*Interesting Articles

If you run across and interesting article or web site, post it here for everybody to see. As with the Message Board, we'd like to keep discussion to a minimum on this thread.

Not sure if this is where it goes or not but there is some interesting discussion over at GeekMom on the topic of "Are romance novels good for geek girls and women? Why or why not?" (plus you get entered into a drawing for a kindle by commenting!)

http://www.geekmom.com/2010/12/start-the-new-year-with-a-free-kindle/

(group admins: please feel free to move or delete if this is in the wrong spot - it seemed easier to just jump in than take forever getting acclimated to the group first)

This is the right spot!

Not sure if this was posted in last year's group, but I think it's worth reposting.

Writers and Readers

The idea that those who purport to write books don't read books is just odd to me.

January Magazine gazes into its crystal ball and predicts The Best Books of 2011. Kind of fun to see what is upcoming. The Mieville is a definite for me and The Paris Wife is a maybe depending on what folks around here think of it.

http://www.januarymagazine.com/features/11bestof11.html

A newspaper article about the length of literary books:

http://ind.pn/h8yUyt

Thanks to alphaorder on Club Read for posting this article from The Millions about the most anticipated books of 2011:

Most Anticipated: The Great 2011 Book Preview

Here is another that I'm probably the last to know about. NYT Disunion Blog covering the Civil War. This one could totally damage my book-reading time, I think.

http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/category/disunion/page/7/

elkiedee, I think there is merit in what that writer has to say if the penultimate paragraph

None of this is to argue against the production of modern-day War and Peace epics. Length, when a book does not drag, is a wonderful thing. Think of a night at the theatre: some three-hour plays whizz by; others leave you thinking wistfully of the journey home.

is not ignored.

It is too easy to be simplistic in judging a book by its length even though the length may be material to its value. One of the impressive things about Black Lamb and Gray Falcon was the sustained good writing. I think a book should be just as long as it should be, no longer and no shorter, as one of the commentators said about the short story.

If Proust had written on as he wanted to, inflating what he had and not just adding to the end, I don't think many would have condemned him.

Robert

And have you seen this?

http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSTRE70460O20110105

A Twain scholar is issuing Huckleberry Finn with politically correct language, and plans to do the same with Tom Sawyer.

Would Mr. Clemens roll over in his grave, please?

Sounds a whole lot like Newspeak is coming upon us here.

sheesh!

Roll over, hell....he's likely to jump right out of it. And a good thing it would be, too.

I heard about on NPR and was just appalled, almost more by the fact that schools won't teach the book because of the so-called "n-word" than that this idiot wants to replace it. Isn't reading Huckleberry Finn in school exactly the kind of opportunity to teach kids about the uses of words, and how they change, and about racism, and how it has changed that schools should be looking for????? It's not like kids have never heard the word!

I have mixed feelings about this. It was intensely uncomfortable for me, as one of a tiny number of black students in an otherwise all white suburban high school, to read Huckleberry Finn in English class. I think that my white classmates, who treated me very well, were also uncomfortable, and we were all glad when we finished the book. On the other hand, I'm strongly opposed to altering books to meet current sensibilities. If you start with this, what's next?

I'm curious, kidzdoc, if you think you and your classmates would have been more comfortable if the "n-word" had been removed. I have heard sound arguments for not teaching Huck Finn in high school (and even college), but I think changing the language misses the point of those sound arguments. I think if we accept "it makes us uncomfortable" as a reason not to teach a work (I'm not sure we should), then changing the language probably doesn't alleviate the discomfort. The attitudes are the same whether the language stays as Twain wrote it or if we substitute "slave."

#14: I don't think it would have made much difference if the "n-word" had been removed. The discomfort I felt was mainly due to being the only black kid in the class discussing this book. I can't remember, but I think we had to read segments of Huckleberry Finn out loud, which was even more uncomfortable. I think that I actually skipped school for a day or two during that time, and had headaches and gastritis for a couple of weeks, which I didn't have at any other time during high school, so it was moderately traumatic for me.

Darryl, that is very interesting. Not to put you on the spot, but do you think it would have made a difference to you if it had been taught in some sort of social studies or history class that could discuss racism in American life, or if there were a more even mixture of white and black students in the classroom?

#16: I agree with you on both counts, Rebecca. I had meant to suggest in my previous message that I think it would have been less traumatic if there was a more even mix of white and black students. However, having one or two other black students in the class may have made things worse. The stress I felt was entirely self induced, as I seriously doubt that any of my classmates said anything that was remotely insensitive to me.

>16 rebeccanyc:, 17: and remember, this was in, what, the early 1970s? a "social studies or history class that could discuss racism in American life" is quite plausible today but would have been pretty rare back then!

I read The Adventures of Tom Sawyer aloud to my girls a year or so ago. The first time the "n-word" appeared, I stopped reading and explained what an ugly, awful word that was and why, and why the author would use it. When it appeared later in the book, the girls actually flinched. At some point we'll read Huckleberry Finn, and we'll probably have a similar conversation. As awful as the word is, Twain's message is powerful, and I don't think it's the same book without it.

Agreed and agreed. I haven't actually read that book, but times have changed and if you change some of that book, it's like changing the authenicity of the book. Geez, it really isn't that big of a deal in my opinion. The only reason why people may do that is for younger readers, and if that's not the case, I think some person messed up.

For the history buffs: presently reading a book by Simon Sebag Montefiore, I remembered coming across this 2008 Al Jazeera interview of Montefiore on Stalin (his Young Stalin is a great book!).
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cnu9U3JAJSU&feature=related

Here's a New York Times take on the "fumigation" of Huckleberry Finn:

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/01/07/books/07huck.html

Saturday's Guardian Review includes an article about the books to look out for in the UK in the first half of 2011:

Books to look out for in the next six months

Interesting piece about the pleasures of paper books: http://www.missourireview.com/tmr-blog/2011/01/11/they-want-books-they-might-act...

#23 - Darryl, I don't know about you, but I felt slightly disappointed by that list. Just some new books by the usual suspects, and in particular the fiction doesn't look all that inspiring. But I'm sure there are (and will be) some real gems there. I'll wait until you read them and let us all know :)

#25: Wait a minute. You're the one who lives in London, not me. Shouldn't you read these books and let us know about them???

Nice try.

Chabon's take on the Huck Finn controversy: http://www.theatlantic.com/culture/archive/2011/01/the-unspeakable-in-its-jammie...

#24 Well, how much different is that from the Filthy Rich of the 19th century filling their libraries from floor to ceiling with uncut books bound in Moroccan leather?

