Week 9 - At last, at last, done at last

Week 9, Assignment 1

I read the two articles. Couldn't find the video embedded in the Chicago Tribune article. I watched a few of the videos in the New York Times article. Kelly Corrigan's video on the "Middle Place" was very touching and I even requested the book because of it. When I looked at You Tube and typed in book trailer, I got mostly children's and young adult books. I did watch the one for "The One and Only Ivan" and thought it was unique. No one speaking, just pictures, quotes and praises from other authors.


Week 9, Assignment 2

Some book trailers are good and some not so good. I found that some would bore me to death, while others made me want to read the book immediately. I don't know if they would up the sales of books and where does one normally find them? I know I wouldn't go to You Tube to find them and would others?

Week 9, Assignment 3

Be More Bookish was informative and I learned a lot, but some of the assignments were too long and somewhat repetitive. Also week 1 asked us to choose a genre that would come up later in the assignments. I personally think that Goodreads and Amazon, both of which I use frequently, are just as useful.

Week 8 - Almost there!

Week 8, Assignment 3

Memoirs - Garlic and Sapphires,Secret Life of a Critic in Disquise,by Ruth Reichl -Biography
Travel - Sex Lives of Cannibals - Adrift in the Equatorial Pacific, by J. Maarten Troost - 919.595
Food - Julie and Julia,  by Julie Powell - 641.5
Crime - Helter Skelter: The True Story of the Manson Murders, by Vincent Bugliosi - 364.1523


Week 8, Assignment 4

Any fan of the cozy cooking mysteries would enjoy Garlic and Sapphires by Ruth Reichl.  It's gossipy, clever and witty,has recipes and she transforms herself into many different personas as many of the main characters in the mysteries do.  It's a fun, light book to read.

Do you like gore,violence and not being able to sleep at night?  Do you read Stephen King books?  If you are looking for a true crime book then Helter Skelter is the book to read for all of the above reasons.

Week 7

ARGHHH!!!!!!!  Will this ever end?? 

Week 7, Assignment 2

I read YA Comes of Age and The Next Best Thing.  Both articles mentioned vampires and paranormal books as being crossover from adult to young adult.  The Next Best Thing calls the interest in dystopian novels as the Hunger Games Effect.  There is an increasing number of adult fiction authors transitioning over to young adult.  Authors such as James Pattersson, Carl Hiaasen and John Grisham.  In the YA comes of Age article, Alessandra Balzer states that "there are no more taboos; YA covers every category". 

Posted on Doug B. and Sue F.'s blogs.

Week 7, Assignment 3
I am following Stacked.  Is is written by Kimberly Francisco who is a public librarian and Kelly Jensen who calls herself  a "compulsive consumer of all things books and blogs".  It is written primarily for readers of young adult books.  It also contains audio books, digital books, videos, music, zines, and graphic novels.  Interesting topics, but sometimes they seem to go on too long.  It has won the CYBILS- Children's and Young Adult Bloggers' Literary Awards award 4 years in a row.

I have also been following School Library Journal: Someday My Printz Will Come.  Karny Silvrman and Sarah Couri write this blog.  They are both high school librarians have been members of YALSA.  They review books which they will be likely to be considered for the Printz Award for Excellence in Young Adult Literature.  This would appeal to any reader interested in the best of YA books.

Week 7, Assignment 4
All the websites had some paranormal and dystopian materials. 
Went to Teens/Penguin Young Readers.  I enjoyed browing through the site.  Tried  Matched
Society Matched them; Love set them free. Use our Matched Facebook application to find your Optimal Match. First was matched with a teacher/musician then tried it again and was matched with another librarian.  Can't see either as my optimal match. 

Harlequin Teen.  Boring, boring site.  Lots of information, but terrible formatting.

Week 6

Week 6, Assignment 1
I am following Stop, You're Killing Me!  This is for mysteries.  I am not too impressed by the format of the blog, but once you get into it, it has lot's of good information.  The Genre Index lists by genre and then by author.  Within that, the main character is listed with a blurb about the character.  I also use the Read Alike link.  Ths has author and catagory read alikes listed. 

Week 6, Assignment 2
This is amazing.  I loved exploring around it.  I accidentally clicked on Horror, thinking it was humor and that was pretty humorous.  Wish there were a full size copy of it.

Week 6, Assignment 3
Contemporary Westerns - "These stories, set in present time somewhere in the west, often in one of the southwest or Rocky Mountain states, feature cowboys, ranch hands, rodeo stars, horse trainers and so on. The plot centers around their courtship of the woman they've set their sights on. The heroine, usually the main character, has the guy jumping through hoops to win her heart". This is from westernauthors.com.  I googled comtemporary westerns and after all the goodreads hit, this one was #5. There are links within the site for contemporary fiction and contemporary romance.    This may be a genre I could get interested in as a change from my typical chicklit.  Three books listed are: Rosie's Dilemma by Weta Nichols, Sillouette Romance Series by Madeline Baker and Letting Go of the Reins series by A.E. Rought.

Christian Urban Fiction - googled Christian Urban Fiction.  Came up with christianfiction.com. You can refine your search by audience, binding, author, publisher and top rated.  I sorted by bestsellers and the top 3 are Rain Storm by Vanessa Miller, Lindsay's Legacy by Janice Jones and Three Fifty-Seven A.M by Hank Stewart and Kendra Norman-Bellamy. 

Mashups
Steampunk and Romance.  An example of this is Clockwork Heart by Dru Pagliassotti.
Historical Fantasy - Earth's Childen series by Jean Auel

 

Week 5

Week 5, Assignment 1
I have been monitoring NPR Books every few days.  It covers popular best sellers plus somewhat obscure books.  There are many author interviews which have been featured on NPR.  One column is titled My Guilty Pleasure in which writers talk about the books they love but are embarrassed to be seen reading.  It's a great site.

Week 5, Assignment 2
The best resource in my branch is Book Pages, which is not mentioned.  Many customers, including myself, will go through it at the desk, and put books on reserve.  I will try to use Early Word and some of the others and see if it is something useful to use at my branch.

Week 5, Assignment 3
From PW Most Anticipated Books of Spring 2013. Big Girl Panties by Stephanie Evanovich- The season's hotly anticipated romance debut. Stephanie Evanovich is Janet Evanovich's niece, which is enough to get people interested, and the book itself looks to be a fun chick-lit-ish exploration of love and body image issues. Anything with the Evanovich name on it is going to be big.

Week 4

Got my shelves made on Goodreads.  Added a new one "books I couldn't get through".  I already have about 45 books and just added 5 that I want to read. 

I recommended Tapestry of Fortunes to Heather Mays.  She is a fan of Chicklit and, as I described this book, it's a bit more sophisticated Chicklit. 

I have read and put on hold, many books that I have seen on Goodreads.  I need to keep my account more updated though.  Many of the books that Goodreads recommends to me are not books that I would read.  Not quite sure why some were recommended.

Week 3

Conversation 1

I would recommend Tales of a Female Nomad by Rita Golden Gelman.  After her husband suggests a two month separation, she begins a new life traveling by herself to Guatemala, Nicaragua, Israel, the Galapagos Islands and ends her 15 year journey by living in Indonesia for 8 years. The two books are similar.....women who are traveling on their own, searching for something.  In the end they both found what they were looking for.

Conversation 2

For the reader who wants vampire stories, but without teen angst, I would recommend The Vampire Chronicles by Anne Rice.

Conversation 3

I would show the customer Endurance: Shackleton's Incredible Voyage is also about an ill fated expedition, but this one was to Antarctica.  Both books are about discovery and exploration.