Link Roundup

If you read only one link this week, let it be this blog post by Linda Holmes (blogger at Monkey See from NPR) who writes in praise of cultural omnivores — “people who … ‘are involved in both ‘highbrow’ and middle- or lowbrow activities.” I won’t say much more, just share this quote, which gives you a good sense of the tone and topic.

I’m a huge fan of getting into television shows late in their run so I can sit down and watch watch a bunch of it in a row. The Guardian had a fun article about the appeal of watching multi-season tv shows over again from the beginning:
The final page of a novel is planned and meant; the final scene of a TV drama is often accidental and dictated by external events. The rerun screening gives viewers their equivalent of the pleasure that comes from taking a well-thumbed hardback from the shelf and opening at page one.

Katherine Rosman has a new column in the Wall Street Journal — her first is titled “The Dance of Marriage: Who Does What?” and discusses how couples balance the various tasks in a marriage.

The Atlantic figured out the identity of the man behind the @MayorEmanuel Twitter account, and did a profile of him. I loved this section that compares to Twitter to older forms of storytelling.

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.

Books and Blogging

I thought this post, Best Practices For Bloggers: 9 Tips For Working With Publishers And A Question About Contests, which I thought were helpful.

Joyce Carol Oates’ memoir, A Widow’s Story, came out this week to a little controversy. I enjoyed this reaction piece from Neiman Storyboard, which looked at death, truth and memoir.

I think today’s tally is especially eclectic. I’m not sure why—I must have done a lot of link clicking last week.

In honor of Valentine’s Day, one love related article about the idea of having a “work spouse,” and whether that person should get a Valentine. I found this whole idea weird, but maybe that’s just me?
For the Love of Reading
Sheila (Book Journey) wrote about the challenge of reading chunksters and how, despite really wanting to read them, they often get left on the shelf. Given that I am trying to start War and Peace, a chunkster if there ever was one, I liked reading this post and following the great discussion in the comments.

It’s a bit of a short tally this week — I didn’t find as many great links because I was so distracted by a mid-week snow day and reading as much Super Bowl analysis as I could find. #Imissfootballseasonalready

Geoff Nicholson wrote about the perils of profiling people based on the books they read in the New York Times, which makes sense but also makes it less fun to poke around the bookshelves of people when you go to their house for the first time.

Thinking About Reading

Jackie (Farm Lane Books) made a bold statement last week: “If I had to choose between only reading debut novels for the rest of my life, or eliminating them completely, I would choose the former.” Hop on over to her post about loving debut authors and join the discussion — it’s a good one.

Video of the Week

Neil Pasricha, author of The Book of Awesome gave a sweet TED Talk about the three A’s of awesome: attitude, awareness, and authenticity.

Additionally, his blog, 1000 Awesome Things, featured one of my favorite awesome things: the smell of a library.