Or take this quote about the irreproachable Reverend Verringer's manse, from Alias Grace: "Simon is ushered into the library. It is so self-consciously the right sort of library that he has an urge to set fire to it."

@ 29

"Books are awwfully decorative, don't you think?" http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ezpirYFXZBk

I just love the look on Auntie Mame's face--and the "bottoms up" response to it all!

What to do when cuts to public spending threaten your local library;

http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2011/jan/14/stony-stratford-library-shelves-prot...

Our local library is the a real center for our community. I can't imagine how we'd cope without it.

>30 lycomayflower: One of my all time favorite movies.

"Are we all lit?"

"Life is a banquet and most poor fools are starving to death!"

Did you all see this about the flood damage at Boston's Athenaeum? http://www.boston.com/news/local/massachusetts/articles/2011/01/25/flooding_dama...
Very sad news.

The Guardian has a special online section in which 10 writers discuss the fall of the Tunisian government, and its implication for other regimes in the Arab world, including Egypt:

After Tunisia: Arab writers reflect

According to Alfred A. Knopf's publicity director, Haruki Murakami's latest novel 1Q84 will be published in the US as a single volume on October 25th:

Haruki Murakami’s 1Q84 Coming 10/25 in Single Volume

Colin Firth's Book List: http://www.aucklandcitylibraries.com/getdoc/5fd4c08a-275b-4262-bd27-b9b8c9eec9c4...

#36: Thanks for that link! I expect I will be browsing that tomorrow.

The Denver Post ran a feature yesterday about e-readers. Along with the article is a link to a chart comparing 10 different kinds.

http://www.denverpost.com/travel/ci_17220359

40- Thanks for that link. I went to the chart and read all the pros and cons, and that verified in my mind that buying my Kindle was indeed the best choice for me. I would also consider a Nook in the future.

For the Brits amongst us, the Guardian has a list of libraries that will be hosting read-ins and other forms of protest against funding cuts this weekend

#42 - thanks for posting that. I see there are two events near me, so I will try to drop in on them.

Yesterday's New York Times featured an article about the upsurge in popularity of e-readers amongst young readers:

E-Readers Catch Younger Eyes and Go in Backpacks

Today's SF Chronicle had an article where the author discovered he focused much better on his reading when he was forced to use a camp headlight instead of his lamp. I always found my concentration was inversely proportional to the space I was in which is why I hardly ever read outside - I'm much too easily distracted by my surroundings.

Nancy Pearl (World's Most Famous Librarian) on the rule of fifty

If I followed that rule I never would have finished The Poisonwood Bible, one book that several readers found slow going at start.

Yeah, I don't know that I agree with the idea, I just thought it was an interesting take on the 'life's too short to read everything!' panic I think we all get occasionally.

I think a few refinements to the Rule of Fifty make it very workable. For example, if you've had people you trust tell you that a book "gets better", then you can push through to the good parts--as with The Poisonwood Bible (although I don't remember thinking it got off to a slow start, myself. ) Or if the author is one of your favorites, and you just "have a feeling" you should keep going. On the other hand, if I find myself re-writing sentences in my head, 10 pages can be enough to make me decide to quit. I just gave up on two * library books in a row---one highly recommended by someone on LT, and another that I had been wanting to read although I don't remember why. In both cases, the narrative voice struck me as artificial and a bit forced. I didn't need 50 pages to decide that I wasn't interested in "listening" any longer.

*Make that "three"...the last from an author I used to love, who has now completely lost the ability to hold my attention.

I wanted to like Atwood's The Blind Assassin and gave it 300 pages (out of 500) before quitting. That's more total pages than at least half of the books I read! Maybe someday I'll pick it up again. I certainly have loved her other books!

> 46 "rule of fifty"

I loved this:

“This rule of 50 worked exceedingly well until I entered my own 50s. (…) When you are 51 years of age or older, subtract your age from 100, and the resulting number (which, of course, gets smaller every year) is the number of pages you should read before you can guiltlessly give up on a book. As the saying goes, 'Age has its privileges'.

And the ultimate privilege of age, of course, is that when you turn 100, you are authorized (by the Rule of 50) to judge a book by its cover.”

Did anyone get to the library protests? I was at a more general anti cuts demo in the area where my partner works.

On a totally different subject

http://news.bookweb.org/news/aba-presents-books-president-white-house-library

What caught my eye is that he's been presented with a copy of the wonderful Cutting for Stone

No, in the end I couldn't get to a library with an event - the walk was a little too far for me. I will try harder another time :(

An article in The Guardian on the lost art of editing: http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2011/feb/11/lost-art-editing-books-publishing

I found that article very interesting, Stasia, having been an editor for many years (although not for literature). I have certainly seen, and authors have told me, that publishers provide much less editing than they used to, and I've especially seen the dearth of copy-editing (also called line editing) and proofreading. Back when I got my first job (as a proofreader/copy-editor), publishers had their own in-house copy-editors or had people who supervised the work of freelance copy-editors. That meant that newcomers like me got trained by people with experience. Now, everyone is freelance, and newcomers don't have the opportunity to be trained, and publishers probably don't pay enough for editors to do a thorough job anyway.

I thought it was sad that authors feel they have to do their own editing. I do some writing too, and I really believe that everyone needs an editor, another set of eyes to look at the work and, ideally, help make the author's own ideas and approach clearer and better and more what the author intended.

I could go on and on but I'll get off my soapbox.

#55: I appreciate your soapbox on this one, Rebecca. I find it sad when I as a reader, catch mistakes in a book that should have been caught before the book was published. I agree that another pair of eyes other than the author's is definitely warranted.

According to this article in today's Wall Street Journal Borders Books & Music in the US will file for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection as early as Monday or Tuesday, and close approximately 1/3 of its stores, which will result in "hundreds of store closings and thousands of job losses".

Chapter 11 for Borders, New Chapter for Books

The Egyptian journalist Tarek Osman was interviewed by PRI's The World from Cairo:

Idea of Pharaoh still relevant in Egypt

I read Osman's book Egypt on the Brink: From Nasser to Mubarak last weekend, which I thought was excellent. The Kindle version of the book is currently on sale for $4.99.

Today's New York Times Book Review section includes, for the first time, lists of the top 25 e-book fiction and nonfiction best sellers. There are also lists for the top 15 fiction and nonfiction combined print and e-book best sellers, along with the usual print edition best seller lists.

