The Agatha Awards are different than The Edgars, in that they are voted on by readers and writers–anyone who attends the Malice Domestic convention each year. You must register by a specific time to be able to nominate, but all attendees at the conference vote The Edgar Awards are decided by a small group of … Read more
One of the cool things about AbeBooks.com, is the theme e-mails they send to customers, like myself. I use bookfinder.com, which in turn sends me to various internet used book sellers on Abe and other large sites. Before the invention of the internet, it could take months, sometimes years for a wanted book to be … Read more
Nancy Pearl, the librarian with an action figure to her name, has revised her ’50 page’ rule. First, if for some reason you’ve never heard of the book maven, here is a link to her home page. http://www.nancypearl.com/?page_id=2 What is a ’50 page rule’ and how was it revised? http://www.shelf-awareness.com/issue.html?issue=1388#m11451 If you are like me, … Read more
Have you ever had a particularly crappy day and needed something to read that would be familiar, give a cozy feeling, a sense of comfort to you? If sick, in bed or the hospital, are the books you crave of a nature to cheer you up? These are called ‘comfort’ reads. Where the phrase comes … Read more
When I read something like the following article I found on Banned Books Week , I realize how darn lucky I was growing up in a world that hadn’t yet discovered political correctness, school book censorship by parents, and banned books because of outside interference. I just don’t understand parents who believe they need to shield their children … Read more
I asked myself, what does that mean? The best books of all time? Best fiction? Best nonfiction? Both? From what time frame–the beginning of time–do cave drawings count? Books–are plays included, how about poems, religious tomes, children’s books, what languages, the questions were endless, with no definitive answer. The lists I saw ranged from strict … Read more
Deja View A new section on the blog–Reviews of old titles, many from the Golden Age Of Crime Fiction.To find a copy of this or any other of the Deja View books–your local used bookstore is a great place to start. (The Murder In Retrospect is the icon for this group of posts) Murder Gives a Lovely … Read more
There are thousands of old books out there minus their original dust jackets. Some are first editions, some are not. There are a few talented people who work at restoring the original book covers, front, back, and flaps. Why should used bookshops be interested? A book that is in fairly decent condition and found … Read more
