Tag: Saturday Miscellany Page 13 of 61

We’ve got a bumper-crop of new books this week, and a few other things that show me more than my memory does how little time I spent online this week.

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:
Book bans backfiring? Study reveals increased readership for prohibited books
Is Traditional Fiction Publishing Broken?
What’s the Future of Books? Amid historic disruption in the publishing industry, big questions are—rightfully—being asked. Here, experts weigh in on how books (and the ways we discover them) are going to change.
No, I Don’t Want to Join Your Book Club—some non-traditional book clubs
Has It Ever Been Harder to Make a Living As An Author?
Book Thieves Take the Story and Run with It
#R3COMM3ND3D2023 continues to look at favorites from 2023:
…with Nicki Mags of Secret Library Book Blog
…with Karen Kingston of KarenKisreading
…with Author Rachel Sargeant
…Gill of A Good Book ‘n a Brew
…with Joanne of Portobello Book Blog
…with Carol of Reading Ladies
…with Davida Chazan of The Chocolate Lady’s Book Review Blog
Witty and Sarcastic Book Club’s Dragon Week wrapped up this week, so you can read all of the goodness there now.
To celebrate the publication of Femme Fae-Tales anthology, Peat Long conducted Femme Fae-Tales Interviews with all of the authors, like this one.
An Important Reminder from Chuck Wendig

This Week’s New Releases that I’m Excited About and/or You’ll Probably See Here Soon:
Partial Function by JCM Berne—”If Taken starred Michelle Yeoh and was set on a Jurassic Park-inspired Cradle.” As I said recently, I had a lot of fun with this concept and its execution
Resurrection Walk by Michael Connelly—Mickey Haller + Bosch. I’m sure there’s more to say, but who cares beyond that?
The Olympian Affair by Jim Butcher—Yes, it took Butcher an eon to give us the second Cinder Spires book, but something tells me most readers will forgive him for that once we get to dive in.
Noodle Conquers Comfy Mountain by Jonathan Graziano, illustrated by Dan Tavis—this follow-up to Noodle and the No Bones Day is aDORable. I’ll have more to say about it soon (mostly consisting of rephrasing of that sentence).
Calico by Lee Goldberg—a murder mystery and a Western in modern California. That’s really all I know so far, but I can’t wait to learn more.
Chaos Terminal by Mur Lafferty—a murder among a new batch of human visitors to the sentient space station, a conflict between alien races, and an attack from without? Things don’t get boring in this Midsolar Murder sequel.
Bookshops & Bonedust by Travis Baldree—this prequel to Legends & Lattes contains all the warm fuzzies of its predecessor, a dash of action, and a more overt romantic arc.
A Curse of Krakens by Kevin Hearne—the much-anticipated conclusion to the Seven Kennings trilogy is out, which means it’s time for me to read the second volume any day now.
Blood Betrayal by Ausma Zehanat Khan—Detective Inaya Rahman investigates a pair of officer-involved killings. I’m guessing neither of these will turn out to be what they seem at first glance.

Yeah, this is later than usual. I spent the morning at the Boise Library!’s Boise Book Faire 2023 getting to chat with several local authors about their works. I got to renew acquaintances with a few authors who have shown up here over the last 12 months or so—and met a few who I hope to feature soon.

But that’s for the future (or, I guess, the past), let’s move on to today’s Miscellany.