Introducing E-Book Best Sellers

The Commonwealth Writers Prize regional shortlists have been announced, some really interesting books on these lists. Regional winners will be announced 03 March and overall winners in May at the Sydney Writers Festival. http://www.commonwealthfoundation.com/Howwedeliver/Prizes/CommonwealthWritersPri...

From The Atlantic: Writing with Links.

Excerpt:
In the car this morning, I listened to the estimable Katherine Kellgren reading Connie Willis' new historical fiction, Blackout. This is fun (and better for my blood pressure than talk radio), but it's also work: Eastgate has always been very interested in interlinked electronic narrative and for years I've been trying to interest hypertext writers in historical fiction.

>54 alcottacre:: That was an interesting article, Stasia.

I confess I'm clueless about the mechanics of publishing these days. In my naïve fashion I imagined that, since this is the age of word processors and electronic copies of books, changing them must be quite easy and virtually instantaneous.

I was disabused of this notion when, after reading an Early Reviewer book that was clearly marked Advanced Reader Copy, I sent the publisher an email with 30 typos identified. They were quite polite in their response but it boiled down to, "It's too late for that."

#61: I am glad you found it interesting too, Tad.

It's official: Borders has filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy:

Borders Goes Bankrupt: Will You Miss Your Local Chain Bookstore? (NPR)

Borders Files for Chapter 11 Bankruptcy Protection (Wall Street Journal)

This PDF file from Borders' web site lists the stores that will be closing in the next few weeks:

http://media.bordersstores.com/pdf/Borders_Reorganization_Closure_List.pdf

It looks like California must have stopped reading. All of the stores in my area have survived; I've cut back my spending there, but I guess it's enough.

Robert

The two Atlanta stores that I use most frequently survived the hit list, but a smaller store that is actually closer to me, and one close to the hospital I work at, did not. The store close to my parents' house in Philadelphia (which we rarely went to) and the one closest to my best friends' house in Madison, Wisconsin (ditto) did not, nor did the two San Francisco stores in Union Square and in San Francisco Centre on Powell & Market Sts (ditto). I do want to see my local stores survive, as Atlanta suffers from a lack of good independent bookstores, so I'll go there more frequently, starting tomorrow.

Personally, I'd like to see my local Borders stores focus more on selling books that aren't readily available at other bricks-and-mortar stores that sell books: local and regional authors, literature in translation, books by independent publishers and university presses, and cutting edge and experimental fiction. I'd also like to see them resume readings and book signings by local authors, and have live concerts by local artists. That would make me go there more often than I do now.

Around here they stopped all of that stuff that draws in readers and pondering buyers. Chairs went away as fast as depth of stock did. All the things you mention used to be here and left except they still have some strength with regional literature. I thought they had lost it when they decided that customer service was no longer their strength and proved it.

Robert

Just announced in Australia and New Zealand that the big business group that owns our big bookshop chains - Borders, Angus & Robertson, Whitcoulls is putting them all under administration which means 'gone bust'. Whitcoulls in NZ has been around since the 1880s and Angus & Robertson likewise in Australia. Borders has a small number of shops in this part of the world but each one is large and significant as far as selection goes.
That leaves us really with just indie bookshops here in New Zealand, Australia still has the Dymocks chain.

From the New York Times -- a lawsuit against the author of The Help.

http://artsbeat.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/02/17/family-maid-files-suit-against-auth...

68: an article on the same topic in today's Guardian

The Help author sued for unfair use of maid's life story
http://t.co/8kUCsMa

How ironic.

But why sue for just $75,000?? The author is worth a fortune now. The Help has been out for a couple years now and is still not available in paperback because it hasn't slipped out of the bestseller's list.

Because once it goes over $75,000, it becomes a federal suit and much harder to win.

An essay Who Owns Kafka by Judith Butler at the London Review of Books

I was sent a link to an author article on book bloggers this morning, by Sue of the Bookbag (who is mentioned in the article). The article, the comments and the negative review are well worth reading (I have a copy of The Other Hand aka Little Bee but haven't read it yet).

http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/booksblog/2011/feb/21/writers-met-bloggers-lunch

IMHO - you can follow the reviewer's advise and wait until you have absolutely nothing else to read (all cereal boxes, magazine, and street signs having been read). I also found this book very confusing and the reviewer puts it in words much better than I could.

Dogs listening to children reading aloud:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/education/2011/feb/28/dogs-listen-to-children-reading

A couple of interesting articles in the Guardian's books blog over the last few days:

The first: Where are all the daring women's heroines? asks why there aren't any daring women in adult fiction compared to children's fiction.

The second ebooks on borrowed time comments on Harper Collins decision to allow US libraries to only lend its ebooks out 26 times before needing to replace them. This is based on their belief that on average, a print book only survives being loaned 26 times before needing to be replaced.

There's also a link to a brilliant youtube video where two librarians from Oklahoma took a random selection of five HarperCollins bestsellers from their shelves and showed they were all in perfectly readable condition. Well worth watching and reading some of the comments.

Thanks Heather, must read those articles above.

Where's Darryl? Here's the Orange Prize longlist:

Lyrics Alley by Leila Aboulela (Weidenfeld & Nicolson)
Jamrach’s Menagerie by Carol Birch (Canongate)
Room by Emma Donoghue (Picador)
The Pleasure Seekers by Tishani Doshi (Bloomsbury)
Whatever You Love by Louise Doughty (Faber and Faber)
A Visit from the Goon Squad by Jennifer Egan (Corsair)
The Memory of Love by Aminatta Forna (Bloomsbury)
The London Train by Tessa Hadley (Jonathan Cape)
Grace Williams Says It Loud by Emma Henderson (Sceptre)
The Seas by Samantha Hunt (Corsair)
The Birth of Love by Joanna Kavenna (Faber and Faber)
Great House by Nicole Krauss (Viking)
The Road to Wanting by Wendy Law-Yone (Chatto & Windus)
The Tiger’s Wife by Téa Obreht (Weidenfeld & Nicolson)
The Invisible Bridge by Julie Orringer (Viking)
Repeat It Today With Tears by Anne Peile (Serpent’s Tail)
Swamplandia! by Karen Russell (Chatto & Windus)
The Secret Lives of Baba Segi’s Wives by Lola Shoneyin (Serpent’s Tail)
The Swimmer by Roma Tearne (Harper Press)
Annabel by Kathleen Winter (Jonathan Cape)

Of those, I've reviewed 3 for the Bookbag, (Swamplandia!, Whatever You Love and The Birth of Love), read 3 more (Room, The Invisible Bridge and The Pleasure Seekers) and liked all of them, I've bought at least two more and want to read most of the rest. I think this is going to be a very interesting Orange Prize year.

