At the beginning of our lives, many of us grow to love books. The stories often take place in magical settings or simply places we’ve never been and so seem magical to little readers. I came across a wonderful blog post about popular children’s books and the places that inspired them. The comments below the article are just as interesting, with a small argument going on about the origins of Winnie the Pooh.
Just click on the link above, or on the picture to go to the site and read more. A fun way to waste a few minutes!
Tonight is World Book Night in the US and the UK. It’s a wonderful idea where people go into the community on the night of April 23rd, and give out free paperbacks to people who might not be big readers. The organizers hope to forge community spirit, make ties between people and also promote literacy. Books are donated by libraries, bookstores, through financial donations and personal donations.
There are selected books, so it’s not just about giving away those worn out Harlequins your Aunt Madge has sitting on her bookshelves. This year, some of the books include Tracy Chevalier’s THE GIRL WITH THE PEARL EARRING, Ray Bradbury’s FARENHEIT 451, John Green’s LOOKING FOR ALASKA and Nora Roberts’ MONTANA SKY. Book givers sign up early, and then pick up a stack of books from a designated post on the night of the 23rd.
You can read a great blog post about ways to get ready for this fun evening right here. There are library events, author readings and even events online (check out the Facebook pages).
Right now, there are no official planned events for Canadian cities, but maybe next year. This event seems to be growing (in the US, there were only 2 events last year compared with 28 official events this year). It’s a wonderful idea and certainly something to get a community excited, while promoting literacy and books at the same time. Will you follow it online or attend one of the events? Let us know!
We had a great week last week at the library, ending all our Forest of Reading® voting! The kids arrived on Thursday night nice and early and had their chosen books decided. We have a very official vote, with a secret ballot and everything. The kids waiting their turn, got into the polling station and then placed their ballots in the box. While we enjoyed a party and some rewards, Janet tabulated the votes and presented us with the official winners from our library!
Here were the winners:
Silver Birch Non-Fiction
Blue Spruce
Silver Birch Fiction (part of a 3-way tie)
Silver Birch Fiction (Part of the 3 way tie)
Silver Birch Fiction (Part of the 3 way tie)
Silver Birch Express
We’ll send all of our votes along to Toronto where they’ll be compiled with the other votes from libraries and schools across Ontario. And once the official votes are in, I’ll make sure to let everyone know how we did this year! Congratulations to everyone who read books this year, to those who completed all ten books in their category, and especially to those who read in TWO categories (that’s 20 books!).
And a HUGE thank you to Janet for taking care of the vote, to Sheila (and Bronte) for pouring drinks for an hour, and to Judi and the girls at the front desk for taking care of the extra crowd of people. We’re looking forward to next year already!
Yes, it’s that time again. Forest of Reading® voting week! Specifically, we’re voting on Thursday, April 18th from 6 – 7 pm, but if you can’t make it that day, feel free to drop by the library anytime this week before then.
The voting list has been posted in the library. If your name is on it (meaning…you’ve read at least 8 – 10 books & you’ve checked them off in our book), you are eligible to vote. If you haven’t read enough books (but you’ve read at least 5), you’re invited to the party anyway.
We’ll post the list of winners that our library readers voted for later this week. And in May, we’ll let you know the official winners. This is going to be exciting!
“Take these off your shelves” is the cry that many libraries in the US are hearing. Once again, the American Library association has released their list of top book complaints for last year and some of the entries might surprise you.
At the top of the list is not E.L. James‘ FIFTY SHADES OF GREY, like you might imagine, but a simple piece of juvenile fiction–Dav Pilkey‘s CAPTAIN UNDERPANTS series. The books are placed on the list when a parent, educator or member of the public makes a complaint about a book and asks to have it removed from the shelves. Typically, offensive language, racial discrimination and sexual themes are the most common reasons for complaints. In the case of the Underpants books, one of the problems (along with offensive language) was that the series often depicts teachers as aggressive or sometimes even bullies. Pilkey says that he hopes it teaches children that adults in authority positions are not always good or right, and that he’s pleased to be in such good company (past authors on the list have included Mark Twain and Harper Lee).
Just because a book lodges complaints does not mean libraries pull them from their shelves. They are simply noted, and it is up to the discretion of each library to keep them or not. What’s interesting is that usually books will stay only a year or so on the list, and then will be replaced with a new “scandalous” book. There is never a shortage of bad books.
You can read more about this year’s list right here. And no, we have no plans to pull any of the books from our shelves…even if you do find a guy in underwear on the cover of a book offensive.
One thing we’ve heard through the last few years is that one drawback with ebooks is their lack of sharing capabilities. Yes, if you purchase a book, often you can share the book among devices. But unlike actual paper books, you can’t bring it into your library once you finish and donate it. So, even though the ebooks cost just as much as the hardcopy versions, you’re pretty much “stuck” with it, and no way to re-sell or donate.
Recently, however, Amazon and Apple have both applied for patents to re-sell ebooks. This has caused a great swell of backlash from a lot of different people, the same way it did when Amazon began selling used books, often at prices as low as a penny. Yes, it’s great for the consumer, but not so great for the authors, who see their work devalued. Plus, the biggest fear concerns digital rights. Who owns the book when it can be shared with anyone? Amazon and Apple have prepared for this problem–only one person can ever have that particular copy of the book at one time. So, if you purchase a book and then sell it to someone else, the book is no longer yours. I guess each book will have a special DRM (digital rights management) code built into it, making it unique.
Authors still will only be paid for the first copy of each book, even though there could be potential for more revenues with re-sale. But in the printed world, an author is paid when someone buys the book from a store, for example, but wouldn’t be paid again if that person sold their copy to a used bookseller, for example.
The question becomes, why would someone pay for a NEW copy at full price, when a used copy at a greatly reduced price might become instantly available? (This is the same question for hard copies of books, really, but these books eventually become too worn for re-sale.) Digital copies remain pristine. It won’t matter if you’re the first person to read it, or the millionth…the copy will look exactly the same on your device. With hard copies, the book’s condition will eventually match the sale price, but with ebooks, it never will. And that’s a BIG problem.
Turns out that Apple and Amazon have thought of this. Their patents might limit the bottom price, depending on the date the original ebook was released. So, if an eBook sells for $10 one day, people re-selling will have to wait six months, for example, before they can sell it for half that price, and even longer to go down to the penny sale. They may also limit the number of times a book can be resold, essentially mimicking the way a hard copy might be resold.
This is just in the early stages, and there will probably be a great deal of change before eBooks are able to be resold. The complications are vast and must be settled with all parties involved–authors, publishers and booksellers.
