Jill's 2026 Reading, Rummaging, and Sorting Piles of Books, Part Three

Okay, time for a new thread. When I looked back over the past three weeks (in terms of what I’d been reading), I realized I’d been floundering about. I was reading in a most fragmented way. Of the titles immediately below, I’d really only FINISHED two or three. The others were looked at haphazardly, not really making much progress through them.

So in May I had finished and posted reviews of Converts and Katabasis. I began one of the Hugo nominees, Raven Scholar. There’s been an enormous amount of world-building and establishing of ambiance in the first fifty pages, but I’ve not felt swept along. Theoretically, the reader is supposed to feel the suspense and the fear of what’s about to happen to our primary protagonist, but I really just want the author to get on with it. Part of it has to do with the size of the print product. It’s bigger than a normal trade paperback and it is at least 2 inches thick.

There was also a late-in the-game shift with one of the book groups. Katabasis they scheduled for later in the summer while kindly shifting the date of this upcoming one so that we can instead read one of the Hugo nominee titles, Death of the Author by Nnedi Okorafor. Which sounds like a murder mystery but – insofar as I can – tell really isn’t.

I started and am making progress through Guilty by Definition as bedtime reading. It’s well done. The writing is good.

Other days in May I was tasting various titles to figure out what my mood was. One was A Most Peculiar Book which @haydninvienna had liked. I was concerned that the subject matter might be too dense to be an enjoyable leisure read, but it’s really rather fun. (Enlightening while managing to still be readable.) Other tastings include two re-reads – Legends and Lattes and The Moonstone. I am not sure that I will ever come to enjoy Collins’ The Woman in White because it’s convoluted and the people are irritating. So that one got consigned to the infamous Rehome Bag.

Coming up are two reviews. One is for All the Books of My Life and the other is Jane Haddam’s Murder Superior.

First of the two reviews promised.

Second of the reviews promised. I go back and forth on Jane Haddam's mysteries. They're fun but I sometimes think she would have benefited from a different style of editor.

>1 jillmwo:
Susie Dent has another novel coming out soon. I am glad you are enjoying her first one.

Do I understand correctly that you have been faffing around and not getting down to some quality reading? Sampling novels and passing on The Woman in White, such an excellent novel by Collins. You shock me. I expect the next thing I hear is that you are deeply engrossed in a Dickens novel.

>4 pgmcc: I thought you'd get a kick out of that one. Bleak House still sits on a pile in the bedroom. I have to either summon up the wherewithal to read it or find a way to rehome it. Procrastination at its finest. Note however that I still have a copy of The Woman in White in a Folio Edition. I can't break up a set!. The volume that is being released into the wild is a less-expensive Penguin edition with a trim size that didn't work for me.

Of course, what I really came back in here to say was that Public Library Groups Are Calling for Action on Ebook Licensing: https://www.ala.org/news/2026/05/leading-public-library-groups-call-e-book-actio...

>2 jillmwo: Thank you for this review. I actually might do the Agatha Christie autobiography first, which I am ashamed to admit I was only dimly aware of.

Happy New Thread!

Happy new thread!

Happy New Thread! :)

Happy new thread!

I knew of the existence of Sheila Kaye-Smith (but no more than that) because there's a mention of her in one of Dorothy Sayers' novels, where an intense young woman who's an enthusiast for stark, grey novels of country life asks somebody (might be Harriet Vane) "Do you read Sheila Kaye-Smith?" But I looked through the Sayers archive on Faded Page without finding the reference and now I'm worried that I might have made the whole thing up.

Happy new thread!

>5 jillmwo:
The whole library licensing for e-books reminds me of the problems when people were trying to introduce copyright.

On a slightly different vein, e-books are a disruptive technology that has hit the whole book world. Whether you are a library or an individual, the licensing around e-books is heavily weighted to the publisher's benefit. Until the world works out how to fairly merge the e-book with the physical book from a licensing and copyrigth points of view there is going to be unrest and discomfort. Then we bring in the whole AI thing. The humble book is suffering tremendous pressures that have not been seen before.

Also, the poor writers are being totally squeezed and abused.

