October 26, 2011; Source: Christian Science Monitor | It isn’t clear that it will sell as well as Ann Coulter’s Demonic or Bill O’Reilly’s Killing Lincoln, but a book written and published by a group of anonymous authors volunteering their time and expertise under the name “Writers for the 99%” is in the works and slated for a December 2011 publication. Occupying Wall Street: The Inside Story of an Action that Changed America will be published by OR Books, the company that published Going Rouge, a critical examination of Sarah Palin, that came out the same day as Palin’s memoir Going Rogue. Famous authors have already graced the Occupy encampments and written about the movement, notably Lemony Snicket, the secretive author of A Series of Unfortunate Events, who wrote and distributed “Thirteen Observations made by Lemony Snicket while watching Occupy Wall Street from a Discreet Distance”. It isn’t clear that Snicket (a pen name) will be one of the “Writers for the 99%,” but who knows? The history will be something of a transcription of the oral testimonies of Zuccotti Park participants, compiled as a collective story on the three-month anniversary of the protests. However, the OR publisher also said, according to the article, that “the content of the book [will be] decided by a consensus of movement participants.” “It’s an absolute nightmare,” he noted. “But I think there’s something very exciting about it, too.” The book will be exactly 200 pages long and will sell for $15. Let’s hope that the emphasis on consensus doesn’t eliminate all dissensus to the point where the book is a least-common-denominator story. And maybe the New Yorkers will find room to include stories about Occupy efforts in other cities that have been just as vigorous as the New York effort—just not first out of the box.—Rick Cohen
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