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:
Banned books often get circulation bump, new study finds—a silver lining? Or fodder for conspiracy?
Why Kids Aren’t Falling in Love With Reading: Hint: It’s not just the screens
Make Humanities Fun Again
How Has Big Publishing Changed American Fiction?: A new book argues that corporate publishing has transformed what it means to be an author.
Does Reading Improve Health?
Robert B. Parker: The Master of Crime Fiction
The Story Behind the Story: “A Good Rush of Blood,” by Matt Phillips—I’m so glad I put off reading this until I’d written about the book—I’d have spent far too long working in responses to it. Secondly, I’m so glad Phillips stuck to his guns and gave us the book that he did (wouldn’t have liked it nearly as much if he’d buckled)
Language and translation in Insiders – Shannon Knight—a nice little BTS about Knight’s newest book.
The Science Behind Steampunk and Retrofuturistic Technology—from Jonathan Fesmire
Partial Function Unboxing!—Who doesn’t like a good unboxing video? Watch JCM Berne get the first Partial Function hardcopy! (available Tuesday—order it today!)
Self Published Fantasy Releases – November 2023—In case you needed to do some shopping for yourself/others. Good looking offerings here.
Eternally Fascinating, the Vampire Endures—Author LindaAnn LoSchiavo stopped by Witty and Sarcastic Bookclub to talk about Blooksuckers/vamps/Fangheads/or whatever you want to call them
#R3COMM3ND3D from Damppebbles is back with #R3COMM3ND3D2023. This celebration of the best new books of 2023 is guaranteed to add to your TBR.
BookBlogger David of Blue Book Balloon
Lisa from Owl Be Sat Reading
Book Blogger Carla of Carla Loves to Read
Emily Quinn of A Quintillion Words (which is just a brilliant blog name)
Witty & Sarcastic also kicked-off Dragon Week 2023—Who needs “Shark Week” anyhow? I’m not going to link to every piece here, but you need to go check it out.
Spells and Spaceships is yet again hosting Norsevember, where you can read fun things like The Norns and the Weaving of Fate and The Dwarves of Norse Mythology
And there’s one more November-celebration—SciFiMonth! Some great-looking stuff there, too.

This Week’s New Releases that I’m Excited About and/or You’ll Probably See Here Soon:
Hacker by Duncan MacMaster—Jake Mooney, a ghostwriter turned reluctant amateur-sleuth, gets pushed into solving another murder–this time of an old nemesis.

Lastly, I’d like to say hi and extend a warm welcome to cchittom and Ashleigh Mordew who followed the blog this week. I hope you enjoy the content and keep coming back.

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:
How many books Americans own — and how they organize them—fun with statistics (which is good, because what those stats represent isn’t so fun)
A New Fantasy and a 20th Anniversary for Christopher Paolini—I didn’t read past Eragon (but had one kid who got obsessed). But it’s hard to deny the impact he had.
Addicted to Scarcity—Book Publishing’s Retail Price Problem
A Big Year for Little Golden Book Bios—(not the point, but some of these look really cute)
Q&A: Bruce Borgos, Author of ‘The Bitter Past’
Magic to Serve, Not Solve, a Story: KJ Dell’Antonia on Magical Rules in Literature
How Do You Manage Reading Expectations?

This Week’s New Releases that I’m Excited About and/or You’ll Probably See Here Soon:
The Innocent Sleep by Seanan McGuire—the 18th Toby Daye novel gives Tybalt’s perspective on recent events. Given that we know how things go after reading the 17th novel, I’m curious about how this will keep my attention (but assume it will)

A little bit of catch-up from last week, a little bit of stuff I found this week, and just a touch of things I will have found next week.

(two out of three ain’t bad).

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:
Dispatch From the Ghosts of Bookstores Past
We Don’t Talk About Harry Potter: The perils of publishing a diverse magic school series in the shadow of a juggernaut
Bros Are Coming for BookTok. These TikTokers Aren’t Having It
The Man Who Invented Fantasy: All those wizards, ogres, and barely-clad elf queens in the bookstore? You have Lester del Rey to thank.
How to Exclaim!—varied thoughts on !
Agony Editor: Judging your own book’s cover design – and what to do about it
What Makes Some Long Books Feel Too Long?—Templeton again asks the important questions
How Far Afield Can Sci-Fi and Fantasy “Fake Swearing” Get Before You Feel Uncomfortable?—honestly, I enjoy the fake swears. But, whatever…fun post anyway.
Bookish Jobs I Would Do For Free—yup
Worlds Unlike Our Own and The Strawberry Post both recently celebrated their 5th Anniversaries. Each in an interesting fashion.
Why Shakespeare still matters—odd that this needs to be said, but…
10 Books That You Must Read Once in Your Life—yeah, maybe. I wonder if I put off reading a couple of these for a few more decades, do I get to live longer? How authoritative is that “must”?
The Five 2013 Reads I Remember Best—I enjoy Finn’s premises almost as much as his posts
The SciFiMonth Challenge—it’s right around the corner, are you participating?
On Writers, Reviewers, and a Pointless Tangle—tempted to just post this link on social media every so often for the next decade

