Monday, June 06, 2011
Monday, May 16, 2011
And who doesn't love free nail polish?
 If you're going to be in Southern California in early June, you might want to add the various promotional events for the Go Fug Yourself ladies' upcoming YA book Spoiled to your day planner. In addition to whatever kind of undoubtedly-awesome interactions the writers have planned, there will also be free bottles of O.P.I. nail polish! Labels: Beauty, Events, other websites, Upcoming Books
Monday, March 07, 2011
Wednesday, February 23, 2011
Monday, January 31, 2011
Encyclopedias for the people
 In the ten years of its existence, Wikipedia has posted more than 3.5 million articles in English, but a recent New York Times article pointed out that barely 13 percent of its hundreds of thousands of contributors are women. The executive director of the Wikimedia Foundation has set a goal to raise the share of female contributors to 25 percent by 2015, but in the meanwhile traditionally female-oriented subjects (like friendship bracelets) will probably continue to get short shrift, while traditionally male-oriented subjects (like baseball cards) will feature more useless facts than one can shake a stick at. Labels: Nonfiction, other websites
Tuesday, December 28, 2010
Tuesday, November 16, 2010
Save the words!
 The fine people at Oxford English Dictionaries have started SaveTheWords.org, a website devoted to reviving thousands of gloriously obscure English words that have fallen out of daily use. Visitors are encouraged to "adopt" a word and begin using it as often as possible. I'm torn: I could probably find some way to work "vappous" into my daily conversation (it means "flat, bland"), but "locupletative" (defined as "tending to enrich") just rolls off the tongue, doesn't it? Labels: Dictionaries, other websites
Friday, November 05, 2010
Friday, October 01, 2010
I'm pretty sure this is contradicted by Hogwarts: A History, but...
Monday, August 02, 2010
Seriously, dude? Thucydides?
 While checking out the Horn Book Blog, I followed a link to this Harvard Magazine profile of literary agent Andrew Wylie. I was mostly impressed by Mr. Wylie's seemingly colossal ego*, but I think he makes a good point about the future of e-books: the trashier the title, the more attractive its e-book version. I'm never going to give up buying printed books, but when e-readers drop down into the $50 range, I expect I'll start buying e-book versions of the authors on my B-list—you know, the titles you buy because you're too impatient to wait for a library copy, but you're unlikely to read twice. *Also the fact that he twice uses Shakespeare to disparage Danielle Steel. I'm not arguing the idea that Steel is a terrible writer, but Wylie's comparisons suggest that he is unfamiliar with the many, many genre writers who fall somewhere between the two. Labels: ebooks, Magazines, other websites, Publishing
Monday, July 12, 2010
Build your own book review
 I had never heard of Common Sense Media before yesterday, but their purpose statement sounded innocuous enough: they're a nonprofit organization dedicated to "improving the lives of kids and families by providing the trustworthy information, education, and independent voice they need to thrive in a world of media and technology." Unfortunately, this School Library Journal article paints a more disturbing picture. CSM's reviews break literary content down into various categories, including appropriate age levels, "good stuff", and "what to watch out for". Thus a book like Lauren Kate's Fallen gets a high rating, because it contains relatively low levels of violence, sex, drug and alcohol abuse, bad language, and consumerism. (Plus, the author of the review feels fallen angels are "more charming" than vampires, although no reason was given for that assessment.) The fact that Fallen was poorly thought out and featured an emotionally bipolar love interest doesn't bother CSM one bit, apparently. Ugh. Look, if you're worried about what your kid is reading, read it yourself. Don't rely on someone else (no matter how well-respected) to tell you what's safe and what isn't. And just think: young adult and kids' books can be fun. You might even enjoy yourself! Labels: Kids' books, other websites, Reviews, teen literature
Tuesday, June 01, 2010
RIP, CMX.
 I didn't hear much about DC Comics' CMX manga line while it was up and running, but now that DC has decided to shut it down it's all over the place. The Beat posted a helpful summary of the many, many complaints about DC's behavior, but if you're looking for the Cliffs Notes version, here goes: A. People are mad because they feel DC failed to promote the line adequately
B. They worry this is (yet another!) sign that major comic imprints don't care about girl readers, and...
C. They're mourning the loss of CMX's many tween-appropriate titles, as this is a market that's really under-served here in the U.S. The only CMX title I cared about was Venus Capriccio, so I'm not, like, crazily emotionally invested in this debate, but I'm always sorry to see a manga imprint die. Labels: Comic news, manga, Obituaries, other websites
Friday, May 21, 2010
Not the cake I would have chosen, but...
