Look, I know it’s the cool thing to scoff at Dan Brown and lament the fact that the “good” books and the popular books don’t overlap more. But that conversation is a snoozefest, and any author who can sell millions of books and help keep a publishing house in business is good news for readers. So I think it’s [...]
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People think I’m ridiculous when I tell them I have certain relationships with books, and that those relationships dictate how I read those books. Why don’t you just finish one book before you pick up another? That book was terrible, how could you finish that one and not this one? And how could you LIKE [...]
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It’s been my mission these last few years to expand my readerly horizons and try out genres I’ve never read before, usually because I had silly notions of what they were about and the kinds of people who read them. Admitting to myself that I was holding untested theories (okay, they were stereotypes) about what kinds [...]
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Our START HERE book project grew out of the recognition that every reader has one author–and in some cases, many authors–they haven’t read because they don’t know where to start. Some writers are so prolific, and the choices so overwhelming, that it can seem easier to not read them than to try to find a good [...]
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This week’s List List is sponsored by Biographile. Love true stories about fascinating people? So do the folks at Biographile, a website dedicated to helping readers discover a rich mix of real lives through author interviews, news updates, reviews, essays, contests, and more. One of their latest Q&As is an exclusive interview with the hilarious comedian and actor Jim [...]
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But the movie’s excess is okay. Think about how great it would be if there were a major new Walt Disney World ride dedicated to jazz age underground New York City, and then think about the fact that Baz Lurhmann’s The Great Gatsby really is a long and excellent Walt Disney World ride through jazz-age underground New York [...]
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An old flame of mine (and by that I mean the relationship went down in flames, nahmsayin’?) told me a while back (when I was trying to remain friendly with him, how cute was I?) that he was working on a new book. This was my outward reaction: But this was how I felt inside: [...]
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Welcome to another installment of Boy vs. Girl, in which we (Casey Peterson and Marisa Atkinson) read and debate new books at least one of us is really excited about. This week we discuss A Questionable Shape by Bennett Sims. — Marisa: A Questionable Shape was more a philosophical treatise on the ethics of living [...]
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Lolita is one of the most beautiful books I’ve ever read, and it made the list of Book Riot Readers’ Top 50 Favorite Novels, so I know that a lot of people agree with me about that. But it’s also one of the most disturbing, and not just for its subject matter, but because the [...]
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Lately, it seems like we’re seeing one hell of a resurgence in tabletop card games. It feels like every other week I’m going to a party where someone is playing Cards Against Humanity, and those game nights always spiral out of control. In a good way, of course. After the massive success of Cards Against Humanity post-Kickstarter [...]
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The World’s Strongest Librarian by Josh Hanagarne Josh Hanagarne is a librarian and a lapsed Mormon, which made me feel like we were destined to be spirit-animals right off the bat. But the similarities dwindle from there. Josh suffers from Tourette Syndrome so severe that, in its darkest moments, has caused him to punch himself [...]
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It’s been a wild few days in the librariosphere. (What? That’s what I’ve decided to call it. Shut up.). Last week, journalist Michael Rosenblum took to the Huffington Post to explain that, while he hasn’t been in a library in years, he’s sure they’re entirely unnecessary. What with the Google and all. I read it, [...]
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Jane Austen Metal Bangle: To paraphrase Mrs. Bennett, if you like it, put a ring on it, with this Austen bangle. Beluga Bookends: That prized collection of Moby-Dick editions getting a bit too unwieldy? Straighten and decorate with a smiling set of bookends. Bookish Font: A page-turning design for getting your point across, designed by Byggstudio. Reader Mud [...]
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And I have a real problem with this idea that only what is “good” deserves financial success, or that something is off when what is “not good” sells eleventy billion copies. Because I think there is a judgment implied there that carries over to the reader – like, we can dismiss the thoughts of Twilightfans, [...]
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The Rapture is a belief among people who take their religions very, very literally. If you don’t know what the Rapture is, it’s the idea that Biblical prophecy will be fufilled, Jesus and the Angels will come back to Earth. The faithful will be lifted bodily up into heaven. The rest of us sinners are [...]
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This round of Name Those Authors! is sponsored by Shadow and Bone by Leigh Bardugo. Surrounded by enemies, the once-great nation of Ravka has been torn in two by the Shadow Fold, a swath of near impenetrable darkness crawling with monsters. Now its fate may rest on the shoulders of one lonely refugee. Alina Starkov has never been good [...]
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Current cover trends are really starting to get to a lot of reader attention. Just last week, Maureen Johnson made a casual comment on Twitter about gendered book covers. She started a conversation that took on a life of its own. The #coverflip project got a lot of people thinking about what the cover art [...]
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As a fellow Rioter noted recently, the Doctor is a literary hero. He’s also a library hero. Libraries pop up again and again, and when Doctor Who does libraries, it does them grandly. I thought my favorite Doctor Who library would always be the 51st-century library featured in the award-winning 2008 episodes “Silence in the Library” [...]
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Is America sick of Fifty Shades of Grey? Based on the success of two touring musical parodies, the answer is “not yet.” The books may have finally relinquished their Kegel grip on the bestseller lists, but there’s enough interest in the craze to support two competing musical parodies (Spank! The Fifty Shades Parody and 50 [...]
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Look, y’all, I know I’m supposed to roll my eyes at all things James Franco, but this actually looks…not terrible. And maybe even good. As I Lay Dying is a difficult novel, and I’m sort of in love with the idea of introducing a bunch of people who might be intimidated by the notion of reading [...]
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