Hachette Livre Australia has announced an urgent recall of actress Kathleen Turner's biography Send Yourself Roses, as a ‘precautionary measure', following legal action taken by actor Nicholas Cage in relation to what he says are false claims in the book.

Matt Richell, sales and marketing director for Hachette's Headline division, told us that while there had been no legal order for the book to be recalled, Headline had decided to reprint the title with two contentious sentences removed as a precautionary measure after the book had become the centre of a libel case that was likely to take some time to resolve.

‘The book is not a Hollywood tell-all,' said Richell. ‘It's a high-quality biography and we don't want it to be known for one [legal action]. It's a great read'

The book, which is published by Hachette Book Group in the United States and Hachette Livre's Headline division in the United Kingdom and Australia, has been frozen in the UK and Australia pending the arrival of the reprints. The situation in the United States could not be confirmed as yet.

While Richell said his team was ‘very disappointed' that the title had to be recalled, and regretted the extra work load for booksellers and distributors, he pointed out that there was a silver lining to the situation. ‘Of course extra publicity is good,' he said.

In Australia Hachette has stuck to its initial print-run of around 10,000 copies, and is hoping booksellers will reorder the title, which Richell says can be in-store by tomorrow. ‘We realise it's still a busy time of year, but we hope everyone will work with us--there is a deal of major publicity to come.'

This article from Thorpe Bowker's Weekly Book Newsletter and Media Extra is reproduced by kind permission of Thorpe-Bowker, a division of R R Bowker LLC. © Copyright 2008, Thorpe-Bowker