Oprah's baaaaack...

Yes, its true -- Oprah's Book Club is back and better than ever! Bookninja rhapsodizes about why those in the literary community are obsessed with this woman and her book club ...

free books

Well...sorta...
More like free in the sense that these are books in the public domain and available for anyone to read or download...

beach reading

Books you need to bring to the beach this summer...
{Note: thanks to LII!}

consumption

What I bought at Borders last night (because I couldn't help myself...)

Small Island by Andrea Levy (recently won the Whitbread Award)
Lolita by Vladimir Nabokov
War Trash by Ha Jin
Trying Again by Ann Douglas and John Sussman
Dead Souls by Ian Rankin

Author of the Day: cranky writers

There is something loveable about Christopher Hitchens, which I have stated before, but now I have proof others love him!
Here are selected articles & interviews: The Atlantic Monthly (must be a subscriber to read), The Guardian Unlimited: Books, History News Network, Identity Theory: the narrative thread, Stop Smiling Magazine, The Village Voice, The Weekly Standard

Gabaldon update...

I am so excited -- it looks like the next book in Diana Gabaldon's wonderful Claire and Jamie Fraser series will be published in September 2005...just in time for my birthday!

Orange Prize winner

The 2005 Orange Prize winner for Fiction is Lionel Shriver's novel, We Need to Talk About Kevin...

Keillor fans

Any Garrison Keillor fans out there? If you are, then you probably will be interested in The Writer's Almanac, "a daily program of poetry and history hosted by Garrison Keillor" usually found on public radio stations across the country. Today's entries include a poem, literary trivia and a short essay by Keillor...

mocking me

To Kill a Mockingbird is that one great American novel I have never read, but always meant to. Maybe I'll try to dig into it this summer while sitting by my brand new pool...
In the meantime, I should check out this resource guide to start thinking about the larger themes of the novel.

Potter parties

Can't wait until the new Harry Potter book comes out? Check out this site which keeps track of "Potter Parties" happening all over the world... {Note: thanks to ResearchBuzz}

literary maps

What a neat idea ... The New York Times created a literary map of Manhattan, designating all the great literary landmarks. Thanks to Susan who let me read her copy of the Book Review!

tricky evolution topic

Apparently children are not supposed to know about evolution...picture book author Lisa Westberg Peters has written a book about evolution for children and was told not to talk about the book at an elementary school in Stillwater, Minnesota, where she was invited to speak. She refused to visit the school...

sex scenes worth mentioning

Nerve.com has a monthly award for the best literary sex scene, called the Henry Miller award. Sue Miller won for May, with her novel Lost in the Forest...

summer adventures

Librarian Nancy Pearl recommended some adventure novels for summer reading on NPR...

pop-ups

Remember those cute pop-up books from when you were a kid? Well, the University of North Texas Libraries has a wonderful site which takes you on a tour through the history of pop-up and moveable picture books...
{Note: found on LII.org}

Book Sense winner

Book Sense, the online commercial venture of independent booksellers across the U.S., announced their 2005 Book Sense Book of the Year award for fiction: Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell by Susanna Clarke...

books to remember

The New York Public Library has an annual 25 Books to Remember -- a list of the 25 best books from the previous year's publications, both fiction and nonfiction. The list is compiled by a committee of librarians who read TONS of reviews to narrow down the list to 25 -- I should know! I served on the committee selecting the books for the 1998 list...

Austen adapted

Finished another retelling of Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice over the weekend. This book is entitled Vanity and Vexation: a novel of pride and prejudice by Kate Fenton. The new twist in this story involves a middle-aged reporter-turned-novelist, who moves to the country and stumbles into a real-life Pride and Prejudice plot. The Mr. Darcy character in this new P&P is a dark, arrogant, & headstrong female director named Mary. The Elizabeth Bennet character is reversed, and is now Nick Bevan, the novelist. Misunderstandings and mix-ups ensue, with much hilarity. One particularly neat device involves a "novel-within-a-novel" plot twist which surprises the reader halfway through the novel.

freaky economics

Book of the Day goes to...
Freakonomics by Steven D. Levitt and Stephen Dubner, which has been getting all kinds of crazy press in the past few weeks. Yesterday, the two authors were interviewed on the TODAY show with Matt Lauer about their controversial new book. The two authors come to some startling conclusions about ideas, using rigorous statistical analysis. Examples include: "Which is more dangerous, a gun or a swimming pool? What do schoolteachers and sumo wrestlers have in common? Why do drug dealers still live with their moms? How much do parents really matter? What kind of impact did Roe v. Wade have on violent crime?"
Read some reviews here: About.com, BookBrowse, English Rules, Powell's Books, SocioWeb, The Weekly Standard...

foreign fiction prize

The Independent Foreign Fiction Prize, given out by Arts Council England, was announced. The winner is Windows on the World by Frédéric Beigbeder -- a novel about September 11th.