A Book-ish Related Podcast episode (or two) you might want to give a listen to:
Lone Wolfe – Steve Hockensmith – Episode 32—a fun chat with the author of the Holmes on the Range series about fiction, Nero Wolfe, his own material and more. Couldn’t agree more with everything he said about The Big Sleep, incidentally.

This Week’s New Releases that I’m Excited About and/or You’ll Probably See Here Soon:
Up on the Woof Top by Spencer Quinn—a new Chet and Bernie book? Sign me up. Based on the last “Christmas” novel for these two, the holiday will be part of the setting, but it could be read without regard to the season.

If you’re reading this, I’ve discovered that my fears have been realized and I couldn’t figure out how to format this post on my phone.(well, not really “fears” I didn’t really think I’d pull it off)

So, you’re going to have to do the work this week, sorry! I’m willing to be that things worth reading have been posted at:
The Hub
CrimeReads
Witty and Sarcastic Book Club
The Write Reads’ Blog Of the Day—the whole feed, too, probably. But those are more on brand for this post.
Peat Long’s Blog
A Literary Escape
Mark As Read

This Week’s New Releases that I’m Excited About and/or You’ll Probably See Here Soon:
The Mysteries by Bill Watterson, Illustrated by Bill Watterson and John Kascht—We’ve all been wondering what Bill Watterson has been up to since that last sled ride into the unknown. Well, here’s part of the answer. Can’t wait to dive in!
An Inheritance of Magic by Benedict Jacka—I just loved this entry to a new UF series and think you will, too. As I opined earlier.
‘Twas the Bite Before Christmas by David Rosenfelt—Andy and co. bring the warm fuzzies (and murder). I talked about it recently.
Long Past Dues by James J. Butcher—I cannot wait to see how the second book in this series builds on it’s very strong predecessor.
The Art of Destiny by Wesley Chu—I jumped the gun a couple of weeks ago, so I’m going to repeat myself: the sequel to The Art of Prophecy is one of my most anticipated reads of the year, and I honestly have no idea when I’ll be able to get to it. Possibly January (at least 2024 will get off to a strong start).
A Grimm Decision by Jeffrey H. Haskell—depending how my reading went this week, this publication will either put me one or two books behind in this very solid SF series. (but I’m so behind I refuse to look at the blurb)

I thought I had a little more for this post, but I’ve apparently been as busy this week as I felt. Still, it only takes 3 items to make a list, so I have two to spare.

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:
The Most Popular Book the Year You Were Born—kind of interesting
An Interview with K. R. R. Lockhaven—a great interview from Spells & Spaceships with a Friend of the Blog.
On Dead Dogs and Other Reading Dealbreakers—Molly Templeton talks about having those boundaries about books we won’t read.
29 Best Classic Books actually worth reading for Adults—some great Classics were listed here
Book-to-Screen Adaptations: Fantasy Edition—some good thoughts on Fantasy adaptations

This Week’s New Releases that I’m Excited About and/or You’ll Probably See Here Soon:
Godzilla and Godzilla Raids Again by Shigeru Kayama, translated by Jeffrey Angels—two novellas written by one of the creators of everyone’s favorite kaiju, showing what the movies were intended to depict. Now in English for the first time—it’s just a great look at his background. I had a good time with this.

In the back of my mind since the Mid-Year Freak Out tag back in July how strange it is that I hadn’t been moved to tears by a book in a while. Richard Osman’s new one took care of that for me yesterday*, so now I can focus on other things in the back of my mind. Like, what stupid jokes am I going to make in my Festivus post this year or something equally important.

