#! perl -slw
use strict;

my @things_to_sort = (
    { author => 'bart',  title => 'skateboarding' },
    { author => 'lisa',  title => 'postmodernism' },
    { author => 'marge', title => 'hairstyles' },
    { author => 'lisa',  title => 'THIS BOOK FIRST' },
    { author => 'homer', title => 'donuts' },
    { author => 'bart',  title => 'coolness' }
);

my $firstTitle = 'THIS BOOK FIRST';

## Find the author of the title
my $firstAuthor;
$_->{ title } eq $firstTitle and $firstAuthor = $_->{ author } 
    for @things_to_sort;
die "Title $firstTitle not found" unless $firstAuthor;

my @sorted = map{
    $_->[0]
} sort {
    $a->[ 1 ] cmp $b->[ 1 ]
} map {
    [
        $_,
        sprintf "%s%s%s\0%s\0",
            $_->{ title } eq $firstTitle ? chr(0) : '',
            $_->{ author } eq $firstAuthor ? chr(0) : '',
            lc( $_->{ author } ),
            lc( $_->{ title } )
     ]
} @things_to_sort;

printf "%-8s %-20s %-6s %-10s\n", %$_ for @sorted;
__END__
c:\Perl\test>junk
title    THIS BOOK FIRST      author lisa
title    postmodernism        author lisa
title    coolness             author bart
title    skateboarding        author bart
title    donuts               author homer
title    hairstyles           author marge