Bellis demonstrates a popular method for pleasuring his female fans.
Sometimes, there are no words, no punchlines, no trademark "snark" to describe an image. Seeing Bret Easton Ellis flash the shocker would most certainly be one of those times.

Intern Alexis goes spelunking into the depths of this week's Times Book Review and, in turn, comes up with a big basket of Rachel Donadio. One has to wonder if Donadio has actually taken to washing editor Sam Tanenhaus' dirty bed linens, just to ensure her weekly shout-outs in the Up Front section. Meanwhile, Ralph Nader gives Bruce Springsteen a run for his letter-writing money, forcing Richard Posner to take a time-out in the naughty corner for his news media abortion/essay. All this, plus the frightening thought of The Collected Emails of Dave Eggers, after the jump.

We were pleased to see this (admittedly somewhat old) news in last night's Publishers Lunch roundup:

• While enjoying some lovely 10-cent wings at Croxley Ales last night, Scarlett Johansson and Josh Hartnett were interrupted by local comedian Aziz Ansari, who dropped off a flier for one of his shows. And, so long as he was there, he couldn't NOT give Johansson his digits. Can't fault a man for trying. [Aziz Is Bored]
• Why is stickball the go-to photo-op for mayoral types looking to seem "common?" [Copyranter]
• You have to admire the sheer audacity of ShopVogue.com, in which you can rifle through the September Vogue's 8342835 advertising pages by brand, and then quickly jump to the appropriate online purchasing venue. Oh, if only they had simply done this instead of printing actual pages, so many trees might've lived. [ShopVogue]
• Desperate for an editor to take on the crappy manuscript for your great American novel? This guy uses pubbed as if it were a real word, so we imagine he'd be open to just about anything. [mediabistro]

• Imagine if a Woody Allen antihero was on a warfront. We'd call that Bananas. Michiko calls it War Reporting for Cowards. [NYT]
• More bad news for American Media: First they lose Arnold, now Standard & Poor's drops their debt rating. And on top of that all, the CEO is still named Pecker. Heh. [NYP]
• Martha Stewart Living and two other women's mags now caught in "apocalyptic" wave of circ scandals. Fraud at Martha Stewart? No way. [Ad Age]
• Mr. Big is renovating his house. In the last week of August, that counts as news. [WWD, second item]

• When asked whether or not she and Paris Latsis were really getting married, Paris Hilton replies, "I don't know, I'm just having fun!" For once, we're certain that Paris is being completely honest. [Page Six]
• More from the VMAs in Miami: Drinking! Debauchery! Shootings! Photo Ops! Ancient History! [R&M]
• If you really want to get out of jury duty, just be 50 Cent's publicist. [Lowdown (last item)]
• It's the news you've been waiting for: On Martha Stewart's version of The Apprentice, she'll reportedly replace Donald Trump's "You're fired!" with the positively irritating, "You just don't fit in." [Page Six]
• It's a shame that former Playmate Jenny McCarthy is getting divorced; it really renders moot that $1 million deal for her book on marriage. [Scoop]

In this week's Publishers Lunch deal report:

Because we live to serve:

The Today show got genuinely compelling for a moment this morning, as Lunar Park author and creepy-fantastic contemporary lit legend Bret Easton Ellis sat down with Katie Couric's legs for a brief interview. Couric, being a concerned, motherly type, naturally asked Ellis about the graphic violence and exaggerated bloodshed of his harrowing American Psycho. A paraphrased transcript:

After nearly a year of thankless slavery (no, seriously, we don't even thank her for doing shit), Intern Alexis finally receives a small nibble of vindication in this week's Times Book Review, in the form of an acknowledgment of our existence from A.O. Scott. It doesn't even have much to do with, well, anything, but whatever it takes to get you out of bed, right? Moving onward, we find Rachel Donadio has moved about the food chain (although we're unsure which direction) and, get this, hipsters are greasy. All that, plus fun with madlibs, after the jump.

From The Nation's review of Sean Wilsey's Oh the Glory of It All:

Big news in today's Publishers Lunch:

A headline from Publishers Weekly:

We're sorry for the late notice, but you've still got a few minutes left to haul ass to the Virgin Megastore in Union Square, where 50 Cent will be signing copies of his new autobiography, From Pieces to Weight. (Be sure to say hi to Lloyd Grove for us; he'll surely be on the scene as his new beat seems to encompass all things "Fitty.") Because imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, we're sure Mr. Cent will take kindly to those of you wearing bulletproof vests and Kevlar top hats.

It seems that the reach of literary wunderjew Jonathan Safran Foer only goes so far:

Yesterday we mentioned our burning excitement at Nicole Richie's forthcoming book, which we hoped would explain how she lost 80% of her body weight in a matter of minutes. As it turns out, the September issue of Teen Vogue features Richie on its bite-sized cover and, lucky us, her book is mentioned in the resulting interview:

Yesterday was Teen Vogue sales assistant Lauren Blitzer's last day on the job, as she and her writing partner Lauren Levin have sold a book proposal to Simon Spotlight Entertainment for an "undisclosed sum." And they're not even bloggers!

This week in the Times Book Review, resident bitch Joe Queenan seems to think so and goes so far as to declare Geraldo Rivera as more compelling than Hillary Clinton. Blasphemy! Once Intern Alexis finishes researching Queenan's hidden past, she touches herself with excitement over a letter to the Review from Bruce Springsteen. Rounding out the emotional rollercoaster is a teary look at Harry Potter, served with a shot of vodka. Alexis' review follows.

• A milestone in the struggle for equality: TV networks cover a missing black and Hispanic woman the same way they usually cover missing white women. Someplace, Dr. King is smiling. [USAT]
• Surprised to learn in the Post a few days ago that Osama planned to poison our cocaine? Yeah, so was the DEA. [NYDN]
• Morgan Spurlock is coming to Comedy Central, continuing his effort to become more ubiquitous than McDonald's but not nearly as delicious. [Mediaweek]
• Interestingly, in-flight mags are not the best place for subversive political satire. Who knew? [Folio:]
• At new Bloomberg LP headquarters, Charlie Rose guests are insufficiently from the hoi-polloi reporters. The horror. [WWD]
• Bob Woodward's The Secret Man is, maybe, a very poorly selling best-seller. [Media Mob]

We have no idea if this is actually Adrian Grenier's Friendster, as we're told it is. We're sort of willing to believe it, for several reasons including that it dates back to well before the debut of Entourage. Real or not, though, we very much enjoy the "favorite books" section: