Cheryl Alkon is now contributing to Healthy Perspective, USAToday.com's health blog (see below for URL)

Gerald Bartell reviewed Patricia Cornwell's Red Mist for the Washington Post (12/30/11)

Bob Brody appeared on "The CBS Early Show" on New Year's Eve Day to tout his blog, letterstomykids.org and to urge parents to pledge in 2012 to preserve personal family history in writing

Marda Burton's book, Galatoire's: Biography of a Bistro, co-authored with Dr. Kenneth Holditch, has been re-issued in trade paperback and ebook by Garrett County Press. The book about New Orleans was a finalist in the nonfiction category for the award given by the Mississippi Institute of Arts and Letters

Joan Detz, author of How to Write & Give a Speech (St. Martin's Press), has added a new location to her seminar schedule. In addition to her speechwriting seminars in Philadelphia, she will offer training in Washington D.C. from August 20-21

George Devine does live game updates on Bay Area teams (Giants, Athletics, Raiders, Cal) for Yahoo! Sports Radio and Fox Sports Radio, as well as features for sportsradioservice.com

Chicago-based freelancer Elisa Drake covers everything from dance clubs to deep dish, play spaces to parking spaces, in her second book from Globe Pequot Press, the Insiders' Guide to Chicago.

HBO has begun production of a TV pilot based on Jack El-Hai's book The Lobotomist. Robert Schwentke (The Time Traveler's Wife, Red) will direct, and the program will be co-produced by Leonardo DiCaprio's Appian Way and Brad Fischer's Mythology production companies. The pilot, about lobotomy developer Walter Freeman, may become an HBO series

Chrystle Fiedler's new novel, Death Drops: A Natural Remedies Mystery, is about a naturopathic doctor who runs a health food store and dispenses natural cures. Release date is Feb. 21 by Gallery Books/Simon & Schuster

Among hundreds of farms in New England, only a small percentage engage in active agricultural tourism (a.k.a. Agritourism), the focus of a new iPhone app written by Rebekah L Fraser. "New England Farm Tours" shares the fun and challenging experiences of farm life

Holly Gleason's cover story on The Band Perry (famous for the song "If I Die Young") is in the Country Music Association's CMA Close-Up magazine's Feb./March issue

Anne Hosansky, who wears two hats as both fiction and nonfiction writer, has added a third hat: poet. She has a poem in the December issue of Mobius Magazine

Melanie Radzicki McManus' article "On the Backs of Giants" (Minneapolis Star Tribune, 12/11/10) received a Gold 2011 Lowell Thomas Travel Journalism award. McManus also released the complete version of her Sutro Media app "Vía de la Plata," a trail guide to one of Spain's most famous pilgrimage routes

Carole Moore will keynote the Australian Missing People Conference at Griffith University in Queensland, Australia, in July 2012. This month Moore will also present a breakout session based on her book, The Last Place You'd Look at the Missing and Unidentified Persons Conference in Appleton, Wis.

Michelle Rafter is helping produce a career series called "Reinvent Yourself" for BlogHer, the women's blog network. Rafter recently had her first byline in Edmunds.com, the consumer auto news site, and continues to contribute to Crain's Workforce Management and SecondAct.com, Entrepreneur Media's online magazine for people over 40

Deborah Robson has been publishing articles related to The Fleece and Fiber Sourcebook, with Carol Ekarius (Storey Publishing, 2011). The most recent: "On the Edge: How a Handful of People Have Preserved Some Rare, Valuable Sheep and Their Wools" (PieceWork, November/December 2011) and "Fiber Diameter: Almightily Important and Easy to Misunderstand" (Spin-Off, Winter 2011)

Denise Schipani's first book, Mean Moms Rule: Why Doing the Hard Stuff Now Creates Good Kids Later (Sourcebooks, April 2012) helps parents ditch the indulgent, helicopter-parent trend and do the sometimes hard, but always satisfying work of growing kids into good men and women

Susan Shapiro's eighth book, Unhooked: How To Quit Anything, just came out from Skyhorse Press with good reviews in PW and Kirkus. Her coauthor is her addiction specialist Frederick Woolverton, who helped her quit smoking and drinking 10 years ago

Arthur G. Sharp recently completed a history book for Adams Media called Not Your Father's Founders. The trivia-filled book profiles 55 founding fathers and their revolutionary friends, including a variety of men and women ranging from spies to financiers and scalawags. Available July 4

Kelly L Stone is hosting "No Matter How Busy You Are You Can Find Time to Write" and "Empower Your Muse," online classes that help aspiring and established authors focus their efforts toward writing projects and enhance creativity through the power of the subconscious mind. Stone, a licensed counselor, is also hosting a 90 Day Daily Writing Challenge on Facebook

Robin Westen's ninth book, V is for Vagina: Your A to Z Guide to Periods, Piercings, Pleasures, was co-authored with Alyssa Dweck, MD, Ob-Gyn (Ulysses Press) and will be released on February 14, just in time for Valentine's Day

Jennifer Wilson published Running Away to Home (St. Martin's Press), about chucking it all during the recession and moving to the Croatian mountain village of her ancestors. Booklist says "a fun-filled, revealing book for admirers of Peter Mayle's A Year in Provence and Francis Mayes' Under the Tuscan Sun."

Barry Yeoman's article about the plight of Asia's moon bears, thousands of which are locked up in tiny cages and drained of their bile, has generated considerable buzz (see the online edition of OnEarth Magazine at is.gd/moonbe)

The world has become a different place in the decade since Lois Zachary wrote The Mentor's Guide: Facilitating Effective Learning Relationships, her first book in a series of bestsellers about mentoring. The new second edition reflects these changes and more, providing a framework to help mentors successfully navigate mentoring relationships.