Hello– this is Chip again, back from my hiatus in the land of non-blogging. Apologies for my long silence, but I come bearing gifts: the first edition of Books Bulletin, a weekly post you’ll find here at the Lit Life every Friday morning that will catalog the bizarre & fascinating news of the literary world. From gossip about your favorite authors to the discovery of new works by Shakespeare, I’ll show you the most interesting stories I’ve found in the wacky alternate universe of publishing.

Plagiarism Software Identifies New Shakespeare Play. Word-comparison software is one of the primary reasons I talked myself out of selling college papers in my younger days. I’m happy to see it scoring goodwill points with the English major crowd.

Book reviewer quits over sadistic misogyny. Fed up with the way female characters are treated in crime novels, award-winning crime novelist and book reviewer Jessica Mann has called it quits. What does this say about today’s thrillers?

Coco Chanel books storm shelves, stores, take no prisoners. What’s with the sudden surge in novels and books about this famous French designer? Author Karen Karbo ponders: “Some mystical thing in the zeitgeist?”

Author and motivational speaker James Arthur Ray sees the publication of his two books delayed, following the deaths of three people and hospitalization of 18 in a sweat lodge ceremony he led. According to the article, Ray has “vowed to continue holding seminars despite criticism,” even as a criminal investigation of his practices is underway. In his next book, does he discuss strategies for ducking homicide allegations in a spiritual warrioresque way?

Writer Rick Moody plans to tweet a short story on Twitter over the course of three days. Just a reminder: Twitter posts are limited to 140 characters, shorter than the text message limit on most cellphones. I’m sure that wherever he is, Hemingway, inventor of the six word novel, would approve.

That’s all for this week. Happy reading!