* Big ol’ jerk creating characters that you can’t help but care about.

Thursday, I attended Rediscovered Bookshop‘s latest Grown-Up Book Fair at White Dog Brewery, and showed remarkable restraint (but still walked away with some gems)—today, I get to go to the Boise Library!’s Comic Arts Festival, which is always a good time. That’s a lot of people-ing in just a few days, but a lot of bookish (and other) goodness, too. If you’re one of the handful of readers I have in this area, you should definitely come by. If you’re not in the area, I hope you have some bookish goodness to get up to (even if it’s just sitting in a comfortable spot with a good read)

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:
Spenser at 50: The Evolution of Robert B. Parker’s Iconic Character—How did I not think to spend the year celebrating this anniversary?
From one legend of Mystery Fiction to a couple of others: Lee Goldberg in Conversation with Michael Connelly—a great video from a recent event in Agoura Hills
Five Enduring Reasons to Love the Mass Market Paperback—agreed. I’d love for a resurgence of this format (as would my overburdened shelves)
The Coolest Bookshelves from Our Contest: We’ve asked for the best shelfies, and you delivered—Electric Lit got some nifty submissions to a recent contest
Are the Dragons in Fourth Wing Better than in Game of Thrones?—These are the kind of vital debates that need to be had. (even though I’m pretty sure I hadn’t heard of Fourth Wing until The Orangutan Librarian talked about it)
What Do You Think About Books Marketed Solely on Vibes and Tropes?
Why I Love Middle-Grade Books
Three Middle Grade Fantasy Series You Should Read—Over at FanFiAddict, Matt Pittman picks three great series. I’d have picked two of these myself had I tackled the question—not sure I’d have gone with The Wingfeather Saga myself, but I can’t argue against it.
Interview with a Second Grader: Hidden Gems—an interview about books with Jodie’s 2nd Grader. The fact that this leads off with a dragon book says something about the household, I think (something good, I stress. Also, completely un-surprising.)
I linked to this earlier in the week, but I’m going to share it again. On My Radar: September 2023—Celeste’s month-end wrap-ups are a great way to catch up on things you should’ve read earlier.

This Week’s New Releases that I’m Excited About and/or You’ll Probably See Here Soon:
The Running Grave by “Robert Galbraith”—Robin goes undercover in a cult to help rescue their client’s son. I haven’t seen anyone up in arms about this release, which is a bit odd. Maybe since the target is a cult this time? I’m just excited that this is under 1K pages (not by much, but at the rate this series was going, I was expecting to injure my back)
The Chalice of the Gods by Rick Riordan—Percy Jackson is gearing up to go to college—but he and his friends have to deal with new challenges from Mount Olympus first. I’d stepped away from Riordan recently, but new Percy adventures just might get me to reverse course.

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:
The Authors Guild, John Grisham, Jodi Picoult, David Baldacci, George R.R. Martin, and 13 Other Authors File Class-Action Suit Against OpenAI
Who Needs Plot When You Have Vibes?—this approach to novel writing appeals to me, but almost every book described here would drive me nuts. Maybe I need to try one or three, though.
The Early Days of American English: How English words evolved on a foreign continent.
Anjili Babbar On The Rise of Irish Crime Fiction
An interesting rebuttal to the publisher’s statement on the reading order for The Chronic (what?) cles of Narnia
5 Reasons We Love to Read—my local bookstore compiled a list of why their staff loves to read
10 Reasons to Leave a Book Review—I’d quibble with some of these items—but on the whole, a helpful post. Particularly for non-book bloggers.
Authors and Reviews—may the tribe of Douglas Lumsden increase
Arthurian inspired fiction: Where to start reading—So much temptation in so few words. A good companion list to the one Celeste posted a few months back, between the two of these, your Arthur-itch is sure to be scratched.
The Wish Givers Cover Creation: The Process in Pictures—A deep dive into the process of making this cover
Ranking books based on their first lines.—by Geaux Read Books, “Nothing heavy, just a fun video ranking books based on the first line of that book”
Are You a Stubborn Reader? Know Your Reading Tastes

