News & Notes – 1/07/2017

January 7, 2017 News & Notes 10

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

 

Worth Reading

 

For Writers & Bloggers

 

Awesome Lists

 

Really Cool / Just for Fun

  • Mindwebs was a radio show in the ’70s which offered “semi-dramatized” readings of great science fiction stories. 153 of those episodes are available on the Internet Archive; they include stories by SF writers like Harlan Ellison, Theodore Sturgeon, Ursula LeGuin, Philip K. Dick, Arthur C. Clarke, but also some by writers we don’t usually associate with SF, like John D. McDonald and John Cheever. They’re free to listen to online or to download.

 

Bookish Quote

Graphic by randoms. T-shirts, wall art, and more available on Redbubble.

Graphic by randoms. T-shirts, wall art, and more available on Redbubble.

 

That’s it for this week!

 

10 Responses to “News & Notes – 1/07/2017”

  1. Stephanie Jane

    So much to mull over, thank you for collating these articles 🙂
    I’m absolutely in favour of reading older as well as new books and do a ‘decade challenge’ each year to encourage myself to search out backlist titles. If only there were more hours in a day!
    Stephanie Jane recently posted…The Map Of Love by Ahdaf SoueifMy Profile

  2. Berls

    Allromance.com’s announcement really was shocking. Even more stunning is what they’re doing to authors though! I’m surprised they have the legal right to strip royalties so harshly 🙁

    I always enjoy reading your notes – thanks for keeping me up-to-date!
    Berls recently posted…My TBR List | January 2017 VotingMy Profile

    • Lark_Bookwyrm

      I suppose the authors could band together and sue for full royalties, but if AllRomance is out of money, it’s hard to see where the royalties would come from. It’s not clear from the article, but I think the reduced royalties are just for authors published by AllRomance, not traditionally published authors whose books were sold by AllRomance. Those authors should get their royalties from their own publishers (who might have a better shot at squeezing their payments out of AllRomance, or not.)

      I’m glad you enjoy this feature! Every time I consider dropping it (because it really is a time-sink!), someone says something nice like that, and I realize y’all appreciate it. 🙂

  3. Lexxie @ (un)Conventional Bookviews

    ARe caught everyone by surprise, I think! And I find it to be very strange that they can legally do what they’ve done. Both to authors who haven’t been paid, and to readers who can’t access the books they’ve paid for. It’s really bad.
    Thanks for sharing so many things that have happened this week, Lark.
    I hope you’re enjoying your weekend 🙂
    Lexxie @ (un)Conventional Bookviews recently posted…Weekend Wrap-up #169My Profile

    • Lark_Bookwyrm

      I agree that it’s strange they can leave everyone in the lurch like that. But if they’re out of money or in debt, it’s hard to see how they could pay authors what AR owes them. As for the readers, AR didn’t give them very long to download their books (and I gather the servers kept crashing), but they did let the readers know and gave them at least a little opportunity to download. (Not nearly enough, though.)

      I ran into this twice myself, once when the Sony Reader bookstore closed (they transferred readers’ books to Kobo) and once when BooksOnBoard was in financial difficulty and shutting down. It’s part of why I switched my ereading to Kindle; I figure Amazon is more likely to stick around. And it’s why I try to download all my ebooks to my computer… just in case.

  4. Rita @ View From My Books

    Great post today, and so relevant to how I’ve been feeling. The article, In Praise of the Backlist, could’ve been written by me! I was nodding my head as I read it, agreeing. That’s also why I joined your challenge. So many book titles go hurtling by me and I lose track of them. It’s also a great way to save some money, because these titles are likely to be in a library or used bookstore or available online, for sale.

    And thanks for the link for the Early Bird newsletter from Open Road Media. I joined up and appreciate it 🙂

    • Lark_Bookwyrm

      I’ve been getting the Early Bird emails for at least a year or so, and I love them. Often there is nothing I want, but when there is, I jump on it, because the books are only on sale for that day. I picked up a bunch of Katherine Kurtz’s books that way   the Deryni novels. And they recently released some of Madeleine L’Engle’s memoirs, which I loved when I was in my 20s.

      You’re absolutely right that reading older books is less expensive, because you can so often find them at the library or on sale, whether new or used.