being wasted unless they’re shared. So Karen will discuss the writing life and living with cats, and the cats will contribute their observations on human behavior whenever the spirit moves them.

They’re cats – that’s the firmest commitment Karen could get out of them.