Free For All: Fixing School Food in America, by Janet Poppendieck
Janet Poppendieck writes like a lawyer, and we mean that in the best possible way. She's careful and she covers her bases—both highly desirable traits in a nonfiction writer, particularly wh...
Austen goes Bollywood... again
AustenBlog informs me that Aisha, a Bollywood film adaptation of Jane Austen's Emma starring Sonam Kapoor (left), will be coming out this August. I'm a big fan of Kandukondain Kandukondain, the 2...
Returned (in part) to the original owner
Newspaper publisher E.W. Scripps Co. is selling the licensing rights for Charles Schulz's 'Peanuts' characters to Iconix Brand Group Inc. (owners of Joe Boxer and London Fog) for a whopping $175 m...
Who knew she was dating Harry Potter?
Speaking of Nora Roberts' Bride Quartet, there's a game! It's an interactive "Hidden Objects" sort of deal, and apparently there will be separate games for each book in the series. Now, I'm not ...
Savor the Moment, by Nora Roberts
Savor the Moment is the third book in Nora Roberts' best-selling Bride Quartet. This installment focuses on pastry chef Laurel McBane, co-owner of Vows, the wedding-planning company she founded w...
Living Hell, by Catherine Jinks
Great horror novels usually feature two things: a terrifying antagonist and a plot capable of lending weight to what would otherwise just be a lot of running and screaming. Catherine Jinks' novel...
Just a reminder....
They're offering tons of titles, but I'm most interested in the Tick issue and what appears to be a Lady Gaga bio linked (in some obscure way) to S.E. Hinton, author of The Outsiders.
The Sisters Grimm: The Inside Story, by Michael Buckley
Once again, Michael Buckley's newest Sisters Grimm book is scheduled to go on sale May 1st, and once again, it was widely available by mid-April. I asked about this (again), and the bookseller tol...
Cringe-worthy
I finally watched the Eclipse trailer, and it is bad. Like, hilariously bad. Everything about it, from the "creepy dudes coming out of the water" bit* to the run-towards-each-other-and-SMASH! ba...
I'm *sure* there's already fanfic about this.
Huh. Apparently, long-running comic series Archie is about to introduce its first openly gay character. It's sweet that the Archie writers are trying to make their universe more diverse, but ge...
Taming the West
NPR has a great interview up with Stephen Fried, author of the recently-published book Appetite for America, a nonfiction account of the life of entrepreneur Fred Harvey. Harvey created the Harve...
Contest news...
Flat broke, but still in the market for a Mother's Day gift? Check out Bookreporter.com's Mother's Day Contest. In addition to a variety of Mom-inspired reading material, they're also giving awa...
Movie magic
Rumors are rampant that Robert Downey Jr. will be starring in a movie prequel to the Wizard of Oz series. I wonder if Johnny Depp is upset that Downey is now sufficiently clean and sober to provid...
Once more (with pants)
Harry Potter actor Daniel Radcliffe is continuing his march towards Broadway fame. Unlike his role in Equus, we're assuming playing J. Pierrepont Finch in the 2011 production of How to Succeed in...
For serious?
Whoa: the Royal Shakespeare Company has arranged something called Such Tweet Sorrow, a five-week-long event that allows six actors (playing Romeo, Juliet, and four additional characters) to tweet ...
Fun with taxes...
In honor of Tax Day, allow us to point out that you can find copies of Jean Johnson and Scott Bittle's excellent Where Does the Money Go? for as little as $5.99 online.
Manga Shakespeare: A Midsummer Night's Dream, by Kate Brown
Amulet Books clearly worked hard on their Manga Shakespeare books. The series is edited by a “leading Shakespeare scholar” and evaluated by an educational editor and an advisory group of teachers...
Dark times
There was an interesting article in the Seattle Times (via the Tri-City Herald) a few days ago about a potential censorship case in the Richland School District. A 10th grade Honors language-arts...
The Scarlet T-Shirt
The L.A. Times recently posted an article about literary-themed t-shirts. I particularly liked the style of and idea behind these baseball-style shirts... but I wish they'd chosen better characte...
The Reckoning, by Kelley Armstrong
Kelley Armstrong is one of those authors whose work I rarely think about unless one of her books is right in front of me. I like her novels, but they just don't stick in my brain—at least, they h...
National Library Week
April 11th through the 17th is National Library Week, and public libraries nationwide will be celebrating with special events. This year's theme is "Communities Thrive @ Your Library", so if it's...
Let them read read Pat the Bunny.
After years of finding Gwyneth Paltrow unbearably full of herself, I'm learning to appreciate her. I still think she's insane, but insane in a fun way, you know? But while reading her GOOP newsl...
Never Tell Our Business to Strangers: A Memoir, by Jennifer Mascia
When Jennifer Mascia was five years old, her father was taken away by the FBI. It was the first sign that there was something different about her family—a difference that Mascia only dimly unders...
Return of the Tiffany
AWESOME. There's a release date up for the next Tiffany Aching novel: I Shall Wear Midnight is coming out on September 28th. We will be there with bells on.We want Terry Pratchett to focus on hi...
Out and about
If any of our beloved readers are going to be within traveling distance of Olympia, WA on April 23rd and 24th, make sure to check out the Olympia Arts Walk. Not only is it a consistently awesome ...
They Never Came Back, by Caroline Cooney
Caroline Cooney has never quite achieved household-name status, but she's made a successful career out of writing suspense novels for young readers. Her latest effort is They Never Came Back, a f...