I posted the Orange Prize longlist on my thread about 12 hours ago! Several of us (Jill, Tui, Laura, Cushla, and Joyce) have been talking about the books on the list on Facebook since last night (the longlist was posted at around 7-8 pm Eastern Daylight Time in the US).

I've read Room and Grace Williams Says it Loud, and highly recommend both books. I'll read Annabel for a Belletrista group read next month, and I'll plan to read The Memory of Love in April, as well. I'm continuing to support my local Borders by buying two or three books there every month, so I'll buy Swamplandia!, Great House and The Tiger's Wife later this week.

I'm a big fan of Great House and A Visit from the Goon Squad; both were among my favorite reads of last year and either of them would be a great winner. I am so-so about Room and haven't read any of the others, although several sound interesting.

Have you checked out Looking for Kimiko? - All of a sudden, dressed in a kimono, she appeared on my parents’ doorstep - http://hollandparkpress.co.uk/magazine_detail.php?magazine_id=120&language=E...

For Ian Rankin fans: he's retiring Inspector Rebus.

@ 82

What's he doing for those of us who aren't fans? *runs away*

You want me to thump you?

Sure. Come on down. Bring wings.

One of you is going to have to learn how to cook those.

Why? ;)

I have re-punctuated. I believe it removes your quibble.

Well, if you're going to be that way about it.

I had thought that younggeekylibrarian would post this to this page since I saw it on her Facebook page, but I don't see it. It's a list of books "not to read." I have to admit that I've read many of them, and many of them are on the BBC list of 100 books to read and on the 1001 books list as well. http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/books/8408894/Not-the-50-books-you-must-read-...

>90 thornton37814: - The list is, as it says at the beginning, tongue in cheek and pretty funny, I thought. Currently living in Texas (and hastening to add that I am not from Texas), I especially liked this entry:

"Men Are from Mars, Women Are from Venus by John Gray

No, they are not. And Gray is from Texas, which tells you all you need to know."

That was hysterical. My favorite was: "Would be more bearable if reduced to a 140-character tweet."

The Guardian Books section features an article about author Jacqueline Howett, who went just a wee bit overboard in responding to a negative review of her latest novel The Greek Seaman by an online reviewer. This is recommended reading for future authors and those needing a good laugh (hint: using four letter words and grammar unbecoming of a 5th grader is probably not the best way to respond to your critics).

How not to handle bad reviews

Another prize longlist:

The Orwell Prize for political writing:

The longlisted books are:

The Rule of Law - Tom Bingham (Allen Lane)

Let Our Fame Be Great: Journeys Among the Defiant People of the Caucasus - Oliver Bullough (Penguin)

Chasing the Devil: The Search for Africa's Fighting Spirit - Tim Butcher (Chatto)

23 Things They Don't Tell You About Capitalism - Ha-Joon Chang (Penguin)

The Hare With Amber Eyes: A Hidden Inheritance - Edmund De Waal (Chatto)

The Betrayal - Helen Dunmore (Fig Tree)

Ernest Gellner - John A Hall(Verso)

A Guide to the New Ruins of Great Britain - Owen Hatherley (Verso)

Hitch-22 - Christopher Hitchens (Atlantic Books)

We Are a Muslim, Please - Zaiba Malik (William Heinemann)

Death to the Dictator! - Afsaneh Moqadam (The Bodley Head)

Why the West Rules for Now - Ian Morris (Profile)

Decline and Fall - Chris Mullin (Profile)

Enough is Enough - Fintan O'Toole (Faber)

Whatever It Takes: The Real Story of Gordon Brown and New Labour - Steve Richards (Fourth Estate)

Red Plenty - Francis Spufford (Faber)

Supermac: The Life of Harold MacMillan - D R Thorpe (Chatto)

Living Dolls - Natasha Walter (Virago)

http://www.thebookseller.com/news/forensic-and-furious-books-orwell-prize.html?u....

A library without books? : http://today.msnbc.msn.com/id/42339223/ns/today-books/?GT1=43001

>95 alcottacre: - A library without books is my idea of hell :-) (Good to see you, Stasia!)

#95 Pfui. I wouldn't go there.

It wouldn't be my choice. But for a number of patrons, I think it would make them perfectly happy. Free computers? check. Cell phone use OK? check. Food OK? check.

I wouldn't want to work there either.

Check out the book surgeon here.

#98 OK, people can go there. They just can't call it a Library.
#99 I am in awe of that work. How I'd love to see some of it up close in 3 dimensions---or OWN a piece of it. Wow.

#99: Wow. Those pictures look so cool. Like Linda, I would love to see them up close.

Interesting interview with Henning Mankell who - maybe - has written his last Wallander novel.

Lots of literary awards around, here's a chicklit award:

The Melissa Nathan awards shortlist for Comedy Romance has been announced:

We are delighted to announce the short list for 2011:

FOURSOME, Jane Fallon (Penguin)

GETTING OVER MR RIGHT, Chrissie Manby (Hodder)

MAJOR PETTIGREW'S LAST STAND, Helen Simonson (Macmillan)

OBSTACLES TO YOUNG LOVE, David Nobbs, (HarperCollins)

A PERFECT PROPOSAL, Katie Fforde (Random House)

SWEET TEMPTATION Lucy Diamond (Pan)

It's wonderful to hear about programs such as this one at the New York Public Library giving writers and scholars a dream year of access to everything.

I know there are a lot of George R.R. Martin and Game of Thrones fans out there... Here is an article about the new HBO series.

Nice story on Patrick Rothfuss (The Name of the Wind and The Wise Man's Fear) from New Zealand Herald: http://www.nzherald.co.nz/entertainment/news/article.cfm?c_id=1501119&object...

James Jones' From Here To Eternity to be published uncensored for the first time, 60 years later:

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/04/05/books/james-joness-from-here-to-eternity-is-un...

I enjoyed this tongue-in-cheek piece about what your favorite book as a child says about you now:

http://flavorwire.com/169166/what-your-favorite-kids-book-then-says-about-you-no...

(from the Tattered Cover's FB page)

#109: Well, rats. Charlotte's Web was not included :)

I protest that most of those books weren't even around when I was child, and the ones that were aren't children's books at all. Come on, Lord of the Flies, Animal Farm???

Nice blog post on NPR about public libraries - here.

How can you use your library with your smart phone? Cuyahoga County offers check outs

Ebook pricing discussed here.

The struggle to be "well read" is discussed here.

I want to live in it! The Shelf-Pod

114- Ooohh...I liked that article!

