1 Jul 2010
Posts Tagged ‘digital books’
Guest blogger: Ten summer young-adult books you’ll want to read, despite your age
Source: usatoday.com
By Nicole S.
Summer reading lists always take me back to a time of frayed friendship bracelets, tie-dyed camp T-shirts and the yellowed pages of a classic. The children and teen titles being released this summer make reconnecting to those days as simple as turning a page.
Cut open an ice pop and enjoy some of this summer’s hottest books with just as much appeal for adults as for their intended under-18 readership:
1. Mockingjay by Suzanne Collins — The final installment of The Hunger Games promises to answer many questions, including the fate of 
District 12 and the reality of what lies in District 13. Details on this much-anticipated title have been very hard to come by, but that hasn’t stopped it from being the most talked about YA book of the year. (Aug. 24)
2. Zombies vs. Unicorns edited by Holly Black and Justine Larbalestier – The hottest names in YA have banded together to answer one of life’s greatest mysteries: Who are the superior creatures, zombies or unicorns? The book reads like a campfire story-off, with each tale more hilarious than the last. (Sept. 21)
3. Linger by Maggie Stiefvater — The second title in the Wolves of Mercy Falls series follows the story of a werewolf and the girl who loves him. Grace and Sam found a way to be together in the first novel, Shiver, but arrival of a new wolf and an unresolved issue from Grace’s past threaten to destroy their fragile happiness. (July 20)
READ MORE HERE
Libraries Have a Novel Idea
Source: Geoffery A Fowler at online.wsj.com
SAN FRANCISCO—Libraries are expanding e-book offerings with out-of-print editions, part of a broader effort to expand borrowing privileges in the Internet Age that could challenge traditional ideas about copyright.
Starting Tuesday, a group of libraries led by the Internet Archive, a nonprofit digital library, are joining forces to create a one-stop website for checking out e-books, including access to more than a million scanned public domain books and a catalog of thousands of contemporary e-book titles available at many public libraries.
And in a first, participants including the Boston Public Library and the Marine Biological Laboratory will also contribute scans of a few hundred older books that are still in copyright, but no longer sold commercially. That part of the project could raise eyebrows, because copyright law is unclear in the digital books arena. Google Inc., which is working on its own book scanning efforts, has been mired in a legal brouhaha with authors and publishers over its digital books project.
READ MORE HERE
What do you think of the summer reading list? And the change in libraries – good/bad?
Join us in the forum to discuss!
31 May 2010
BOOK NEWS FOR MAY 31ST: HARRY POTTER E-BOOKS, NEW YA FICTION AWARD, & MORE
Author: Chris54 | Filed under: Author News, Book News, News Blog
Rowling opens door to digital Harry Potter books
J K Rowling looks set allow Harry Potter fans to read her novels as e-books at last.
Neil Blair, partner at the Christopher Little Agency (CLA) which represents Rowling, said the agency was “currently considering all the options and opportunities that this evolving space provides”. The agency was “actively” looking, whereas previously it had just been “monitoring the developing area”, he said.
Richard Charkin, executive director of Rowling’s print publisher Bloomsbury, declined to comment on whether Bloomsbury was in discussions with the author on e-book plans, saying: “That’s between us and CLA.”
Waterstone’s e-books buyer Alex Ingram said: “Our customers have been asking for Harry Potter on e-book since we launched digital books on Waterstones.com in September 2008.
Read more HERE
Waverly graduate finds strength in family, friends, literature after car crash
Hannah Risner has lots of nerve — so much so that even a devastating family car accident nine years ago could not overcome her.
Thanks to the dedicated support of family, friends, professionals and the engaging characters in J.K. Rowling’s Harry Potter books, nothing could squash the 18-year-old Waverly grad’s will to live and to mend.
“I really couldn’t move or do anything,” she recalls of the long, long stay in Cabell Huntington Hospital in Huntington, W.Va. But every night, her father read to her from the Harry Potter books and gradually she became absorbed in the characters’ vivid flights of fantasy and fell asleep with the current book tucked beneath her covers.
“I just wrote and wrote and told her how much I liked the stories and how much they’ve meant to me and how they’d gotten my mind off other things. Mom wrote to her, too,” she said.
The heartfelt letter brought a full-page response from the author — a letter Hannah always will treasure.
Read more HERE
A New Award For Unpublished Writers Of Teen Fiction
Storylines Trust and HarperCollins Publishers New Zealand are proud to announce an exciting new annual award on the children’s literary scene the Storylines Tessa Duder Award for unpublished writers of fiction for young adults, named in honour of one of New Zealand’s best writers for young adults.
Unpublished writers looking for an opportunity to emulate the outstanding writing careers of Kiwi authors such as William Taylor, Kate De Goldi, Bernard Beckett or Tessa Duder herself will be excited by this new initiative.
‘As someone who over three decades has seen New Zealand’s young adult publishing go from strength to strength,’ says Duder, ‘I am truly delighted that the new award will provide a kick-start for an exciting new talent. Storylines and HarperCollins Publishers are to be congratulated for setting up this first award specifically for a YA manuscript, and I confidently look forward to seeing each year’s winners go on to establishing solid writing careers.’
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What Science Fiction Books Should Be In Every Fan’s Library?
The folks over at SFSIGNAL.com had a great two-part post (Part 1 & Part 2) a few weeks ago when they asked a variety of panelists “What science fiction books should be in every fan’s library?” The panelists were allowed to recommend up to ten books, and could explain their selections to the readers. It’s a great read if you are a fan of sci-fi or are just looking for new ideas of what to read.
Classics
Dune(Frank Herbert) – First sci-fi book I read outside of school and it’s still one that I pick up to reread once a year or so.
Wrinkle In Time(Madeleine L’Engle) – This was the first sci-fi book I read, and it was a great way to enter the genre when I was young.
Moderns
Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter(Seth Grahame-Smith) – Yes, it’s more Horror or even Biographical than sci-fi. Still, the story was so engaging and the topic of vampires was worked in so deftly and at the right moments that I like to recommend it to people to show how a vampire book can be great without the capes, fangs and eastern european accents
Read more HERE
What do you think about today’s book news? Come join our discussion on the FORUM
11 Sep 2009
BOOKSELLERS TO PROFIT FROM DIGITAL LIBRARY
Author: Dawn | Filed under: Book News, News Bloglatimes.com:
In an effort to quell its critics, Google Inc. on Thursday said it would open up its vast digital books archive to rival retailers who can access the books and sell them online.
The announcement, made during a congressional hearing before the House Judiciary Committee on Google’s book-scanning project, involves digital copies of millions of so-called orphan books, works that are still under copyright but whose rights holders can’t be tracked down.
Since 2004, the Mountain View, Calif., technology company has scanned more than 10 million books provided by publishers and libraries, and allowed people to search the texts within those books. In 2006, the Authors Guild and the Assn. of American Publishers sued Google, alleging copyright infringement.
More here
Sounds like a good deal to me. Do you prefer digital books to the real thing?
