Book news: Virginia Woolf, Britney Spears’ mom, free Neil Gaiman

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• An exhibit on Virginia Woolf opens at New York’s Grolier Club with previously undisplayed Woolfiana on Tuesday, Sept. 16.

• That’s the same day that Lynne Spears’ memoir, ‘Through the Storm: A Real Story of Fame and Family in a Tabloid World,’ hits shelves. Bits and pieces have been circulating on the Internet, including how daughter Britney lost her virginity. Who’s calling who tabloid?

• Also on the Internet, and for free, is Neil Gaiman’s 1997 book ‘Neverwhere.’ A downloadable e-book version is available, too.

• Twentysomething Ryan Holiday asks, ‘What is the ‘classic’ book of the ‘80s and ‘90s?’ The suggestions coming in at the blog Marginal Revolution are pretty good: ‘Neuromancer’ by William Gibson, ‘White Noise’ by Don Delillo, ‘Blood Meridian’ by Cormac McCarthy, ‘Bonfire of the Vanities’ by Tom Wolfe, ‘Cathedral’ by Raymond Carver, ‘The Unbearable Lightness of Being’ by Milan Kundera, ‘The Name of the Rose’ by Umberto Eco. But how about each decade get a book of its own?

• Although I hate to have to mention book banning at all, let alone twice in one day, I have to mention that Rick Wartzman speaks at the Los Angeles Public Library tonight about his book ‘Obscene in the Extreme: The Burning and Banning of John Steinbeck’s ‘The Grapes of Wrath.’ ‘

— Carolyn Kellogg

Image credit: Grolier Club