The Dutch House Book Club Questions Your Meeting Guide

Ann Patchett’s The Dutch House is the book everyone is talking about right now. And I know this because when I visited my family for the holidays, more than one family member came up to me and asked if I’d read it yet. Word evidently spread over the end of the year, because when I went back to work, everyone was talking about this book there as well. So what did I do?...

January 1, 2023 · 3 min · 575 words · Willie Olson

The Enneagram Numbers Of Your Favorite Baby Sitters Club Characters

Type 1: The Reformer Type 1s are known as “the rational, idealistic type: principled, purposeful, self-controlled, and perfectionistic.” Hi, Dawn! Our favorite California girl is a typical type 1. She’s an individual whose principles are more important to her than what others think, and she sticks to those principles, whether it’s asking her pint-sized charges not to play with guns or campaigning for the environment (see Dawn Saves the Planet). She’s always up for improving the world in some way, a characteristic of many type 1s....

January 1, 2023 · 7 min · 1321 words · Douglas Shehan

The Hermione Of Comic Shoppers

I entered some writing contests, but mostly I posted my poetry on Tori Amos fan sites devoted to our own creativity. Deep in the annals of the internet, I’m sure there’s still at least one of my own old websites kicking around with its black background and eyesight-wrecking fuchsia font. I WAS AWESOME, SO SO COOL, YOU GUYS. Same went for college. I knew I’d be going to grad school, so I kept my GPA not a tenth of point higher than it needed to be to get in....

January 1, 2023 · 4 min · 735 words · Melissa Byas

The Problem Of The So Called Forgotten Woman And Patriarchal Histories

(I kid. She hasn’t.) But she is there, I promise. The forgotten woman. The woman who changed the world with a blink of her eye is being remembered, reclaimed, and rediscovered by a new generation of readers. She’s a bygone broad, a rebel girl, a forgotten feminist hero. And I don’t have a problem with that. Not in the slightest. I want these women and their stories told. I want them heard....

January 1, 2023 · 2 min · 393 words · Kristen Obrien

The Problem With The Cat In The Hat

When I watched that with my sister I turned to her and was like “But the Fish was right. They totally shouldn’t have left the Cat into their house. He wrecked everything.” “You’re overthinking this,” she, being my sister, scoffed. I still stand by this statement even after all these years. I commiserate with the little orange guy and will readily admit that I’m the Fish in most situations. I’m that nerd in teenage movies who says, “We shouldn’t sneak this beer, guys....

January 1, 2023 · 6 min · 1156 words · Sharon Byard

The Worm In The Big Apple Seedy New York City Stories

Condom dresses and space helmets have debuted on fashion runways. A dead body becomes the trend when a coat made of human skin saunters down fashion’s biggest stage. The body is identified as Annabelle Leigh, the teenager who famously disappeared over a decade ago from her boyfriend’s New York City mansion. This new evidence casts suspicion back on the former boyfriend, Cecil LeClaire. Now a monk, he is forced to return to his dark and absurd childhood home to clear his name....

January 1, 2023 · 1 min · 153 words · Mark Doward

The Ya Book Prize Shortlist

It celebrates amazing books for teens and young adults and aims to get them into their hands as much as possible. It is the first UK and Ireland prize to focus on fiction for young adults. The YA Book Prize is organised by the book trade magazine The Bookseller and is in partnership with the famous Hay Festival. I’m very fortunate to be a judge on this year’s YA Book Prize....

January 1, 2023 · 5 min · 1032 words · Marie Jarvis

Thoughts I Had During My Latest Reading Slump

What if I never read again? via GIPHY Who am I without my mountains of books? via GIPHY What if reading isn’t really part of my identity? What if it was all fake? via GIPHY What are my Instagram followers going to think? via GIPHY What am I going to do with all these books? via GIPHY How will I ever catch up to my TBR that keeps growing while I can’t read?...

January 1, 2023 · 1 min · 85 words · Guadalupe Rackley

Thoughts On Assigned Reading

There’s nothing I like more than poring over a textbook, inevitably grumbling about it, and having some friend say “What’s wrong? I thought you liked reading?” Reading textbooks is reading, but it’s also tedious, dry reading. For me, anything that’s assigned is never nearly as much fun or as interesting as something that I choose to read on my own. I think that’s true for most people, actually. So basically what that means is that there are few books I’ve been assigned to read that I’ve actually enjoyed....

January 1, 2023 · 2 min · 226 words · Nick Hidalgo

Three Future Targets For Book Censors Book Censorship News January 13 2023

Of course, those battles wage on. We’ll continue to see races for school and library board seats over this year, with those whose agendas include censorship to be itching for those roles. We’ll still see books being pulled left and right, with titles not even on shelves in some of these institutions included. More “bad books” lists will continue to emerge, and we’ll keep seeing groups like Moms For Liberty claim they don’t curate BookLook/BookLooks but then have their members claim to be authorities on how to best run a library because they’ve volunteered to build this nonsense, unprofessional database....

