News & Notes is a weekly Saturday post featuring book- and publishing-related news, links to interesting articles and opinion pieces, and other cool stuff
Book News
- The National Book Award finalists for 2014 were announced this week. (National Book Foundation)
- Richard Flanagan wins the 2014 Man Booker Prize. You can read or watch his full acceptance speech and read an interview with Flanagan at The Guardian.
- Lost Stories by Truman Capote are published. The stories, written between the ages of 11 and 19, show a writer already working hard at developing his craft. (New York Times)
- ALA Confronts Adobe on Ebook Data Gathering. Apparently, Adobe has been gathering users’ data through the Adobe Digital Editions platform – and transmitting it unencrypted. (both articles from Digital Book World)
- Bloomsbury UK is holding the first Harry Potter Night on Feb. 5, 2015. Librarians, booksellers, teachers, and community organizations can sign up to receive or download a free kit to help you hold your own event. Signups close on 11/28/14.
- McSweeney’s to become nonprofit publishing house (SFGate)
- Publishers React to Amazon’s Pop-Up Stores (Publishers Weekly) You may have heard that Amazon is dabbling in pop-up stores, kiosks, and vending machines to push its devices (e-readers, the Fire phone, etc.)
Worth Reading
- The Harry Potter Generation Has Been Waiting for Malala (Charlotte Alter, Time )
- On John Grisham, Victimized Pedophiles, and the Children’s Book Industry (Anne Ursu) Ursu wonders how the children’s book industry should react to statements made by Grisham to the effect that men who look at child pornography are getting overly-harsh jail sentences.
- A Basic Guide to Managing TBR Piles (WordRevel) I missed this post back in September, but it’s worth reading.
For Writers & Bloggers
- Author Jim C. Hines talks about Amazon’s new Kindle Scout program. (And here’s Amazon’s Kindle Scout page.)
Book & Movie Announcements
Artist Stephanie Hans’s cover image from ‘James Patterson’s Max Ride: First Flight’ #1 (Marvel)
- James Patterson’s Maximum Ride Will Become a Marvel Comics Series (Wall Street Journal)
- The Fantastic Beasts & Where To Find Them movies will be “at least a trilogy” and are projected to release in 2016, 2018, and 2020. (The Verge)
- Lena Dunham to adapt Karen Cushman’s Catherine, Called Birdy for the big screen (BuzzFeed)
- Robin McKinley’s Backlist FINALLY coming as ebooks! Open Road Media will release eight of McKinley’s backlist titles, including The Hero and the Crown, Beauty, and Sunshine, on Nov. 18.
- Kensington is featuring 31 books in it’s 31 Days of Halloween promotion. Some are full-price, but some are bargains. Prices should be similar on Amazon.
Awesome Lists
- Best Books to Read for Halloween (Goodreads)
- Best Halloween Picture Books – for the younger crowd (Goodreads)
Just for Fun
- Windows has a Beauty of Books theme for your desktop: 13 photos of libraries and books for your wallpaper/screensaver. Who knew?
- Watch Neil Gaiman read The Graveyard Book (yes, all of it!) on Mr. Babo’s Remarkable Mouse Circus (the Neil Gaiman website for young readers.)
Bookish Quote
That’s it for this week!
Kimberly @ Turning the Pages
I’m so excited about The Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them movies! I just hope they do them right 🙂 By the way Lark I love the new look! It’s simple but so cute Flashy layouts are nice and all but simple is awesome too and I love the font you used in your header. Did you do it yourself?
Kimberly @ Turning the Pages recently posted…*[Blog Tour Review & Giveaway] Orenda (Orenda #1) by Ruth Silver
Lark_Bookwyrm
Hi, Kimberly! The theme is “Tweak Me” by Ashley of Creative Whim (she also writes the blog Nozegraze.) She converted my blog from Blogger to a self-hosted WordPress site for me, too (and the price was really reasonable!) The theme is very customizable, so I’ll probably be personalizing it a bit more over the next few months. I love the clean, simple look of this, but I miss my little bookwyrm! So maybe I’ll just customize the header a little more.
Bea @Bea's Book Nook
Oh, I’ll have to check out the desktop theme.
Bea @Bea’s Book Nook recently posted…The Friday 56 #59 Seeing the Light by Eileen Bell
Lark_Bookwyrm
I downloaded it – it’s nice! But right now I’ve got a collection of Fall/Autumn wallpapers I downloaded from here and there. I like to change out my background a lot; it keeps things interesting.
Windsprite
I’ve right away downloaded that desktop theme. Love it 🙂
Windsprite recently posted…“Arthur und die vergessenen Bücher” /”Arthur And The Forgotten Books” -Gerd Ruebenstrunk
Lark_Bookwyrm
I like it, too! 🙂
anna@herding cats & burning soup
It really is so very hard to stop reading once you start 😀
anna@herding cats & burning soup recently posted…Interview w/ Jennifer Faye– Princes, Santa, Needlepoints & Tudors!
Lark_Bookwyrm
It certainly is – but why would you want to?! 🙂