RIASS stuff:
Humour as an art form: Michael Frissore on having a laugh in fiction
The Folio Society: beautiful books for book lovers'Your eyeballs will thank you for clicking this link. Really.
Evil in-laws, spineless husbands and Kirsty Crawford's The Secret Life of Husbands'Rating: 
Shakespeare on Toast by Ben Crystal (or: how I learned to stop worrying and love the Bard)'Rating:
Other bookish stuff:
How newer titles can help support the classics'The author notes how easy it is for people to bypass great books given the amount of competing entertainment options out there these days. However, some authors are writing books that can help act as a springboard for the classics: take, for example, Kenneth Oppels work, which follows the family of Victor Frankenstein.
This guys obviously a pretty huge fan of Sherlock Holmes: check out this very, very detailed rendering of 221b Baker Streetdrawn using'all of the Sherlock books as a guide.
An interview with MG author Kim Baker''I think I would have really been drawn to a book like Pickle as a young reader. And apart from the humor and shenanigans, I would've been really excited about a Mexican-American protagonist.'There was, and is, a huge void of books with Latino characters. Last year,'Mitali Perkins'pointed out that Latinos make up over 16% of the U.S. Population, but less than 2% of kid/YA books are written by Latinos or'about Latino characters. That's crazy!
Pandora charms are so passe. How about a bracelet with US author charms instead, huh? Huh?
How'Black Beauty changed the way we see horses (and which reminds me that Ive been wanting to re-read this) Sewells decision to write the book as an animal autobiography was quite novel in Victorian England, and the little green book with the sad-looking horse on the cover was released to great fanfare. Promoters in the U.S. brought a pirated edition of the book to America hoping it would do for animal rights what'Uncle Toms Cabin'had done for slavery.
Ten marketing techniques than annoy readers'Basically: avoid using every possible opportunity to thrust your stuff on people. Please. Pretty, pretty please.
Livia Blackburne on why she signed with a traditional publisher'Many of the agents I spoke with had solid revision suggestions that I was excited about implementing, and these conversations convinced me that I would benefit from working with an editor. While I' could have self-published with a freelance editor, in practice, I probably would have made do with beta readers. Since I had no prior sales record, I wanted to keep expenses for the first book low. And there was some risk to hiring a freelance editor. I wouldve had to vet editors myself and pay for the editor's time before knowing how I would'resonate with her suggestions.
Signing with a small press can be a better option than going it alone'Small presses remove some of the risk of self-publishing, while also allowing the author some control over their product.
Guys, this bookshelf is giving me a headache:
On the problems facing publishing'What is concerning is that Amazon will restructure the pricing of books so that the profit for publishers is squeezed out, robbing us of a publishing ecosystem that invests in unwritten books tens of thousands of times a year. My argument and fear is that a restructured ecosystem will deny us booksthat take years to write and require hundreds of thousands of dollars of financing to be written will never see the light of day if publishers can't earn a profit by investing in their creation.
Mind-bending endings from science fiction and fantasy fiction (obviously contains spoilers for those who dont want to see such things) Ive only read about half of these, big nods to'The Man in the High Castle,'Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde, I am Legend, and as much as I hate to give props to Orson Scott Card, Enders Game.
Catherine Devenys five tips for writers'Some good tips including not being afraid of writing rubbish, not being worried if you cant see more than a few steps ahead, and striving for completion over perfectionism.
Can horror climb out of the genre ghetto?'Our postmodern, capitalism-in-crisis, media-saturated world is ripe to describe it anew. Our very language seems to demand it.
Adele Geras interviews Livi Michael'I was interested in how Michael agrees that shes very much a Northern writer, which made me wonder just how much every authors voice is influenced by geography and the history and culture that surrounds that geography. Yes, I think I'm a northern writer ' haunted in a particular way by its landscapes and by certain voices. My grandmother, for instance, spoke a Lancashire dialect that no longer exists.
Yup, that bookcase is making my head spin!
Cant wait for Enders Game movie! Was a bookclub read as I dont think its something Id pick up normally but really liked it.
The bookshelf is crazy, isnt it? I think Id get a headache trying to shelve my books. :)
The Enders Game movie has been in the words for *years*. They were talking about it when I was in high school, and thats almost ten years ago now! I loved the book, which Im glad I read before I found out that Card is a bigoted meanie!
Enjoyed reading several of the articles, as usual, including the 10 Marketing Techniques and the ones on publishing. Also found the The Guardian article on horror interesting, and agreed with the writer about Stephen King. Thanks for bringing them to our attention!
My pleasure, Laurie! Im glad youve found them useful. :) Sorry for being a bit quiet latelyIm caught up in the NaNo madness!