115- I want to live there, too. :)

>115 tash99: There are even shelves in the bathroom! I love it.

Article by Elif Batuman (author of The Possessed) featuring an embarrassing encounter with Jonathan Franzen, tweeted by Sarah Weinman:

"In which Elif Batuman asks Jonathan Franzen if he has any weed, and other literary misadventures. Great piece. http://bit.ly/efQkkR "

Good news for Kindle owners: Amazon announced yesterday that it will permit books from 11,000 public libraries to be read on its e-reader, beginning later this year:

Kindle Users to Be Able to Borrow Library E-Books

Interesting blog post by Will Manley on why he thinks reading is on the rise: http://willmanley.com/2011/04/19/will-unwound-421-why-i-think-book-reading-is-on...

A very dear friend of my friend Meg's (who some of you may know better as Ben's mom), Jerry McGillis, has had his self-published book, Dear Marcus: Speaking to the Man Who Shot Me, reviewed by Lorrie Moore in the NYRB! He's asked people to share it, and I'm delighted to do so. Here is a link. Jerry's book is the last one Moore discusses.

Karl Lagerfeld is to release a perfume that smells like books...: http://www.extravaganzi.com/karl-lagerfelds-paper-passion-perfume-to-smell-like-...

Wonder if someone else will come up with a fragrance that smells like an ebook! ;-)

Hugo Award nominees are up:
Best Novel
Blackout/All Clear by Connie Willis (Ballantine Spectra)
Cryoburn by Lois McMaster Bujold (Baen)
The Dervish House by Ian McDonald (Gollancz; Pyr)
Feed by Mira Grant (Orbit)
The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms by N.K. Jemisin (Orbit)

David Mitchell is visiting Auckland this week for our writers festival and he answered these questions for the Booklover column in our local paper's book pages:

David Mitchell is a UK author whose most recent novel is The Thousand Autumns of Jacob de Zoet. He will be appearing at the Auckland Writers & Readers Festival.

The book I love most is...
......To choose only one feels like an act of betrayal to all the others.
If forced at gunpoint, I'd go for a big fat volume of Chekhov's stories -
one which includes his novella, The Duel. But I can already hear
 Conrad and Tolstoy and Giuseppe di Lampedusa and George Eliot
 and Sylvia Townsend Warner and John Cheever on the sidelines 
booing and calling out Right, yeah, thanks a bunch, pal - and after
 everything we've done for you. Then there are the poets, the 
historians, the biographers, the travel writers and science writers...
We could have a riot on our hands.




The book I'm reading right now is.........The Way We Live Now by Anthony Trollope.
 I always thought he was a starchy Victorian, but this is brilliant - 
it's about an almighty financial crash, the reasons behind it and
 the lives it wrecks. You can either laugh or cry at the novel's 
contemporary relevance. The villains are human and the heroes are flawed, like the rest of us.
Also on the go are Michel Faber's short stories,
 Sam Selvon's The Lonely Londoners and
 Icelander Halldor Laxness' Independent People.



The book I'd like to read next is

…... My guilt-pile is 20 books high, but as I plan to visit Iceland later 
this year I'd like to read some Norse sagas. Battles, land-grabs,
 abductions, witchcraft, whale hunts, icebergs, incest...
never a dull moment in the 10th century North Atlantic.



The book that changed me is.......... I don't think I have been changed by a book, to be honest, 
not in a Damascene conversion sort of way. Don't you think
change is more a matter of increments, day-by-day, encounter by encounter? 
 Only by looking back 15 years at the younger stranger you used to be
 does the accumulated change become visible, but the majority of that
change is down to life-lessons, not book-reading.
Oh dear, that all sounds a bit self-helpy, doesn't it?

Okay, both Primo Levi's The Drowned And The Saved and Jean-Dominique Bauby's The Diving Bell And The Butterfly 
reminded me that my so-called problems are really tiny dents
 in an otherwise lucky life, and that I really should stop whinging.



My favourite bookstore is..........John Sandoe's Bookshop in Chelsea, London.
 And Three Lives Bookstore in New York.
 And my local, Kerr's Bookshop in Clonakilty, West Cork.



#125 Thanks for posting that Kerry.

"My guilt-pile is 20 books high" - only 20 books?!? Clearly an amateur.

The Guardian books blog had an interesting article about library closures in the UK here.

Jeff Howe of The Atlantic is administering a monthly "One Twitter, One Book" or 1Book140 where the "whole Internet" nominates, votes on, and reads the same book. Then discusses it on Twitter. Then does it all again the next month.

It's modeled after programs like One Book One Chicago and it's just getting started. Nominations are open now for the first book to be read in June. Read more here:

http://www.theatlantic.com/entertainment/archive/2011/05/what-if-everyone-on-twi...

An essay about long books, and some comments discussing it. The author equates the reading of really long books to Stockholm Syndrome in some cases also seems to have this idea that you read lots of books for intellectual cachet, not for the enjoyment of reading or learning.

Anyway, I thought it might be of some interest:

http://www.themillions.com/2011/05/the-stockholm-syndrome-theory-of-long-novels....

#128 Keri, thanks for posting the link for that article. I thought it was funny but true.

#128 I loved that article, it was a great, self-consciously silly argument, and I loved how utterly seriously some people took it!

This is from a few months ago but I don't think anyone has posted it yet - there's an old theatre in Argentina that has been converted into a bookstore, and it looks amazing.

#130> I've been to that bookstore a few times, it's really beautiful. Last couple of times I sat with a coffee and read just to prolong the time spent there. They have live music in the early evening too, a classical guitarist on my last visit. Only problem is that there is a very pitiful range of books in English!

I was reading a blog post about the current obsession by publishers/editors to kill off the 'semi colon' in books nowadays and the blogger posted a link to a hilarious post - 'The Punctuation Hunter'.

#132 That's wonderful!

Very funny. But, inquiring minds want to know: what is wrong with semicolons?????

Good news from our corner of the world - Borders and Whitcoulls bookstores have been sold to a company owned by a local family known for reviving flagging businesses, over 900 jobs have been saved.

#134> I'm also not sure what this is with semicolons, but here is the original blog post -

#135: What great news about the bookstores, Kerry!

Not an article, but I thought the 75ers might appreciate this;

Luxx posted that on her thread a couple of weeks ago. I liked it then and I like it now!

I know this is happening everywhere but it is so wrong - Books get the shove as university students prefer to do research online. It's probably the lack of consultation that upsets me - having a policy of removing books from a library just because they haven't been borrowed for a couple of years removes the chance of future readers/researchers of finding/stumbling across books and revaluing them. Culling is important but each book needs to be considered on it's merit/content, not just on whether it has left the library lately.

