Facebook counted 500 million users today, prompting us to finally create a GalleyCat Facebook page. Stop by and say hello--we will use the new site for event listings, literary contests, and publishing debate.

Discovering the keyword "publishing" turns up 17,000 pages, we realized that we can't navigate this sea of content alone. So we've decided to build a reader-curated directory of the best publisher pages on Facebook--to help us build our Facebook network and help our readers find the best Facebook content.

We've started the list below--a directory that barely scratches the surface of the publishing scene on Facebook. Add your favorite publishers to the comments section, and we'll keep updating the directory.

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Just two months after the launch of the first Awkward Family Photos book, bloggers Mike Bender and Doug Chernack have sold two more books from the popular site to Three Rivers Press.

The Crown Publishing Group imprint has scheduled Awkward Family Pet Photos for fall 2011 and an untitled third book for a later release date. Rebecca Oliver of WME negotiated the deal with senior editor Suzanne O'Neill. According to the release, Awkward Family Photos spent 10 weeks on the New York Times' bestseller list.

Here's more about the next title: "Awkward Family Pet Photos is based on a spin-off site Bender and Chernack have just launched of the same name. It currently gets over 4 million impressions per month. The new book will include the most outrageous submissions from the site, along with many never-before-seen photos. The book will showcase the hilarious, and sometimes disturbing, bonds families and owners have with their pets."

As the amount of content on the web multiplies, a few companies are developing tools for helping readers read faster simply by cutting and pasting text into a special reader.

The video embedded above shows you how to use ZAP Reader, a tool that claims to be able to increase reading speed by up to 300 percent. The website Speeder has a similar interface, and speculates that some users can read up to 1,000 words-per-minute after training with the interface.

Here's more about how one reader works: "ZAP Reader is a web based speed reading program that will change the way you read on your computer. Current beta testers report reading twice as much in half the time--that's a 300% increase in reading speed, without any loss in comprehension! There is nothing to install, it works with most popular browsers, and it's totally free!"

What do you think? (Via Maree I Think)

Reviewed by Maryan Pelland
Read more about GalleyCat Reviews

Linger is a young adult novel about werewolves. No surprise, considering the success of properties like Twilight and True Blood. Shape shifting's commercial appeal makes it logical that publishers are sensitive to the genre. One writer mixed Alcott's Little Women with werewolves. Why shouldn't Maggie Stiefvater follow suit?

In Linger, Stiefvater offers readers four post-adolescents--Grace and Sam, Isabel and Cole. The girls are mostly human. They guys are, or have been wolves. There's background noise about other wolves, but we never meet them. They remain unresolved.

Stiefvater has good ideas. She stages the book from four points-of-view. Each character gives us the story as he or she sees it. The multiple points-of-view device is seldom used, and for good reason. It takes incredible prowess to pull it off--making sure readers don't feel like the little balls popping around in a toddler push toy.

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As literary journals around the country struggle to update for the 21st Century, one founding co-editor at The Believer maintains a nearly exclusive print-focused strategy.

Today's guest on the Morning Media Menu was Vendela Vida, author of the new novel The Lovers and a founding co-editor at The Believer.

Vida talked about her novel, her intentional lack of Internet access at home, and The Believer's print-oriented strategy. She also shared the screenwriting experience and advice she learned while writing Away We Go with her husband, Dave Eggers.

Vida explained the print strategy: "The Believer hasn't changed at all. I think we still like to pretend that nothing's changed and put out the same magazine we've always put out. Obviously we have a website, but it's not an integral part of our magazine. I feel like the magazine could exist without the website except that people like to go there and find back issues and back pieces. We try to be as oblivious to all the changes going on as we can be."

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Novelist Stephen Graham Jones has signed a two-book deal with Dzanc Books. The publisher will release the coming-of-age novel Flushboy in 2013 and the detective novel Not for Nothing in 2014.

Jones has written nine works of fiction, ranging from the postmodern horror of Demon Theory to the Blackfeet Indian reservation novel Ledfeather. The novelist has built a dedicated following online, celebrated along with two other writers at The Velvet reading community.