This Week’s New Releases that I’m Excited About and/or You’ll Probably See Here Soon:
Slipped up and mentioned this last week, but I’m still excited for: The Last Devil to Die by Richard Osman—The Thursday Murder Club is back in action—who cares what it’s about?
The Art of Destiny by Wesley Chu—the sequel to The Art of Prophecy is one of my most anticipated reads of the year, and I honestly have no idea when I’ll be able to get to it. Possibly January (at least 2024 will get off to a strong start).
Starter Villain by John Scalzi—”Charlie’s life is going nowhere fast. A divorced substitute teacher living with his cat in a house his siblings want to sell, all he wants is to open a pub downtown, if only the bank will approve his loan. Then his long-lost uncle Jake dies and leaves his supervillain business (complete with island volcano lair) to Charlie.” Oh, that sounds fun. Particularly when you add in “unionized dolphins [and] hyper-intelligent talking spy cats.”

I’m putting the “misc” in “miscellany” today. I have a shorter (but will take you hours to get through if you play out every link) and pretty varied offering. I hope you find something to scratch an itch (or create one)

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:
“I Can Give It Away to Whoever I Want”: Fables Creator Declares Hit Comic Series Public Domain, But DC Disagrees—I’ve tried a few times over the years to dive deeply into Fables, but laziness (and trouble finding them when I want them) have kept me from it. But still, it’s hard to miss the drama around Willingham and DC. I wonder how this will play out.
The real spiritual journey behind Tod Goldberg’s fake-rabbi desert antihero—a good profile and I really appreciate the observations and ideas expressed about Crime Fiction (paragraph 4 is quite telling, isn’t it?)
Goldberg’s brother shared the video Craig Johnson in conversation with Lee Goldberg & cast members of Longmire at Live Talks Los Angeles this week. I haven’t finished it yet, but it’s well worth your time.
The Dark Humor of Millennial Crime Capers: 30-somethings can laugh in the face of anything—including death.
Tufa Songs: Songs mentioned in and inspired by the Tufa novels.—Alec Bledsoe posted this playlist to Facebook this week to go with the first four Tufa novels being put on Kindle Unlimited—”a Tufa-themed Spotify playlist made up of songs mentioned in the books, songs that inspired the books, and songs that have the same vibe as the books.” Good reading music even if you (tragically) haven’t encountered the series yet.
dresden files.—Flipphony put this out last year, but I didn’t see it until this week–a nice little video introduction to the Dresden files (there’s also one on the First Law that I should check out)
BookForager started Counting Down to SciFiMonth 2023—and I can already tell my TBR Stack is gonna grow
The Ultimate List of 46 Fantasy Books for Beginners—Oh, wow. There’s so much to mine here.
The Creation of The Fantasy Explosion Flowchart—when is Peat Long going to put us all out of our misery and publish a giant book on Fantasy fiction so we all have a good, one-stop, reference?
The Road to 100K Via Burnout—a good piece on burnout (something I’ve flirted with more than I probably realize)
Is There a Market for “Quiet” Children’s Books?—That’s a good question (and a good answer is given). The term “Quiet Books” is new to me, but I like it.

This Week’s New Releases that I’m Excited About and/or You’ll Probably See Here Soon:
The Last Devil to Die by Richard Osman—The Thursday Murder Club is back in action–who cares what it’s about?
The Ninja’s Oath by Tori Eldridge—Lily Wong heads to Japan to rescue a kidnapped girl and deals with all sorts of other issues as well.
Shadow of Hyperion by JCM Berne—Rohan gets a call to help from Earth.
Catch Her Death by Melinda Leigh—Bree Taggert’s family are in the crosshairs in this book, and Dana’s suspect #1 in a murder. Should be an eventful read.
Federation Cowboy by Joyce Reynolds-Ward—”Caroline Starshine didn’t expect to find a job when she met Jeff Tophand…Nor did she expect to find drug smugglers, a conspiracy intended to overthrow two Galactic powers and turn them into an Empire, unusual allies, a new family, and…love.”
How I Won a Nobel Prize by Julius Taranto—this novel is “about a graduate student who follows her disgraced mentor to a university that gives safe harbor to scholars of ill repute, igniting a crisis of work and a test of her conscience (and marriage)”.

