Sweatshops & Kwok's Girl in Translation

From Tuesday's BBC article "Bangladesh collapse: Thousands hold prayers for victims:"

Thousands of mourners in Bangladesh have held prayers for more than 1,100 people who died when a garment factory building collapsed last month...

At least 1,127 people died when the eight-storey Rana Plaza collapsed on 24 April. The collapse is the latest in a series of deadly incidents that have focused global attention on safety standards in Bangladesh's export garment industry, which is the second biggest after China's.

Hundreds of factories have been forced to close by recurrent worker unrest sparked by the disaster, officials say. The government has since announced steps aimed at improving conditions. That includes raising the minimum wage for industry workers and making it easier for them to form unions.

For a novel about sweatshops (in the US), try Girl in Translation by Jean Kwok:

When Kimberly Chang and her mother emigrate from Hong Kong to Brooklyn squalor, she quickly begins a secret double life: exceptional schoolgirl during the day, Chinatown sweatshop worker in the evenings. Disguising the more difficult truths of her life -- like the staggering degree of her poverty, the weight of her family's future resting on her shoulders, or her secret love for a factory boy who shares none of her talent or ambition -- Kimberly learns to constantly translate not just her language but herself back and forth between the worlds she straddles.

Cricket in Pakistan & Hall's The Case of the Deadly Butter Chicken

From yesterday’s BBC article, “Salman Butt & Mohammad Asif: Pakistan cricketers lose appeals:”

Salman Butt and Mohammad Asif have lost their appeals at the Court of Arbitration for Sport (Cas) to have their bans from cricket overturned.

Ex-Pakistan captain Butt, bowler Asif and team-mate Mohammad Amir were found guilty of "spot-fixing" in 2011. Butt, 28, is said to be "bitterly disappointed" and his legal team plan to continue to fight the ban.

"In the coming days and weeks, we will be exploring every other available avenue," said one of his legal team.

Butt is banned for 10 years by the International Cricket Council (ICC), with five years suspended, while swing bowler Asif is banned for seven years, two of which are suspended.

For novels about cricket, try the following:

• Want cricket-lit set in Pakistan/India? Try The Case of the Deadly Butter Chicken by Tarquin Hall:

Vish Puri is as fond of butter chicken as the next Punjabi. So when it’s served at the Delhi Durbar hotel at an India Premier League cricket match dinner, he’s the first to tuck in. Faheem Khan, father of Pakistani star cricketer Kamran Khan, can’t resist either. But the creamy dish proves his undoing. After a few mouthfuls, he collapses on the floor, dead...

• Prefer some cricket action in Afghanistan? You might like The Taliban Cricket Club by Timeri N. Murari:

A harrowing yet tender novel — Bend It Like Beckham in a burka — The Taliban Cricket Club is a moving and unforgettable tale of one woman’s courage and guile in the face of terror and tyranny. Set in war-torn Kabul, Afghanistan, this extraordinary new fiction by Timeri N. Murari, acclaimed author of the international bestseller, Taj, is a sweeping story of love, family, resilience, and survival, featuring an unforgettable heroine determined to help her loved ones win their freedom with a bat and a ball.

• Or maybe some cricket in New York? Try Netherland by Joseph O'Neill:

In a New York City made phantasmagorical by the events of 9/11, Hans--a banker originally from the Netherlands--finds himself marooned among the strange occupants of the Chelsea Hotel after his English wife and son return to London. Alone and untethered, feeling lost in the country he had come to regard as home, Hans stumbles upon the vibrant New York subculture of cricket, where he revisits his lost childhood and, thanks to a friendship with a charismatic and charming Trinidadian named Chuck Ramkissoon, begins to reconnect with his life and his adopted country.

Boston Marathon Attack & Waldman's The Submission

Here's the latest about this tragic event from the New York Times:

Boston Marathon Blasts Kill 3 and Maim Dozens

Two powerful bombs exploded near the finish line of the Boston Marathon on Monday afternoon, killing three people, maiming dozens and transforming one of this city’s most cherished rites of spring from a scene of cheers and sweaty triumph to one of screams, bloody carnage and death.

Some three-quarters of the 23,000 runners who participated in the race had already crossed the finish line when a bomb that had apparently been placed in a garbage can exploded in a haze of smoke amid a crowd of spectators on Boylston Street, just off Copley Square in the heart of the city. It was around 2:50 p.m., more than four hours after the race had started, officials said. Within seconds, another bomb exploded several hundred yards away.

