Celebrate Your Freedom to Read: Banned Books Week Sept 22-28

It's Banned Books Week, and I am celebrating MY freedom to read by reading Where the Wild Things Are to my kids tonight.

Books are challenged (and sometimes removed from circulation) all over the country every year. While not banned as other countries do, restricting access to ideas has a similar effect. Think your part of the country is immune to these challenges? It happens where you'd least expect.



View Book Bans and Challenges, 2007-2011 in a larger map

Yes, Author to Author Blurbs Really Are Worthless

After my last gripey post , I was surprised by the number of responses I received from authors on Twitter.

Sadly, those authors were not objecting to the practice I had been describing as both deceptive and wrong. They were objecting to the notion that author blurbs (those marketable little quotes from fellow authors you see on the covers and on the first few pages) were fake. Or less than genuine. Responses ranged from "I only blurb authors I think my readers will love," to "Just because authors are friends, it doesn't make the blurbs less genuine."

Trust and the Reader/Author Relationship

I got my ranty-pants on yesterday, but in an unusual turn of events, it wasn't about authors behaving badly regarding reviews or social media. It was about a publishing, writing, and marketing decision made by Sylvia Day and her publisher Berkley (a division of Penguin).

[To be as transparent as possible, I have not read the series in question. I can only gauge the content from the reader reactions I have seen online.]

In contrast to so many reader flame-ups regarding series direction, authorial choice, quality decline etc. this reader rage-fest was caused by a decision to extend a promised trilogy (the Crossfire books) to a (minimum) of 5 books—and in a less-than-transparent way that caught many readers who pre-ordered by surprise when they reached an abrupt ending in book 3. As of this morning, at least 50% of the readers who left reviews on Amazon are feeling taken advantage of, duped, misled... None of which is good for Sylvia Day's reputation.

Read Across America: March 2, 2012

Today is Read Across America Day!! It's also the birthday of Dr. Seuss. Our area had a Family Reading Night last night, and most of the students this morning were toting in blankets, pillows and their favorite books to have a read-a-thon in their classrooms.

This is one of my favorite days in the whole year. Grab a book and a few minutes to celebrate reading today!

You can find out more about Read Across America by going here and here.

The Romance Masquerade

No, I'm not talking about the silly thing found in historical romances where rich people dress up and wear masks. I'm talking about when romance books masquerade as something other than romance. These are the books that non-romance readers forget to sneer about.

Catherine Coulter, Jayne Ann Krentz, Susan Elizabeth Phillips, Nora Roberts and Diana Gabaldon are a few authors I can think of whose books are often shelved outside the romance area. Sometimes in mystery or fiction. During my tenure at BN, I spent quite a lot of time of escorting a confused buyer from the romance section to the fiction section when they were searching for Jennifer Crusie books or any number of other "romances in disguise."

Anyone who has followed the blog for awhile knows that I'm not a fan of my local indie. But I did manage to find some romance there. Just not in the romance section. And invariably, it was a big name author. In my observation, big names in romance seem to more frequently warrant the general "Fiction" label from the marketing department for their books. Which in turn allows them to skirt the stigma romance continues to suffer under and sell more to a wider audience. (Women's fiction and chick lit offer great camouflage, too.)

BN.com changes shipping promo

I admit it. I was a bit peeved to find out that Barnes and Noble had stopped offering their "Fast and Free" shipping service for orders over $25. Living where I do, fast delivery was the primary reason I chose Barnes and Noble over the plethora of other online book vendors.

They still offer "standard" free shipping with a $25 minimum, but so does everyone else.

So, why did they change? They moved that 'fast' delivery as a member benefit to their Membership card program. The one with the $25 fee.

It seems they are taking a page out of Amazon's playbook with this move. And it doesn't make me happy.

I don't believe in paying a fee for a loyalty card. Ever. Either the store offers deals and service that I like or they don't. I don't want to be strong-armed into paying for a card that then requires me to be "loyal" to that company in order to make my investment pay off.

Which is why I'm not an Amazon Prime member either.

Initially, I expect to see an increase in BN Membership sales. (Formerly Readers' Advantage). Then I expect BN to increase the cost of the card.

Yeah, I'm an optimist.

That's not to say there aren't advantages to BN Members. In addition to the tiny discount members are given(for in store purchases ONLY), they are now getting free 3 BUSINESS day shipping from BN.com. With no order minimums. That's a good thing for existing cardholders. And much cheaper than Amazon's nearly $80 membership. But BN's fast delivery is not 2 day delivery. Or really 3 day delivery since it is only business days and itoften takes them 2 days to ship. Which means it could take up to a week to receive your books--even with the faster options.


B&N Membership Information

Beware the Ugly Covers

Christina Dodd has been poking fun at bad covers on her Facebook page this week.

I inadvertently did the same after stumbling across the cover for the new Amanda Quick hardcover, Burning Lamp, due out April 20.
No, that's not her mouth. It's her nose.

There's something not quite right about this cover. With the creepy angle, near baldness of the woman, the odd eye color, and the nose-mouth thing at the bottom it's a wonder how this example of hideousness made it out of the art department.

Even weirder is the UK version. Perhaps it's because Jayne Ann Krentz is more well known in the UK than the Amanda Quick pen name that the JAK name was given such prominence. It's disconcerting to say the least. At this size, I can hardly even SEE the Amanda Quick name.

From there, it's just a quick jump to pondering the usefulness of the not-really-a-secret pen name. Is it merely to keep your genres separated ala Nora Roberts/JD Robb? Is it to keep prolific authors from overwhelming the market ala Barbara Michaels/Elizabeth Peters? Or is it strictly a marketing tool? Given the intertwined nature of the Arcane Society series between both Krentz and Quick, I'm thinking the latter in this case.

For me, it seems a bit silly to write under assumed names that are open secrets. And even sillier to put those multiple names on such ugly covers.

I've got the Can't Stay Focused Blues

Something about the post-holiday let-down is making me not want to read anything. At all. I've actually been finding "spring cleaning" chores around the house rather than reading. And that's just not like me.

I have started and put down a whopping 4 books in a row. Just not in the mood for any of them. The last one I did finish, I hated. Maybe that's it.

So...while I continue to struggle with the newest Christina Skye (I usually love Draycott Abbey stories), I'm debating picking up an old favorite to reread.

My usual go-to books are Devil's Bride by Stephanie Laurens, A Secret Love by Stephanie Laurens, or The Lady in Red by Karen Hawkins. All, oddly enough, historicals.

What are your favorite rereads?

The Holiday Spirit: Bibliophile style

It's that time of year again. Time to be thankful for our blessings and to think about sharing a little with those who are less fortunate.

In that spirit, here are a few ideas for those who find their bookshelves overfloweth!

• Sign up as a volunteer shipper for Operation Paperback .  OP is a registered non-profit that ships paperback books (and a few other odds and ends) to our troops overseas. 
• Sell those books online and donate all or a portion of the sales price to the charity of your choice. eBay has recently reduced the minimum donation amount, so selling books for a good cause just got better!
• Donate your old books to the Friends of the Library or to your local library's collection. I have quite a few book club edition romances that I've grown tired of. Our local library doesn't have a big romance selection, so I think I'll offer them to them first.
• Donate to First Book, a site that provides free children's books to kids in need.

Anyone else have some bibliophile ways to share the holiday spirit this season?

The first post!

It's about time I started my own blog filled with my reviews for Romance and Mysteries.

Here it is.

With money being tight these days, we're all being more selective about which books we buy and which we borrow. I hope these reviews help make the decision a little easier!