Gina Turner, Pittsburg, Calif.

Bridges is still talkin’ ’bout (Killing) Willis. While the book hadn’t made the best-seller list as of press time, the former child star (Diff’rent Strokes) tells us he’s in talks to turn his story into a feature film. “If it’s done right and acted right, we can get ourselves to the Oscars,” says Bridges, 45, who lives in Los Angeles with wife Dori, son Spencir, 12, and daughter Bo Rushing, 14. The arc is “Hollywood meets gangster meets survival.” Bridges sees Larenz Tate or Nick Cannon filling his shoes as an adult and Jaden Smith playing him as a child. “Jaden has the chops to cry,” Bridges says. “I was a very emotional kid.”

Who’s News Column Contributors: Olivia Barker, Lorena Blas, Gayle Jo Carter, Cindy Clark, Ann Oldenburg

Keena Benning, Detroit

You have a good eye for box-office potential! A movie based on the 2009 bestselling book is due in theaters in August. Viola Davis plays Aibileen in the drama directed by Tate Taylor and filmed in Mississippi. Other members of the cast include Emma Stone as Skeeter Phelan, Bryce Dallas Howard as Hilly Holbrook, Allison Janney as Charlotte Phelan and Sissy Spacek as Missus Walters.

Who’s News Column Contributors: Olivia Barker, Lorena Blas, Gayle Jo Carter, Nancy Mills

Romantic. Hot. True Love. Obsessed.

When I asked Twi-hards at a recent Twilight convention in Arlington, Va., why they loved the saga, these words came up in every response.

And who can blame them? The plot allows for Robert Pattinson, Taylor Lautner and the Quileute Wolf Pack* to spend a large portion of the movies with their shirts off wielding rock-hard abs.

*By the end of the Twilight book series, there are 10 shape-shifters in the Quileute Wolf Pack – Jacob Black (Lautner), Sam Uley (Chaske Spencer) , Embry Call (Kiowa Gordon), Quil Ateara (Tyson Houseman), Seth Clearwater (Booboo Stewart), Jared Cameron (Bronson Pelletier, pictured above), Paul Lahote (Alex Meraz), Collin Littlesea and Brady Fuller. The pack has one female member, Leah Clearwater (Julia Jones), Seth’s sister, who manages to stay covered up in the books.

For Taylor Robeson, 14, of Fairfax, Va., Edward Cullen (Pattinson) was her favorite character until the movies came out. That’s when she had to switch to Team Jacob (Lautner). “Because of the abs,” says her friend and classmate, Nina Lucas. “Yeah. When his shirt’s off,” they agree, giggling.

The Official Twilight Convention Tour — featuring live Q&As with the actors, photo ops, autographs, karaoke, a monster ball, and a costume contest — will travel around the country for another year bringing Twi-hard fans everywhere their fix of vampires and werewolves. In the meantime, there are movies to flock to: the first part of Twilight: Breaking Dawn is released in theaters Nov. 18, with the final chapter out a year later.

Read below for more of my experiences from my Twilight convention, including interviews with two Twilight stars.

Photos by Marie Lindberg

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Jared Scott Tesler, Rochester, N.Y.

Oscar-winning Dame Dench, 76, released And Furthermore in mid-February and says the book is not an autobiography but rather a chronicle of her time in the theater world. On acting, she tells us: “I don’t know how you do it. You just hope to make the person you read on the page live through you. …You have to make them believable and real.” The acclaimed actress stars next in the J. Edgar Hoover biopic J. Edgar as the legendary FBI director’s mother. Leonardo DiCaprio plays Hoover.

Who’s News Column Contributors: Olivia Barker, Gayle Jo Carter, Nancy Mills, Arienne Thompson

Chris Gallery, Santa Barbara, Calif.

The project is still in development, a rep at HBO tells us. Though it is too early to disclose specifics, HBO says, the originally announced details are still the same. With no confirmed screenwriter, cast or shoot date, a launch in spring 2011 isn’t likely, but perhaps you can see Skloot at one of her upcoming appearances. Check rebeccaskloot.com for a calendar of events she will be attending.

Ann M., Ames, Iowa

Sorry to disappoint you, but Katherine Heigl is playing the lingerie-buyer-turned-bounty-hunter. She shot One for the Money, Evanovich’s introductory book about Plum, last summer. The film is due for release July 8. Heigl hopes to do more but says: “It depends on how the first (film) does. We really only have the rights to that one. It would be cool to do a series because there are so many good books.”

