Publisher attacked over The Jewel of Medina

Mike Riggs rounds up the reports on the firebombing of Martin Rynja's home in London. Rynja is the publisher of Sherry Jones's controversial novel The Jewel of Medina:

Since losing her contract with Random House, Jones has pinned much of the blame for her book's ups and downs on Denise Spellberg, a professor at UT-Austin. In her efforts to dissuade anyone from publising Jewel, Spellberg has argued that it "use[s] sex and violence to attack the Prophet and his faith," and called it "soft core pornography." But Jones is either naive or scrambling to deflect attention by arguing that pejorative labels are the culprit here, or that all would be well if only radicals could read her book:

"The planting of that bomb is Martin Rynja's letterbox was not about my book," Jones said, noting that the novel was not yet available in Britain. "It's not about the content of my book. It's not about the ideas in my book. It must be about the rumors and innuendos....I feel that the people who resorted to violence are responsible," Jones emphasized. "But her use of the word 'pornography' has done nothing to help the situation."

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