January 1, 2023 · 11 min · 2240 words · Randy Small

Three Upcoming Comics From Valiant Entertainment

Because it’s a smaller con, RCCC’s policy for said panels is generally “in and out as desired as long as you’re not loud and rude.” I wanted to make certain I got a seat for Kelly Sue DeConnick and Chelsea Cain’s spotlight event, so I headed over about half an hour early (I’d already gotten lost three or four times that first day – the Oregon Convention Center should have its own minotaur) and slunk quietly into an end-of-row seat, intending to mind my own business until the appointed time arrived....

January 1, 2023 · 4 min · 667 words · Frances Mcnutt

Top 18 Books Like Shatter Me To Obsess Over

Unraveling The Obsession With Shatter Me Shatter Me by Tahereh Mafi follows Juliette’s freedom from solitary confinement in a Dystopian prison. Her lethal touch landed her in a cell, but upon her release, she discovers that her power is just the thing the military needs. Environmental collapse and food insecurity have paved the way for dictatorial leadership that believes in strength and austerity. Most literature is banned, art is confiscated, and citizens are too busy trying to survive to protest....

January 1, 2023 · 11 min · 2287 words · Katie Guzman

Trapped In A Bad Situation Let S Talk Melody

Melody is a cult classic, originally self-published in French in the early ‘80s, widely regarded as “the first autobiographical Canadian comic,” and only recently available in a single English volume with the original artwork. In the introduction to the new edition, Chris Ware mentions that some of Rancourt’s illustrations are, “curiously elegant, almost Matisse-like,” which, to me, is a very kind way of stating there’s a degree to which these black and white drawings appear childish and flat, with little differentiation among characters....

January 1, 2023 · 4 min · 736 words · Donna Bassford

Trump S 2020 Budget Proposal Threatens To Defund Libraries

For the third straight year, the Trump budget proposes permanent elimination of the Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS), an independent federal agency that provides library and museum grants, policy development, and research. Defunding the IMLS would effectively end all federal funding of public libraries. The proposal would also cut funding to the Department of Education by 10%, including support for the Innovative Approaches to Literacy program Although Trump promised protections for social programs throughout his presidential campaign, the FY2020 budget includes steep cuts to Medicaid, Medicare, and Social Security....

January 1, 2023 · 2 min · 310 words · Stephen Jackson

United States Of A Mystery Essential Florida Crime Fiction

Throughout the series, we’ve followed Pete as he drank his feelings after his father died in Silent City, tried to sober up in the wake of his best friend’s death during Down the Darkest Street, managed to get on the shit list of lethal Cuban gang in Dangerous Ends, and then tied up with a cult leader in Blackout. Oh, and Pete somehow managed to find some lost people and solve a few mysteries during all that....

January 1, 2023 · 7 min · 1313 words · Della Cervantes

Viral Story Of Edmund Kemper S Audiobook Narration Tells Bigger Story

The Kemper anecdote, while interesting, isn’t the whole story. Volunteers of Vacaville (VOV) is a nonprofit organization that began The Blind Project in 1960. VOV’s mission is to help the sight-impaired community worldwide through its cadre of volunteers from local Lion’s Club members, whose biggest project includes glasses donations, teachers for the blind, and community members passionate about the work. The Blind Project is an arm of the VOV that built a partnership between them and and those who are incarcerated at the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation’s California Medical Facility....

January 1, 2023 · 5 min · 909 words · Quentin Henriques

Vs Podcast The Books That Make Season One

Here is a list of the books published, or soon-to-be published, by the authors who have been invited to the season one of VS, including the hosts. Soft Science by Franny Choi The book comes out in April, and here is a small preview of what you can expect from it: “Franny Choi’s Soft Science offers an exceptional exploration both of all that comprises the intimate and of all that consumes the communal in our lives....

January 1, 2023 · 5 min · 897 words · Johnny Grim

We Need An American Girl Doll Who Bookish Edition

Since their introduction in 1986, American Girl dolls have highlighted a variety of different points in history and unique experiences. Fans could even create a doll to look like themselves and buy matching outfits! But leave it to Twitter and Instagram to find the gaps in American Girl doll representation. Wow, meme one and I’m already feeling attacked! We’ve all been there. Recently. — morgan 🍂🍁🪵 (@heartstoppeer) June 15, 2022 The perfect doll for those who can’t get enough of the latest literary drama....

January 1, 2023 · 2 min · 224 words · Lynne Lundsford

We Rate Book Covers With Dogs

The page (which is available across several social platforms, including Twitter, Instagram, Facebook, and has its own merch shop) was started in 2015 by Matt Nelson. In a little over a year, the page gathered over two million followers, went on to publish a book, and even inspired a mobile phone game. Their socials are filled with pictures of good dogs, which are sent to the admins to be given a rating....

January 1, 2023 · 3 min · 499 words · William Shearer

We Re Off For Christmas

title: “We Re Off For Christmas " ShowToc: true date: “2022-11-23” author: “Julia Eden” via GIPHY

January 1, 2023 · 1 min · 16 words · Gerardo Hill