Bullock fans needn’t despair, though: She is now shooting Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close with Tom Hanks.

Who’s News Column Contributors: Nancy Mills, Andrea Mandell, Carol Memmott, Maria Puente, Arienne Thompson

Nancy Toney, Melbourne, Fla.

Lucky you! The film version of Water for Elephants will hit theaters April 22 and it stars Oscar winner Reese Witherspoon as Marlena Rosenbluth and Twilight hunk Robert Pattinson as Jacob Jankowski. Add to that mix Austrian actor Christoph Waltz, who won an Oscar last year for his turn as a Nazi in Inglorious Basterds.

Witherspoon and Pattinson filmed reshoots for the movie in January, forcing the actor to dye his brown locks auburn as he switched between filming Elephants and the next movie in the Twilight franchise, Breaking Dawn.

Even if you’ve never watched MTV’s popular reality series Jersey Shore, you’ve surely seen some of its hilariously nicknamed cast members — The Situation, Snooki or JWoww — on talk shows, magazine covers and now even at the bookstore. On Tuesday, Jenni “JWoww” Farley’s new advice book, The Rules According to JWoww, hits shelves. “So many fans asked for advice to the point where it became too much to respond,” says Farley, 25. “So I thought I should just write a book for these guys that are all wondering the do’s and don’ts.”

Delroy Lindo, 58, who stars in Fox’s new police drama The Chicago Code starting Monday at 9 p.m. ET, says he finds later-in-life fatherhood a “win-win” for himself and his son, Damiri, 9. “It absolutely is a good thing [because of] my own experience of life, my own experience with myself, my own abilities to raise him in ways I think are appropriate,” he says. Basically, Lindo says, that means allowing him “to be a kid and just find out who and what he’s going to be by himself.”

Even with all the buzz about director Marc Webb‘s cinematic Spider-Man reboot — including the casting of Andrew Garfield, Emma Stone and Rhys Ifans (who may or may not be the villainous Lizard) — don’t sleep on the Spidey comics. That’s where Marvel Comics’ legendary web-slinger has had his defining moments, after all, and business is picking up in “Big Time,” a new storyline that will act as a perfect jumping-on point for new readers and a new wrinkle for longtime fans of Peter Parker and his alter-ego. Written by Dan Slott (whom we talked with about the recent Spider-Man: Shattered Dimensions video game), the story arc begins in Amazing Spider-Man No. 648, an issue that finds Peter with a new job and a new girlfriend, hanging out with the Avengers and a new Spider-Girl, his greatest enemy is in the slammer, and the majority of his rogues gallery on ice for the time being. All is looking pretty good. However, this is Spidey we’re talking about here, who’s been marked for life upheaval quite a bit in his superhero career. In fact, that sure does look a lot like the mysterious Hobgoblin in this brand new trailer that gives a sneak peek at the first issue of the “Big Time” storyline, which hits comic shops Nov. 10.

Art courtesy of Marvel Comics

Guess who’s back? Captain Underpants! Author Dav Pilkey has agreed to write four more books in the 1997 series that has irked elementary school librarians and become known as “poop fiction,” reports AP. The first book, The Adventures of Ook and Gluk, Kung-Fu Cavemen from the Future, will be out in August with a worldwide printing of 1 million copies, Scholastic announced today. This is the first new Captain Underpants in four years. In an e-mail to AP,  Pilkey said he and his wife “had to take some time off to care for my father, who had terminal cancer.” His father, David M. Pilkey, died in 2008. – Ann Oldenburg

Looking for a vampire story with some real bite? Then, boys and girls, Scott Snyder has a comic book for you. His American Vampire series debuts in comic shops today, and Snyder’s taking literary royalty along for one bloody good ride. The master of horror himself, Stephen King is writing a backup story in each of the first five issues of the Vertigo Comics title, which introduces the first American vampire: an ornery outlaw from the Old West named Skinner Sweet, who’s a far cry from the likes of Twilight’s Edward Cullen. Featuring art by Rafael Albuquerque, American Vampire will follow the bloodsucking bloodline as it moves through U.S. history, one decade at a time, in each multiple-issue “season”: The locale for Snyder’s main story over the first five issues is Jazz Age Hollywood, where an up-and-coming starlet named Pearl in the 1920s runs into the wrong sort of folks. “The idea of the series is to try and investigate a little bit what is heroic and monstrous about the American character at different points in history,” Snyder says. “It will trace the bloodline up to present time, and also go back and explore why these vampires we’ve become so familiar with – the nocturnal, Eurocentric ones — has become the dominant one.” I talked with Snyder about American Vampire, working with King and what kind of horrors pop culture has been missing, so read below for the Q&A.