>11 pgmcc: "The humble book is suffering tremendous pressures that have not been seen before."

Well, yes... But there have been pirated books as long as there have been popular books.

Many younger folks seem to have the theory that as long as people are reading certain books it's all good, but I'm a lot more concerned about authors not being paid.

Discussing the consequences of AI on publishing is above my pay grade.

Words once again fail me: https://yalereview.org/article/sheila-liming-the-end-of-books

The article is certainly relevant to the >11 pgmcc: comment about humble books suffering under pressure.

The decline of books—of their value, ubiquity, or availability—is the decline of the effort to push ideas into circulation and make knowledge matter.

I don't know whether to yell at the faculty professor (who has no clue about sensible weeding of collections), the librarian (who may not have been asked about the rationale for weeding), or even the architect who assumed that faculty members no longer use or don't need books in their offices. Although I do agree that the use of such phrases as "information commons" cause one to roll one's eyes.

We live in a deeply imperfect world. *head desk*

>12 clamairy:. Yes, there have always been those who pirated books. But just recently, I had to break it to a young aspiring self-published author that people don't pirate books because they think they're high-quality. The pirate them because it's just easier.

And while this was announced six months ago as a move MIT had to accept as a means of closing a budget shortfall, it is still upsetting to read stories like this: https://fnl.mit.edu/may-june-2026/lament-for-the-mit-libraries/ The faculty member here references AI as well.

When texts are accessed solely by digitized means, without experiential basis in the original volumes, organization and material contexts, the learner is cut off from the process, extent and relationships that ground and constitute human works and knowledge. Those original works on paper, now being stored in dark spaces away from learner – or even staff-access, are the irreplaceable core and heart of human knowledge, history and expression. As the digital scan forms of many of those works but probably excluding those whose copyrights are still enforceable enter the repositories of AI, the works, ideas and facts become plagiarized and misrepresented. When I was educated, plagiarism was the most serious academic offense; now it is epidemic via AI. As AI-generated plagiarized text and images expand across the internet’s digital world, the actual voice of human-generated content diminishes.

I have met and chatted with the chief librarian there at MIT and I'm fairly confident that this wouldn't have been her preferred course of action. As I understand it from other coverage, it was MIT administrators who handed down that decision.

The original MIT announcement is here: https://libraries.mit.edu/about/vision/our-approach-to-budget-reductions-at-the-...
Additional coverage here: https://thetech.com/2025/12/04/mit-libraries-closure-2025.

>13 jillmwo: >15 jillmwo: Sad. If I need an 'information commons', I can just stay home. Being located in a library doesn't make finding online information any easier.

>14 jillmwo: Any idea how much the cost of books factors into pirating? I know some people will pirate just because. With prices going up quite a bit since 2020, is it more of a problem now?

>17 Narilka: A great deal of it is people who pirate just because: because they can and think it's fun, because they somehow think they're sticking it to "the man" when they do, because they have some vague notion that books should be free to everyone. Some pirate books, change the names of the characters and the places or otherwise file off the serial numbers, and put them up on Amazon as their own work. A related problem is people who belong to Kindle Unlimited reading entire series and returning them one by one as they finish them with some flimsy excuse...except then the publishers/authors lose more money than just the royalties as they have to eat the download fees.

>13 jillmwo:
I have read half the article and am being dragged of to shops. The article is very interesting and I join you in the “head desk” action.

By the way, as it happens I have just passed the 3,000 books mark in my LT catalogued books.

>19 pgmcc: 3000 is a promising number. Keep up the good work!

>20 Bookmarque:
I see you are way ahead of me.

My mentioning 3,000 in >19 pgmcc: was because it was featured in the article Jill linked to in >13 jillmwo:.

>19 pgmcc: On one hand, I feel like scolding you for announcing such an elite status as a collector of 3,000 books. OTOH, I commend you and deeply envy you all the bookshelf space you must have. Meanwhile, here's the quote from the article. (I loved the writing in the piece, but really, it's time people understand that books require storage space which is in short supply on campus.)