#139: What a shame especially, as you say, for future potential readers.

re: the article about semi-colons, a student recently asked me to proofread her paper and I couldn't believe how many she had. They seemed preferable to commas and even periods!

141> Well, naturally! A semi-colon is both a comma and a period, so it's two for the price of one, so to speak. ;)

Does Reading Great Books Make You a Better Person?.

I must get my hands on A Jane Austen Education.

The Telegraph obituary for Sir Patrick Leigh Fermor : http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/obituaries/military-obituaries/special-forces-ob...

And a more literary focused one from the Guardian: http://www.guardian.co.uk/theguardian/2011/jun/10/patrick-leigh-fermor-obituary

Thank you for posting that! Some favourite quotations from those obits:

"He was the sort of man who would take you to White's for dinner because you were handy, without telling you he was a new member, and proceed to sing the menu in Italian."

"And there, unbelievably, and every bit as thrilled to be reunited with Leigh Fermor as all the others, was the German former general Heinrich Kreipe. The two men grinned, hugged and fell into excited conversation, absolutely chuffed to see each other again. That is charm, is it not, the ability to inspire the deep affection of a man you only ever knew because you had spearheaded his humiliating wartime capture, then imprisoned him in a cave?"

I'm in a hotel room and saw an interesting article in the USA Today which was delivered. I found it online at: http://travel.usatoday.com/destinations/story/2011/06/Dragon-Tattoo-tours-lure-v... It deals with the effect Stieg Larsson's novels have had on Stockholm tourism.

Writers comment on their own memorable holiday reads. I particularly like Ian Rankin's comment on War and Peace: "The book was also handy for crushing bitey insects."

100 greatest non-fiction books, according to the Guardian:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2011/jun/14/100-greatest-non-fiction-books

Interesting article entitled "Weight of Book Collection Damaging House": http://www.upi.com/Odd_News/2011/06/07/Weight-of-book-collection-damaging-house/...

Shaun Tan does an interview without words here: http://www.spiegel.de/international/zeitgeist/0,1518,769089,00.html

What a fun, great interview! Thanks for posting it, kerry :)

The Story of O has fascinated me ever since somebody put the two words 'mystical' and 'sex' in the same sentence about it. The last time I read the book I took it to be almost a direct reading of aspects of monastic mysticism, so I am now up against this article. I nevertheless found the article very interesting.

Robert

Really neat interview, Kerry!

Patrick Ness who won the Carnegie Medal this week eloquently slams library cuts in The Guardian: http://www.guardian.co.uk/childrens-books-site/2011/jun/23/patrick-ness-carnegie...

Interesting article about the source of reviews on Amazon.

No so much interesting perhaps as worrying, but here's an article about the idea of book-swapping clubs supplementing public libraries (in the context of drastic cut-backs in public services currently going on in the UK). The comments underneath are interesting too. http://www.guardian.co.uk/local-government-network/2011/jun/30/libraries-book-sw...

A very subjective, but still interesting, list of 10 great historical novels. Some surprises.

Happy to see A Place of Greater Safety on it, which I liked even better than Wolf Hall, as well as The Siege of Krishnapur and the nod to Troubles, and The Leopard. Will have to look up some of the others.

#157 Delighted to see Rosemary Sutcliff at the top of the list; some of the others are completely unknown to me.

I kept reading after the implication that Rosemary Sutcliff was once a boy, and I'm glad I did. I have read two of these, have one or two others, and am convinced that at least three others could hold my interest. Thank you for posting this.

Robert

I also thought Rosemary was a very unusual name for a boy! :)

eta--I've read several of the books, and for anyone who is participating in Reading Globally's "Sea" segment, Rites of Passage by William Golding would be an excellent choice.

Interesting, and sad:
Amazon Acquires UK-Based Online Book Retailer The Book Depository For International Expansion. A quote: "It’s unclear from the release if The Book Depository will become an Amazon-owned but independent site or if will be folded into the Amazon platform."

Sigh.

162> I had just started a thread in Book Talk about it, if people want to discuss it there - http://www.librarything.com/topic/120016

I added your TechCrunch link. The one I'd seen was to Yahoo!, but the TechCrunch is a bit more reader-friendly. :)

NPR had a piece on the recent ER book about E.B. White: http://www.npr.org/2011/07/05/137452030/how-e-b-white-spun-charlottes-web

An article in today's Pittsburgh Tribune-Review about the Mystery Lovers Bookshop:

http://www.pittsburghlive.com/x/pittsburghtrib/ae/books/s_746096.html

Controversy over young adult literature content. Yeah, these articles are over a month old, but still interesting I think.

Darkness too visible (WSJ) & Has young adult fiction become too dark? (Salon)

Author Sherman Alexie's response to the the Wall Street article.

For those who are fans of Vera Brittain and Winifred Holtby, you might like to listen to this radio interview with Shirley Williams, British politician and daughter of Brittain, reflecting on her childhood and the adults who were influential in her growing up.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b012wzf8#synopsis

You can listen on BBC iPlayer or access a podcast.

>167 gennyt:: thank you Genny! I am very keen to listen to that programme!!

#167: Me too! Thanks for posting the link.

I'm rather late to the disucssion about Huckleberry Finn, but I would like to tell everyone my experience with something similar to that. When I read Huck Finn I am aware of the racism that blacks endured and still endure to today. However, I cannot connect to it. I'm white and I've grown up in the US where it privileges white people. But what made me connect and understand their plight better is the book Blonde Roots by Bernardine Evaristo that I read last year. It reverses the slaves trade: whites are the property of blacks. It tells the story of Doris Scagglethrope and how she was captured from the UK of Great Ambossa and made a slave of a chief and how her attempt at traveling the underground railroad, for bett lack of term, goes. I cannot recommend it enough. The book provided the emotional impact/connection that I could not get through Huckleberry Finn.

Jim Toole, used bookseller in amusing interview mode: http://peoplesdistrict.com/jim-on-capitol-hill-books

....and then, there are the people who argue about prices and don’t understand inflation. I charge less than half price for a book, but if it cost $10 in 1980, it costs more now. I can’t take you in a time machine back to when it was $10. Sometimes I feel like I have to teach these people basic economics.

A school district in Virginia has banned Conan Doyle's A Study in Scarlet, apparently because some parents objected to the way Mormons are portrayed therein.

ETA: The book was not banned or removed from the school library, just taken off the required reading list for one sixth grade class in the district.

