Wednesday! 3.16.11

A mixed bag of links today, mostly making no sense and being vaguely interesting. I'm not in the mood. With what's happening in Japan and in Libya all I've got in my head is a refrain of 'oh those poor people' over and over again. If, like in Wings of Desire, angels can be invisible and near people who are troubled, easing their pain, or if just by my thinking and hoping that things get better - but that's ridiculous, I know. I can only say, it can't hurt, right?

The guardian has an article on Angela Carter's lost poems - she's my favorite author and her lost grocery list scrawled on the back of an electricity bill would be of interest.

Monday (3/13) was International Pi Day
Also, NPR did a story about a math geek who wrote what's essentially a love song to Pi using, well Pi.

So, are ebooks the end of publishers as we know it? The EU suspects there might be something rotten in the state of Denmark.

Over at YA Highway, the writing commandment 'Write Every Day!' is debunked.

Finally, got to give a shout out to my comrade Laura for putting one of the funniest lego videos of Eddie Izzard I've ever seen on her blog. Death or Cake is truly awesome. Hop on to Laura's blog posting and check it out.

Wednesday! 3.9.11

The Mid Week Wrap ? Nah, that's not very zingy...OK, we continue with the uninspired name of Wednesday! until I figure it out...

I never miss living in london (and I miss it almost every day) more than when something abso-fucking-lutely amazing happens. World Book Night was one of these times. Nick Cave and Margaret Atwood? Has someone been reading my diary?


Slushpile has great coverage of the event. If they make it an annual event, by crook or by hook, I'll make it next year.

http://notesfromtheslushpile.blogspot.com/2011/03/return-of-reader.html

Nathan, Nathan. Is it wrong to have a crush on you? The Amazing Mr. Bransford does the breakdown on 99Cent ebooks and what they can mean to publishing, but more than that, he paints a picture of how the industry is and how it might be. Sigh.

WriteOnCon

A writing conference you don't have to get a sitter for, travel for, eat bad canapes for, get dressed for. Sounds like heaven. While I don't know what an online conference would be like I'm all for trying it. They already have some good agents on board. Check it out.

Daniel Craig In a Dress! That's was pretty much the entire scope of the entertainment news reports in the states on this thought provoking video on gender inequality. For the rest of the world, International Women's Day is big while here in America it's non existent. That must be because there's no such thing as gender inequality here, right? Just like the race issue has been settled. Yeah right. This video was made by Sam Taylor Wood and narrated by Judi Dench. What do you think?

Definitely an E Ticket

My family went to Disney when I was seven and and all I remember is crying over ice cream*. When I hear e-reader or email or even, in an airport, e-ticket, I think of Julie Brown and her song Homecoming Queen Has Got a Gun. I was eleven when that song came out and I thought it was hilarious, the way most eleven year olds think guns are a hoot. So in trying to get my head around electronic readers I have two hurdles: First, my general oldness and luddite tendencies and second, the fact that the song lyric "Definitely an E Ticket" keeps popping up in my head. E stood for 'exciting' in those days, now it stands for things that move faster than I can comprehend Easily.

I don't need to understand technology to understand the allure of the e-reader. I use email, I have an iphone, ipod, imac, I'm lousy with i's. And though I've blogged about my general feelings about e-readers, I find that I need to find out more, because I'm not only a reader, I'm a writer and electronic readers and their partners in crime, electronic books are about to kill/save publishing, thus have a knock on effect, possibly, on my hoped for livelihood.

So I've been gathering some information on the ebook revolution which won't be televised so much as tweeted and occasionally post a Facebook update:

I *heart* Nathan (Bransford) rounds up the doings of 2010 as transitions in this post about the seismic changes that have taken place and are still to come.

Eric at Pimp My Novel reminds writers, gently, gently, that publishing is a business, and market forces rule.

And a nice, in depth piece from the Independent.

Let's get e-schooled together!

* I do also remember "It's a Small World". I cried over that, too.