“A judge has ordered a US school district to put Harry Potter back on library shelves after rejecting arguments that it encouraged witchcraft.”
Also:
“Each of the authors has two hours in which to write two pages of the book.”
Two hours? For two pages??
From the sofa, Peter hears this and utters one word:
“Wimps.”
…Seriously, though, I didn’t realize today was World Book Day (probably due to one of those micro-cosmic ironies: today has been mostly about writing TV). Let this be the moment I say: 
Thank you, God/dess, for letting me be involved in books: writing them as well as reading them. This is the best life, and the best thing to do, though paychecks can be unpredictable or downright nonexistent, though reviewers can fail to get the most obvious point; though print runs can go mysteriously haywire, and whole printings be pulped in the warehouse; though covers may come out weirder than the human mind ought to be able to imagine (who is that vaguely see-through woman, why does the guy seem to have a congenital bone disease of the hands, and who doused the horse with lighter fluid?), and your readers may contumaciously insist that the books in which you’ve invested the greatest amount of your love are not the ones they’re all that interested in; never mind all that. Thank you. All you readers I’ve been fortunate enough to come in contact with over all these years, by mail or e-mail or at conventions or whatever: all you other writers with whom the Business has happily brought me into contact: and, of course, the arch-Reader, sine qua non, who lies on the sofa and shares my life day by day: thank you. Thank you.
Now I should go unpack the groceries: and the cats are shouting for Addictive Kitty Milk, and we have to finish up the notes for the Ring producers…
