Birdbrain(ed) Book Blog

Fastpass Changes Coming to Walt Disney World @ The Disney Blog

Geek Chic: Fashion Inspired by The Big Bang Theory @ College Fashion

YEARS from Bartholomäus Traubeck on Vimeo.

To My Old Master:

Sir: I got your letter, and was glad to find that you had not forgotten Jourdon, and that you wanted me to come back and live with you again, promising to do better for me than anybody else can. I have often felt uneasy about you. I thought the Yankees would have hung you long before this, for harboring Rebs they found at your house. I suppose they never heard about your going to Colonel Martin’s to kill the Union soldier that was left by his company in their stable. Although you shot at me twice before I left you, I did not want to hear of your being hurt, and am glad you are still living. It would do me good to go back to the dear old home again, and see Miss Mary and Miss Martha and Allen, Esther, Green, and Lee. Give my love to them all, and tell them I hope we will meet in the better world, if not in this. I would have gone back to see you all when I was working in the Nashville Hospital, but one of the neighbors told me that Henry intended to shoot me if he ever got a chance.

Plus: What happened to the author after writing the lettr!

No More E-Books Vs. Print Books Arguments, OK? @ NPR

Author Interview: Amanda Hocking:

4) What’s the hardest thing about your sudden fame?
It seems like it’s come so easy to me. And that can be very frustrating. It was a very arduous journey and then it happened very quickly. Everybody’s only seeing the very quick part. It was a perfect storm of things. I had written a bunch of books in a popular genre, had a number of books in my back list and when I decided to self-publish there weren’t many other authors doing it. Now the market’s much more saturated. I priced my book low when there weren’t many other self-published authors. I think people were more willing to give a chance on an unknown author [if they’re paying a low price] and that got people reading it, talking about it and got more people to buy it.

Why Manga Publishing Is Dying (And How It Could Get Better):

But the problem isn’t just about fickle Americans — the Japanese manga market is hurting too. Sales of manga magazines, the traditional delivery medium for manga in Japan, peaked in 1995, and have been falling ever since. Graphic novel sales remained steady longer, but have also declined.

Manga is hurting the way that all print media is hurting — but in some ways it’s worse, because manga is ill-equipped to adapt to New Media. Like American comic books, manga started out as cheap entertainment for kids, but while American comics faced their dwindling readership by turning into an adult collector’s item with color, thicker paper and higher production values, manga magazines (and to a lesser extent, graphic novel collections) still use cheap ink and cheap paper to cram in as much pages-per-yen value possible.

Pinterest and Book Blogging: Use The Latest Social Media Craze To Your Site’s Advantage @ BlogHer

Also: about the ALA drama that happened: I honestly and truly don’t think that bloggers cause the majority of problems at book conferences. I distinctly remember reading a blog post after BEA 2011 that said the exact same problems we’re having now (people taking multiple copies, people grabbing and running with books, etc.) happened way before bloggers ever got there. My MOM, who went to book conferences in the 1970s, said that those EXACT SAME THINGS happened back then, too!

I think bloggers are getting the majority of the blame for bad behavior nowadays because we’re new, we’re the most visible of all the groups, and because people aren’t used to us yet. I also don’t think we should avoid book conferences just because we’re worried that some people(/publishers) might not like us, or that we might not be welcome. If we weren’t welcome then the conference organizers wouldn’t have non-industry/non-librarian/etc. passes available for people to get! So don’t worry about it, okay? Just try to be on your best behavior and don’t be scared away by drama.

Happy Saturday! It’s raining over here but in a gentle, almost nice sort of way. I’m still making my way through Jane Eyre, although I may have to start skimming because I’m at the part where Rochester is all gooey over Jane and it’s kind of boring compared to the rest of the book.

Meanwhile, here’s some interesting stuff I found online this week. Click images to go to their source!

Interview: Eloisa James, author of ‘The Duke is Mine’:

Of course, we can (and must) tell off people who seem retrogressively prone to dismissing romance as a genre written by foolish and uneducated women and read by the same. It’s just not true! But there’s an aspect other than simple prejudice that I find interesting: The field of romance writing is one of few great meritocracies in America. It doesn’t really matter if a good author has a Ph.D. or a GED: In fact, education is pretty useless when it comes to creating a gripping, sigh-worthy romance novel. So your question about why people are surprised when they find out that lots of romance authors are super smart not only reflects misogyny in America, but also the fact that some of the best romance writers are super smart, but never bothered to get a degree.

The First Five Days on Goodreads @ CuddleBuggery. Drama! Just in case you don’t know what’s been going on at Goodreads lately.