A fitting tribute
I had planned (and still intend to post, but on Monday) a review of the three books in Amber Kizer's Meridian series, but then Megan pointed out that today's Google Doodle is honoring my beloved Edward Gorey, and it was too magnificent to go unmentioned...
Filling a void
Thank goodness: someone has finally responded to the worldwide demand* for a book combining wacky cat photos with Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice...
Solving a mystery
In a bit of interesting (if gross) news, poet Pablo Neruda's body is going to be exhumed and tested for evidence of poisoning, according to Time. Neruda's family has always maintained that he died at age 69 of advanced prostate cancer, but a judge in Chile has ordered the autopsy in response...
Anachronisms ahoy!
Slashfilm is warning us to brace ourselves for Dodge and Twist, a movie retelling of Charles Dickens’s novel Oliver Twist that will combine "the context of a period film with modern action thrills". They're comparing it to Guy Ritchie's recent Sherlock Holmes films...
G-rated swooning
The website Avidly recently put together a lovely list of G-Rated Moments of Swoon featured in literature. I've never read a few of their picks (including the Trixie Belden series, although their description was enticing enough that I now intend to do so as soon as possible), but I absolutely agree with the others...
Weekly Book Giveaway: Please Ignore Vera Dietz, by A. S. King
Our current Weekly Book Giveaway pick is A.S. King's Please Ignore Vera Dietz, which we reviewed here. We don't want to sound like we're damning with faint praise (the book is really good), but here are our thoughts in a nutshell: King's book is more fun than any story about a budding teenage alcoholic mourning her best friend ought to be...
Please Ignore Vera Dietz, by A.S. King
It is no coincidence that the promotional blurb on the cover of A.S. King's darkly funny novel Please Ignore Vera Dietz was written by Crank author Ellen Hopkins—King's story doesn't actually revel in its grim subject matter the way Hopkins's books do, but it's aiming squarely for the same audience...
I disapprove.
Man, one piece of good news giveth a Valentine's Day warm and fuzzy feeling; one piece of bad news taketh it away...
Sendak lives on
Okay, this is pretty great: the Huffington Post informs me that New York City is planning to name a new public school (PS 118 in Park Slope Brooklyn) after famed children's author Maurice Sendak...
Refreshing Harry Potter
According to USA Today, Scholastic recently unveiled the first of seven new cover designs of J.K. Rowling's Harry Potter series. The new covers will appear on paperback reprints of the series coming out this fall. They feature artwork by author/illustrator Kazu Kibuishi (of Amulet fame), and will mark the 15th anniversary of the U.S. publication of Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone...
My condolences
Remember when I wrote that Jennifer Crusie was republishing a novella she'd written long ago, later described as "embarrassingly bad", and said she never wanted to lay eyes on again? I was trying to be understanding about the reprint, because I know Crusie has had a really rough year and could use the money, but it turns out that wasn't an accurate assessment of the situation...
Signs of life from L.J. Smith
I was looking up information on the CW's upcoming spin-off series The Originals, which will kick off with a "back-door pilot" episode of The Vampire Diaries airing on April 25th. I wanted to see if L.J. Smith (the original author of The Vampire Diaries) was going to be involved, so I made one of my infrequent visits to her delightfully hokey website...
Weekly Book Giveaway: I Was Jane Austen's Best Friend, by Cora Harrison
This week's book giveaway title is Cora Harrison's I Was Jane Austen's Best Friend, which we reviewed here. (The book isn't actually a fictional tell-all about Jane's dirty secrets, despite the way the title makes it sound...
I Was Jane Austen's Best Friend, by Cora Harrison
According to the promotional sheet included with the review copy we received, Cora Harrison's YA novel I Was Jane Austen's Best Friend was written for “anyone who has imagined what it might have been like to be the best friend, cousin, and confidante of the one and only Jane Austen.” That is, um, a very specific fantasy, but I'm sure those readers are out there. Somewhere...
Passion and Rapture, by Lauren Kate
I reviewed Lauren Kate's novel Fallen in 2010, its sequel in 2011, and then waited nearly two full years to bother reading books three and four, despite the fact that they've been sitting on our To Be Read shelf for ages. That says a lot about my feelings about this series—the premise was too promising to set aside entirely, but...
For the hardest of hardcore geeks only
If you are really, really rich, and really, really geeky, you should check out this $9,900 "Orcrist" sword inspired by The Lord of the Rings. It's a limited-edition item, will only be made to order, and requires a wait time of up to 6 months...