Art courtesy of DC/Vertigo Comics

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John Grisham is going to write his first children’s book series, Penguin Young Readers Group has just announced. The first two novels will be aimed at readers 8-12. The first book in the series, Theodore Boone: Kid Lawyer, is set to come out on May 25, 2010. It will follow the adventures of a 13-year-old kid lawyer who unwittingly becomes involved in a high -profile murder trial. The second book in the series, also featuring Theo, is due to be published in 2011. – Ann Oldenburg

While a few devil’s advocates may disagree with me, there aren’t too many young hit-making authors like Joe Hill. From his short-story collection 20th Century Ghosts to his debut novel Heart-Shaped Box to his horror comic Locke & Key, the man’s a talented dude — much like his famous dad, Stephen King. Hill’s latest, Horns (out tomorrow), is a tale of revenge, redemption and romance that’s heartfelt, more than a tad creepy, and just crazy good. His main character is a guy named Ig who — after one particularly drunken night — wakes up and finds horns growing from his temples. From there, Ig slowly turns into a man with more than a few devilish qualities and works to find out who killed his girlfriend, all while his family and townsfolk share their deepest, darkest secrets in his presence. The book, like Heart-Shaped Box and Locke & Key before it, has already been optioned for a movie version. “I have a friend who says when it comes to the movies, the best possible thing that can happen to a writer is get paid a whole bunch of money for a movie option and then never have the film get made. That way, you’ll have a whole pile of dough, and your story won’t be destroyed by a ham-fisted adaptation,” says Hill, who worked as a production assistant on a couple of his father’s film projects when he was in college. I spoke to Hill for a piece on this past weekend’s Who’s News page, but read below for more on Horns, Hill’s love of Twitter, and why he never wants to hear Shawn Mullins again. (Hill’s also on a book tour starting this week, so check here to see if he’s coming to your town.)

Photos courtesy of Shane Leonard and HarperCollins

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“Brian Wood Month” has come to DC Comics, and it’s about time, since the Brooklyn writer is one of the most thoughtful and innovative in the industry these days. Wood, who’s known for carving out niches for himself and pushing boundaries with his creator-owned work, has a host of good stuff on the Vertigo imprint out in February. DMZ, Wood’s look at an embedded journalist on the frontlines of a second U.S. civil war, releases its special 50^th issue Wednesday. His Viking epic Northlanders celebrates 25 issues come Feb. 24 (the third collected volume of what he considers his finest work arrives in March). And for those who loved his fantastic and youth-oriented 2003-05 short-story series Demo — with art by fellow New Yorker Becky Cloonan — the first issue of the second volume is now in stores with a great tale of a sleep-deprived woman dreamily led to St. Paul’s Cathedral in London. (For fun, take a gander at Wood’s original Demo pitch dating back to 2002.) In addition, Wood, who wrote Generation X back in the day, returns to superheroes by taking on a DV8 miniseries for Wildstorm in April, a relaunch of the late 1990s title. The busy Wood took some time out to talk about his variety of books this week, so read below for his thoughts on returning to Demo, his plan for DV8 and what real Northlanders think of Northlanders.

Art courtesy of DC Comics

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Audrey Niffenegger made waves in the literary world when her debut novel The Time Traveler’s Wife — featuring the love story of time-traveling Henry and his destined love, Clare — came out six years ago and was named Amazon’s best book of 2003. She’s traded in time travel for a multi-generational ensemble ghost story with her second book, Her Fearful Symmetry, which follows a pair of 21-year-old Illinois twin girls who inherit their dead aunt’s London flat — and their aunt’s spirit as well. One of the “characters” in the book is London’s famed Highgate Cemetery, where Karl Marx, Douglas Adams and many other notable figures are buried. Most of the book is set in and around it, so Niffenegger got a gig as a guide there while doing book research. I recently had the chance to talk with the 46-year-old author during her current book tour, which ends next month and will start back up on the West Coast in January. Read below for our conversation, and for a taste of Her Fearful Symmetry, check out this excerpt.

