"There was a different ending to 'New Moon.' Originally it was much quieter [and took place] in Bella's head," she said. Meyer changed it at the urging of her mom, Candy Morgan. She introduced the Volturi earlier, and — voila! — a Volturi smack-down jazzes up the end. Thanks, Candy.

Otherwise, Oprah and Meyer went over very familiar territory: "Twilight" came to Meyer in a dream; she imagined a hot vampire who was in love with a mortal girl; she wanted to know more; that dream became Chapter 13 of "Twilight." "In the dream it was two people in a circular meadow and one of them was a sparkly boy and one was just a girl who was human and normal and the boy was a vampire, which was bizarre," Meyer said. "It was a passion and frenzy when I started writing."

And of course, there was a question about Robert Pattinson. His hygiene having often been called into question, Oprah wanted to know, "What does he smell like?" "He smells great," Meyer said. "Rob is hilarious. He is the funniest person. He's not at all like the Edward character. He's so different. He just doesn't look like anyone else, in a good way. He's very striking looking."

Oprah Winfrey broke her silence Friday about former guest Herman Rosenblat, saying she's "very disappointed" in his now discredited story about meeting his future wife in a Nazi concentration camp. "That's what happens with lies," Winfrey said on an episode of "The Oprah Winfrey Show" that aired Friday. "They get bigger and bigger and bigger."

Rosenblat, a 79-year-old resident of North Miami Beach, Fla., and his wife Roma have appeared twice on Winfrey's show. Winfrey said he had planned to appear again to "explain himself," but the man's lawyers scuttled that. Rosenblat's tale of a little girl throwing apples over a barbed-wire fence to him every day at a sub-camp of Buchenwald in the 1940s was endearing, Winfrey said. "And he told that story and I was crying, everybody was crying," Winfrey said.

*****

Until Friday, Winfrey let her Web site do the talking, adding a small disclaimer that "on December 27, 2008, Herman Rosenblat admitted to fictionalizing portions of his life story, including how he met his wife." As of Friday night, Rosenblat's discredited tale remained listed on the site as the first example of "Love Lessons From Amazing Couples."

It's no surprise that Oprah Winfrey gave copies of Eckhart Tolle's A New Earth to the 4,666 graduates of Stanford University when she gave the commencement address on Sunday. Now No. 8, A New Earth was No. 1 for 11 consecutive weeks on USA TODAY's Best-Selling Books list after Winfrey chose it as her book club pick in January. She also gave copies of Daniel Pink's A Whole New Mind: Why Right-Brainers Will Rule the Future (Riverhead, $15), published in 2005. The book argues that professional and personal success in the 21st century will require traits such as empathy in addition to left-brain qualities like logic.

Though Pink has never spoken with Winfrey, he says his publisher had given him "an inkling that something was going to happen." "I was amazed, grateful and humbled," the writer from Washington, D.C., says.

Last year, Keifer Bonvillain was hit with a federal extortion charge after he allegedly tried to sell Winfrey audiotapes for $1.5 million of a high-ranking Harpo employee bad-mouthing her. But the charge didn't hold up in an Illinois court. Now Bonvillain, 37, who touts himself as a Louisiana-born "civil-rights activist," has launched a Web site in a bid to get a publisher for his exposé, titled "Ruthless."

His breathless pitch reads: "An office manager at Harpo broke his silence and his confidentiality agreement when he spoke freely about Oprah Winfrey's private life and business affairs. Keifer Bonvillain underestimated one of the world's most powerful women when he, armed with clandestinely recorded tapes, decided to write a 'tell-all' book unmasking the famed celebrity. Within days of Harpo learning about the book, two men were attempting to break into Keifer's home - presumably to get the tapes. Oprah was desperate to keep the truth from being revealed . . . The fallout was Keifer's highly publicized arrest."

Bonvillain vows to disclose that Harpo may have been involved in "blatant discrimination . . . This CEO not only knows about these practices . . . she condones them . . . Hours of taped conversations . . . reveal what they don't want the public to know about [Oprah's] private life, and a business that prides itself on its diversity."

Shortly after the Oprah response to Sneed, TVGuide.com claimed they interviewed Vernon Winfrey, who said, "There is no book" and that he is not shopping a proposal around to publishers or agents. But he did leave the door open by stating, "We might think about it later on ... and ... it's just on hold right now."

"Hermes regrets not having been able to accommodate Ms. Winfrey and her team and to provide her with the service and care that Hermès strives to provide to each and every one of its customers worldwide," the store said in a statement. "Hermès apologizes for any offense taken due to such circumstances."

The store said the incident occurred on June 14 around 6:45 p.m., about 15 minutes after the store closed. It said Winfrey and her team arrived at a time when "a private PR event was being set up inside." Harpo Productions spokeswoman Michelle McIntyre said Winfrey "will discuss her 'crash moment' when her show returns from hiatus in September." Crash is a film dealing with race relations. The phrase "crash moment" refers to situations where a party feels discriminated against on the basis of skin color.