A List Of Things Thrown Five Minutes Ago

THE ONE AWARDS SHOW THAT WILL NOT FEATURE JESSICA SIMPSON: Quill Award nominations (kinda like the People's Choice Awards for books) are out. Some winners are no-brainers, like Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince winning "Children's Chapter Book." Oddly, Half-Blood Prince doesn't get to compete in the big "General Fiction" category, which would pit it against a range of books from Nick Hornby to Philip Roth, or in the "SciFi/Fantasy/Horror" category, which would seem to be a veritable sure thing (at least among litcrit types) for Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell. Other nominees include Jim Wallis' God's Politics, Anne Lamott's Plan B (both of which had better stomp Joel Osteen's Your Best Life Now in the religion category), French Women Don't Get Fat, He's Just Not That Into You, and America: The Book by Jon Stewart. My favorite "literary" novel of last year (Jodi Picoult's My Sister's Keeper) didn't get nomintated, but for the most part, it's pretty solid stuff.