Monday Tally is a weekly link round-up of some of my favorite posts discovered over the week. If you have suggestions for Monday Tally, please e-mail sophisticated [dot] dorkiness [at] gmail [dot] com. Enjoy!
Science Author/Journalists
Jonah Lehrer, who might win the award for “Science Writer I Like Best Withough Actually Reading His Book,” had an interesting piece about the creative benefits of distraction — a nice reminder in an age of constant productivity.
Joshua Foer, author of a book on my TBR pile right now: Moonwalking With Einstein: The Art and Science of Remembering Everything, wrote an article called “Secrets of a Mind-Gamer.” I read the first part of the story and thought it was quite good, but skimmed the end (since I’m going to be reading the book anyway).
Readers on Reading
Teresa (Shelf Love) is contemplating ways of “shutting off the fire hose” of books on her shelves. The post feels like something I could have written myself, since I feel the same way.
Meg (write meg!) has a great post about how she finds time to read even though people in her life rarely see her reading. For the most part, this could have come straight out of my own life.
A new type of relationship therapy, bibliotherapy, could help couples reconnect over specifically chosen books. I’m really intrigued by this idea, and curious what kind of reading list someone might come up with for Boyfriend and I.
Anyone who loves organizing bookshelves even a little bit should take a couple minutes to watch this video of bookshelf arranging gone to far. It’s awesome.
Bloggers on Blogging
More thoughts on working with book bloggers with some tips for authors approaching book bloggers. I like reading posts like this one, which is full of actual helpful advice for working with bloggers, because it makes me feel like some people actually get it. Thank goodness!
The New York Times has a long profile of Heather Armstrong, blogger at Dooce.com. If you haven’t ever read about Armstrong, who was one of the first “mommy bloggers” and first people to make a living blogging, definitely check out the piece.
Because I Like Television…
For tv fans out there, this analysis of why Glee and Community are basically the same show is a must read. You might not agree with the conclusions, but it’s a thought-provoking read. I happen to think the author is spot on, but that might be because I’m a fan of both shows.
What’s the Deal with eBooks?
I didn’t follow this controversy at all — Friday at work was a mess — but apparently some publishers want to cap the number of times a ebook can be circulated at the library to 26 times. After that, the library would need a new license for the book. As might be expected, this made people mad.
Will the rise of ebooks threaten the pastime of marginalia?
Books for My TBR
- Devotion: A Memoir by Dani Shapiro because of Colleen’s review (Books in the City).
- Nothing Remains the Same: Rereading and Remembering by Wendy Lesser after a recommendation from Buried in Print on a post I wrote this week.
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I’m reading Moonwalking with Einstein now, and so far I am really enjoying it. It’s such a fascinating subject in my opinion. I can’t wait to hear your thoughts on it.
Trisha: I just started Moonwalking With Einstein, and so far it reminds me of Word Freaks by Stefan Fatsis, another book I really liked. I think it’s going to be good!
I just loved the bookshelves video from YouTube. I showed Chuck last week (he’s a designer), and he was nuts for it, too.
Thanks for the links! I’m off to check out that post at Shelf Love. I adored Meg’s post on no one seeing her reading. 🙂
Andi: I’ll bet he’d love that! I thought it was way cool.
Love the post on Glee and Community, and the last part, about the consistency of character and genre within the shows, is very very true. That’s what drives me batty about Glee and nearly always makes me love Community (except the claymation episode).
Jenny: I agree — I thought that part of the article was exactly right. I’m liking Glee less and less, and I think it is because of the consistency issues with the characters. You just never know what you’re going to get. At least with Community, they’re all reliably the same even when the situation is nutty.
I have never even heard of the show Community before. Will have to see if I can see an episode.
That’s a fun video. I saw it somewhere the other day. 🙂
Kailana: Community is a great show! I think it’s at risk of getting canceled since the audience on Thursday nights is pretty small, which would be a huge bummer.
I clicked on the Community/Glee article, but every one and their mother is online in my house right now and that means that the internet is SLLLLOOOOWWW. (I think that even the dog is using the iPod touch to browse his favorite dog sites!) Anywho, I love Community and watch Glee for the music numbers, can’t wait to read the article.
I think that it is crazy that publishers are limiting the number of library e-book loans. I could see limiting “copies” out at a time, my library does that, but not the total loans. It seems down right scroogey.
Gwen: I hope you like the article, I thought it was really insightful.
The more I think about it, the more I get why publishers might want to limit the checkouts on ebooks. I think it’d be better if there was a “re-licensing fee” of some kind that was less than what a paperback would cost. I can maybe understand that. I have to do more research to think about it though.
I heard about the ebook lending limit to libraries. What a crazy idea! One moment, everyone’s trying to make ebooks the next DVR phenomenon, the very next minute, there’s all these limits and controls in place to prevent exactly that.
Aths: Yeah, it does seem really odd at first, since there isn’t actually anything wrong with ebooks after being lent any number of times. But I suppose that’s exactly the point — publishers count on books being replaced by libraries after a certain time, and if ebooks don’t let them do that publishers could be out of a lot of money. It’s still feels so weird though.
Thanks for linking to those posts from the write meg! and Shelf Love blogs. Like you, those were words I could have written myself (but I’m glad someone else wrote them because I was too busy reading to take the time for writing)
David: Great posts, right? Often, other bloggers write exactly what I want to say so much better than I can — I love that.