Not just a thriller writer

Scott Turow, who will be the Library’s featured gala dinner speaker on May 24, is known for writing legal-themed thrillers. But he writes often and insightfully about much else. Just in the past week, Turow appeared on the op-edit page of the New York Times to raise alarm about copyright infringement and internet piracy (“Would the Bard have Survived the Web?”) and a few days later in the New York Times Magazine, profiling Rahm Emanuel, “The One-Man Political Machine,” who has just been elected mayor of Turow’s native Chicago.

Turow, who practices law while writing bestselling books, was elected president of the Authors Guild last year (succeeding Roy Blount Jr.), and comments often on the future of the book and of reading – for example, in an Authors Guild posting about e-books and e-readers and whether he is “for them or against them.”

Meanwhile, save the date and save your places for the 2011 gala….