The British will bet on anything, and the bookmakers Ladbrokes is keenly aware of this. As such they continue their tradition of posting odds for who they believe will win the Nobel Prize in Literature. If anyone will give me odds, I want to put money on none of these folks winning. Takers?
‘Keep calm and carry on’ is a worthy motto. The Telegraph reports on Barter Books’ battle over the rights to merchandise goods carrying this wartime slogan.
Barter Books, in the UK, is a long-time AbeBooks bookseller and owns one of only two surviving wartime originals of this famous poster. Do visit their bookshop in Alnwick, Northumberland, if you ever get the chance.
You can see Barter Books’ line of ‘Keep calm’ merchandise here.
A New York City book thief met in his match in Donald Davis of East Village Books in St Mark’s Place, who was a wrestler in high school. The NY Post reports. Three cheers for Donald.
(Let’s the hope the thief gets thrown in the Big House where the tough guys will ask what his crime was and he’ll reply: “I robbed libraries and sold the books to bookstores.” And the hard men will ask how he got caught and our thief will reply: “this bookstore guy kicked my ass.”)
Granted, I know I’m a bit of a luddite when it comes to reading, and really prefer paper to digital every time (with the exception of news – I don’t miss newsprint fingers), but come on.
I know there’s a whole big, well-thought out article there, but all I heard was “blahblahblah now you can douse your expensive devices in marinara, melt them next to a hot stove, smudge your peanut butter fingers on them mid-recipe while trying to scroll or turn the page, and get flecks of oregano into all its bits.”
Least practical idea ever. Am I alone here? Would you, like me, never dream of using an e-reader for a cookbook? Or do you think it’s a great idea? Let us know your thoughts in the comments.
When I heard there was a photography book called Chicks with Guns, I forlornly hoped that it was baby chickens with guns but it’s ladies packing heat. The Today Show featured the book this morning and MSN has a dramatic slideshow of images from the photo-book.
The book features nearly 80 portraits and captions in which women describe the role of guns in their lives in their own words. It quickly becomes apparent that rich women, poor women, young women, old women, athletic women, sedentary women and a fair number of confident girls possess guns for reasons that are peculiarly their own.
The photographer behind the book is Lindsay McCrum. Flicking through the slideshow, I thought the book should be called Scary Women with Shotguns. Her next project is Youths in Hoodies with Knives.
My dear, dear friend Beth reviews a couple of books. The Strain and The Fall are the first two books in a trilogy about vampires written by Guillermo del Toro (director of Pan’s Labyrinth and the Hellboy movies) and Chuck Hogan (writer of “The Prince of Thieves: a Novel” upon which the film “The Town” was based). Given the recent trend toward vampires as troubled (read: whiny), lovelorn creatures full of self-loathing and angst, readers may be hesitant to take a chance on the books, but when they do, they’ll be in for a pleasant surprise. The creatures in the stories, far from the sparkling, brooding fanged heartthrobs populating fictional high schools everywhere, are ancient parasites.
Rather than seeing humans as complex, emotional beings from whom they feel a saddening distance, they see us as a food source, and an occasional nuisance. The vampires are powerful, frightening, relentless and – frankly – gross, as they excrete a pungent-smelling ammonia-based waste while they feed. The books detail the struggles of CDC (Center for Disease Control) employee Ephraim Goodweather and his motley band of believers (including a wizened, arthritic Jewish holocaust survivor and pawnbroker named Abraham Setrakian) to first be heard and believed about the vampire threat, and then to contain the virus before the contagion spreads too far and all hope is lost.
Fans of Justin Cronin’s “The Passage”, Stephen King’s darker works, and suspense in general will enjoy these fast-paced, gripping stories
The Calgary Herald issued a photographic list of 12 of the coolest looking libraries in the world. I would argue with a couple of their selections but it’s definitely work a look. Which libraries do you think deserve to be on this list? What is the coolest library you have ever been to?
I read a lot of essayists, I love essayists, I love essays. I’m a huge Joan Didion fan, I’m a huge Montaigne fan. It might be unlikely in the extreme that I’ll be able to reprint Orwell, but given the opportunity, I sure would. To me, there are certain books and authors that I feel evangelical about.
Despite what the puppy says, when it comes to who will win the 2011 Man Booker Prize, here at AbeBooks headquarters we’re rooting for local author Esi Edugyan, whose nominated Half Blood Blues is her second novel and a heck of a good read.
Longlisted for the Giller Prize, shortlisted for the Booker Prize, and with a new daughter born just over a month ago, Edugyan’s life must be a whirlwind of everything under the sun (except sleep) these days. Still, we managed to catch up with her to talk about her book and more.
The Museum of the City of New York is running an exhibition about Cecil Beaton from October 25 until February 20, 2012. Cecil Beaton: The New York Years describes Beaton’s adventures in the Big Apple from the 1920s until the 1960s.
Our feature about this author, designer and photographer puts his long career into perspective. This man lived a full life.
A prisoner in an Alabama jail claims his jailers have prevented him from reading a Pulitzer prize-winning book called Slavery By Another Name: The Re-Enslavement of Black Americans from the Civil War to World War II written by Douglas Blackmon. The Guardian reports. The prisoner is serving a life sentence after being charged at 14 with helping his older brother commit two murders. The books tells of thousands of people who were enslaved after the abolition of slavery.
Maurice Sendak, 83-year-old author of globally-loved children’s book Where the Wild Things Are, has released a new book, also for children.
Bumble-Ardy is the story of a pig who is an oprhan after his parents are sent to the slaughterhouse (ouch). But the biggest problem for Bumble-Ardy is that his aunt and guardian won’t have a birthday party for him. So in true Sendak fashion (remember Max?), Bumble-Ardy throws a rager for himself, instead.
In interviews with Sendak, he seems to be private to the extreme, with an intense dislike of the spotlight. That dislike seems to extend to a lot, actually – including the way most adults tend to perceive and treat children, as made plain by his recent Associated Press interview. Roald Dahl was apparently much the same – didn’t care for the limelight, didn’t think children needed to be shielded and coddled as much as they were.
Interesting that their books appeal so much to children – perhaps kids agree.
Has the UK’s book-buyers given up on chick lit? The Independent asks why sales for some major writers are tanking. Even books from Marian Keyes and Jodi Picoult are remaining on the shelves.
I am heartily in favor of this video I came across from the Harvard Book Store in which they employ a scientific and methodical approach to predicting the winner of the 2011 Man Booker Prize:
(Though I disagree with Lucy – my money for the winner is on Esi Edugyan).
(This will prove embarrassing, if I am out-predicted by a puppy).