Here's more about the two novels: "Flushboy is a novel about the 16-year-old boy working the window of the drive-thru urinal of his father's latest business venture, The Bladder Hut. It's a uniquely told coming-of-age story and more. Not for Nothing, is in theory, a detective story, but as usual, Jones plays with convention and gives his readers much more than they might expect."

Agent Peter McGuigan of Foundry likes to take an active role in helping his writer's books become even better. In this interview, he tells us about the steps that he takes to accomplish his goal -- to help the writers that work for him be able to live from solely their art.

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Sony has scheduled a David Fincher-directed adapted version of The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo for December 2011.

James Bond actor Daniel Craig is being considered for the role of journalist Mikael Blomkvist. Fincher has directed some hardboiled adaptations, including Fight Club and Zodiac.

According to Deadline New York, the lead role has an impressive list of contenders: "The studio is also signing test deals with a group of young actresses dying to play the complex role of Lisbeth Salander. While Carey Mulligan, Ellen Page, and Mia Wasikowska (Alice in Wonderland) have been mentioned as possible Lisbeth candidates, i'm told others include Emily Browning (Sucker Punch), Sara Snook (Sleeping Beauty), Rooney Mara (The Social Network) and Sophie Lowe (Blame)."

Filmmaker and developer Garrett Murray is pioneering a new kind of short short story on his blog--a movement we have dubbed crash report fiction. Every time Photoshop crashes, Murray emails a short and bitter story to the company instead of a crash report (like the story posted above).

We'd love to see more writers follow Murray's example, sending software corporations stories that channel a unique sense of frustration. As Murray explained on his blog: "You know, I hadn't planned on this being a regular feature of the site, but these days Photoshop is just begging me to do it."

All of his crash report stories are archived at this link. Here's an excerpt from a recent story with a particularly violent ending: "Tracy was the youngest in her family, but by far the smartest. While her sisters were in high school they had focused on boys and parties and cheerleading, but Tracy hit the books and received top marks. She was the valedictorian. The class president. The head of Model UN. When Samantha dropped out of college to take a job as a backup dancer for Beyonce, Tracy laughed and shrugged."

Brigham Young University's Harold B. Lee Library may have created the world's most popular library promotional video.

In a 50-second short, a university comedian channeled the Old Spice guy commercials, urging students to start using the library more. In just five days, the video earned over 1.2 million views on YouTube

Oddly enough, the Old Spice guy himself actually celebrated libraries in a brief video last week. Watch the whole clip here. (Via Consumerist)

Amazon founder Jeff Bezos rocked the publishing world with a Kindle sales quote late yesterday.

He explained: "[W]hile our hardcover sales continue to grow, the Kindle format has now overtaken the hardcover format. Amazon.com customers now purchase more Kindle books than hardcover books--astonishing when you consider that we've been selling hardcover books for 15 years, and Kindle books for 33 months."

The online bookseller put out a release today loaded with intriguing facts. Nevertheless, the company still has not released straightforward figures about total Kindle sales or total eBooks sold. Among the other details, the company revealed they have sold three times as many Kindle books in the first half of 2010 compared to the first half of 2009.

According to the release (embedded below), five authors have already sold more than 500,000 Kindle books. eBookNewser has the complete list of these new digital all-stars.

Amazon also shared this statistic for paid books: "Over the past three months, for every 100 hardcover books Amazon.com has sold, it has sold 143 Kindle books. Over the past month, for every 100 hardcover books Amazon.com has sold, it has sold 180 Kindle books."

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Last week the literary journal Granta opened an online archive containing all 110 past issues of the magazine.

The subscription-only online archive is available for the one-year price of £12.99, approximately $20. Collecting all the issues since the 1979 debut of the journal, the archive features early work from writers like Nick Hornby, Salman Rushdie, and Joyce Carol Oates. In addition, the journal unveils free nuggets from the archive, like Don DeLillo's "At Yankee Stadium"--an early draft from Mao II.

Editor John Freeman had this statement: "No more hunting through charity shop bins, or stealing them from your friends. Wherever people are, they'll be able to enjoy and discover the magazine's fabulous thirty-year breadth."