Three-day weekends can really mess with you, you know? Monday afternoon, I sketched out a plan for the week that saw me productive on the reading and blogging front. And then Tuesday came along and everything else in my life collectively chuckled and said, “no.”

Without my research collaborator, Peat Long, this would be a very short list. Be sure to check out his Friday Favorites for more goodness along these lines.

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:
‘A Plague on the Industry’: Book Publishing’s Broken Blurb System: Do authors actually like the books they endorse—or even read them? Writers, literary agents, and publishing workers take Esquire inside the story of a problematic “favor economy.”—Great piece from Esquire
Stephen King Once Played “Mambo No. 5” So Much His Wife Threatened Divorce—I’ve never clicked with King’s fiction (and stopped trying decades ago), but I always enjoy hearing about King the person and writer.
When Teens Play Detective: The Influence of Golden Age Detective Fiction on YA Mysteries
The 75 Essential Books For Gen Xers: These are the books that entertained us, taught us, shocked us and molded us into who we’ve become—not necessarily the best, but those that shaped a generation. The fact that this is a relevant topic to the AARP’s site has cost me some sleep. (I got my membership card earlier this year, for the record, which didn’t cause me to lose sleep because it made me put a big dent in a bottle of bourbon)*
Too Much Information! Two Big Reasons Not to Over-explain Your Novel—Naturally, Paul Goat Allen nails this. I haven’t read him much lately…I need to fix that.
Let’s Get Honest About Reading (And Blogging)—some wisdom here
Author vs Author and Author with Author is Complicated—good thoughts from Mr. Long
Cyberpunk: The Truth Behind the Shades—in the mid-90s, I got really into Cyberpunk, but since then I really have only dabbled. This piece “fact check[s] some assumptions about the genre” and rekindles my interest.
Why I Enjoy Reading Negative Reviews of the Books I Love – & Mid-July Thoughts—I did snicker a lot at some of these featured reviews
How I Select Books to Read—I can relate to a lot of this. I don’t know that I’ve ever broken down my reasoning like this (not sure I can), but I enjoyed reading it.

* I feel compelled to stress that I’m joking about the sleep and drinking.

A Book-ish Related Podcast episode (or two) you might want to give a listen to:
Story Craft CafeThe Western Renaissance With Craig Johnson | SCC 113—Craig Johnson telling stories about whatever is almost more reliably entertaining than his books (like I said about a Story Craft Cafe episode last week, the audio quality on Johnson’s part isn’t great, but it’s not that distracting)
The Thriller Zone Episode 147: Lee Goldberg, author of Malibu Burning—Goldberg gets on a roll here and I challenge you not to chuckle

This Week’s New Releases that I’m Excited About and/or You’ll Probably See Here Soon:
The Longmire Defense by Craig Johnson—There’s a chance I get to start this today, and I can’t wait. I have no idea what this is about—something to do with an old case and digging into Walt’s relationship with his grandfather.
Sleep No More by Seanan McGuire—I haven’t written anything about last year’s Toby Daye novel because I’m very conflicted about the ending—and am almost never satisfied with the kind of story it set up. So now…here we go with part one of the payoff. I trust McGuire, but now it’s time to put it to the test. (click the link there to get an actual idea of the premise)
It Ends with Knight by Yasmin Angoe—I can’t imagine that the conclusion to this trilogy is anything but fantastic.
Spider-Man’s Bad Connection by Preeti Chhibber—I had a lot of fun with Chhibber’s take on young Peter Parker and figure the same is in store for her follow-up.
Look Out for the Little Guy by Scott Lang—the autobiography of Ant-Man. Yeah, go ahead and roll your eyes that I mention this. Roll them even harder when I say that I bought the hardcover.