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Friday, July 31, 2009
I Scream, You Scream, We All Screa--
Shhh! This Is A Library, Dammit!
Summer sees a sizable increase in two things in our store: (1.) Folks asking us for book recommendations and (2.) staff sojourns to the ice cream shop next door. As if stalking us from afar, The New Yorker has news of a Facebook group which sorta blends both: People for a Library-Themed Ben & Jerry’s Flavor. A few of the suggestions/submissions thus far:
Writer’s Block: Coffee with fudge chunks and nicotine stains.
Chick Lit: Fat-free Peach-Mango swirl with pieces of Chicklet chewing gum.
Chexy Librarian: Demure vanilla on the outside, chocolate-covered cherries and Chex cereal pieces on the inside.
And here's mine:
Using the Computers to Upload my Amateur Smut Stories Crunch: Sinfully sweet black raspberry ice cream with long, sticky shavings of almost pornographically delicious dark chocolate. (Note: Best served in a cone or on a stick.) As an added bonus, the container will come with a wrap-around slip cover that reads: 'Just Looking for a Job Crunch,' and shows a well-dressed family man eating from a decidedly non-phallic bowl of bland, vanilla bean ice cream.
Got one of your own? Go here for the New Yorker article and/or here for the Facebook group.
Tip via: Estoreal!
Thursday, July 30, 2009
Adaptation News
(for those who prefer to watch)
Brian Lee O'Malley's Scott Pilgrim -- soon to be a feature film -- is now en route to becoming a video game, as well.
Another really good comic, Greg Rucka's Whiteout, will have its film adaptation hit theaters in September. Click here to view the trailer...and Kate Beckinsale in the shower.
Having successfully adapted Dennis Lehane's Gone Baby Gone, Ben Affleck is hopping back into the director's chair again, this time for a film version of Charles Hogan's The Town.
Tolkein's heirs have filed a lawsuit to try and block the filming of The Hobbit. When this case is miraculously dismissed due to a large sum of money being dropped into the Tolkiens' laps, remember, you read it here first.
Wes Anderson, the fetishistic stylist behind Rushmore and The Royal Tenenbaums, has made a stop-motion animated feature out of Roald Dahl's Fantastic Mr. Fox. For a nice look at the puppets (and a blocked view of the sets), click here.
Remember Mrs. Frisby and the Rats of NIMH? It was the Newbery Medal-winning children's book that they made into the creepy and cool cartoon, The Secret of NIMH. Well, Hollywood is adapting it again, this time as a blend of CGI and live action.
In order to keep some semblance of coolness, I'll try and keep the Twilight news as brief as possible: Radiohead's Thom Yorke has written a song specifically for New Moon, and Bryce Dallas Howard will be replacing Rachelle Lafevre as 'Victoria' in Eclipse.
Wednesday, July 29, 2009
Book Review:
Sense and Sensibility by J. Austen
I’m fully at the mercy of my Jane Austen fixation now. It started with Persuasion, ramped up with Emma, and is continued by Sense and Sensibility. The latter has all the usual elements of a novel by Austen: a female protagonist; marriage at the end; some sort of impropriety by a character in the protagonist’s immediate social circle; prose which brings grown readers to their knees; and use of the nowadays-rare literary voice “free indirect speech.” Interestingly, I noticed some differences. Sense and Sensibility mentions the servants regularly throughout, unlike the other two novels. Also, it focuses on a pair of sisters, with one of them fulfilling the role of primary protagonist. There is a richness to their sisterhood, and it endears you to both of them, even when one holds a little less sense than the other. In contrast, I found myself under-whelmed by the male characters. The previous books had male characters that impressed, while one in Sense and Sensibility comes off as a bore at first. Another is far too charming, to the point of being suspicious. Both characters eventually show other layers. Still, I didn’t find myself rooting for any of them to end up with the protagonist on account of their personalities; only because of the female character’s own desire did I have allegiances. The protagonist Elinor Dashwood is thought by some scholars to be one of the first literary depictions of a female intellectual. Her consideration of social situations and her pleasure at playing with ideas seem to back this up. To borrow a line from Moreland Perkins’ Reshaping the Sexes in Sense and Sensibility, Elinor is “a talented analyst of human conduct, character, and convention who is equally dedicated to concretely applied reason - although we imagine her functioning this way long before the phrase ‘an intellectual’ was put to its current use.” (Perkins, p.13) To put a personal spin on it, I found myself becoming attracted to Elinor mainly for the above reasons - in the previous two novels I was extraordinarily happy for the protagonists for their eventual fortunes, though I could not share in their husbands’ love. I was endeared towards the protagonists, most certainly, though I didn’t find myself jealous of an Austen character until Elinor was scooped up. I won’t tell you by whom - you’ll just have to find out for yourself. Enjoy!
