According to Publishers Weekly, St. Paul Library’s Got Friends — including authors and publishers. With author chats, book sales, cocktails and dinners, the library’s fund-raiser had 796 attendees this year. In 2008, they made a profit of $102,000. Other libraries should take note.

Do you think e-books are hot in romance? Publishing Perspectives does. They have numbers and quotes, including information that the over 60 demographic reading e-books is growing.

RWA-WF member Susan Wiggs was mentioned in agent Donald Maass’s recent Writer Unboxed blog about writing “bigger” books. He said:

“Recently I had the privilege of co-teaching workshops with two contemporary novelists whose work embodies bigness: mystery novelist Nancy Pickard and women’s fiction author Susan Wiggs. In interviews and with in-depth analysis of a novel by each (The Virgin of Small Plains by Nancy and Just Breathe by Susan) we were able to discover, at least in part, the methods of bigness.”

Agents are in the news again. Query Tracker reports that Kathleen Ortiz of Lowenstein Assoc. is looking for chick lit and YA. This is so new it’s not on the agency website yet. You could be one of the first to query her.

If you’re querying agents, you’ll want to read Chuck Samuchino’s Guide to Literary Agents editor’s blog on 7 Reasons Agents Stop Reading Your First Chapter.

Here’s an interesting blog on why women read women’s fiction, and why WF has difficulty making it in transmedia.

Not about publishing, but important to all women, the Senate passed a women’s health amendment. According to this New York Times article, “the Senate approved an amendment to its health care legislation that would require insurance companies to offer free mammograms and other preventive services to women.” Bravo to the Senate!