Little Thoughts About Books and Stuff

Now I'll be honest I'm not a huge James Patterson fan.  I've read a few of his books and I've enjoyed them, but I'm not reaching for his novels first.  I know he's very popular, his books are in constant circulation at the library and the holds list for his new book is always incredibly long.  That being said I don't think he should be considered for this list because of this co-author deal with his novels. I know authors use ghost writers and I'm fairly certain that some of my favorite authors use them too, but they still have novels coming out at a normal pace of one or two a year, sometimes three. But in this one year span James Patterson is credited with 10 books. He released 9 in 2010 and has currently 6 books out in 2011. I just question how involved he is in the writing of all these books and how much is the co-author and how much is him.  I kind of want to be cynical and think that it's the co-author writing the book and he just approves ...

I saw this over at Gallycat yesterday and just laughed. I laugh because it's absurd that one Sherlock Holmes book would be challenged over another when both would have questionable material.  I can understand challenging a book and I can understand when a book is removed (though I don't always agree it was the right decision). I don't understand why they would only challenge one book for one character's thought and not all Sir A.C. Doyle's books for the main characters continual use of drugs. Sherlock Holmes is a drug addict. If you've read the books, you know this fact. I can understand not wanting sixth graders to read about a man who uses cocaine when he's bored. If the book was challenged and banned from the reading list for this reason I'd accept it, it's understandable. The book wasn't. I've done some digging and found that A.C. Doyle apologized for his portrayals of Mormons in this book and admitted that he had been misled by the...