Reviewed by Wendell 'Scutopus' Edwards
Book News, In Brief
Wi-Fi(nally): Barnes & Noble take a late leap into the 00's, offering -- wait for it -- free Wi-Fi!
It's not you, N.C. It's them: Textbooks.com has joined Amazon.com in abandoning its North Carolina booksellers over the state's proposed internet sales tax.
i-Caramba: The online world is buzzing about Apple's newest gadget, the Tablet. Boasting a 10 inch touch screen, it's expected to take e-books where the the Kindle couldn't -- into the homes of average Janes & Joes.
Amazon Hawks Hate (And So Should You): I hate it when I have to take Amazon's side about anything, but truly practicing free speech and anti-censorship means selling sh*t you find offensive -- even Nazi books.
The Groupies Wear Corsets and Their Rider Requires Mead: Shakespeare's Globe theater company -- London's premier tights-wearing troupe -- has deemed the U.S. worthy of a three month tour. States and dates can be found here.
Tuesday, July 28, 2009
Go, Look: Editing Sarah Palin
Full on power-props to The Abbeville Manual of Style for steering me towards this choice bit of fact-based hilarity: Vanity Fair's executive literary editor, Wayne Lawson, took the red pen to Sarah Palin's long-winded resignation speech. Page one is posted above. To read the rest, click here.
Tuesday's Tips for Flailing Writers
Ten Tens
10 Writing Prompts
10 Daily Writing Rituals
10 Common Writing Mistakes
10 Myths of Freelance Writing
10 Tricks to Hook Your Reader
10 Writing Tips from Joss Whedon
10 Signs You're Obsessed with Writing
10 Reasons to Take More Photographs
10 Dos & Don't for Writers Seeking Feedback
10 Writing Tips from the Masters (with quotes!)
Monday, July 27, 2009
Henry Sene Yee: Master of Minimalist Cover Art
Violence by Slavoj Zizek
Columbine by Dave Cullen
Winner of the National Book Award: A Novel of Fame, Honor, and Really Bad Weather by Jincy Willett
Flying Leap by Judy Budnitz
Check out more of Yee's book cover designs here.
Book News, In Brief
The cougar craze ends...now.
Remember the un-official sequel to Catcher In The Rye that J.D. Salinger successfully sued to have stopped in the States? Surprise, surprise: The case is going to appeals court.
We've all seen the adjectives Joycean, Proustian and Kafkaesque while reading book reviews. Now the writers at The Australian are attempting to introduce a new word to the lit lover's lexicon: Malcoholic.
After posting two 'Recommended Viewings' in one day, you'd think a bookstore blog would try and stay away from non-literary links for a little while. Eff that. Click here to read Entertainment Weekly's list of TV Characters Who Read Books.
Amazon has issued a public apology for the unannounced removal of George Orwell titles from its users' Kindles. Folks still waiting for Amazon to apologize for their de-listing of gay titles should take this as a sign: Y'all have been forgotten.
It seems like every time a new Harry Potter film is released, a first edition of the first volume miraculously turns up in a used bookstore somewhere. Knocking tens of thousands of dollars off this year's find's final bid is the bookshop's handwritten pricing on the inside cover -- a mere 99p!