We humans communicate knowledge about the past through language—through conversation, through storytelling, through education, and, yes, most of all through writing, which creates a semi-coherent, semi-anchored record of that language. We present that record in the form of a book, something that can be turned to and consulted over and over again. And then, finally, we store that book in a place where we can get at it: a library. For someone like Wharton, that can mean a personal library, filled with the remnants of one’s own engagement with those texts. But since few of us can afford to build a three-thousand-volume personal library, there are also shared libraries, the public ones in our towns and schools.

And now I must go off and declutter, deaccession, and otherwise eliminate stuff from the house.

>17 Narilka: and >18 Marissa_Doyle:. The issue with pricing is that there are so many variables. And like every other business, publishers have payrolls and production expenses, etc. At the moment, there's an awful lot of the printing industry that was allowed to go offshore with the result that at the moment for very large print runs or for four-color printing, publishers in the U.S. rely on China. (I recently looked at the copyright page for a study bible -- not a really expensive one -- but one with four color. The copyright page reflected sixteen different ISBNs and proudly showed the message, Printed in China.

Suffered an interruption w/ grocery delivery.

Sorry. LT went down for maintenance at the same point I was having to unpack the groceries. And now that I think of it, I don’t know what we’re doing for dinner at the moment. Do I have ANY leftovers?

Continuation of discussion truncated in prior message. At any rate, during the pandemic, the publishing industry kind of recognized that this was not a good situation and have slowly been trying to redirect printing jobs to different areas of the world. Shipping constraints and costs also forced this on them. (If you want to sell in Europe and conform to EU standards of sustainability, then there's a good case for seeing what you can get printed over there.) Book costs are rising due to standard business expenses, but also to make up for lost volume of sales (due to competition from other forms of entertainment, budget cuts in libraries, etc.). In recent months, I have been seeing a disconcerting uptick in the prices of ebooks. We've gone from $12.99 for a Kindle edition to $14.99 for one in roughly the space of about 9-12 months. This isn't even the pricing for front list best sellers; this is for back list stuff, stuff that has been out for more than three years. I know that I'm slowing down myself on what I purchase. (I am still reading 'way too quickly. But I'm rereading more stuff I already own before I jettison any print. I’m also buying more used books although even buying through thrift stores has gotten more expensive when it comes to second-hand stuff.)

And @Marissa_Doyle is quite right. While book piracy is a very real problem, few of the pirates are stealing titles on the basis of quality. Those in other parts of the world who defend the practice will tell you it's because they can't afford the cost, but I'm not sure it's anything to do with individual consumers. There's one pirate library (I think it's called Anna's Attic) that justifies the theft of digital books because they think all knowledge should be free. How that justifies stealing novels is beyond me. Although I think the idea is to hack your way in and grab the full digital corpus of a publisher's assets with the idea of sorting through it afterwards. (A low priority for the pirate entity.)

Marissa, of course, makes an equally good point about how so many of the current consumer behaviors cheat creators. It's an ugly world out there in many respects. Trade publishers will tell you that they're fighting for survival as they are forced to compete with self-publishing authors, AMZ holding the profits hostage, as well as piracy. Scholarly publishers will tell you that they no longer expect profit, they're just trying to see how well they can keep to the point of break-even.

The folks who buy books are either individual consumers or libraries. Both of those groups are cutting back due to budgetary concerns. (You hear about foundations etc buying books in great bulk, but there aren't as many of those and they tend to only buy a single title or within a single subject area.)

Okay, I'm feeling depressed now myself. I don't feel comfortable with the licensing model for ebooks because that means I have no control over the item in which I have invested. But neither am I comfortable with the idea of publishers driving print into the category of "luxury goods". Books are how I fight off boredom. They’re making it harder for me to do this. I’ll adapt, but I won’t be happy about it..

*murfle*

>22 jillmwo:
I loved that paragraph too.

>24 jillmwo: You summed that up well. Ebook pricing baffles me. If I'm going to spend $15 on an ebook I may as well wait for the paperback and actually own the thing. I'm starting to think I may be in the minority with that thinking though.

