Revealed: Lord Byron’s personal copy of Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein. The book will be exhibited at Peter Harrington, Chelsea’s world-renowned rare bookshop, later this month.
Lord Byron’s Frankenstein
Reading Green
As if the ebook juggernaut didn't already have enough steam behind it, The Washington Post says that, "perusing electronically will lighten your environmental impact." You see, "every time you download and read an electronic book, rather than purchasing a new pile of paper, you're paying back a little bit of the carbon dioxide and water deficit from the Kindle production process."
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Wake Up Lucid
For your consideration: "A Minor," (mp3) the first single from the emerging LA band Wake Up Lucid. If you like your contemporary rock rootsy, bluesy, and earnest (The Black Keys, Jet, The White Stripes), you might like Wake Up Lucid.
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Genre: A Map
This week in book-related internet graphics: Penguin has created an interactive map of literary genres, complete with some very creatively shaped "countries". As Electric Literature points out, "the fact that the map is aimed at current self-publishing authors explains why YA is it’s own continent while genres like Gothic fiction don’t exist."
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“My life work decided”
"The most important year of life. Every emotion and my life work decided. Miserable and ecstatic but a great success." What F. Scott Fitzgerald wrote in his financial ledgers the year he married Zelda Sayre and sold This Side of Paradise.
“A sports version of The Awl”
Step aside, Grantland. There's a new alternative sports site in town.
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Beautifying Books
As e-books gain market share, publishers are gussying up book designs. Free Press vice president and publisher Martha K. Levin says, “the message [is] that even if you’re buying 90 percent of your books on your e-reader, this is the one that you want to have on your bookshelf.” The article highlights 1Q84 as an example of a successfully well-designed physical object, but if you haven't seen a copy, check out Chip Kidd's discussion of his work on the book.