Friday, July 24, 2009
Racist Accusations are Like Celebrity Deaths: They Tend to Occur in 3s
How's this for unfortunate kismet? Less than a week after we posted our long and spiraling screed about White readers' hesitancy to buy books outside their Caucasian comfort zone, Publishers Weekly is running a story about the controversial 'White face' cover art to Justine Larbalestier’s upcoming novel, Liar. The book, about a Black tomboy with short, “nappy” hair, has inexplicably (yeah, right) been given a cover featuring...a White girl! Making a bad situation worse, the book's publisher, Bloomsbury, has issued the following, ridiculous bit of PR spin: "I do think it’s going to raise awareness of race in teen literature to new levels. Clearly, our striving for ambiguity with this cover, and for it to be interpreted as a ‘lie’ itself didn’t work for everyone. But again, if this jacket proves a catalyst for a bigger discussion about how the industry is dealing with its books on race, that’s a very large good to come of this current whirlwind."
Uh, Bloomsbury? No. You effed up. Big time. Now's the time to bite the bullet, admit you messed up, and print new covers. You still have two months 'til the book hits shelves.
Oh, and the literary world's 3rd racist accusation/occurrence of the week? Boston's finest and their arrest of author and Harvard professor, Henry Louis Gates Jr. -- for 'breaking into' his own house!
Things That Make You Go, "Ew!"
Moriah Jovan's Concept for "The Perfect Bookstore."
A simplistic mix of 2001 minimalism and McDonald's showmanship, Moriah Jovan envisions a bookstore made up of nothing more than two Espresso book machines and a small wall featuring e-books. While this sterile, impersonal brand of instant gratification is already the norm in the sleek and sexy world of bus station vending machine banks, I'm not so sure John and Jane Q. Public are gonna be willing to use this as a book buying option more than, say, once. I mean, after the gimmicky thrill of getting a book made-to-order has worn off ( -- and seriously, don't you think that this thrill is gonna wear off approximately 5-10 minutes into the best case scenario 15-20 minute wait time?), why would they bother coming back to buy a second book this way? I mean, if they're the type of consumer who puts speed and price above personal interaction, a quality looking product, and actually being able to read the first couple pages of the book they're considering buying, why the hell wouldn't they just stay at home and download the e-book -- for free?
Alright, so that's this jerk's knee-jerk reaction to Jovan's McBookstore 3000. What's yours?
Book Review:
The Little Stranger by Sarah Waters
Sarah Waters (Fingersmith and The Night Watch) has built a reputation for writing literary gothic stories reminiscent of Henry James and Shirley Jackson. Her talents for creating realistic historical settings and unique characters come to fruition in her newest novel, The Little Stranger.
Post WW2, the Ayres family struggles to hold onto Hundreds Hall, a crumbling English great house that still retains a fading remnant of its glory. Mrs. Ayres clings to her past in an attempt to imagine that the aristocracy still holds power, even as massive social changes sweep postwar England. Her son, Roderick, terribly wounded and scarred from battle, exhausts himself working on the land to try to keep Hundreds solvent. Spinster daughter, Caroline, who is bright and bitter, tries to keep up some semblance of family. Into their Grey Gardens style lives appears Dr. Faraday, who as a young boy visited the great house during a village fête, and became enamored of Hundreds. The Ayres alternately welcome the distraction of the outsider Faraday and then remind him of his humble origins.
Each character is trapped by circumstance and by the house that holds deep secrets. Their lives are bound by a darkness they have yet to comprehend, and the unraveling of their pride, fears, and longings brews up a chilling storm of consequences.
The Little Stranger makes for compelling reading; in addition to featuring nuanced characters and psychological insight, it has a surprise ending that will change your interpretation of all the preceding events.
