Space Station Mir

30. The Song of the Wanderer by Bruce Coville 31. Dark Whispers by Bruce Coville 32. The Last Hunt by Bruce Coville Do books, or should books, have age limits? While there are no hard or fast rules, I think most readers can agree that your average adult doesn't need to be reading The Babysitters' Club books or Animorphs (exception granted if you're reading to a child). This question is more complicated these days for two reasons: 1) The proliferation of book series and 2) More widespread acceptance (or at least practice) of adults reading YA fiction (See Harry Potter and Twilight). How do book series affect my query? Well, generally, books in a series do not all come out at once. The Harry Potter series, for example, was released over a period of ten years, from 1997 to 2007, during which time I emerged from elementary school, tackled the rigors of middle and high school, and entered college. Now, Harry Potter is a series that aged remarkably well or rather, grew...

This week's Top Ten Tuesday topic at the Broke and the Bookish: "Top Ten Series I Haven't Finished (because either you didn't like them, you just have procrastinated, etc.)" 1. The Magicians and The Magician King by Lev Grossman I read the former, but not the latter. 2. The Babysitters' Club Who could read all of these? Seriously. 3. American Girls I LOVED these as a kid, but I'm too old for the later ones. 4. Animorphs Okay, I aged out of these, but they were getting worse and worse. 5. Replica See above. I really liked the premise-a girl who finds out she's a superhuman clone. Did anyone else actually read these? 6. The Abarat I read the first two, and actually own the third, just haven't read it yet. 7. Divergent and Insurgent by Veronica Roth I'm getting to it, I swear. 8. The Dwarves To be fair, I only recently finished the first book. 9. Wolf Hall and Bring Up The Bodies I haven't finished the seco...

29. Committed by Elizabeth Gilbert A three-in-a-row nonfiction streak! I think this is a new record for me. I'll confess, I never read Eat, Pray, Love . Maybe I'll get around to it one of these days. But this book has a much more interesting premise for me: What would you do if you had to get married? Let's back up. I'm not talking arranged marriage or marriage for money. Not even accidental pregnancy. Elizabeth Gilbert's situation is a little more unique. See, she's in love with a guy from Brazil with an Australian passport whom she met in Bali. He and she swore eternal love, they've been living together all over the world, and they've also sworn never to get married. Why? Both are survivors of bad divorces and don't trust the institution. Okay, so one day they arrive in the United States together and her Felipe, her love, is taken away. He's been coming to the US too often, it appears that he's in fact (gasp!) de facto living there...

I apologize-I have moved to Chicago and had no Internet in my apartment until this weekend. There are lots of posts to come! This was one I'd mostly written and hadn't scheduled yet before becoming Internetless. Headed by a Tolkien scholar, three children's authors, and moderated by a self-described "Inklings fan," (again, names are lost due to my as-yet-unfound notes) the panel on Tolkien and Lewis explored the following questions: Why did Tolkien and Lewis decide to write for children? What was it, either about the nature of their works or their own goals that made them write for children? The moderator began with a poll. Who was there for Tolkien, who for Lewis, who for both, and who for neither? Most of the room was there either for Tolkien or for both, a smattering of hands for Lewis alone, and one or two "unwilling captives" (there with friends). The moderator went over the respective histories of Tolkien and Lewis, which I was mostly fa...

This week's Top Ten Tuesday over at the Broke and the Bookish . An appropriate topic for the anniversary of September 11th. It was a Tuesday morning. I will never forget. 1. The Theory of Everything by Stephen Hawking 2. Logavina Street: Life and Death in a Sarajevo Neighborhood by Barbara Demick 3. Committed: A Skeptic Makes Peace with Marriage by Elizabeth Gilbert 4. Night by Elie Wiesel 5. The Sunflower by Simon Wiesenthal On his deathbed, a Nazi soldier asks a Jewish prisoner to forgive him. What would you have done? 6. Parable of the Sower by Octavia Butler 7. Eating Animals by Jonathan Safran Foer 8. The God Delusion by Richard Dawkins 9. The Prince by Niccolo Machiavelli 10. Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close by Jonathan Safran Foer After his father dies in the September 11 attacks, nine-year-old Oskar searches for a lost message that his father left him. But the true question of the story is, who are we and how do we define ourselves? "War,...

