Tidbits

I am only what is best described as incredibly behind, so enjoy this collection of links you've probably already seen elsewhere, while I enjoy sleeping past 6 am for the first time since my 9 day first week of school back started, 9 days ago.

Business:

• Four different people have sent me the link to Mental Floss' roundup of 11 Amazing Librarian Tattoos.  So I think now is as good a time as any to reveal that I have a tattoo of my favorite misogynist Melville Dewey's face in a very secret location.  Not.  But there are some awesome additional photos in the comments, so scroll down when you visit! 
• The Atlantic Fall preview of YA lit is fairly decent - I've read and will write brief reviews of three (let's just say I liked two).  
• In news that is not news to librarians or booksellers anywhere, sales of YA literature to adults account for more that 55% of total sales - and we cold, hard, selfish adults aren't buying for our disenfranchised teenage friends. 
• With that said, I'd also like to vote negative on this whole new 14-35 year old "New Adult" labeling. Stop trying to make it happen, Guardian.  If you want to raise that age bar to people who can drive cars, and lower it to people who can't afford to buy new cars because of their student loans, maybe I'll reconsider.  
• In a sweet twist of irony, Amazon is basically the only winner in the publishing anti-trust brouhaha, which makes total sense in trying to prevent monopolies, right?  Good work, team!
• Oh Wikipedia.  You are the best friend of iPhones and dinner party debates, but not Phillip Roth! Mwahaha - no way I'm not using this in this years research orientations!

Design:

• OhEmGeeWhiz you guys! Tablescaping based on literature.  I think I'd like to go to a Game of Thrones dinner party the most. 
• In addition to work, I've been furniture shopping. Okay, so it's just for a kitchen table.  But whatever whatever.  I found these instead.  Please enjoy my new bathtub and my new lounge chair.   I think they'll go well with my new candles. 

The Talkies:

• Did I black out and miss the news that Divergent is going to be a movie?  Because now it has a release date.
• Also, we're still talking about Y: The Last Man being a movie.  Can't HBO or FX or somebody just get on board and adapt it to the miniseries it would do so well as? (Not that I'm complaining - this news excites me).
• The Wuthering Heights trailer makes it seem almost endurable.  Unlike Heathcliff. 

PrE-view:

• Daughter of Blood and Shadow!  Which apparently has had its movie rights optioned too.

Bonus:

• Kind of hoping POTUS uses the white folks soundbite during debates... 

Tidbits: Sweeeeet Valley, kids learn to read good, someone gets lotioned up, a cookbook with rave reviews

• In really excellent news, there may one day be a Sweet Valley High movie with Diablo Cody doing the writing (or something).  What is there not to love about her promises to make it "glamorous and colorful and bubblegum and a feast for the senses"?  Me and my middle school self are down.  Especially if Armie Hammer plays Elizabeth and Jessica; he does blonde twins so well.  And now all I can't get the tv series theme song out of my head...Sweeeeeet Vallllley, Sweeet Valley, Swweeeeet VALLEY HIGH.  Good luck getting this out of your head!
  

• Via the New York Times, this is a rather interesting article about how many parents of young children are eschewing e-Books in favor of print books for their children.  Frankly, as a former children's librarian, I can't agree with them more; learning to read should be a physical, tactile experience.   Interestingly, this great interview with a Candlewick publisher about the future of children's publishing came out this week too.  Read them together, have a ponder.

• Need a laugh?  I dare you to keep a straight face while watching this Time piece on romance novel covers.  Particularly when the makeup artist describes getting the male model ready ("I had to wet him down, I had to lotion him, so there's a little bit of shine..."). Have I mentioned that I'm twelve?

• And now...onto something that qualifies for Case of the Terribles status, courtesy of Amazon reviewers and the eagle eyes over at the Publisher's Weekly PWxyz blog: The Worst Book Ever is 'Microwave for One.'  Although, my favorite comment?

You keep it classy, ladykiller.

FreE-book alert!: 13 Little Blue Envelopes

Once upon a time, I thought "self, you will never enjoy reading anything on a kindle."  But then I tried it, and it wasn't so bad.  I didn't like it enough to own one, but hey, I learned my lesson in absolutes.  Never say never!  But when I got my schmancy new phone and noticed there was a Kindle for Droid app, I clearly forgot all about the lesson.  "Self," said I, "fat chance you'll ever read a book on this big-screen TV for Barbies."

But, but!  Then, thanks to the magic of the internets, I learned that Maureen Johnson had a present for me.  For you too, if you are cool enough to want to get in on this!  As a promo for her new book/sequel, The Last Little Blue Envelope, dropping April 26th, she's done something rather awesome.  Her earlier book, 13 Little Blue Envelopes, has been made available for free download from Amazon from April 12th to April 25th, when it will magically disappear to wherever e-Books disappear off to.  I pre-ordered mine, but I think that you can still get in on the action by going through the link she provides on her blog.

Thusly, I am doing what I said I would never do: reading a book on my phone.  I'm three chapters in, and my only complaint?  My battery got too low (from reading it) to read it on the way home.  Considering I thought it would be a pretty lousy experience to read a book one paragraph at a time, consistently having to flick my finger oh-so-delicately across the screen, I've been a little surprised. So far, so good.   So good that I might have missed my bus stop yesterday...