According to the Washinton Post, it wasn't banned. It was merely removed from the required reading list for the one school where it was required reading. It is still available in school libraries.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/answer-sheet/post/sherlock-holmes-book-remov...

I think this is very different from being "banned" -- though a Post writer still find it objectionable that a parent should have any say in the reading list material.

Personally, while I strenuously object to banning books, I do think community members should have some input into what kids are required to read.

Well that is rather different, Terri. Thanks for the clarification. I see that one of the comments on the LA Times article pointed out the mis-statement, and quoted the Post.

For those interested in Scandinavian Crime Fiction, and able to access BBC iPlayer, there is currently a repeat of a documentary first broadcast last December: Nordic Noir: The Story of Scandinavian Crime Fiction - available until Sunday 28th. I watched it when it was last showing - it's a good overview and mentioned one or two authors I'd not come across, as well as the obvious ones.

You can watch it or download it for watching later from: http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b00wvcyj/Time_Shift_Series_10_Nordic_Noir_T...

An interesting piece from the Op-Ed page of the Scranton Times-Tribune, on the value of studying Latin. The school district referred to is the one from which my daughter graduated. I know she was "exposed" to several foreign languages, and studied German, but cannot remember if Latin was one of the options back then.

It was. We started foreign language study in seventh grade with a number of weeks (I think it was seven) of study in each of the foreign languages offered by the school: Spanish, French, German, Russian, and Latin. I tried to take Latin in my senior year (while carrying on with German), but the only German IV class was offered at the same time as the only Latin I class, dash it all.

Ahh...I figured you'd step up and clarify.

I did study Latin in school, but sadly I've forgotten most if not all of it. I occasionally think I'd like to restudy it.

Interesting. My daughter is taking Latin I as a first-year college student. She took several years of French in high school.

I took 3 years of Latin in high school, 1 year of French (which didn't agree with me -- I never could distinguish words in French speech) and 2 years of Spanish in college. I find I can still make sense of some French and some Spanish on the page, but not enough to read literature. What Latin has done for me is almost impossible to quantify. I think I often draw on it unconsciously.

A slightly silly article from the Guardian books blog about unfortunate typos in novels.

And another article (Guardian books blog again) about the possibility of Amazon offering some kind of subscription library service for ebooks and more here.

#183 I'm trying to get the Wall Street Journal article (they seem to be the ones who first published the piece), but I can't get online access to it and the paper wasn't delivered today! Grr.

So wonderful! Book/paper sculptures left anonymously in various literary places in Edinburgh: http://community.thisiscentralstation.com/_Mysterious-paper-sculptures/blog/4991...

I'm doing a books-as-art seminar/project thing at the local public library, so I'll have to be sure to bring that link along, if the person running the program hasn't already seen it. :D

An article about the closing of Borders and bookstores in general.
http://www.cnn.com/2011/US/09/12/first.borders.bookstore.closing/index.html?hpt=...

185: Oh, those are fantastic!

#185 - These are incredible! Thanks for posting the link.

Guardian article where travel writers pick their favourite book: http://www.guardian.co.uk/travel/2011/sep/16/travel-writers-favourite-books

189: Well that adds several items to the wishlist. Thanks, I guess. :-)

People who read Nothing to Envy and/or Pyongyang might be interested in these photos of North Korea: http://www.boston.com/bigpicture/2011/09/north_korea.html.

#190: Yes, I was hit by a few book bullets too.

A lighthearted piece for fantasy readers, which (if you recall the song) you can sing to the tune of "Baby Got Back": Baby Got Books.

I got a kick out of this blog post today about Americans not reading: http://www.philipvickersfithian.com/2011/09/niall-ferguson-americans-dont-read.h...

This is an inspirational story about a teenage girl with cerebral palsy who loves to read books: http://nems360.com/bookmark/15568520

I thought this Bookseller.com article was quite interesting - Women's brands hard hit by downturn:
A squeeze on consumer spending in supermarkets and the migration to digital are being blamed for the spectacular falls in sales suffered by many of the UK’s biggest commercial women’s novelists in 2011 - http://www.thebookseller.com/news/womens-brands-hard-hit-downturn.html

No More Adventures in Wonderland: Maria Tartar in the New York Times contrasts the older children’s books of J.M. Barrie and Lewis Carroll with more recent ones

I wanted to post a link to an article I just read about Haruki Murakami that'll be in this Sunday's NY Times Magazine. It's long but reads quickly. It focuses on Murakami's new book 1Q84 that is being released in the US on October 25th but it also talks about his earlier works. Don't miss the sidebars on Murakami's Tokyo (especially helpful if you're planning to read 1Q84) and the Murakami Starter Kit. I thought it was a fascinating look into Murakami's writing process and mind.

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/10/23/magazine/the-fierce-imagination-of-haruki-mura...

>197 avatiakh: Good article, Kerry. Thanks for posting it. I especially liked Pullman's quote:

“There are some themes, some subjects, too large for adult fiction,” Mr. Pullman once declared. “They can only be dealt with adequately in a children’s book.”

An interesting article in The Guardian about the publication of some of Tolkien's original illustrations of The Hobbit to mark its 75th anniversary next year.

There's a selection of the pictures here.

That is so cool! Thank you for posting it.

#200 Where have the last 25 years gone? I still have a poster on my wall of another of Tolkien's Hobbit illustrations, from an exhibition commemorating the 50th anniversary which I saw in the Bodleian Library, Oxford. I'm adding this new book to my wishlist at once!

This past Sunday's New York Times Magazine features an article about Haruki Murakami, whose latest novel 1Q84 will be released in the US today.

The Fierce Imagination of Haruki Murakami

For fans of Stephen Fry, you might be interested in this: not an article but a TV programme, available on BBC iPlayer here : http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b016mykm/Frys_Planet_Word_The_Power_and_the... - the latest episode of Fry's series Planet Word is dedicated to 'literature' - great writers and great storytellers.

Fry admits it's a very personal selection of his own favourites - and it couldn't be anything else, trying to cover Literature in an hour! His list includes Homer and Shakespeare, Joyce, Tolkien, Wodehouse, Stephen King, Auden and Bob Dylan - some for the power of their storytelling, some for their use of language - "the right words in the right order". I think there were one or two other authors featured, I can't recall who - but I did notice (and was not surprised) that he didn't include any women authors in his list.

#202 It went straight on my wishlist too :-)

#204 I have a lot of catching up to do on iplayer but I watched the first episode of the Stephen Fry series last night and really enjoyed it.

#204 Thanks! I can't stream that link, being outside the UK, but I bet I can track it down elsewhere.