 Huh. Apparently, May 10th through the 16th was Children's Book Week, and the always-entertaining site Cake Wrecks decided to celebrate with a selection of literature-inspired cakes. I don't know about you guys, but I'd like to see the party that accompanied that Neverending Story cake. I bet it was awesome. Labels: other websites
Monday, April 19, 2010
For serious?
 Whoa: the Royal Shakespeare Company has arranged something called Such Tweet Sorrow, a five-week-long event that allows six actors (playing Romeo, Juliet, and four additional characters) to tweet their way through the events depicted in the play. Each actor is following a loose script overseen by the RSC, but they'll write their tweets themselves. This leads to fascinating character insights like this one, which Romeo (@ romeo_mo) wrote about Mercutio (@ mercuteio): Mercutio is seriously on the prowl tonight,ladies look out!!He's like a dog on heat! @mercuteio close your mouth, your drooling in your pint I do love me a good literary gimmick, so I'll probably be following this. Labels: other websites, Technology, William Shakespeare
Thursday, December 10, 2009
Holiday cheer on tap
 The fine people at Bookreporter.com have kicked off their second annual " Author Holiday Blogs" feature--a collection of holiday-themed posts by authors ranging from Stephen Coonts to Barbara Delinsky to Lisa Scottoline. They'll be updating this feature through Christmas Day, so check it out if you're in the market for some literary holiday inspiration! Labels: Holiday, other websites
Monday, November 30, 2009
Made of win.
 I can only read FailBlog for short periods of time. (I usually get queasy around the five-minute mark.) But I can certainly see why other people like it—at its best, it's insanely, painfully funny. So if you're the kind of person who likes your humor cringe-inducing, you might want to pick up Fail Nation, the recently-published "visual romp" through some of the site's most, um, memorable moments. Labels: other websites
Friday, October 23, 2009
Seems like a stretch
 NPR's "All Things Considered" featured an interview and Q-and-A session with Diary of a Wimpy Kid author Jeff Kinney yesterday. Both were fun, but I was even more interested in the interview that followed, with Books4YourKids.com blogger Tanya Turek. Turek was invited on the show to discuss parents' concerns about their children over-identifying with Kinney's lazy, selfish, totally self-absorbed main character, Greg. Turek is a good interview, and she gives some solid general advice to parents whose children are old enough to make their own choices about reading, but I seriously had no idea that people were worried about this. I mean, does any kid want to act like Greg? He's hideous! Kids laugh at him, not with him. It would be like wanting to emulate Adrian Mole. I'm sorry, but this seems like unnecessary pearl-clutching to me... Labels: Interviews, Jeff Kinney, other websites
Friday, October 09, 2009
Literary tone-deafness
 I usually like Salon, but sometimes their stuff irritates the hell out of me. Take this recent article on Lise Haines’ new novel Girl in the Arena, which kicks off with the following lines: "Girl in the Arena is like nothing you’ve ever read. Lise Haines’ new novel is about the rise of a modern gladiator culture in America, in which fights to the death have become a hugely profitable televised sport." "Nothing you've ever read"... unless, of course, you've read The Hunger Games, which sold about a bazillion copies last year. Are the Salon writers seriously that oblivious to literary popular culture*? I haven't read Haines' book (although I might; it sounds kinda cool), so I can't weigh in on any similarities between her novel and The Hunger Games, but trust me, Salon: combining that opening line with that description was a mistake. *They've weighed in on Harry Potter and Twilight, but that's pretty much it. Labels: other websites, teen literature
Wednesday, September 23, 2009
Highs and lows
 Slate has set out to answer a question I've been wondering about myself: what's with all the recent articles proclaiming vampires some kind of "new craze"? Haven't they been a consistent craze? (There's certainly been a steady vampire-story presence throughout my lifetime.) Anyway, two Slate writers have mapped the ebb and flow of vamp popularity since the 1960s in their Garlic Years Timeline. Labels: other websites, Vampires
Tuesday, August 18, 2009
Fahrenheit 451: dumbed allll the way down?
 Sarah Boxer has a nice article up in Slate about the recent graphic-novel adaptation of Ray Bradbury's classic novel Fahrenheit 451--you know, the book about a world where all books are banned except for comic books, which are regarded as stupid enough to be safe for mass consumption. Labels: Magazines, other websites
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Lifehacker has put together a helpful guide for How to Create an Awesome Summer Reading List. They offer everything from basic tips ("First, tackle your reading backlog") to DIY-instructions for building a bookstand for your exercise bike (for all those summer multi-taskers out there), so it's well worth checking out!