Reviewed by Inkwell Michelle
Thursday, July 23, 2009
The Scritchy-Scratchy Cover Art of Skottie Young
Wonderful Wizard of Oz #1
Iron Man: Armored Adventures
Iron Man: Armor Wars #1
Wolverine: First Class #18
Captain Britain & MI13 #12
Wolverine: First Class #19
Locals Only: Harry Potter Exhibit is Coming to Boston's Museum of Science
From The Museum of Science's website:
This fall, Harry Potter fans will get the chance to step inside the famous wizard's magical world through Harry Potter: The Exhibition, which opens at the Museum of Science, Boston on October 25, 2009, at 9 a.m. Tickets are now available online at mos.org or by calling 617-723-2500, 617-589-0417. Visitors will be able to experience dramatic displays inspired by the Hogwarts film sets and see the amazing craftsmanship behind authentic costumes and props from the films. Harry Potter: The Exhibition will run in Boston through February 21, 2010.
For more info, click here.
Book News, In Brief
Carrie Prejean -- the former Miss California & current anti-gay marriage mouthpiece -- has garnered herself a book deal, proving that closed minds do occasionally open books.
Malaysia -- home of pineapple, palm oil, and bookstores where the books come wrapped in plastic. (FWIW, I'm writing this from America -- home of apple pie, peanut oil, and grandmothers' couches wrapped in plastic.)
I don't know if this marks the start of an anti-anti-corporate movement, or if the New York Times was just so hard up for news that they thought stating the obvious would somehow suffice: When Big-Box Stores Smile on a Book, Sleepy Titles Can Become Best Sellers.
A day after Barnes & Noble announced their entry into the e-book business, their stock price fell 70 cents (or a little over 3%) to $21.41. Although the publishing industry sees electronic libraries as their next big cash cow, the rest of the world seems to view this as just a bunch of bull.
Wednesday, July 22, 2009
Go, Look: James Jean's Kindling
One word: Gorgeous.
Six additional words: For a peek inside, click here.
Adaptation News
(for those who just prefer to watch)
Wired.com asks and answers, After Watchmen, What’s ‘Unfilmable’?
Jane Campion, the directorial genius behind The Piano and The Portrait of a Lady, has made a biopic about John Keats as seen through the eyes of "the love of his short life, girl next door Fanny Brawne." Eye-gougingly gorgeous photos can be glimpsed here.
I didn't give a damn when DC announced that Ryan Reynolds had been cast as the Green Lantern. But when I woke up this morning to read that Galaxy Quest scribes David Howard and Robert Gordon are penning a Bizarro Superman script, I nearly dropped my Gogurt. Galaxy Quest was hilarious! Via.
Lord of the Rings star Sean Bean is sticking to the tried and true, taking the lead role in HBO's adaptation of George R.R. Martin's fantasy series Game of Thrones. Also LOTR related, the sets for Guillermo del Toro's adaptation of The Hobbit are starting to appear on the New Zealand countryside. Pictures of uncompleted Hobbit holes are here.
Tim Burton's adaptation of Lewis Carroll's Alice's Adventures in Wonderland and Through the Looking-Glass has added yet another element to its already expansive online advertising blitz: Character Facebook Pages! Yes, now you can become e-friends with fictional characters, or -- even better -- send your phone-cam nude shots to the Mad Hatter in hopes of Johnny Depp happening across them and becoming your e-lover. As the Cheshire Cat would say, "Meow!"
An emasculating admission: I'm looking forward to seeing Nora Ephron's upcoming adaptation of Julie & Julia. I had a childhood crush on Julia Child, and currently harbor an ongoing adult obsession with Meryl Streep, so seeing the two of them combined is more than enough to ensure my matinee ticket purchase. Another reason I'm looking forward to the film version of Julie Powell's bestselling blog-to-memoir? Apparently, Julia Child had a less-than-positive reaction to Powell's "stunt," and I'm curious to know what could irk such a normally jovial babe. Via.
Related: Movie City News asks, Latest Book From Author Of Julie & Julia Delayed Until After Movie. Could It Be Because Her Hubby's Not So Sympathetic In Its Pages?
