While in an airport bookstore recently, this title caught me eye: How to Build a Business Warren Buffett Would Buy: The R.C. Willey Story.

How could I resist? I bought a copy and read the whole thing on my flight (OK, the book is only 192 pages).

The author of the book, Jeff Benedict, tracks the entrepreneurial career of Bill Child, who transformed a furniture business -- R.C. Willey -- into a retailing giant (he came on board the company in the mid 1950s when his father-in-law died).

The collapse of Bear Stearns took place with lightning speed, and so did the publication of the first book about the firm's demise. Bear Trap: The Fall of Bear Stearns and the Panic of 2008 hit shelves in September of 2008, and is easily one of the sloppiest, worst business books written in a long time -- quite an accomplishment.

So William D. Cohan's more rigorous account of Bear Stearns has a pretty easy act to follow. Still, House of Cards: A Tale of Hubris and Wretched Excess is one of the best corporate failure books I've ever read, taking its place alongside Kurt Eichenwald's Conspiracy of Fools, a meticulous recounting of the collapse of Enron.

We've all been wondering what President Bush would do after leaving office with the lowest approval ratings in history and now we have our answer: He's writing a book.

"I want people to understand the environment in which I was making decisions. I want people to get a sense of how decisions were made and I want people to understand the options that were placed before me," he told the Associated Press.

Disgraced former Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich has signed a six figure contract with Phoenix Books to write a book exploring "the dark side of politics that he witnessed in both the state and national level."

If by witnessed, you mean created, then yeah. Illinois state representative Jack Franks moved to preempt Blagojevich's effort cash in on his infamy by introducing a bill that would require politicians convicted of corruption charges to turn over the proceeds from any related book or movie deals to the state.

The publishing industry might be in the toilet, but former Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice is doing just fine.

The Associated Press reports that the former Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice has signed a three-book deal with Crown Publishers that guarantees her at least $2.5 million. The first book will be a memoir of her years in the Bush Administration, followed by a book about her family, followed by a young-adult version of her life story.

Back in 2001, Jim Collins had a monster of a business bestseller with his book Good to Great: Why Some Companies Make the Leap. . . and Others Don't. In it, Collins explored companies that have become hugely successful and found that success generally comes as a result of focusing resources on things that you're good at instead of mindlessly diversifying.

Arkansas Business writer Jeff Hankins read the book again to see how the companies profiled have weathered the downturn. The companies profiled were Abbot Laboratories (NYSE: ABT), Kroger (NYSE: KR), Kimberly-Clark (NYSE: KMB), Walgreens (NYSE: WAG), Altria (NYSE: MO), Nucor (NYSE: NUE), Pitney Bowes (NYSE: PBI), Wells Fargo (NYSE: WFC) and tragically, Fannie Mae and Circuit City. Gilette was eliminated from contention because of a merger.

Financial writer Robert Hagstrom has referred to investing as "the last liberal art" -- a field of endeavor that requires familiarity with an enormous breadth of knowledge and ability to synthesize between various sources of knowledge.

Numbers play a huge role in the world of investing and economics and in the current market where financial news dominates world news, we are bombarded with data every day. In The Numbers Game, Michael Blastland and Andrew Dilnot explain the dirty little tricks that statistics play on us, and how we can arm ourselves for dealing with them without dismissing numbers altogether.

The honeymoon between Warren Buffett and the biographer he allowed access to his personal records has ended. For more than a decade, each Berkshire Hathaway (NYSE: BRK.A) annual meeting has included a question and answer session between Alice Schroeder and the Oracle of Omaha.

The event -- held as a dinner at a local country club has been canceled, "apparently because of his displeasure with some aspects of Ms. Schroeder's 960-page encyclopedic best seller about his life," according to The New York Times.

Buffett and Schroeder deny any particular rift and say that they still do communicate, though with less frequency because the work on the book is finished.

If Buffett is concerned about the public knowing intimate details of his life, he shouldn't be. The book has sold a lot of copies but at 976 pages, it's doubtful that the majority of buyers ever actually read it.

Being the untalented brother of one of the greatest sluggers of all-time can't be easy. How is Jay McGwire dealing with it? By trying to sell publishers a on a book called "The McGwire Family Secret: The Truth about Steroids, a slugger and Ultimate Redemption."

If Jay is as bad at writing books as he is at coming up with titles, this one could rival Jose Canseco's Juiced as one of the worst books of all-time. Jay claims that his brother Mark started using steroids in 1994, and that he personally injected him.

"Mark is a man I think most would like to forgive because his reason wasn't nefarious -- it was for survival," the proposal says, according to Deadspin. "My bringing the truth to surface about Mark is out of love. I want Mark to live in truth to see the light, to come to repentance so he can live in freedom -- which is the only way to live."

The first authorized sequel to A.A. Milne's beloved Winnie the Pooh series will make its debut this year. David Benedictus's "Return to the Hundred Acre Wood" will be in stores on October 5. Dutton Children's Books is the publisher, and executive Don Weisberg says the book will be a "huge seller for a long, long time."

To its credit, Milne's estate has carefully guarded the character -- they could have easily cashed in for millions years ago by authorizing sequel after sequel. That Mr. Benedictus was finally the one who convinced them would seem to suggest that the book will be quite good.

