"The Black Box" debuts at top of U.S. bestseller list

NEW YORK (Reuters) - "The Black Box" debuted at the top of the Publishers Weekly's bestseller list on Thursday.

The list is compiled using data from independent and chain bookstores, book wholesalers and independent distributors nationwide.

Hardcover Fiction Last Week

1. "The Black Box" by Michael Connelly (Little, Brown, $27.99) -

2. "Notorious Nineteen" by Janet Evanovich (Bantam, $28.00) 1

3. "Cold Days" by Jim Butcher (Roc, $27. 95) -

4. "The Forgotten" by David Baldacci (Grand Central, $27.99) 3

5. "The Racketeer" by John Grisham (Doubleday, $28.95) 5

6. "Agenda 21" by Glenn Beck (Threshold, $26.00) 2

7. "Merry Christmas, Alex Cross" by James Patterson (Little, Brown, $28.99) 4

8. "The Last Man" by Vince Flynn (Atria, $27.99) 6

9. "Gone Girl" by Gillian Flynn (Crown, $25.00) 8

10. "The Casual Vacancy" by J. K. Rowling (Little, Brown, $35.00) 7

Hardcover Nonfiction

1. "Killing Kennedy" by Bill O'Reilly (Henry Holt, $28.00) 1

2. "Barefoot Contessa Foolproof" by Ina Garten (Clarkson Potter, $35.00) 2

3. "Thomas Jefferson" by Jon Meacham (Random House, $35.00) 4

4. "Guinness World Records 2013" (Guinness World Records) 5

5. "No Easy Day" by Mark Owen (Dutton, $26.95) 6

6. "The Virgin Diet" by J.J. Virgin (Harlequin, $25.95) -

7. "The 4-Hour Chef" by Timothy Ferris (New Harvest, $35.00) 3

8. "America Again" by Stephen Colbert (Grand Central, $28.99) 10

9. (tied) "The Smitten Kitchen Cookbook" by Deb Perelman (Knopf, $35.00) 9

9. (tied) "I Declare: 31 Promises to Speak" by Joel Osteen (FaithWords, $21.99) 9

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Father's shadow looms over Australian billionaire's book launch

SYDNEY (Reuters) - Australian mining magnate Gina Rinehart, one of the world's wealthiest people, has displayed a trait rarely revealed publicly among the super-rich: insecurity.

Rinehart's first book was eagerly awaited by an Australian public enthralled and sometimes appalled by her story of big business, family feuds and almost unimaginable wealth.

But the 58-year-old widow with a fortune estimated by Forbes at $18 billion, played it safe at the launch of the book, 'Northern Australia and Then Some: Changes we need to make our country rich'.

Media were hand-picked for events around the country and Rinehart surrounded herself with hundreds of supporters mostly from the mining fraternity, where she is revered for transforming her late father's debt-ridden iron ore business into a multi-billion dollar enterprise.

There were no advance copies of the book and no questions over a fractured family life that has left Rinehart wrestling with three of her four grown children over control of a family trust that rakes in hundreds of millions of year in royalties.

Nor was there mention of her contentious plan to hire nearly 2,000 foreign workers to help build a $10 billion outback iron ore mine, at a time when Australians by the thousands are losing their jobs across the sector.

"The way she went about controlling the launch of her book shows a deep insecurity on her part given these types of things are typically designed as promotional media events," said David McKnight, an associate professor in Journalism and Media at the University of New South Wales.

"This was Gina Rinehart controlling the media in order to display her over-developed sense of hero worship for her father."

SHADOW OF LANG

Rinehart's book Northern Australia, a collection of essays, speeches, and poems, calls on politicians, environmentalists and the public to support Australia's miners, the nation's main growth engine, or face the consequences of economic decline.

The book displays Rinehart's adoration of her larger-than-life father, Lang Hancock, which can be touching, but echoes much of Hancock's famed right-wing utterings.

Rinehart has spent much of her life in the shadow of her mining magnate father, who also pressured Australian governments to better support the mining sector.

It was Hancock, a prospector and one-time "jackaroo" or Australian cowboy, who was credited with discovering the vast iron ore deposits of far west Australia's "Pilbara" in 1952 while he was piloting his own plane though a storm.

Anxious to exploit his find, Hancock lobbied for years to get a ban on iron exports over-turned and made a fortune when it was. He also proposed using small nuclear bombs to help mine the Pilbara, advocated secession for Western Australia state and had business dealings with the brutal Romanian dictator Nicolae Ceausescu. His disparaging comments on the unemployed and Aborigines outraged many Australians.

A mountain range and a rail line hauling tens of millions of tons of iron ore across the outback, destined for Asia's steel mills, now bears the Hancock name, as does the private company Rinehart now oversees.