Tuesday, July 21, 2009
White Readers, Meet Black Authors
(a book blog recommendation)
I stumbled across White Readers Meet Black Authors last Saturday while scouring the internet for romance novel news bits, and have been obsessively ingesting their archives ever since. The blog's by-line -- "Your official invitation into the African American section of the bookstore! A sometimes serious, sometimes light-hearted plea for EVERYBODY to give a black writer a try." -- pretty much sums up the purpose of the site, so I'm gonna go ahead and pontificate on the subject for a paragraph or two before circling back around to the recommendation.
(Clears throat, rests hands on either side of podium)
We all notice the color of someone's skin, be they a cousin, a co-worker, an acquaintance or an artist. And whether we like to admit it or not, our behavior, demeanor and conversation are often altered by it -- even if it's only slightly and unintentionally. If we were to take an accounting of our acquaintances, it's safe to say that the majority of us would find that most of our friends shared our skin color. After all, isn't there some truth to the lie that someone who looks/dresses/talks like us has more in common with us than someone who does not? But if we allow ourselves to play it safe, to put up walls around ourselves, to hermetically seal ourselves in a stagnant social and cultural casket, we're, in a word, f**ked. Not only are we sowing the seeds of ignorance in ourselves (with ignorance being the root of racism), we're robbing ourselves of a broader intelligence, an expanded empathy, and a wider variety of life experiences. And for what? To avoid having our preconceptions challenged? Where's the fun in that?
I see this a lot at our bookstore. More often than not, White customers buy books by White authors.* While this in no way makes them racist, their unwillingness to explore something outside their comfort zone does make them dull. What makes these FUBU buying habits even more frustrating is the fact that the majority of these White readers consider themselves to be highly liberal thinkers. They listen to world music, they donate money to Darfur, and they campaigned en masse to make Barack Obama the President of the United States. Still, I dare you to try and push Chester Himes' If He Hollers Let Him Go on a fan of Joan Didion's Play It As It Lays. Both books deal with the slowly crumbling mental states of misfit Los Angelenos, both books make frequent and poetic use of dream imagery, and both books garnered their authors considerable critical acclaim at the times of their release. So what keeps Mr. and Mrs. Whiteperson from picking up Himes' novel while they wait the requisite 7-10 years for Didion's next? You know the answer. It's the pigmentation of the author and his protagonist. Simple as that.
Another thing that makes this segregated reading style so nuts? We're living in a world where Black movie stars, athletes and musicians are considered to be the arbiters of cool. So why are the biggest, so-called 'hippest' faces in the literary world almost all White? In today's hip-hop-centric society, it would seem like keeping the status quo in such a state of stasis would actually require some effort. Or is it just the fact that 99% of the literary world's gatekeepers -- be they agents, interns, publishers or bookstore owners -- are bookish White folks who never really grew up exposing themselves to anything other than the bookish White by-products of other bookish White folks? Could the publishing industry's lack of prominent, young Black writers simply be the result of its historically White world view?
Anyway, that's my admittedly overly-simplistic two cents on what is obviously a complicated and controversial topic. Author Carleen Brice, the main brain behind White Readers Meet Black Authors, has plenty of her own ideas on the subject, all of which she presents in a series of thoughtful, conversational, and un-accusatory posts (wholly unlike mine!). Listed below are a few of my favorites:
The similarity between Black authors and Dr. Seuss' Whos.
In response to Newsweek's recent 50 Books for Our Times, they've complied a list of 40+ Books that W.R.M.B.A. Suggest You Read Now.
An introduction to authors writing about slavery in a manner that is neither guilt and/or shame-inducing, nor old-fashioned in its approach.
The 12 days of Christmas, Hanukkah and Kwanzaa -- specifically day 5's recommendation, Getting Mother's Body by Suzan-Lori Parks. I am so getting this book now.
A discussion about 'What constitutes a Black book?' that starts with a 'Which one of these things is not like the others' game and ends with one of the most thought-provoking comments threads...ever.
*It's also true that our male customers mainly buy books by male authors, our female customers primarily buy books by female authors, our Black customers buy books mostly by Black authors, and our gay customers tend to favor gay authors. In a future post, we'll do our best to address all of these self-imposed parameters. But for now, let's try and stay on topic, okay?
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