Behind the Headlines

It’s official. This week, we agreed to publish a new cookbook by Herald-Leader Food Writer Sharon Thompson, filled with her favorite recipes from around Kentucky. The hardcover book, to be called Flavors of Kentucky, like Sharon’s popular recipe webpage, will be published by McClanahan Publishing, a Kentucky company specializing in regional cookbooks. Herald-Leader designers and photographers will work with Sharon to make the project visually engaging, and Assistant Managing Editor Kim Parson will oversee the staff’s efforts. The book will be available for pre-orders at the Herald-Leader-sponsored Bluegrass Festival of Books on April 29 at Lexington Center. Sharon intends to travel around the state to promote it.

Sharon’s book follows the publication last fall of another Herald-Leader book project, Dr. Thomas Clark’s Kentucky Treasures.  This book showcased 11 places that the late historian thought everyone should visit to have a full appreciation for Kentucky. With photos by Charles Bertram and David Stephenson and text by reporter Jim Warren, the book was a Holiday sensation at Joseph Beth Booksellers, selling more than 1,000 copies in the first few weeks. Managing Editor Tom Eblen ran the project, which benefited from the talents of designer Janet Shedd and many other staff members.

Book projects like these do more than offer a diversion from the daily grind of putting out a newspaper. They seem to have a larger positive effect on newsroom morale.  They give individual staffers a chance to exercise their creative muscle and display their work to a different and discerning audience. And they give us all something to celebrate. As daily newspaper journalists, we get used to furiously putting out a product every day, knowing that within hours it will end up in the recycling bin. Books are more permanent. And it is heartening to realize that our words and images have a broader market and a longer shelf life than we might have expected.

Marilyn Thompson
Editor