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LA Times Festival of Books 2012!

Posted by Anastasia on April 19, 2012 13 Responses »

Apr 192012

I WILL be going to the festival after all! For both days! Yay! I know a few other bloggers are going, too– let me know if anyone wants to meet up somewhere. I think three or four of us are going to John Green’s panel on Saturday, so that might be a good time/place to meet, yes/no?

Besides John Green’s panel, I’m planning on going to Judy Blume’s (and her signing after if I can) and the one with Maureen Johnson, Lauren Myracle, Maggie Stiefvater, and Jacqueline Woodson (with Susan Carpenter as the moderator) on Sunday. There are some other YA-related panels happening that I don’t need tickets for, so I’m thinking I can get to them no problem. Plus, some authors are doing stuff outside of the official panel things, like readings by Julie Andrews(!) and Shawn Thomas Odyssey, and I’m hoping to go catch some of that, too. And of course there will be whatever exciting activities are going on in various booths! Exciting!

I think I’m going to tackle LATFOB like I did BEA last year: I have an outline of what I want to see/do, and the rest will fall into place during the course of the day. That way I’ve got enough wiggle room to be spontaneous but enough structure so I’m not wandering around aimlessly for six hours! Continue reading »

Tagged!

Posted by Anastasia on April 15, 2012 12 Responses »

Apr 152012

I was tagged (…back in February) by Alison of The Cheap Reader to do a questionnaire-type thing! Yay!

She asked me (and the other people she tagged…in February) the following questions:
1. What’s one book that you wish you could make everyone read?
Charmed Life by Diana Wynne Jones! It seems like every DWJ newbie starts with Howl’s Moving Castle (which is v. fabulous of course) and then they don’t read anything else. The Chrestomanci books are my favorite DWJ books EVER and Charmed Life is so good! So I wish more people would read it. Continue reading »

Commonplace Post (29)

Posted by Anastasia on April 14, 2012 3 Responses »

Apr 142012

Happy Saturday, everyone! At this point I’m about one week away from moving into my new house, if everything goes well. Yay! I’ll have pictures and things of my room once I’ve gotten it painted/unpacked/etc. Furnishing it may take a while, since I’ll be picking stuff out from flea markets and whatnot, but eventually it’ll be pretty.

Next weekend is, of course, the LA Times Festival of Books. I’m…not entirely sure I’ll make it. I have no idea what’s going to happen that weekend re:moving in, and so I may just have to skip the festival and go next year.

Only two months until ALA, though! And that’s right where I’ll be living, so for sure I can make it to THAT. Who else is going? Raise your hands!

Cover Trends & The Female Body:

Part of why many believe books are gendered — why some books are for boys and some are for girls — is because of the images and what they’re doing or saying. Even if the story itself doesn’t have a message about the female body within it, readers, especially teen girls who are already bombarded with a sickening number of messages about their bodies thanks to every other media they encounter, the cover is telling them something. It’s further offering up beliefs about the ideal image. It’s not just teen girls getting and internalizing the messages though; teen males are, too. They’re seeing books as gendered and they’re also internalizing those messages, which only continues the cycle. We sell the female body on book covers in a way we don’t on male book covers.

The Most Frequently Challenged Book Features Scandalous Texts and Dubious Emoticons @ Jezebel. Meaning, of course, Lauren Myracle’s ttyl. Continue reading »

Discount mysteries at Poisoned Pen Press

Posted by Anastasia on April 12, 2012 No Responses »

Apr 122012

So Poisoned Pen Press, an independent publisher based in Arizona, has been doing these monthly deals on books this year. I haven’t really paid attention to them before, and I’m kicking myself about that now because WOAH there are some good books available. For only $0.99! Basically, I can’t resist $1 books. More than $1, okay, I need to think about it (especially if I’m running low on Amazon gift cards). $1 or less? I am THERE.

I ended up getting 9 books for a little less than $9! This month’s books are almost EVERYTHING I like in a mystery: women sleuths, WWII spies, international travels, British snark! And there’s even a true crime book that looks pretty darned good. There are a total of 12 books available to buy, and you can check them all out here. Since most of them usually retail for $6.99-9.99 (ebook prices), this is a seriously good deal.

I bought mine direct from the publisher, but I think they’re all available for the same price at various ebook retailers, including Kobo (where you might be able to use coupons?) and Amazon. If you buy ‘em from PPP you’ll need a credit card (no PayPal option), btw. I think all their books are available worldwide, too! No geographic restrictions! Plus they’re DRM-free and come in Kindle and EPUB format. Yay!

Are you going to buy any mysteries? What’d you get?

Commonplace Post (28)

Posted by Anastasia on April 7, 2012 2 Responses »

Apr 072012

Happy Saturday, y’all! I have good news! Barring any massive screw-ups, we’ve got a move-in date for our new house! Exciting!! It won’t be for a few more weeks, but it’s nice to see the end of the tunnel, finally.

I’m most looking forward to getting my books back, of course! I’ve got a whole plan for what I’m going to read when I do: Scott Westerfeld’s Uglies series (including that fourth book I never managed to read); at least one Diana Wynne Jones book, if not more; Pure by Julia Baggott; that one review book I really should have NOT packed; Carter Beats the Devil, since I’ve been meaning to reread it anyway; various fun Doctor Who books, maybe?

Meanwhile, I’m inching my way through The Ask and the Answer by Patrick Ness. I want to read it because I want to know what happens to Todd and Viola, and yet! I’m really scared. I feel kind of like I did when I read my first Stephen King book: terrified, fascinated, unable to read it at night in case I got nightmare.

Links! Continue reading »

Monthly Review (March 2012)

Posted by Anastasia on April 4, 2012 2 Responses »

Apr 042012

Trying out a shortened monthly review format, this month. Because I don’t want to write a million things! So there.

GOALS FOR APRIL: keep working on my review style,¹ finish putting all my eTBR books into my LibraryThing account,² catch up on writing my reviews,³ go to the LA Times Festival of Books for at least one day⁴, finish reading the Chaos Walking trilogy and also the Abhorsen trilogy. Continue reading »

Commonplace Post (27)

Posted by Anastasia on March 31, 2012 8 Responses »

Mar 312012

Hello! Happy Saturday, everyone. Both of my parents are sick and so it’s only a matter of time before I get sick, too. Opposite-of-yay! I hate being sick, but maybe it’ll help me stay off the internet and/or read more.

Lots of nifty links this week! So here we go.

Ride out the apocalypse with tinned sammiches @ BoingBoing

I went to see The Hunger Games on Wednesday AND I’ve read the first two books and so here are a lot of Hunger Games-related things:

Yes, I love the books but they are not without problems that make me crabby:

PEETA: i love you
KATNISS: i am a teenage girl who has seen unimaginable hardships and i don’t really understand my feelings because i don’t have time to analyze them because we are in a huge fucking arena fighting for our lives so i am going to pretend to love you so people send us things so we don’t fucking die on national television
PEETA: y u so mean?