Category: News/Misc. Page 231 of 242

Remember me? Sorry this page hasn’t been updated in forever, I’m really frustrated that things have gotten so hectic (beyond hectic) that I haven’t been able to write practically anything. It’s worse than that, actually, I’m down to about a novel a week for the last month and a half or so. Still no time to write anything, but I figure at least I can dump a bunch of miscellany links and whatnot.

• I have to start with this one: On Becoming 1/3 of Robert B. Parker — I’ve made no secret of the fact that I’ve been disappointed (to put it mildly) with Michael Brandman‘s efforts taking the helm of the Jesse Stone books — as much as I’ve appreciated his work on the movies. I’ve only read Coleman’s piece in the In Pursuit of Spenser book — and about 1/3 of Walking the Perfect Square so far — but I’ve got a really good feeling about this.
• Speaking of Robert B. Parker, here’s a nice lil’ piece, A Conversation with Ace Atkins
• How you help authors the most — Kevin Hearne answers a question I’ve always wondered: what’s the best way to get your book buying dollars to help an author?
• Brad Parks, who’s becoming one of the more reliable mystery writers around, recently paid tribute to Sue Grafton at a mystery convention. Watch his Alphabet Sue
• Retaining the Look of a Series — I thought this blog post from Strange Chemistry about the design of covers for a series was quite fascinating.
• The genre debate: Science fiction travels farther than literary fiction — The Guardian gives us yet another defense of SF/F’s ability to do what “literary” fiction cannot
• On the lighter side, a nice little Buzzfeed post: 33 Reasons Why You’re Addicted To Books
• and lastly, I second everything here: A Few Things I’ve Learned As An Avid Reader

I know I’m forgetting a few, but here are the new releases I’m most excited about/interested in since I last posted:
• The Dragon Business by Kevin J. Anderson — looks like fun
• Attack The Geek: A Ree Reyes Side-Quest by Michael R. Underwood — One of the most fun Urban Fantasy series around gets a new entry. Yah-hoo!
• The Thousand-Dollar Tan Line by Rob Thomas and Jennifer Graham — The first in a hopefully very long Veronica Mars series. Not as good as I hoped, but fun enough to keep me wanting more. I’ll try to write more soon.
• Heaven’s Queen by Rachel Bach — The Paradox series ends here. Can’t wait.
• Dawn’s Early Light by Pip Ballantine and Tee Morris — The third Ministry of Peculiar Occurrences novel. Should be fun.

The end of last week rolled away from me before I could assemble this for Saturday. So, rather than dusting something off, I figured I’d throw up the odds ‘n ends from last week about books and reading that caught. You’ve probably seen some/most/all of them, but just in case:

• 5 Reading Rules for Book Lovers of All Ages — A nice little piece from Reading Rainbow, didn’t even know that was still around.
• There Is Reading, and There Is Looking at Letters — ever since stories about Spritz started hitting the web, I’ve been sounding like a cranky old man to any of my friends who’ve sounded even a little interested. But come on!! The headline says it all, but the post that follows does a good job explaining it.
• The 25 Best Tumblr Accounts for Book Nerds — I’d seen a couple of these before, but not many — and there’s some real fun feeds here.
• David Nicholls moves on from One Day with new novel — Like many others, I really liked One Day, (couldn’t finish Starter for Ten, though). Hope this is more like the former.
• Ernest Cline is the luckiest geek alive — Great profile about Cline — consider me a huge fan, and I expect Armada will only cement that.
• title — blah

There Was One Release Last Week that I’m Excited About and/or You’ll Probably See Here Soon:
• Night Broken by Patricia Briggs — a new Mercy Thompson! Know nothing about it, but that it’s sitting on my desk waiting to be taken on a road trip with me this week.

Still in the midst of the reading/writing lull I mentioned last week — working really hard at shaking it. In the meantime, here are some odds ‘n ends over the week about books and reading that caught my eye. You’ve probably seen some/most/all of them, but just in case:

• The Strongest Brand In Publishing Is … — Fascinating look at publishing, book/author branding, etc.
• 19 Quotes That Will Make You Fall in Love With Books All Over Again — The headline oversells it a bit, but, there are some great lines here that will likely resonate with anyone who reads this blog. Favorites include: “The love of books is a love which requires neither justification, apology, nor defense.” – J.A. Langford and “I read my eyes out and can’t read half enough… The more one reads the more one sees we have to read.” – John Adams
• An Interview with Author Jonathan Wood — I thoroughly enjoyed the ebook versions of Wood’s first two novels — No Hero and Yesterday’s Hero. Very glad to see him get the better exposure that paper copies will bring — and that there’s a third volume next year.

This Week’s New Releases I’m Excited About and/or You’ll Probably See Here Soon:
• The Player by Brad Parks — the newest in the series about a mystery solving member of that very endangered species, newspaper reporter. I expect that it’ll be tense, amusing, and well-crafted.
• Half-Off Ragnarok by Seanan McGuire — the third InCryptid novel. I’ve got this sitting on my desk, waiting for the road trip I’m taking in two weeks. I might be able to wait that long to tear into it.
• Notes from the Internet Apocalypse by Wayne Gladstone — this looks pretty funny.

You ever have one of those weeks, where despite your best efforts/intentions, you just can’t find the time or energy to read? (or, write about what you read?) I’ve had two of those in a row here. Hope that changes soon. In the meantime, here are the odds ‘n ends over the week about books and reading that caught my eye. You’ve probably seen some/most/all of them, but just in case:

• The first item this week was linked by Lee Goldberg, who tweeted it was “A monumentally stupid essay from a struggling author: If JK Rowling Cares About Writing, She Should Stop Doing It. Since then I’ve seen it a few places, never once mentioned positively. One of the better responses as An Open Letter to JK Rowling: Please Don’t Stop Writing (somehow I have a hard time believing such an open letter was necessary, even if Rowling somehow heard of the first essay).
• Doors of Stone sketching comic — Someone made a comic depicting what’s going on in the minds of all Rothfuss’ fans.
• The Endangered Art of the Movie Novelization — I loved movie novelizations as a kid, and will still pick the occasional one up. This piece makes a lot of sense.

This Week’s New Releases I’m Excited About and/or You’ll Probably See Here Soon. After a lean week or two, I’ve got a bunch this week:
• Hammer of Angels by G. T. Almasi — the first in this series as such a blast, I can’t wait to get my hands on this
• The Chase by Janet Evanovich and Lee Goldberg — two of my favorites are back with their new Fox & O’Hare series, should be fun
• Honor’s Knight by Rachel Bach — And one more second in a series. As long as this is almost as good as the first, I’ll be happy
• The Undead Pool by Kim Harrison — the series gets one step closer to the end here. I’m ready for it to be over, but I also know as soon as the paperback hits the shelves, I’ll be diving in.

Odds ‘n ends over the week about books and reading that caught my eye. You’ve probably seen some/most/all of them, but just in case:

• Harper Lee settles museum lawsuit — A bit of good news on this front
• A couple of weeks ago, I posted a reaction to Isabelle Allende’s view on her mystery novel. Here’s some more. Now she’s apologized.

Only one new release caught my eye this week (I’m super excited about one next week):
• Grimm: The Chopping Block by John Passarella — There are Grimm tie-in novels? Huh. I just might have to check these out. The premise on this one works for me.