According to The Wall Street Journal (subscription required), "The troubled book industry, in need of titles that will pull readers into the stores, will get a much-needed jolt" from the title.

I somehow doubt that Winnie will be a big enough hit to provide much relief to booksellers. But he's a hard guy not to root for.

There are times when technology displaces existing products and services, and times when it augments or supports existing products and services.

Further, while there is little doubt that online news and publishing is displacing newspapers and magazines - - it's at minimum forcing them to revise their missions and alter business models - - the same can not be said, at least at this stage of the digital age, regarding the Internet's impact on books.

Try curling up with a good computer screen

Initially, critics and other observers declared 'the end of books' - - that readers would gravitate toward reading books on computer screens. Reading a book on a computer screen?

Thankfully, the initial panic that gripped book publishers soon faded after what was clear to anyone who reads books became clear to publishing executives during a calmer moment: that the experience of reading a printed book in a traditional setting (such as in your favorite chair in a living room or study, or even on an outdoor deck / patio) is vastly superior to reading a book on a flat panel screen. Try curling up with a good computer screen.

not Harry Potter.

Not Twilight or even the latest thriller from James Patterson. The bestselling book of 2008 is, just like every other year, The Bible. 90% of U.S. households already have at least one copy, but slick marketing and endless procession of new editions with new translations, new illustrations, and new limited edition leather bindings helps The Bible sell about 25 million copies each year.

A fascinating piece in the December 23 Wall Street Journal (subscription required) looks at the brilliant niche marketing that keeps people who already have Bibles coming back to buy more each year: there are special editions for surfers, golfers, fashionistas, alcoholics and anime fans.

Bibles have been big business as long as they've been around: It was the first book to roll off of Gutenberg's printing press and, according to scholars, there's probably never been a year since then when it didn't sell more copies than any other book. In the first half of this century, it was a business dominated by door to door salesmen immortalized in this classic documentary from 1968.

According (PDF File) to religious publisher Thomas Nelson, 38% of Bible buyers already own between three and ten copies of the book, and most Bibles are bought as gifts.

Shares of Borders Group (NYSE: BGP) are down 26% to 39 cents per share today after the company announced an agreement to "extend the expiration date of the previously announced Borders option to "put" its U.K.-based Paperchase gifts and stationery business to Pershing Square for $65 million, subject to certain conditions."

The company also extended the deadline for its repayment of a $42.5 million loan made to to the company by Pershing Square, a hedge fund run by superstar value investor William Ackman.

Last month Borders abandoned its efforts to sell itself but with its balance sheet presenting a serious problem in the face of tanking sales, investors are incredibly skeptical about the company's future. The company's market cap of less than $25 million indicates that many investors believe that the company is a candidate for bankruptcy court.

While the economic smackdown certainly isn't Borders' fault, the company has made an enormous number of strategic blunders, starting with investing millions of dollars in an e-commerce site that will never be a serious threat to larger rivals.

Bookselling behemoth Borders Group (NYSE: BGP) has signed a deal with HarperStudio to accept the new News Corp. (NYSE: NWS) imprint's books on a nonreturnable basis. In the publishing industry, unsold books can generally be returned to the publisher. In exchange, Borders will get a slightly better deal: 58% to 63% off the cover price, instead of the usual 48%, according (subscription required) to The Wall Street Journal.

Is this the future of the book business? No one knows, but the timing certainly couldn't be more strange for Borders. Terrible results and a failed effort to sell the company have sent the stock down to 65 cents per share. The company's balance sheet is a mess and there has been considerable speculation that the company's final destination is bankruptcy. Given those circumstances, it's hard to understand why the company would want to invest in inventory that they're completely on the hook for -- and can't return if they can't sell it.

HarperStudio is a brand new imprint, with former Hyperion boss Robert Miller at the helm. The plan is to shake up the publishing industry with lower advances offset by higher royalties. Cutting down on returns is another goal aimed at reducing costs.

Scoring this deal with Borders looks like quite a coup for HarperStudio, but it remains to be seen how long Borders will last as a relevant piece of the bookselling industry.

This post is part of our feature on Money Winners of 2008. See all 20.

They called her Caribou Barbie. Saturday Night Live lampooned her mercilessly during the presidential election. The media elite denounced her as an idiot and a right-wing loony tune. But Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin is not going to fade into the snow of the beautiful state she governs. In fact, she is coming to a book store near you.

Media reports indicate that the former vice presidential nominee is expected to earn $7 million to tell her life story to a ghost writer. That's not too shabby considering that former president Bill Clinton got about $11 million for his life story and he actually was the leader of the free world. Barack Obama and his former rival John McCain both have earned big money from their books, so why shouldn't Palin.

There was also some talk during the campaign about a talk show or reality show starring the woman responsible for giving Tina Fey's career a boost -- as if it really needed one -- but that seems to have gone nowhere.

Palin, though, will have the last laugh on her naysayers, including me. During her brief time in the spotlight, Palin transformed herself from an obscure politician to a cultural icon. Along the way, she infuriated many voters and charmed more than a few. The power of Palin's celebrity will entice people who may not agree with her politically to buy her book. Her devoted fans will line up at the bookstores to buy it as well. Palin's tome has the makings of a best-seller.