Shopping (for myself)
I've decided to request one of these gender-swapped fairy tale prints from artist Yudi Chen for Valentine's Day. Pretty adorable, huh? I'm leaning towards the "Tarzana and John" one...
DO NOT WANT.
I'm sorry, but I'm voting "no" on this one: according to Deadline, Guillermo del Toro is planning to produce a movie adaptation of Frances Hodgson Burnett's novel The Secret Garden, and it's rumored that his version will be set in the American South at the turn of the 20th Century...
Still a loss, but it could have been worse.
The AP Wire has posted a surprisingly positive story about the recent military activity in Timbuktu. After the French and Malian troops chased out the Islamist militants that had taken over the fabled city, there was concern that the collection of 30,000 ancient manuscripts stored in the city's Ahmed Baba Institute had been destroyed...
Floors, by Patrick Carman
When it comes to Patrick Carman, I usually end up damning with faint praise: his books are, y'know, fine. His 2011 novel Floors maintains his record of being totally inoffensive—I've read better, and I've read worse...
Weekly Book Giveaway: Floors, by Patrick Carman
This week's book giveaway title is Floors, the latest offering from prolific children's author Patrick Carman. Unlike some of his other recent releases, this is just a book (there are no video tie-ins or whatever), but we really prefer that, so here's hoping the story is entertaining enough to stand on its own two feet. Our review will go up tomorrow morning...
There are big names behind the Vampire Academy movie
The upcoming movie adaptation of Richelle Mead's Vampire Academy has some serious YA street cred: according to Deadline, Daniel Waters, writer of the iconic black comedy Heathers, has written the script for the first movie, and his brother, Mean Girls director Mark Waters...
Waste of time
Ugh. NYMag recently posted a ridiculous article about Jane Austen's novels, asserting (shocker!) that she's, like, still way popular, particularly with the ladies! Thanks for the info, guys! The whole thing is really poorly researched (it describes The Lizzie Bennet Diaries as "a web series in which Mr. Darcy has Twitter", which, while technically true...
Unexpected consequences
Well, this is a problem: according to CBS News, the decline in printed newspapers has created difficulties for San Francisco's Animal Care & Control (and elsewhere, presumably). The shelter system has long relied on used newspapers to line its puppy cages, but...
Forget Tim Burton, Sleepy Hollow is going Underworld
I'm shoving this into my mental file labeled "Probably a mistake": according to Entertainment Weekly, Fox has ordered a pilot for a television adaptation of Washington Irving's Sleepy Hollow. They're describing it as “A modern-day supernatural thriller based on...
The Lacey Chronicles, by Eve Edwards
As long-time readers of the site know, I tend to avoid romance novels set prior to the 19th century. I'm sure that means I'm missing out on a ton of excellent books, but Kate Beaton's 15th Century Peasant Romance Comics perfectly sum up my vision of the English-speaking world before, say, 1795: lots of early death, zero dental hygiene...
"Darwin Day" possible (but really unlikely)
According to the Huffington Post, New Jersey Democratic Rep. Rush Holt has introduced legislation that would designate February 12, 2013, as “Darwin Day". Holt's attempt to recognize the famous biologist as a "worthy symbol... [of] the achievements of reason, science, and the advancement of human knowledge” was introduced last week. Unfortunately for science fans...
The Graveyard Book movie is back on
I had no idea (or had forgotten) this movie was even in the offing, much less that the project had gone off the rails. But apparently Neil Gaiman's 2008 novel The Graveyard Book was being developed as a stop-motion project to be directed by Henry Selick and produced by Disney, with a planned release date of October, 2013. Things went downhill last summer...
Blood Magic, by Tessa Gratton
I winced when I read the promotional materials for Tessa Gratton's Blood Magic, which describe the book as “A natural next-read for fans of Stephenie Meyer”. I am not one of said fans, so this news was not enticing. Having now read the book, let me reassure my fellow Twilight anti-fans that Blood Magic is a gore-splattered, intense YA novel without so much as a hint of love triangles, magical imprinting, or sparkly vampire action...
Weekly Book Giveaway: Blood Magic, by Tessa Gratton
This week's book giveaway is Tessa Gratton's debut novel Blood Magic, which we're planning to review this afternoon. It looks fairly gory (I haven't read it yet), but if you're in the mood for that, today could be your lucky day...