It’s not often that I get to write a headline paying homage to John Madden — the retired sportscaster, not the director of “Shakespeare in Love” and, uh, “Captain Corelli’s Mandolin.”
But imagine my surprise at coming across a “book” titled “Lou Lumenick” when searching Amazon for some out-of-print old movies that I recorded DVD introductions for years ago. (They’re not on Amazon, but you can find some of them at the Troma Team website).
Well, the “book description” on Amazon didn’t exactly sound like a page turner: “Please note that the content of this book primarily consists of articles available from Wikipedia or other free sources online. Louis J. “Lou” Lumenick (born September 11, 1949) is an American film critic. He is the chief film critic and a blogger for the New York Post and has reviewed films there since 1999. Lumenick was born and raised in Astoria, Queens. He attended City College of New York (CCNY) and took filmmaking courses at The New School. Lumenick previously worked at The Hartford Times, a defunct newspaper in Connecticut, and the The Record in New Jersey, reviewing films over a nine-year span for the latter. He was metropolitan editor at the Post before taking the film reviewer position. Lumenick has been involved in controversies with director James Toback and with film critic Roger Ebert.”
Not was it exactly encouraging that Wade Anastasia Jere, billed as the book’s “(Ed.)” is credited with over 2,000 other titles “published” in 2011, including “books” on many British and American sports figures, British railway lines, movie directors, and intriguing titles like “Entomopathogenic Nematode.” Some are “French editions” and many are also available from Barnes and Noble and other e-tailers around the world. The “books” are “published” (on demand, I’d wager) by EQU Press, “a trademark of” Mauritus-based International Book Market Service” and “printed in U.S.A., U.K., Germany.”
Still, when was the last time someone published a book about me? So I ordered it, even if $48 (with free Amazon shipping) seemed a little steep for a 66-page paperback with “High quality content by WIKIPEDIA articles,” as the blurb cover puts it.
Sure enough, the book opens by reprinting my Wikipedia page (the one summarized in the “book description”) in its entirety. I’m glad I edit it several times a year. This is followed by the Wikipedia entry on “Film Criticism” and entries on (almost) all of the people and institutions mentioned in my Wikipedia entry.
That would be the New York Post; my former employers, The Hartford Times (defunct since 1976) and The Record of Bergen County N.J.; my former creative writing instructor at CCNY, Toback; Ebert and his employer, The Chicago Sun-Times; the New York Film Critics Circle Awards (I’m a member); Turner Classic Movies, where I have been a guest programmer; and The New School, where I took a few classes. Oddy, Jere seems to have missed CCNY, where I attended undergraduate classes. None of these other articles mention me even in passing, incidentally.
“Lou Lumenick,” which is printed in really tiny type, currently holds a sales rank of 1,705,525 on Amazon, probably thanks to my recent purchase. I guess I should be flattered since EQU’s Jere-edited “Internet Censorship in the United States” ranks 4,273,946 and “Herman Cain” (108 pages, $56) isn’t ranked at all.
I sent an e-mail requesting an interview to International Book Market Service but haven’t heard back.
Meanwhile, a new Amazon search under my name yields “The Leslie Nielsen Handbook” as well as “Handbooks” devoted to Amy Adams, Queen Latifah, Casey Affleck, Zooey Deschanel, Ryan Gosling and Matthew McConaughey…