>18 Marissa_Doyle: I don't use KU so had no idea that was a problem. I had the vague notion that it was like a paid for library subscription and that you returned the books at the end anyway? No clue how authors/publishers make money with this program.

>18 Marissa_Doyle: & >26 Narilka: I thought it was like a lending library as well. You don't get to keep anything with Kindle Unlimited, that's why it's not really that expensive. (I pay almost as much for my music subscription with Amazon, but I use that multiple times a day. Plus I get one free audiobook book a month with that, so definitely worth it.)

This is what Google says about how KU works.

>19 pgmcc: Congrats! That's is a significant number. I don't think I'll ever have shelf space for that many, but these days, I am adding as many ebooks as physical books, if not more.

>24 jillmwo: Speaking of costs, we heard this week that there is now a new paper option available that's both lighter and cheaper, for self-published books and I suspect the publishers have been using it for about a year now.

>28 Karlstar:. Hmmm. I don't think that lighter weight paper is going to solve many of the current issues. I am currently ticked off with Harper Press (part of Harper Collins UK). I ordered a paperback edition of a title initially published back in 2011. There is no ebook edition available and the book is 900 pages (plus). When it arrived yesterday, I was somewhat disenchanted with the production values. Clearly to do the paperback, the publisher just reduced the trim size of the hardcover and shrank down the text on the page. Black-and-white photos run right to the edge of the page.

In terms of measurement, the book is (and I measured carefully so as not to exaggerate unduly):
Trim size width: 5-1/16 inches
Trim size height: 7-1/4 inches
Trim size thickness: 2-1/16 inches.

As a comparison, the hardcover is shown on AMZ as being 6.26 x 2.48 x 9.45 (inches)

Internal margins of text pages are 3/4 of an inch for the outer margin and something rather less than that on the gutter. I actually can't measure the gutter. The actual font is roughly 8 or (maybe if I'm being charitable) 8.5. Certainly not more. I will only be able to read this book during the summer months on days of brightest sunshine streaming through my living room windows. The ink on the page just isn't that dark. (To be fair, however, I probably do need new glasses.)

I don't think that it's print-on-demand. There's no indication anywhere that it is.

The copyright page proudly notes that the printing company used was CPI Print UK, using 100% Renewable Electricity. On that company's website, it says "We lead the book printing market with the latest deployment of inkjet digital printing technology, integrated warehousing, distribution and supply-chain solutions, thanks to significant investments in digital technology and advanced internal IT solutions." The paperback cover is a coated cardstock of some sort. Not awful, but nothing to write home about.

Now the writing is really quite good. But if this is the most cost-effective way that they could do a hard copy, then I really wish they'd have managed to do an ebook. Geez Louise. Just like the EU, I recognize and support sustainable production output, but this does not bode well for the long-term preservation of a single copy.

>29 jillmwo: I hope the new paper is durable, I don't want my hardcovers falling apart in a few years.

>27 clamairy: Argh, you're right--it's not KU, it's just a slimy trick a lot of people pull on Kindle. Fortunately they have taken some steps to crack down on it, but not enough.

>31 Marissa_Doyle: That does not surprise me at all. I am guessing that they have made it a bit harder to do that, though. In fact yesterday evening I couldn't even get a refund for a package that didn't arrive without having to contact customer support and use the 'chat with a representative' feature.

Today's problem is that fiber optic cable in our area got cut yesterday afternoon so we have no Internet so no streaming service or access to other stuff. Using phone to post which truncates communicatio. Spouse in something of a snit. Me too 😁

>33 jillmwo:
As you say, it truncates “communicatio”.

Very clever. I see what you did there.

>33 jillmwo: You have my sympathies. I had a power outage yesterday that lasted five hours. It wasn't really nice outside, but I went for a walk anyway. Then I made myself a small martini to soothe my woes. I finished one book and started another. Of course after the power came back on the Wi-Fi was all mucked up for a bit, and every smart bulb in the house came on.

>33 jillmwo: Is your internet back today?

>35 clamairy: That's a long outage, what was the cause?

>36 Karlstar: Tree damage to the lines. We had 40+ mph gusts yesterday.