>204 gennyt:, 206 YouTube has the episode, in four parts:

Stephen Fry's Planet Word. Episode Five: The Power and the Glory Pt 1 of 4

Thanks, Genny!

Publisher's Weekly has announced their best 100 books of 2011, even though there's still about 15% of the year to go.

http://www.publishersweekly.com/pw/best-books/2011#book/book-1

On their top 10 I have a perfect score: 0 for 10.

(I do give them marks for daring still to call comics "comics." I wonder how many complaints they'll receive saying, "They're graphic novels!")

I'm 0 for 10 too- also 0 in subcategory Mysteries, sci-fi, fiction and non-fiction.

Guess I'm happy in my ignorance of what I'm missing. I thought I was paying attention, guess not.

#208 I'm looking forward to reading The Tiger's Wife by Tea Obreht, but I can tell you steer clear of The Night Circus by Erin Morgenstern. Although she writes well, her characters didn't engage me. I had this sense of lassitude emanating from the book and the romance? What romance? I didn't see any, just heard that the characters told each other they were in love with one another.

Australian book publishers give up the fight for import protection here.

Writers and their bookshelves in the Financial Times:
http://www.ft.com/intl/cms/s/2/8b086300-0b20-11e1-ae56-00144feabdc0.html#axzz1dh...

a peek into the libraries of Gary Shteyngart, Philip Pullman, Edmund White etc plus their top 10 books.

>212 avatiakh: Ha! I was just about to post a link to this article, Kerry. I received a tweet about it from PEN American Center not long ago.

#212 Great link, thanks Kerry.

I really liked the quote from Philip Pullman:

"Every time I go into town I accidentally buy two or three books."

I also noticed at the bottom of the article that it's an extract from a new book Unpacking My Library: Writers and Their Books.

Did you all see this article?

http://news.yahoo.com/blogs/upshot/theory-death-jane-austen-215024956.html

Interesting!

Ann Patchett has opened a bookstore in Nashville.

A publication date for the sequel to Wolf Hall by Hilary Mantel (and an announcement of a further sequel).

And some positive news about library closures in the UK from the Guardian.

#218 That is good news! And #217 exciting news about the Mantel sequels. Darryl posted about the news of 'Bring up the Bodies' on his thread, and I wondered when reading that - since it was described as being about the downfall of Boleyn - whether that was also going to finish off Cromwell's story. So now it will be a trilogy - but the middle one at least will be somewhat shorter by the sound of it...

>217 souloftherose: That makes sense. I remember that Mantel said a year or two ago that the sequel would pick up where Wolf Hall left off, continuing the story of Cromwell until his death.

More Wolf Hall news: HBO And BBC Developing Miniseries Based On Wolf Hall

>220 kidzdoc:: ooh la la, that's exciting (both the sequel and the miniseries)

I'm always a sucker for stories about Ann Boleyn, and I can't imagine anyone doing it better than Mantel. Also excited about the miniseries, although I don't expect I'll get to see it until it's released on DVD. But "I’m an avid reader and I still haven’t managed to get through Wolf Hall. It’s a heavy book filled with historical detail and not a whole lot of sex " ??? Huh. I never missed it.

The New York Times annual list of 100 Notable Books is now available online:

100 Notable Books of 2011

World's largest atlas goes to print but only 31 copies @$100,000 each.
Should I put it on my wishlist?

Yes.

Robert

This doesn't happen very often in New Zealand: Censor to read banned 'Bloody Mama'
http://www.stuff.co.nz/dominion-post/news/6036598/Censor-to-read-banned-Bloody-M...

l'd like to know the answer to the question in the comments: is there a list of the banned books available?

Robert

#227 Apparently not. The closest I could get was this link, where you can search for a particular title to see if there's been a "classification decision" on it.
http://www.censorship.govt.nz/libraries/libraries-banned-books.html Seems a bit perverse not to make the list readily available. But of course, some of the titles themselves are considered offensive and inappropriate for younger people!!

Thank you. That is spooky. We have had literary censorship in the United States in my lifetime, but I think nowadays an office of the Censor would not go over very well.

Robert

I could only find that link as well and to my knowledge the censor office's main job is rating films, dvds, console games, magazines and graphic novels. I have not heard of any books being 'banned' as such in recent years though possibly some are sold in a wrapper with a restricted age rating usually due to the level of violence or objectionable s_x.
Our last chief censor is a regular reviewer on a tv book show and his passionate enthusiasm for Les miserables was the main reason I read the book earlier this year.

227-229: I apologize if I'm not understanding the conversation and/or I've missed something, but the Office for Intellectual Freedom of the American Library Association keeps a list of banned and challenged books in the U.S. You can view it by year:
http://www.ala.org/ala/issuesadvocacy/banned/frequentlychallenged/index.cfm

#231 Happily, in the U.S. at the present time there is no national government body that bans or censors books. Various books are challenged or banned from local libraries or schools by groups such as parent/teacher organizations or strong-willed and highly vocal individuals. The American Library Association does keep track of such challenges as they come to its attention on the list you mentioned. Apparently New Zealand's Office of Film and Literature Classification did ban books at one time, and anything that was previously banned remains banned unless successfully appealed, even though they are no longer placing additional books on the banned list. Also, it appears there is no master list of all the books which have been banned in the past in New Zealand, or at least none that we can find accessible on the internet. I suppose it's probably safe to assume that many of the frequently challenged books on the ALA's list are on New Zealand's banned list as well.

#232 - Ok - I thought you might be talking specifically about New Zealand, but I wasn't sure. I assume most people know about the ALA list, but you never know.

Last of the paper sculptures in Edinburgh - you have to take a look at the sculptured feathers if nothing else.

Interesting take on the Elf on the Shelf phenomena.

>235 brenzi: - It's like a prequel to 1984... ;)

Faulkner on HBO

For those who are still on the fence about getting an ereader:


E-readers or print books - which is greener?

#237 Thanks for that, Kerri. I posted it in the Faulkner group, and then got distracted before I got around to putting it up here.

Video & musical score for Shaun Tan's Arrival here (via paper tigers blog)

Links to various lists of best science books in 2011: http://scienceblogs.com/confessions/best_science_books_2011/.

Is Amazon, despite its "thuggish ways", better for book authors and readers than local independent bookstores?

Dreadful news about a fire in one of Egypt's libraries: http://www.dp-news.com/en/detail.aspx?articleid=106385

For fans of Janet Evanovich, A nifty little contest tied in to the upcoming release of the movie version of One For the Money.