Oct. 2 is Book Deluge Day 2012

This fall has already brought a bevy of big books. In fiction, we’ve seen “NW” by Zadie Smith, “Telegraph Avenue” by Michael Chabon, “This Is How You Lose Her” by Junot Diaz, and “The Casual Vacancy,” J.K. Rowling’s first novel for grown-ups. Nonfiction has been dominated by “No Easy Day,” the account by “Mark Owen” (a pseudonym for Matt Bissonnette), a former Navy SEAL who participated in the mission that killed Osama bin Laden. There’s Salman Rushdie’s memoir, “Joseph Anton,” about his time living under the fatwa, and the David Foster Wallace biography by D.T. Max, “Every Love Story is a Ghost Story.” And that’s just for starters.

If all you did was read the major works that have come out in the last few weeks, you’d be busy for quite a while. But next week is when the books really hit the fan.

Publishers Weekly is calling Oct. 2 the Best Book Day of 2012, but I think it’s more like Book Deluge Day. As many books that have already been piling up this fall, they’re just the overture to the big show. According to PW’s account, more books will be published on Oct. 2 than any other day this year.

How many? A total of 32 books will be coming out from publishing houses large and small next week.

Dennis Lehane (above, with Martin Scorcese on the set of “Shutter Island”) leads the pack with “Live By Night,” a novel about the rise of a prohibition-era Irish-American gangster. There’s a book about math called “The Joy of X,” a new novel by Louise Erdrich, biographies of Ulysses S. Grant and Harry S. Truman (could it be presidential season?), and many more. Happy Book Deluge Day 2012.

There are so many good books to read. But I fear that after the deluge, a drought may come.

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From the department of unintended irony, courtesy Barnes & Noble

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