Some Things...

A general round-up of things that I meant to mention at the time but didn't.

• Let's start with a bit of fun and head over to Stuck-in-a-book's Devouring Books challenge where he asked for submissions of books with food in their title. He sums up the best entries here (I might just mention that one was mine!) and it was fun scouring my shelves and reading other entries. Especially the ones that I have read but forgot about! It strikes me, after reading the list, that the most prolific food-in-title author could well be Joanne Harris.

• Scott Pack is running a "best of the rest" Booker contest to run alongside the official Best of the Booker contest which is between Pat Barker, Peter Carey, JM Coetzee, JG Farrell, Nadine Gordimer and Salman Rushdie. Scott has pulled together a very esteemed panel who have each submitted their favourite book that was shortlisted for the Booker Prize but failed to win. You can cast your vote for the Best of the Rest book here! I voted for Cloud Atlas but confess that I've not read them all.
  

• Last week's Thursday soapbox from Vulpes Libris was by Catherine Jones and called "Pride in the Face of Prejudice". Catherine is Chair of the Romantic Novelists' Association and writes a great guest post. "It is a truth universally acknowledged that writing a book requires no skill and no talent whatsoever..." I thoroughly enjoyed this article and Catherine makes some great points..

• Just One More Book dropped me a line to tell me about the thrice-weekly podcast they record about the children's books they love and why they love them. "Our goals are to link children with great books and to help create happy memories for children and the adults that read to them…and to have fun! "

I think that's it for now...

Some Things...

Some more things that have caught my eye over the past few days.

From The Telegraph"After a debate that left senior members of the Telegraph's literary staff with pulled hair, black eyes and, in one case, an infected bite, we this week present our list of the 50 great crime writers of all time."

Another list of must reads from io9 but this time it's twenty science fiction novels that will "change your life". Some great books there but (even better from my point of view) there are several I've not read yet and have added to my list.

Emma from Snow Books posted the cover she made in one day for George Mann's The Affinity Bridge and I think it is so gorgeous that I am happy to buy the book later this year for no reason other then to own a copy of the picture (although luckily the book does sound like my cup of coffee*!) So jealous and here's the link.

Robert from Fantasy Book Critic issued his monthly Spotlight for Febuary and (as usual) it's a great resource that contains some excellent release, book and author information. I have no idea why I forgot to mention it on my last "some things" post but better late than never!

I discovered this month that the cover of Hanif Kureishi's new novel, Something to Tell You, is a bit rude. I lost count very quickly...

Simon from Stuck in a Book kicked off some fun by posting some eight word book synopses. I was going to join in but got an attack of the shys.

Boing Boing posted a piece inspired by the book "Six Word Memoirs by Writers Famous and Obscure" and the comments grew and grew.

Oh - and who knew that Geoffrey Chaucer hath a blog? "My gentil rederes alle, what merveilous werkes we see yn thys tyme... ich am astonyed with the wonderful werkynges of the Internette. Trewely, yt beth a thyng of grete wisdam and power." What fun and one for the blogroll.

I think that'll do for now! Must post in shorter bursts...

* I hate tea.

Some Things...

I am slightly surprised that it is now the 16th February and I am still only on Book Two of the month. This has to be a "worst-ever" record and, although I am enjoying Matter, I am hankering after something that's not set in space.

To attempt to disguise the total lack of book reviews this month, here's a few things that have caught my eye in the last weekish:

An email dropped into my inbox a couple of days ago from Sade Adeniran to tell me (and everyone else on her mailing list, I am quite sure) the fabulous news that her self-published book, Imagine This, has been shortlisted for the Commonwealth Prize in the Best First Book for Africa category (link). She writes "Thanks to all those who are continuing to spread the word. Now my next dream has to be selling more than 1000 copies. :-) I have to admit, I feel like I’ve been nominated for an Oscar. I wish her lots of luck as it's a great book and don't just take my word for it - Sade has been strongly championed by Me and My Big Mouth. If you buy a copy from her website instead of amazon she'll even autograph it for you.

If you've not already seen it, stop by "Spread the Word" and vote for a book to talk about. I've had Candy Miller's Salt and Honey on my to read pile for a while now and I am quite sure that I could find a space for several of the other books on the shortlist. I'm not so sure when I'll get the time to read them though!

I've read a few posts about Georgette Heyer recently and I hold Emma from Vulpes Libris responsible for a certain eBay bid I have at the moment... I know I used to have a secret stash of Heyer's but I can only assume that they are in the attic as I can't find them. At least it looks as if I can come clean about liking her now!

Speaking of guilty pleasures - Firefly! My Own Kind of Freedom by Steve Brust has been released under a creative commons license. That means that you can download it here for free! To quote io9 "Squee!"