Jul 23 2010

Wave of the future?

According to The New York Times, Amazon.com announced on Monday that they've been selling more titles for its Kindle e-readers than hardcover books during the last three months—143 e-books for eve...

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Jul 22 2010

So dorky, seriously.

My standards are not high when it comes to book trailers, but this one—it's for James Patterson and Maxine Paetro's Private, and a slightly longer version is currently popping up on Hulu—is partic...

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Jul 21 2010

Behind the times

How did I miss this? The 2010 Bulwer-Lytton contest results were released late last month, and this year's winner is (as they always are) a delight:For the first month of Ricardo and Felicity's a...

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Jul 20 2010

Manga for the rich and famous

Huh. If you're artistically inclined, this might be worth investigating: according to AnimeNewsNetwork, the Italian fashion label Prada has announced a Manga-themed contest in celebration of its ...

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Jul 19 2010

An embarrassment of popcorn-worthy riches?

The most recent "Trailer Park" post on Cinematical features four book-nerd-friendly movie trailers: Howl (based on the obscenity trial over Allen Ginsberg's poem of the same name), an adaptation o...

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Jul 15 2010

Upscale goth

Check this out:This, dear readers, is a $30 nail polish set inspired by Morticia Addams. Specifically, the Morticia Addams of The Addams Family Musical, a Broadway production starring Bebe Neuwir...

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Jul 14 2010

I want one.

Sadly, this Epic Win FTW submission isn't a real book:But on the up side, one of the comments informs me that this is, and doesn't that almost make up for it?

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Jul 13 2010

My Little Ponies gone wild

Today is apparently Embrace Your Geekness Day, and someone at Buzzfeed decided to celebrate by collecting 50 of the most geek-tastic My Little Pony dolls. Most of them are movie-related, but ther...

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Jul 13 2010

RIP, Harvey Pekar

NPR put together a really nice obit for Harvey Pekar, the author of the American Splendor series, most of which focused on the day-to-day reality of life in Cleveland. Mr. Pekar was found dead in...

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Jul 12 2010

Build your own book review

I had never heard of Common Sense Media before yesterday, but their purpose statement sounded innocuous enough: they're a nonprofit organization dedicated to "improving the lives of kids and famil...

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Jul 12 2010

Home improvements

Behold the Bookshelf Apartment. Sadly, it's not a real, lived-in space, but a structure built for the "Small Spaces" exhibition at London's Victoria & Albert Museum. I so want to live there. Or...

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Jul 10 2010

White Cat, by Holly Black

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Bookstores are currently overflowing with YA novels about vampires and werewolves, but the majority of the “monsters” in these books seem like fundamentally nice guys. They care about their ...

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Jul 9 2010

Used books on the cheap

Dude, this sounds so cool: the online used-book retailer Once Sold Tales has opened a brick-and-mortar store (well, less bricks and mortar and more a corner of one of their warehouses, but whatev...

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Jul 8 2010

Made of awesome

Aw... I recently found out that Washington State's Grays Harbor Transit System is letting kids participating in the Timberland Regional Library's summer reading program use their library cards as ...

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Jul 8 2010

Pride and Prejudice and cell phone apps

AustenBlog has posted a generally-positive guest review by some dude named Douglas R. Burchill of the new Pride and Prejudice and Zombies video game for the iPhone. If you're looking for the shor...

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Jul 7 2010

Summer Reading: Kids' Comics Edition

The School Library Journal's blog Good Comics for Kids has published their list of recommended summer reading for 2010, and I agree with about 70% of their suggested titles. (Which isn't a bad r...

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Jul 6 2010

Insatiable, by Meg Cabot

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Meg Cabot's new novel Insatiable is full of nods to the current vampire craze (love triangles, seemingly ordinary heroines with mysterious abilities, broody-yet-hot dudes with weird dietary habits...

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Jul 6 2010

Did we really need another one?

Wait. So there's really going to be a new Three Musketeers movie, this time starring Milla Jovovich as Lady de Winter and that dude who played Percy Jackson as D'Artagnan? Wow... that was one of...

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Jul 2 2010

Brace yourselves, horror fans...

If you're looking for a genuinely creepy take on the vampire genre (versus, say, a mopey, dopey, heavy-on-the-sixpack-abs one), check out the trailer for Let Me In, the upcoming film remake of the...

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Jul 1 2010

Wonder Woman goes business casual

Starting this week, Wonder Woman will be wearing a new outfit: DC Comics has nixed the superheroine's iconic costume in favor of pants, a shirt, low heels, and a jacket. Oddly, I think she looks ...

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Jun 30 2010

Yawn.

Well, I suppose the full-length trailer for the Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows adaptation looks nice enough. But I'm still SUPER IRRITATED by Warner Bros.' decision to split the story into ...

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Jun 29 2010

Ew! But also funny!

Salon has very kindly put together a slideshow round-up of the "10 Most Baffling Twilight Products". They range from G-rated weirdness (like the Edward-shaped body pillow) to other, less SFW opti...

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Jun 28 2010

eBooks just aren't the same.

Okay, I love these: Penguin Books has recently released a line called "Penguin Ink", which features six modern classics repackaged with new cover art designed by tattoo artists/illustrators. Jus...

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Jun 25 2010

Losing resources left and right

According to this terribly depressing article, the American Association of School Administrators is projecting that 19% of the nation's school districts will have fewer librarians next year, and 1...

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Jun 24 2010

Raised by Wolves, by Jennifer Lynn Barnes

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The cover of Jennifer Lynn Barnes' novel Raised by Wolves features a promotional quote from Melissa Marr describing the book as “[quite] simply, the most compelling YA werewolf book out there.” O...

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Jun 24 2010

Squee!

AustenBlog has posted a link to the trailer for Aisha, the upcoming Bollywood adaptation of Jane Austen's Emma, and it looks like so much fun, you guys. Seriously, I MUST see this movie. I don't...

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Jun 23 2010

Now that all is quiet on the Harry Potter front...

Diminutive Harry Potter actor Daniel Radcliffe certainly dreams big, doesn't he? He has signed on to star in an upcoming film adaptation of Erich Maria Remarque's All Quiet on the Western Front. ...

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Jun 22 2010

Stuff: Compulsive Hoarding and the Meaning of Things, by Randy O. Frost and Gail Steketee

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I cannot stand TV shows about hoarding. I am fascinated by the subject, but my limited experience with hoarders has convinced me that hoarding is an incredibly persistent condition that is diffic...

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Jun 22 2010

Maybe if it's good enough, I'll begin to consider forgiving them for that movie.

Well, this is just all kinds of awesome. Hyperion has posted the book cover, release date, and plot summary for the first book in Rick Riordan's "Heroes of Olympus" series. Behold The Lost Hero,...

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Jun 21 2010

Waste of a perfectly good YA series...

Gyah. The dread Miley Cyrus has apparently signed on to star in the upcoming movie adaptation of Lisa McMann's Wake. I'm torn on this one: I liked the book, but I'm not convinced it will transl...

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