It’s been a strange week here–as my eldest put it on Tuesday, “today has certainl been a crazy week” (and the day got stranger!). The rest of the week was a little calmer, but let’s stress “little.” So, I didn’t get much book readin’ done. And less online reading done. So…scant things here this week. And a lot is from Witty & Sarcastic Book Club, so much so I feel I owe her a cut. Scratch that, I do owe her a cut. Jodie, you get 30% of every penny I make off this post!

Odds ‘n ends about books and reading that caught my eye this week. You’ve probably seen some/most/all of them, but just in case:
bullet Libraries Expand Multilingual Offerings: Public libraries are augmenting their world language collections and bringing patrons to the international stacks—cool.
bullet To commemorate the 72nd anniversary of it’s publication, Literary Hub posted W. H. Auden’s 1954 review of The Fellowship of the Ring.
bullet My Life in the Closet…With My Imaginary Friends—a little piece by the legendary George Guidall about his very strange career
bullet ‘Neuromancer’ and the Long, Slow Grind of Cyberpunk: We’ve caught up to the future. Unfortunately.—Nick Kolakowski muses Neuromancer, Gibson, Cyberpunk, and society.
bullet Celebrating Human Artists—Rather than another anti-AI tirade (as fun as those can be), A.J. Calvin goes pro-Human Artists.
bullet Monthly Manga Mania Featuring Firsty Duelist: Case Closed! by Gosho Aoyama—Not only does the Firsty Duelist make his regular post, he explains why that kid shows up on the covers (I’ve always thought that looked out of place when I’ve seen it in bookstores, like every bookstore/library puts it on the wrong shelf)
bullet The Specific Bliss of Just Not Having an Opinion (Sometimes)—Molly Templeton talks about something that doesn’t seem possible any more.
bullet Interview with Dana, Owner of Happy Medium Books Café
bullet There were a few more Self-Published Authors Appreciation Week posts that came out since last week’s Miscellany, like:
bullet Interview with Julian M. Miles
bullet An Interview with the Narratess Indie Sale—a person responsible for saving me a lot of money on books I’ve largely left unread. (the former is something I’m grateful for, the latter is my failing)
bullet Jonathan Nevair Shouts About a Favorite Author

A Book-ish Related Podcast episode (or two) you might want to give a listen to:
bullet Spies, Lies and Private Eyes Ep. 183 Tori Eldridge—a good chat about her new book, her background, and more.

My favorite sentence/passage/phrase (or two) that I read this week:
I’ve realized is that I really like reading, I haven’T noticed the other kids reading, and I’m not surprised, because the books on the shelf are old and ratty-looking, I wasn’t drawn to them at first, and i only picked one up because I hoped it would help me fall asleep. Bur started getting really into the stories, and I think I actually like them for the same reason as I like history class: you start off thinking that its good versus evil, or that the main character is the good guy, but most of the time, it ends up being more complicated than that.—Detained by David Esperanza and Gerardo Iván Morales

To help talk about backlist titles (and just for fun), What Was I Talking About 10 Years Ago This Week?
bullet The Sound and the Fury by William Faulkner
bullet The Coaster by Erich Wurster
bullet Friends of the Wigwam by John William Huelskamp
bullet The Wizard’s Heir by Devri Walls
bullet And I mentioned the releases of: The Summer that Melted Everything by Tiffany McDaniel; Outfoxed by David Rosenfelt; Nevernight by Jay Kristoff; GUN by The Gun Collective; and City of Wolves by Willow Palecek

This Week’s New Releases that I’m Excited About and/or You’ll Probably See Here Soon:
bullet Sea of Charms by Sarah Beth Durst—”the third magical adventure in the Spellshop series” focusing on Marin, the supply runner we met in The Enchanted Greenshouse–along with the sea serpent and Ree the shrub.
bullet Magic & Mystery Collection curated by John Joseph Adams—”In these genre-blending short stories, acclaimed fantasy authors work their magic on puzzle-box plots. Whether set in realities far-flung or familiar, these mysteries leave an irresistible trail of clues.”

an image of a Threads post by lewis_workshop 'Did you know that adding a single layer of books to your walls can insulate an average home from the terrible reality of the world outside.'
image source: lewis_workshop on Threads