We're back. It went out at around 3pm yesterday afternoon. Over about 18 hours, the spouse spoke w/ four different Verizon reps, the best of whom was on the midnight work shift. Maybe he was bored, but he was the only one who actually shared what was going on. Someone had cut the fiber optic cable and took out the Internet for roughly 1,000 of us.

I give my husband credit. He didn't bellow at anyone. He just got very, very fretful for lack of television viewing options. But we read books. We played idiot games on the tablet. We conversed. We turned in early. He was up at 6 am this morning and was upset that it still wasn't ON. Verizon said (initially) "Oh, give us another hour." Of course it was more like two or three hours. But they did message us when it got fixed.

The only truly obnoxious moment was when the Verizon rep (some sweet young thing) tried to persuade my husband that he could pay his June bill a month ahead of time and get a 10 percent discount. Takes a certain chutzpah to solicit an early payment when someone is calling you to say that the service is out.

Locus Magazine announces their award winners: https://locusmag.com/2026/05/2026-locus-awards-winners/

>39 jillmwo: Very happy to see so many of my favorite authors nominated.

>39 jillmwo: The fantasy list is all bangers, no skips

I am aware thar four or five paragraphs in a review might be overkill, but I just can't seem to whittle down my thoughts down as well as say @tardis or @Meredy.

Oh, and I forgot to thank @catzteach for pointing me in the direction of The Once and Future Queen because the physcial copy really was a pretty book! The book design did foster a positive reading experience in a variety of ways. The sprayed edges, the gorgeous end papers, etc. A fine example of what can be managed by book designers.

>42 jillmwo: I'm just too lazy to do proper reviews LOL

>39 jillmwo: Thanks for the list, I see some titles I need to add to my TBR pile.

Some while back (December 31, 2024), @pgmcc finished reading a book by Susie Dent entitled Guilty by Definition, giving it a rating of 5 stars at the time. Much as it pains me to do so, I must agree with him. It's a five star read. It's really quite brilliant. I will be writing my own review of it presently, but let me just say right now that I did not see any of the final resolution coming. The final tie-up caught me off guard. You should all be reading this one. Suzie Dent is really quite as good as Kate Atkinson. To the extent, that I'm considering telling one of the book groups that I will buy all the members copies of this one just so that they will read it and so that we can then discuss it. And I'm thrilled that there's a follow-up title coming down the pipe.

Oh, and when one is having one's usual afternoon latte, re-visiting Legends and Lattes is also quite good.

But really, the one by Susie Dent is amazing!! Highly recommended. Gob-smacked -- that's the word I'm looking for. I was gob-smacked.

On an entirely unrelated topic, do the enforcers give credit of any sort for acquisitions ahead of one's Thingaversary if the acquisition was actually an (entirely unnecessary) designer hand bag? Or does that entail adding an extra dozen titles when it's a 20 year celebration? Asking for a friend.

>46 jillmwo: BB--just added to my wishlist.

>46 jillmwo:
Glad to hear you agree with me. Delighted that it pains you to agree with my judgement. :-)

>47 jillmwo:
A designer handbag could incur the wrath of the enforcers. For your sake I hope you have plenty cheese in the fridge.

"The Death of the Reader", Gifted article from The Atlantic. I don't think you will hit a paywall. (Note that this article is about AI so take that as a trigger warning of sorts.)
https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/2026/06/ai-writing-reading-nazir/687419/?gift=...

In the absence of the author, or of the certainty that one exists, we may default to a style of reading that is self-conscious, hyperaware, restless, and anxiety-driven. We may struggle to immerse ourselves in a book, and instead hover at a safe distance, or dip in and out, worried that we’ll be fooled once again. Nothing less than the pleasure of reading is at stake.

>51 jillmwo: That was interesting and it brought up something that was mentioned in the Early Reviewers book I'm reading, where the author indicated that the story actually was written by AI - not that there was doubt.

Isn't this story really calling into question the integrity of the writers? Do we or should we start doubting whether they are using AI too much?

>46 jillmwo: Okay, I'll bite. Going on the wishlist!

>53 clamairy:
Bwahahahahaha!

Another one bites the dust.