Hancock often referred to his softly spoken daughter, his only child, as his "right-hand man" or simply "young fella".

"I think he would probably have preferred a son," Debi Marshall quoted Rinehart as saying in her 2012 biography: 'The House of Hancock. The Rise and Rise of Gina Rinehart'.

Twenty years after Hancock's death, Rinehart heads a mining empire hundreds of times bigger than her father's, but she still appears fixated on gaining his approval.

"Thank you for doing this for Australia, Gina, and once again you have outdone your dad," wrote John Singleton, a well-known advertising executive and a family friend, in a publicity flyer for the book.

One invited guest said the book showed "her lifelong desire to meet and beat" the achievements of her late father, once Australia's richest man.

"This will prove once and for all that she listened to her father all those years ago and took his achievements a step further," said the guest, requesting anonymity.

WAKE UP AUSTRALIA

Rinehart's relationship with her father deteriorated when he married his Filipino housekeeper after the death of her mother but was reconciled before his death in 1992. Rinehart has since been engaged in a gloves-off war with three of her children over a trust set up by Hancock.

She has described them as lazy and spoiled and warned their security would be at risk if they persisted with the action. Her daughter Ginia, the only one of her four children not suing her, was seated beside her at the book launch, along with her fiancé Ryan Johnston, son of Beach Boys performer Bruce Johnston.

For hours at the book launch, giant movie screens rained down recurring grainy images of a younger Rinehart courting politicians and business people in 1979 aboard a chartered Qantas 747 dubbed "Wake up Australia".

The trip was an early expression of the views of father and daughter -- the need for recognition of the importance of the mining industry, lower taxes and less red tape.

"We don't want to see Australia continue on a course with too many heads buried in the sand, critical investors discouraged by bad policies -- even hated -- too few understanding the problems while Australia moves towards being another Greece, Spain or Portugal," Rinehart said at her Sydney launch,

Rinehart's poetry in the book reinforces the message, in one verse she writes: "Through such unfortunate ignorance, too much abuse is hurled. Against miners, workers and related industries who strive to build the world."

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Jackson's Hobbit: the journey begins

WELLINGTON (Reuters) - Film maker Peter Jackson wants to scare children with his latest movie - and perhaps even a few grown ups.

The first of the Hobbit movie trilogy - "The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey" - is about to hit theatres, and Jackson says he's tried to hold true to its roots as a children's fantasy story, with scary bits.

"If they're scared of the trolls great, if they're scared of the goblins great, they know there are no goblins, they know there are no trolls, it's a safe kind of danger," he says.

The film, produced by MGM and Time Warner Inc, is the fourth in the Oscar-winning Jackson's blockbuster "Lord of the Rings" film franchise, based on the books of author J.R.R. Tolkien.

It follows the journey of hobbit Bilbo Baggins, reluctantly pushed into travelling with 13 dwarves to steal treasure from a dragon and regain their homeland. During his travels, he comes by the ring that he later passes onto kinsman Frodo Baggins, which was at the core of the "Rings" trilogy.

Jackson says he's worked to keep distance between the Hobbit, published in 1937, and the much darker Lord of the Rings, which came out nearly 20 years later.

"The Lord of the Rings has an apocalyptic sort of heavy themic end-of-the world quality to it, which the Hobbit doesn't, which is one of the delights of it," he said.

POMPOUS AND SMALL MINDED

The pointy eared, hairy footed hobbit Bilbo is played by British actor Martin Freeman, who says he's tried to make Bilbo his own creation, a character audiences can root for despite his initial pomposity and small mindedness.

"You have to be able to follow him for the duration of the film, but I wanted him to be open and changeable and ready to be surprised," Freeman said.

A key scene is an encounter in a cave between Bilbo and the creature Gollum, reprised in full computer generated splendor by Andy Serkis with the distinctive throaty whisper.

"It was a very rich experience," he said, adding that playing Gollum again was "an absolute thrill".

Such is the affection for the creature, who calls the magic ring "Precious", that a 13 meter (42 feet) sculpture of Gollum hangs in the airport terminal at Wellington, which regards itself as the spiritual home of the Tolkien films and terms itself the "Middle of Middle Earth".

Returning actors from the Rings trilogy, many of whom have only passing mention in the book, were no less enthusiastic. Ian McKellen returns for a leading role as the wispy-haired, grey bearded wizard, Gandalf, while Cate Blanchett is the elven queen Galadriel and Elijah Wood appears as Frodo Baggins.

"You couldn't not come back, you had to come back," says Hugo Weaving, the leader of the elves, Elrond.

HOBBIT - A FRAUGHT JOURNEY

The Hobbit film journey has not been without its setbacks.

Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, owners of the film rights to the Tolkien books, had financial woes, prompting original director Guillermo del Toro to pull out and Jackson, already script writer and executive producer, to step in.

A major labor dispute prompted threats to move production out of New Zealand, and was solved by changing labor laws, while Jackson suffered a perforated ulcer and underwent surgery, delaying the film still further.

Though only two films were planned originally, Jackson has tapped Tolkien's appendices to the Rings to make it into three.

Audiences are also getting more visual bangs for their buck, with the movies filmed in 3D and at 48 frames per second (fps), double the industry standard.

This delivers clearer pictures, but opinion is divided, with some critics calling it cartoon-like and jarring.

Jackson says he wants to drag the iPad generation back into theatres and the romance, excitement and mystery they offer.

"It's more realistic, it's more immersive. I almost feel a responsibility as a film maker to try to do my part at encouraging people to come to the movies, to watch the film in a cinema," he said.

The second film "The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug" will be released in December next year, with the third "The Hobbit: There and Back Again" is due in mid-July 2014.

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Book Talk: Writer completes Churchill bio for late friend

NEW YORK (Reuters) - In the late 1990s, Paul Reid, then a journalist with The Palm Beach Post, became close friends with acclaimed author and historian William Manchester after covering a reunion of Manchester's Marine friends from World War Two.

Manchester was struggling to get the third and final volume of his Winston Churchill biography off the ground. The first two installments, released in the 1980s and coming in at close to 1,000 pages each, were critical and commercial successes.

In 2003, Manchester who was in failing health, grappling with writer's block and unable to find a collaborator to his liking, gave Reid the toughest assignment of his life: write the final volume, with Manchester editing.

But less than a year later, Manchester died, leaving Reid with more than 5,000 pages of often opaque notes and an almost impossible legacy to fulfill.

Finally, on November 6 - almost 30 years after the first installment - the final volume was published, with Reid sharing credit on the book jacket with his late collaborator.

Reid, 63, spoke with Reuters about the book, "The Last Lion: Winston Spencer Churchill, Defender of the Realm, 1940-1965":

Q: What did you think when Manchester asked you to write the final volume?

A: "I knew Bill for about five years and he had mentioned some people had auditioned ... he didn't like talking about it and I didn't push him. I just wanted to be a friend to an old ill man. I never saw it coming at all. When he asked me in October 2003, for a couple seconds I didn't know what he was talking about. I thought, 'Maybe he wants me to read (novelist) Elmore Leonard to him,' because he was reading (his book) 'Maximum Bob.' I was flabbergasted when he asked me."

Q: Did you try to mimic his writing style?

A: "No. Bill's writing style was formed in mid-20th Century. Like Stephen Ambrose or the official naval historian Samuel Eliot Morison, they saw black hats and white hats and heroes and villains and we tried to do something different. If someone said that I did a good job it would be on the storytelling, I hope. That's what Bill Manchester did beautifully. But the style, the pace, cadence - no, I didn't try to imitate him."

Q: Did you feel prepared and did you find anything out about Churchill that previous biographers had not?

A: "Well, my old man went to the Naval Academy, so I felt comfortable with that and World War Two. If Bill Manchester had written two volumes of a three-volume biography of Mozart, I'm not the guy. When I started I realized, however, that it was like an onion, peeling the layers away. I had felt pretty knowledgeable, but realized quickly that I wasn't.

"As to the second question, there are no earth-shattering revelations. I did develop perspectives that are not new, but I realized they were worth articulating. The first is that Churchill never believed the Germans were going to invade. He wanted to keep Britons on their toes and he wanted to convince the Americans that the Germans were coming."

Q: Churchill was danger-prone and made many military mistakes. How does he compare to modern statesmen in terms of leadership, courage and recklessness?

A: "He wanted to be in all places at all times and nothing went right. Try to imagine a modern statesman who gets the big picture and messes up the small picture over and over again. He would put on his tin hat and get in his armored car and drive around London during the blitz, which was really reckless.

"I don't think modern leaders can indulge those inclinations. The president or the UK prime minister might fly into Afghanistan unannounced with about a dozen F-16s hovering around. Churchill would've flown in and then got in an armored car and gone out to Kandahar. Churchill was reckless, but in his recklessness he inspired his country. I'll stop there because I'm certainly not advocating recklessness."

Q: Would you like to write more historical biographies?

A: "I definitely would. Who? I don't know. I have nothing definitive in the near future, but people have said the story of the story - of how the book came about and the story of the writing - for younger writers, might be worth writing about. I hate to say memoir, but a book about the book. It was a real honor. Bill Manchester entrusted me with a mandate to not let him down, don't let Churchill readers and fans down, and that's what I tried to do over the last eight years, because if I didn't get it done, it wouldn't get done. I just tried to do my duty."