Understandably, the last thing most people will want to do after yesterday's events is read a novel about an attack. But for those who do want to reflect on what happened by delving into a good book, I chose one that focuses on how America is dealing with the after-effects of 9/11. The book is The Submission by Amy Waldman and here's the description:

A jury gathers in Manhattan to select a memorial for the victims of a devastating terrorist attack. Their fraught deliberations complete, the jurors open the envelope containing the anonymous winner’s name—and discover he is an American Muslim. Instantly they are cast into roiling debate about the claims of grief, the ambiguities of art, and the meaning of Islam. Their conflicted response is only a preamble to the country’s.

The memorial’s designer is an enigmatic, ambitious architect named Mohammad Khan. His fiercest defender on the jury is its sole widow, the self-possessed and mediagenic Claire Burwell. But when the news of his selection leaks to the press, she finds herself under pressure from outraged family members and in collision with hungry journalists, wary activists, opportunistic politicians, fellow jurors, and Khan himself—as unknowable as he is gifted. In the fight for both advantage and their ideals, all will bring the emotional weight of their own histories to bear on the urgent question of how to remember, and understand, a national tragedy.

Digital Product Placement, the Ad Industry, & Kenney's Truth in Advertising

From Monday's BBC article "Digital product placement creates adverts out of thin air:"

[P]roduct placement isn't new...  Recently Heineken scored a coup by persuading James Bond to choose its beer over a vodka martini in Skyfall.

However, digital placement is fundamentally different in that the product you see on screen was never there in the first place. Editors can drop whatever they like, wherever they like, into programmes or films during the post-production process....

"These are not just logos, they can be video, signage and products, even cars," explains Mark Popkiewicz..."For example beverages are placed as open cans or bottles with glasses containing the beverage alongside - that way they look like they are being consumed... The technology is capable of placing or replacing moving objects and even replacing products being handled by actors like mobile phones... Early trials show almost double the engagements of traditional campaigns... This is because when a consumer watches a show they are not 'defensive' against advertising as they might be with advertising online or commercials on TV - they are in 'receive mode' and are not blocking."...

For a novel about the ad industry, try Truth in Advertising by John Kenney:

Finbar Dolan is lost and lonely. Except he doesn’t know it. Despite escaping his blue-collar Boston upbringing to carve out a mildly successful career at a Madison Avenue ad agency, he’s a bit of a mess and closing in on forty. He’s recently called off a wedding. Now, a few days before Christmas, he’s forced to cancel a long-postponed vacation in order to write, produce, and edit a Super Bowl commercial for his diaper account in record time.

Fortunately, it gets worse. Fin learns that his long-estranged and once-abusive father has fallen ill. And that neither of his brothers or his sister intend to visit. It’s a wake-up call for Fin to reevaluate the choices he’s made, admit that he’s falling for his coworker Phoebe, question the importance of diapers in his life, and finally tell the truth about his past.

Bond Traders & Wolfe's The Bonfire of the Vanities

Our focus on New Journalism authors continues here at Newsworthy Novels.  Now that we've covered Hunter S. Thompson, let's move on to Tom Wolfe.

But first, the news.  From the March 13th Wall Street Journal article "Bond Trading Revives Banks:"

One of Wall Street's most important profit engines is revving back up. Rising appetites for borrowing and investing are fueling a bond market revival, lifting revenue at Wall Street firms that took a beating last year. 

For the first time in a year, traders and bankers are optimistic about the future following a dark second half of 2011. Layoffs, pay cuts and public outrage against the financial industry undermined morale at banks and securities firms, while economic malaise throttled banking and trading businesses.

Perhaps fiction's most famous bond trader is Sherman McCoy, from Tom Wolfe's classic novel The Bonfire of the Vanities:

On a clandestine date with his mistress one night, top Wall Street investment banker and snobbish WASP Sherman McCoy misses his turn on the thruway and gets lost in the South Bronx; his Mercedes hits and seriously injures a young black man. The incident is inflated by a manipulative black leader, a district attorney seeking reelection and a sleazy tabloid reporter into a full-blown scandal...

If you prefer non-fiction, you might like Liar's Poker by Michael Lewis:

In this shrewd and wickedly funny book, Michael Lewis describes an astonishing era and his own rake's progress through a powerful investment bank. From an unlikely beginning (art history at Princeton?) he rose in two short years from Salomon Brothers trainee to Geek (the lowest form of life on the trading floor) to Big Swinging Dick, the most dangerous beast in the jungle, a bond salesman who could turn over millions of dollars' worth of doubtful bonds with just one call. With the eye and ear of a born storyteller, Michael Lewis shows us how things really worked on Wall Street.