Alas, I lost my notes on who the panelists were and immediate thoughts I had on the panel. In fact, I've lost all my notes, which is why I've been slow on posting, in the hopes of finding them. Either no such luck, or they will turn up as soon as I post this. The central questions of the panel: What is the role of sex and romance in science fiction and fantasy? Do they even belong in science fiction and fantasy? The panelists included four women and one man, all of whom were authors. One writer writes romances as well as sci fi romances, one writes primarily sword n' sorcery adventure, one was a short story writer who writes erotica and children's stories, one writes...science fiction, I think, and the man writes fantasy, I remember (I really wish the website had left up the schedule so I could get these people's names). In any case, their collective answer to the second question was a resounding yes. The romance writer in particular was emphatic that she wa...

So in the week leading up to and during DragonCon, I went book crazy*. I picked up some used books at Capitol Hill Books in D.C. before I left: They have quite an impressive collection of Bradbury and Heinlein in the basement, if one is interested in such things. And quite amusing handwritten notes (depending on your political affiliation) scattered throughout the store. I also scored a free book from T.C. McCarthy, the one science fiction author on the Transhumanist Panel at DragonCon: Unlike the other panelists, he was interested in the darker implications and dangers of self-directed, mechanically enhanced evolution. Since this is a book blog, I'm not going to talk too much about it, but audience members brought up some really insightful questions about who will own or control the technology, what people have a right to do with their own bodies, and what constitutes "you." Several people did suggest science fiction books on the topic, including Singularity Sk...

Meanwhile, I've been extremely promiscuous with literature lately: Books Acquired in the Library: Books Acquired for $1 each at the Decatur Book Festival ,which took place the same weekend as DragonCon: Books Received for Review (from Tor on the left and Algonquin Books on the right):

DragonCon is the largest science fiction/fantasy convention in the world, and this year I got to go. This was my first convention and definitely not my last! I'm so glad I had the opportunity to go. In particular, I was very impressed with the demographics-boys and girls, men and women of all ages attended. There were so many panels I wanted to go to and so many people to see and things to do, I didn't get to nearly half of them. I'm going to list the panels I did attend, some book-related and some not-so-book-related. For the book panels, I'll do some follow-up posts so I can have a chance to respond to them. I do wish there was more time for the audience as well as panelists to discuss issues, not merely listen or Q&A. The picture is of " A Night in Bree." DragonCon Panels I Attended: Friday Top Ten Things I Wish I'd Known [As a Writer] with Kevin J. Anderson and Rebecca Moesta Writers Talk: David Gerrold Sex and Romance in SF Sa...

Top Ten Tuesdays are over at the Broke and the Bookish ! I've been bad lately and acquired all kinds of books in a variety of manners (some at DragonCon , which I attended this weekend and plan to write more about over the next week)! HOWEVER, as I am moving to Chicago in just over a week now (!), I think I'll focus first on library books. 1. Committed by Elizabeth Gilbert (this is sort of cheating, I already started this.) 2. A Walk in the Woods by Bill Bryson 3. The Last Unicorn Hunt by Bruce Covey 4. Demon Lord of Karanda by David Eddings 5. This Is How You Lose Her by Junot Diaz Coming out this month! I'm excited to learn more about Yunior and to read more of Diaz's unique style. 6. Insurgent by Veronica Roth Yes, I know this was also on my spring list, but now I have it, so I'm really going to read it! 7. North and South by Elizabeth Gaskell 8. Ready Player One by Ernest Cline This may also have been on my spring list, but now I own it...