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World Chefs: Keller shares memories, spotlight in latest book

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Thomas Keller, one of America's most respected chefs, shares the food memories of his childhood and his time in France in his new book "Bouchon Bakery," which is also the name of his chain of pastry shops in the United States.

Keller is the only American chef who owns two three-Michelin-star restaurants - Per Se in New York City and The French Laundry in the Napa Valley wine region in California.

Earlier this year, Britain's Restaurant Magazine named Per Se, which opened in 2004, the world's sixth best restaurant. Keller also earned the magazine's lifetime achievement award.

Like his four other books, his latest effort is a collaboration. He co-wrote it with his top pastry chefs Sebastien Rouxel and Matthew McDonald along with food writers Susie Heller, Michael Ruhlman and Amy Vogler.

The 57-year-old spoke to Reuters about the book, his pastry chefs and his place in the culinary world.

Q: Why did you collaborate with the leaders of your pastry team with this book?

A: "If you look at my other cookbooks, it's always been a point with me to share these opportunities with those who share their skills and expertise with the general public. That was the reason why I did the book. Sebastien is one of the best pastry chefs in America. His techniques are unparalleled. I'm not trying to pretend that I'm a pastry chef by writing a book about baking and pastries. Nor am I trying to be a bread baker. I have Matthew McDonald, who is one of the best bakers in America. To be able to highlight his skills in the bread section was very important as well."

Q: How did your time in France change your view about pastry and bread-making?

A: "When you are in France, especially in Paris, there were three or four boulangeries of different significance just on the block where I lived because they had pastry chefs with different levels of skills. You went to different ones for different things. To have a fresh baked baguette everyday was extraordinary. Anyone who lived in Paris for any length of time would say eating a fresh baguette is pretty special. Bread plays a real important part in the experience of the diners. To make sure we have the opportunity to significantly impact the experience by controlling the production and style of the bread was very important to me."

Q: Do you have a favorite dessert?

A: "It depends on the day ... There are so many things I love. I think anything that's done really, really well. For me, that's really something I really appreciate. I think one of the things that really resonate with the individual is that idea that eating, and eating through that experience, they have a memory. We are always trying to do something that's good. Why put something on the menu that's not very good?"

Q: The book emphasizes weighing ingredients over measuring with cups and spoons. Could that be difficult for home cooks?

A: "One of the things about pastry ... it's such an exact process. The most exact thing you practice is with weighing. There is an exactness to the execution, which gives you every opportunity to be successful."

Q: French Laundry and Per Se are among two of the best restaurants in the country. Bouchon Bakery is a success. What more would you like to accomplish in the culinary world?

A: "I have accomplished today everything I wanted to accomplish, more than I ever dreamed was possible. Right now, I'm just focused on the restaurants we have and the book I just wrote. Let me enjoy this moment before you ask me what I'll be doing tomorrow."

Pecan Sandies for my mom (Makes 1-1/2 dozen cookies)

1 ¾ cups + 1 ½ teaspoons all-purpose flour (250 grams)

¾ cup coarsely chopped pecans (80 grams)

4 ounces unsalted butter, at room temperature (170 grams)

¾ cup + 1 ¾ teaspoons powdered sugar (90 grams)

Additional powdered sugar for dusting (optional)

1. Position the racks in the upper and lower thirds of the oven and preheat the oven to 325°F (convection) or 350°F (standard). Line two sheet pans with Silpats or parchment paper.

2. Toss the flour and pecans together in a medium bowl.

3. Place the butter in the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment and mix on medium-low speed until smooth. Add the 90 grams/¾ cup plus 1¾ teaspoons powdered sugar and mix for about 2 minutes, until fluffy. Scrape down the sides and bottom of the bowl. Add the flour mixture and mix on low speed for about 30 seconds, until just combined. Scrape the bottom of the bowl to incorporate any dry ingredients that have settled there.

4. Divide the dough into 30-gram/1½-tablespoon portions, roll into balls, and arrange on the sheet pans, leaving about 1½ inches between them. Press the cookies into 2-inch disks.

5. Bake until pale golden brown, 15 to 18 minutes if using a convection oven, 22 to 25 minutes if using a standard oven, reversing the positions of the pans halfway through. (Sandies baked in a convection oven will not spread as much as those baked in a standard oven and will have a more even color.)

6. Set the pans on a cooling rack and cool for 5 to 10 minutes. Using a metal spatula, transfer the cookies to the rack to cool completely. If desired, dust with powdered sugar.

Note: The cookies can be stored in a covered container for up to 3 days.

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