Photo by Stephen DeSantis

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Comic-Con International starts next week (and we’ll be there), but publication today of Blackest Night — an eight-issue epic — is the talk of the comic book world now. The DC Comics Blackest Night story crosses over into many of the company’s other books. It stars Green Lantern, Superman, Wonder Woman and other well-known superheroes. However, today's buzz is all about the resurrection of slain heroes and the possibility of them becoming a part of the mysterious Black Lanterns. However, the big question is — will Bruce Wayne (aka Batman) rise from the dead? Our comics expert Brian Truitt talks with Blackest Night writer Geoff Johns to find out. Click on read more for that and a look at the first three pages of the debut issue.

Art courtesy of DC Comics      

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The new Vertigo Comics title The Unwritten, created by writer Mike Carey and artist Peter Gross, mines familiar territory if you’re into pop culture: A book series about a prodigal boy wizard is a worldwide phenomenon, and the author’s son/character’s namesake is making the most of that infamy. Yet if you’re thinking it’s just a Harry Potter retread, you’re falling down the wrong rabbit hole, Alice. Carey and Gross have created an expansive world where audiences are in love with a man they think is the living embodiment of their fandom, all while a shadowy cabal manipulates popular fiction for its own ends. You know Dan Brown is drooling somewhere right now. “Fiction has tremendous consequences in the real world,” Gross says. “Story is the driving force of civilizations, wars, religions. It’s pretty easy to make a convincing argument that story is the most important thing that humans have ever come up with.” The first issue (which is only a buck!) was released this week, and I caught up with the creators to find out more about this fascinating landscape they’ve conjured up — no wands necessary. Click read more for the full report and three pages from the debut issue.

Art courtesy of DC Comics

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G. Willow Wilson is one of the brightest new stars in the comics world, and one with a diverse resume and full passport. At times, she’s been a music critic, political journalist, history scholar and essayist on topics including religion and the Middle East. But the American pop-culture world may know her best for writing the acclaimed Cairo graphic novel (her husband is Egyptian and she lived in Cairo for four years before moving to Seattle) and the ongoing series Air for Vertigo Comics.

A collection of the first five issues hit stores this week, and Air would be a favorite for anybody who likes Lost, conspiracy theories or the Discovery Channel. It starts out seemingly as a post-9/11 thriller — Blythe, an airline stewardess who’s afraid of heights, has a run-in with a mysterious group whose mission it is to keep the skies safe from terrorism, and the man they’re after, the equally mysterious Zayn. From there, the story flies off into a whole other direction as Blythe finds out there’s an entire country in the Middle East that no one knows about because it’s not on any maps, a weird science called “hyperpraxis” exists and Amelia Earhart may not be as missing as everybody thought. The seventh issue, also out this week and priced at a reasonable $1, is a perfect jumping-on point for new readers.

I got recently a chance to talk with Wilson as she was waiting for a repair guy to fix her dryer. A recent devotee to the Scott Pilgrim books like myself, Wilson discussed her first crush, what got her into comics and Air‘s underlying themes. Click read more for our engaging conversation.

Photo by Jane N. Egerton

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We seem to have a lot of blog readers who are big fans of Stephen King, judging by the comments on our post about the master of horror’s take on Stephenie Meyer as well as your picks on who’s the best writer between King, Meyer and J.K. Rowling. I went looking through the notes from my interview with King for a recent cover story to see if I could uncover any more nuggets you guys might like. And I think I found one.

When we were chatting about his upcoming book Under the Dome, a novel with political subtext out in November, King said he had recently had an idea for a short story. “And then I thought, ‘Well, why don’t I find three more like this and do a book that would be almost like modern fairy tales?’ Then this thing started to add on bits and pieces so I guess it will be a novel.” That idea, according to King, is for a new Dark Tower novel, a continuation of his epic seven-part fantasy/sci-fi/Western series about a lone gunslinger named Roland and his ongoing hunt for the Man in Black. “It’s not really done yet,” King admits of his magnum opus. “Those seven books are really sections of one long uber-novel.” Click read more to find out what other Dark Tower plans he has.

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Stephen King is an American Icon, a fiction writer who has worked non-stop for 35 years. He’s an aging baby boomer, who at 61 stays so on top of the popular culture he writes a regular, insightful column for Entertainment Weekly. I encourage you to read Brian Truitt’s interview for our American Icons series. But there’s more to King than we could fit in print. So, click on read more for just that, more juicy details from the man who is King of the scary story.

Photo courtesy of Scribner

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